DishServe Bags Pre Series A Funding, Ready to Expand Partnership

Delivery-focused ghost kitchen platform DishServe announced the closing of pre-series A fundraising this month. Some of the investors participating include Genting Group, Insignia Venture Partners, Stonewater Ventures, Ratio Ventures, Rutland Ventures, 300x Ventures, MyAsiaVC, and several angel investors. In 2020, they also received early-stage funding from Insignia.

The company plans to use fresh funds to plant over 500 outlets in Jakarta and expand to Bandung and Surabaya. In addition, this capital will be used to increase sales channels, develop technology, and conduct curation to increase food options.

DishServe's Founder & CEO, Rishabh Singhi revealed to DailySocial, Indonesia is a very attractive market with a variety of signature dishes. Cloud kitchens can certainly help F&B brands reach more customers in various geographic areas.

"In a certain way, cloud kitchens have increased the food options available to customers. Delivery only internet kitchen or dark kitchen is the future of the food business," Rishabh said.

The animo of today's society to order food online, has encouraged DishServe's growth which has been functioning as a ghost kitchen. The company recorded sales to grow nearly 20x since its debut. Currently, around 25 brands have joined the DishServe platform.

strategic partnership

Apart from strategic partnerships with brands such as HongTang, Healthy Box by M Kitchen, and Chicken Pao by FoodStory, DishServe is also working with cloud kitchen platform providers such as YummyKitchen and Grab Kitchen is leveraging its platform to scale its operations across Jakarta.

In terms of delivery, DishServe currently partnered with third-party platforms such as GrabFood, GoFood, ShopeeFood, and TravelokaEats. Through this partnership, DishServe claims to be able to increase the visibility and exposure of its F&B partners while helping them get more orders.

"Over the past year we have forged deep partnerships with these players that gives DishServe and our partner brands more exposure and visibility compared to other brands listed on the platform. For example if you open the Traveloka app and continue eating, you will find the DishServe banner on the home page which gives us more exposure," Rishabh said.

In particular, DishServe also provides relevant technology services to its partners. Among these are branding and marketing, inventory management, procurement, enterprise POS solutions, logistics services and warehousing expansion, and logistics services without capital expenditure and low fixed costs.

Apart from SMEs, DishServe has partnered with several well-known chefs in Indonesia to curate savory dishes to be sold under their own brand names. Currently, DishServe sells the Asian Fusion Rice Bowl and a unique blend of cold teas under its own brand.

"There are no big players in the F&B segment after KFC, McDonalds, Pizzahut, Hokben. We have the opportunity to grow a top group of small-scale F&Bs with annual income of less than $100k and have the potential to generate more than $1 million per year," Rishabh said.

-Original article is in Indonesian, translated by Kristin Siagian