Construction Procurement Startup Quipster Receives Pre-Series A Investment from Chailease Holding

Construction goods startup startup Quipster has announced that it has completed its pre-Series A round for an undisclosed amount. This funding was led by an investor from Taiwan, Chailease Holding, which marks the debut of investing in construction startups in Indonesia.

The funds raised will be allocated to digitize the supply chain connectivity of the construction industry, as well as building infrastructure to expand Quipster user penetration in second and third tier cities.

Quipster is a new brand that was used after the merger between Webtrace and TraktorHub last year.

In an official statement delivered today (17/5), Quipster CEO Erwin Subroto said that after the merger, it was claimed that his party had assisted more than 500 construction projects throughout Indonesia. The project boosted the company's revenue by up to 300 percent year-on-year.

"Having 8.000 heavy equipment and commercial vehicles with IoT technology, as well as more than 500 contractors and building shops that have joined our ecosystem. Quipster is ready to digitize the supply chain of the Indonesian construction industry with a one-stop solution for procuring construction materials and tools," explained Erwin.

Chailease Holding Chief Strategy Officer Kevin Lao explained, Indonesia is in sixth position as the country with the highest number of startups in the world, with a total of nearly 2.500 startups. However, there is not much that can solve the problems in the construction industry. Quipster, according to him, is here to make the industry more integrated from upstream to downstream.

"Evidently, Quipster has recorded positive growth by synergizing construction and technology. We believe Quipster can contribute to the development of the Indonesian construction industry which has tremendous opportunities," said Liao.

Chailease is a leasing company in Taiwan with business presence in China and Southeast Asia. Its financial products are quite comprehensive for SMEs, such as equipment and transportation rental, sales installments, debts, and various other corporate financing solutions.

Construction industry

It is projected that the performance of the Indonesian construction industry will continue to increase. Indonesia's total construction market will reach $244,4 billion in 2022, with a projected CAGR of more than 5% during 2024-2027. This growth is supported by various factors, one of which is the surge in government investment as part of the 2020-2024 National Medium-Term Development Plan and the 2021-2030 Electricity Supply Business Plan.

These two things are part of the three drivers of the construction industry, namely residential, industrial and infrastructural.

"The construction industry has great potential. For example, in the residential sector, houses built through the One Million Houses Program in 2022 will reach 1,1 million units. Unfortunately, the construction industry faces a number of challenges, ranging from a lack of connectivity between contractors and construction equipment providers and building materials stores. for construction projects in non-metropolitan cities, to the classic problem of difficulty managing cash flow," explained COO Quipster David Hartono.

He continued, "This lack of connectivity in the supply chain in the construction industry has resulted in high logistics costs and a lack of options for heavy equipment and types of materials available in the local area of ​​the project. Another challenge is the lack of transaction transparency, material purchases, and the utilization of heavy equipment in the project area. construction project."

Seeing the existing challenges, the Quipster platform provides four conveniences:

1. Linking contractors with a more efficient and transparent heavy equipment rental network;
2. Procurement of quality inventory and digitizing the operations of building material shops to meet the needs of contractors in tier two and three cities;
3. Helping contractors meet their building material needs through digital channels and a network of building material shops affiliated with Quipster, and;
4. Financing with payment arrangement features for contractors and building materials stores on the Quipster platform.

"Contractors who join our service to find rental of heavy equipment and building materials can save up to 25% on procurement and delivery costs. Building materials stores also get access to quality and fast moving inventory with delivery support to pintu their stores, with more affordable prices of up to 15% and various payment and financing options,” continued Erwin.

To help service penetration in second and third tier cities, Quipster has set up a marketing and operational team and infrastructure in Lampung which incidentally is pintu entered from the island of Java to the island of Sumatra. With this infrastructure, Quipster is able to increase connectivity between building materials stores with a wider selection of materials that can be offered in the local area.

The building material store network on the Quipster platform will also be able to market their products to contractors who have projects on the island of Sumatra.