After news circulated about an additional funding round, Sirclo today (10/9) officially announced the $36 million additional funding or equivalent to 512 billion Rupiah led by East Ventures and Saratoga. Another investor participated in this round is Traveloka.

In the official release, it is said that this funding will be used to develop the technological capabilities offered and to accelerate retail digitalization for various businesses in Indonesia. During the pandemic, the company claimed to gain momentum to improve its economic unit and was already at the profitability stage.

“With this funding, we plan to use the momentum of high consumer interest in shopping on e-commerce channels during the pandemic and beyond. Sirclo continues to adhere to its mission helping brands sell online through an omnichannel approach,” Sirclo’s Founder & CEO, Brian Marshal said.

Previously, this e-commerce enabler platform had developed the Sirclo Store SaaS solution with an omnichannel approach aimed at helping brands sell online through various channels at once, such as websites, marketplaces, and chat-based sales (chat commerce).

In addition, in a series of Online-to-Offline (O2O) initiatives, the platform which recently launched the #MerdekaJualanOnline program for the country’s national economic recovery program is also developing financial solutions aimed at supporting MSME players to compete with larger-scale retail players.

East Ventures’ Co-Founder & Managing Partner, Wilson Cuaca considered Sirclo as a classic example of a startup running a marathon. As an investor, East Ventures thought that Sirclo was a bit ahead of market-timing when it was founded in 2013. However, the founder’s consistent vision from the beginning has allowed Sirclo to survive and grow over the years.

“The Covid-19 pandemic has accelerated the company’s business, Sirclo recorded the highest revenue in the company’s history, with a nominal value of hundreds of millions of dollars, and is approaching the profitable stage. We are very happy to be a part of their journey, and participate in another funding stage,”  Willson continued.

Throughout the pandemic, Sirclo alone has recorded a 5x increase in transactions driven by changes in consumer behavior during the Covid-19 pandemic. Until this year, Sirclo has helped more than 100,000 brands to sell online, from the scale of individual entrepreneurs, MSMEs, to large companies.

E-commerce enabler performance in time of pandemic

Indonesia’s e-commerce industry has grown rapidly since the Covid-19 pandemic. Nearly half of Indonesia’s population uses digital technology for their daily needs, creating high potential for growth in this industry. The presence of e-commerce enabler services makes it easier for brand principals to enter the online industry. Through a single dashboard, they can manage the product presence in several online marketplace services at once.

In Indonesia, Sirclo is not solely trying to take on the role of an e-commerce enabler, there are several players who also competing to enliven this market. One of those is JetCommerce. Through its solution, they claim to have managed to record a whole 36% transactions increase in the fourth quarter of 2020 compared to the previous quarter, serving more than 750 thousand transactions on various marketplace platforms in early 2021. The company also has a rapidly growing business unit in China, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam.

Among the existing players, a cloud-based e-commerce enabler solution provider from Singapore, Genie tried to stir the competition by expanding into the Indonesian market. The platform claims to have back-end regional integration with e-commerce website builders like Shopify and WooCommerce, reducing the hassle for merchants when they set up an online store.

The Digital Market Outlook report published by Statista showed that e-commerce users in Indonesia are predicted to grow 15% this year from a total of 138 million users in 2020, reaching 159 million users in 2021. Meanwhile, the industry’s revenue is predicted to increase by 26% reaching $38 million, from $30 million in 2020.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian