Buana Solution Essence Offers Complete ERP Application for F&B Business

It is an old story that restaurants find it difficult to solve various problems in order to achieve operational efficiency and increase profits, especially when their business continues to grow. Gunawan Woen, who has an interest in the world of F&B, realized this problem and became an entrepreneur as a consultant at a financial and tax consulting firm from his previous job as an auditor at PwC.

Gunawan's interest in this field led to Essence of Global Solutions (ESB) was initiated after he met Eka Prasetya, who is now one of the co-founders of ESB.

“Then I was introduced to businessesby Prawiryo and Dwi Prawira. Three of them programmer reliable a lot handle programming for big companies, banks, insurance, but mostly so subcon (subcontractor) of play programmer. So I asked them to build ESB in 2015," said Gunawan as Co-Founder and CEO of ESB to DailySocial.

ESB first started its work by creating a customized ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) solution as needed brand restaurant. Gunawan even claimed that their solution succeeded in shifting brand ERP was big at that time. However, in mid-2018, they decided to make their own products that match their respective passions and expertise.

“Then I thought of restaurant technology because at that time, even today, there is not yet integrated solutions who can really give answers to the problems facing the restaurant. Armed with experience as problem solver for many F&B clients, we develop ESB restaurant technology in the middle of 2018, we start commercial November 2018.”

From his experience, restaurants will lose revenue starting from 10% (and even more) due to inefficiency. Therefore, there are three aspects that need to be improved, namely management order & o, HQ & operational management, and management purchase & vendors. This solution can be solved if using technology.

ESB business model

Sebagai startups engaged in SaaS, ESB provides a variety of comprehensive solutions for restaurants, starting from parts ordering, POS (Point of Sales), KDS (Kitchen Display System), CDS (Customer Display System), kiosk, loyalty, and ERP. Gunawan claims that from all these solutions, what distinguishes ESB from similar players is its integration and focus.

According to him, regarding integration, restaurant players who can afford it fully integrated software like this is not much because the price is very expensive. However, with the ESB business model, the software can be provided to restaurants via subscription.

“Because ESB focuses only on the F&B industry, it brings us to a concept called community-based software means ESB Solve problem one brand, then the solution is embedded in the form enhancements, resulting in other brands enjoying its development.”

It becomes a development circle that makes the details of for mobile devices to report the ESB, has become very sharp in dealing with the problems of the F&B world. "It's impossible for one company to solve all the problems in an industry, but if it's helped by many people" brand, it becomes possible. The solution used by ESB merchants tomorrow, is the solution used by ESB merchants brands big. We bring best practice from the technology side to this industry.”

The development of ESB solutions has now touched the aspect of integration with marketplace B2B to connect suppliers with restaurants, Business Intelligence (BI), and Artificial Intelligence (AI). According to Gunawan, most of the process has been completed and will be officially released in the first quarter of this year.

Enter the realm marketplace B2B, ESB wants to simplify the process of procuring ingredients for restaurants, including opening up opportunities for suppliers to sell more easily and safely without having to invest more in logistics or warehouse investments.

“For the B2B marketplace, the business model is a bit different. Here we provide various conveniences for suppliers to be able to process sales to restaurants, helping restaurants to mitigate fraud and errors in the process procurement. So beg will pay for these conveniences per transaction at a price that is certainly not at all burdensome.”

Meanwhile, BI will use a monthly subscription business model and AI will be charged a fee based on the ESB's ability to carry up sell for restaurants. The development of the AI ​​function is expected to be able to recommend the right menu for consumers, be fun for them, and bring more profits to restaurants.

The company cooperates with the financial services industry, to provide business loans if ESB users want to take their business to the next level. “Because all B2C and B2B transactions use the ESB platform, here it can be paired with financial services. ESB get revenue sharing of the flower."

Has pocketed early stage funding

The ESB platform allows it to be used by small-scale restaurants. Although, the majority of ESB users come from brand large groups, such as Boga Group, Ismaya Group, MAP Group, and Sour Sally Group, and many more. Gunawan claims the ESB software has been optimized in such a way that it is able to work in hardware low specification.

"Because, two" cost the highest in the restaurant is the cost of food production and employees. ESB focus helps save on these two types of loads. less cost = increased profit. "

In fact, he revealed that ESB already has users in Malaysia and Switzerland. Also, several users in a number of countries in Europe had contacted ESB because they were interested in the solutions offered. "They claimed they didn't find a good comparison apples to apples with ESB. Which is good news to me, unfortunately we are not ready to expand outside Indonesia. So I still limit users outside Indonesia.”

Regarding the new funding, Gunawan is still closing the meeting. However, he informed that there would be an announcement this month. Previously, ESB was reported to have pocketed initial funding from AC Ventures with an undisclosed nominal in May 2020.

Gunawan said the funding the company has received so far is nearly $5 million (around Rp. 69,5 billion). "Our funding is used to strengthen product functions, while increasing sales," he concluded.