Venture investor (VC) under Lippo Group, Venturra Capital, officially launched an investment arm called Venturra Discovery to focus on early-stage startups to Pre-Series A funding in Southeast Asia.

John Riady, Lippo Group’s Director, said in the launching that Venturra Discovery has opened up opportunities for companies to be more active on early-stage startups funding in Indonesia.

“We’re very lucky to contribute for Indonesia’s development because of the potential we see is not only for Series A and Series B but also seed funding. We can’t wait to see the results in the near future,” he added.

Another reason behind Venturra Discovery creation is the wide gap between seed funding to series A and up. Based on the data cited by Venturra Capital, VCs which focused on seed funding in 2014 are capable to pour $50-500,000 ticket size per company. However, the gap is widen in Series A and up.

In 2018, it’s the contrary, where VCs focused on series A can pour $1-3 million per investment. The gap is there for the active VCs on early-stage startups to pre-series A funding.

“Tech ecosystem wasn’t ready then, but tech industry has grown rapidly the past year. There will be some issues to solve, hence we work with more founders,” Rudy Ramawy, Venturra Capital’s Managing Partner, said.

Therefore, Venturra Discovery focused on early-stage startups to pra-series A funding in Southeast Asia. The company aims for 30-40 portfolios for the investment amount ranging from $200,000 to $500,000. Total investment raised is $15 million (around IDR 223 billion), only from Lippo Group.

“We want to invest on an agnostic sector. Currently, there are 5 (deals), including 1 healthcare company, 2 consumers, one enterprise solution, and 1 incubator. This is the perfect moment for acceleration, and we want to fill the gap with this VC launching,” Raditya Pramana, Venturra Discovery’s Partner added.

Venturra Capital was founded in 2015 with the seed funding of $150 million. Recently, Venturra has distributed investment for funding worth of $600 million, and first investment growth up to 3.1 times.

The independent VC has made investments in Southeast Asia, including Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Vietnam. There are 22 companies have received funding from Venturra, including Ruang Guru, Fabelio, and Medigo.

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Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian