Startup Agritech "Semaai" Receives Further Funding

Startups agritech Semaai announced follow-up funding led by Accion Venture Lab and XA Network, as well as participation from previous investors Surge and Beenext. With this round of funding, Semaai has raised a total of $2,9 million in funding (over 44 billion Rupiah). This gain was achieved every year since the company first announced its $1,25 million seed funding.

Semaai will use the funds to support product expansion, including service development digital advisory for retailers and farmers, as well as farmer applications that allow farmers to access affordable and closer inputs.

Co-Founder and CEO of Semaai Muhammad Yoga Anindito said that agricultural MSMEs have an important role as support system and an aggregator for farmers. However, they are not sufficiently equipped with the tools to help them serve farmers' needs for better knowledge, price transparency and access to markets.

"We believe that empowering them with the right tools will help them serve farmers better. We are proud and grateful for the support from Accion Venture Lab, XA Networks, and our investors who all share the same vision and belief in bringing positive impacts to society. ," he said in an official statement, Monday (27/2).

Co-Managing Partner Accion Venture Lab Rahil Rangwala said, "farmers have an important role to play in Indonesia's agriculture sector, and we saw a great opportunity to provide the digital tools and credit they needed to improve their businesses and livelihoods. We are very proud to partner with Semaai because online marketplace they complete accelerating the digital transformation of small agribusiness retailers and the Indonesian farmers they serve."

Seemai Development

Goodbye offers an integrated digital ecosystem as a solution to overcome supply chain problems and increase technical capacity for Indonesian agribusiness MSMEs such as kiosks/retailers of agricultural production facilities in rural areas (farmer shops), and the small farmers they serve.

The agricultural supply chain in Indonesia is highly fragmented and complex; Farm shops as well as farmers have to deal with unclear prices, lack of access to affordable agricultural products, and a worsening imbalance between supply and demand agricultural products.

Semaai Solutions covers three main services in addressing the systemic problems of the Indonesian agricultural industry, which is as large as $100 billion. The company provides digital marketplace B2B for farm shops and farmers for inputs such as seeds and fertilizers, access to markets for crop products, and agronomic services to increase the quantity and quality of agricultural produce.

Since its launch in August 2021, Semaai claims to have built a network of farmer shops and small farmers in nearly 3.000 villages in Central Java, with a number of active farmer shops and MSME users in marketplace Semaai currently serves 2,6 million farmers in the region. Then in the last year, monthly transactions in marketplace Semaai has grown 37 times, and Semaai's monthly income has increased 20 times.

Semaai also buys crops from its network of farmers and distributes them to several supermarkets, wholesalers and companies E-commerce big in Indonesia. Profits from these sales are circulated back into Semaai's business activities, ensuring a continuous growth cycle.

Agricultural supply chain challenges

The solutions offered by Semaai are not new, previously many startups have entered offering efficiency solutions in the agricultural supply chain. In a publication entitled "Yielding Next Gen. Agri Conglomerate Leveraging Tech Orchestration", Arise highlights four pain points The main factors in the agricultural supply chain are limited access to capital, fragmented and inefficient supply chains, lack of access to technology, and price uncertainty due to climate change.

While this sector has enormous industrial potential, it could be worth more than $500 billion of global GDP by 2030. Contributions from Asia Pacific countries are estimated to contribute 8,2% of the total value. Seeing this trend, in the global arena, investment for argitech startups also continues to increase from year to year. In 2020, there were approximately 834 funding deals, accounting for more than $6,7 billion.

Even though many agritech players have emerged, Arise still sees a number of gaps that have not been filled by digital innovation —as well as investment opportunities that are still open— one of which is B2B marketplace that meet the needs of farmers. Furthermore, Arise will look at management and IoT services that can help farmers manage their cultivated land.