Fintech startup CrediBook announced $1.5 million (over 21 billion Rupiah) pre-series A funding led by Wavemaker Partners. Alpha JWC Ventures participated in this round along with Insignia Ventures as an investor in the previous round.
CrediBook’s Co-Founder & CEO Gabriel Frans said to DailySocial, fresh funds will be channeled to strengthen the company’s new business to provide financial solutions for MSMEs with new features and expanding its presence outside Jabodetabek and Bandung.
“We want to digitize the manual process in MSMEs, for many are still using paper and books, by introducing more robust products and expanding the distribution network of retailers and suppliers,” he said, Tuesday (26/1).
These solutions for the MSME segment, he continued, are not just debt managers or invoices automation. They also need solutions such as sales management, therefore, their business activities can be slowly digitized.
Jooalan is one example of MSME solutions that the company released. It has a number of features for MSMEs, such as making it easier for warung merchants to transact at wholesalers without having to queue at the location.
“Credibook wants to be a catalyst, therefore, retailer business activities can be less manual. We also want to support retailers and wholesalers with more features and financial products to support their business activities.”
CrediBook debuted last year, targeting micro-businesses with simple financial recording solutions for micro-businesses, such as shops, with features for recording debt, complete reports, and sending bills via WhatsApp/SMS, telephone.
Gabriel claims that CrediBook users have reached 500 thousand people throughout Indonesia.
After obtaining funding from Payfazz, the two companies are aggressively expanding their financial products from one another to provide added value to each of their users. “We have several partnerships with lending, including Payfazz, to support users. In the future, there will be more financing products in collaboration with Payfazz.”
From a business perspective, this kind of service is considered very helpful for entrepreneurs to go digital, starting with digital financial records as historical data that can be carried off when applying for loans to financial institutions. The low penetration of micro-entrepreneurs is aware of the importance of this matter, making it an attractive business for many tech companies to do.
In the similar segment, apart from CrediBook, there were BukuKas and BukuWarung which also announced the acquisition of funding during the pandemic. Interestingly, these three startups got funding together last year throughout the pandemic. Apart from them, there are other players who have joined, including Moodah, Teman Bisnis, Akuntansiku, Lababook, Akuntansi UKM, and many more.
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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian