There is a trend that circulates Indonesian startup industry for the past two years. It is the rise of services aimed at SME’s sector. The objective, in addition to transformation, is also to build a capable ecosystem to improve the SME sector. One of the startups is BukuKas. The company founded by Krishnan Menon offers a service that is ready to empower SMEs through improving financial records.
After his return to India to accompany his ailing father, Menon finally decided to start over a career in the Indonesian startup industry with BukuKas in August 2019.
Along with his travel to cities such as Tuban, Cirebon, Jepara, etc. he learned that technology is yet to cover all SMEs. Then, he began designing BukuKas to try to digitize SMEs through financial records.
Aside from financial records using paper and unorganized, most SMEs also lose track of the profits and cash flow of the transaction. It has sparked an idea to develop applications that can record their business cash flow, in a simple and easy way.
“I see the SME sector is full of potential and benefits if we can help them with simple technological solutions and encourage the business to shift into digital and financial ecosystems. Our mission is to help millions of SMEs and through that bring a huge positive impact on their business, the country, and ecosystem,” Menon said.
Menon is quite confident in what he and the team develop. He said, after successfully digitizing SMEs, their business can gradually connect to the formal banking sector through partnerships and so on.
Gaining lots of support
Within almost a year of operation, BukuKas has received a lot of support from investors. As for Krishan’s statement, they currently supported by Sequoia Capital (Surge), Credit Saison, 500 Startups, and several other investors. BukuKas is also supported by more than 20 angle investors, including Christian Sutardi, Filippo Lombardi, Edward Tirtanata, James Pranoto, and Guillem Segarra.
“The fact that many good investors and business leaders put their trust in us is a humbling experience. It also encouraged us to work 10 times harder to repay their belief in our mission,” he added.
Currently, BukuKas provides its services for free. The presence of BukuKas in Indonesia provides additional options for SMEs to manage their business digitally. Aside from BukuKas, there are also BukuWarung with similar services. Both founded in 2019 BukuWarung is supported by East Ventures, AC Ventures, Golden Gate Ventures, and others.
Business during Covid-19 pandemic
The Covid-19 pandemic has affected lots of parties, including BukuKas and its merchants. Menon said the team has tried to help their merchants to the maximum extent by promoting their businesses the affected business through BukuKas’ social media. The company also holds free English classes to improve skills, including actively discussing with existing merchants.
“Merchants who use our platform have increased by 50% since the beginning of Covid-19 four weeks ago. We believe this is because BukuKas helps business owners manage their money better during these difficult times,” he said.
Sailing through 2020, BukuKas has set three main focuses on enhancing the merchant experience in using their platform, adding a number of useful key features, and helping merchants to deal with this pandemic.
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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian