Get Initial Funding from Parent, Surge Aims for More Indonesian Startups to Join

Surge, the proprietary accelerator program Redwood Capital India, will continue to attract more Indonesian startups to join their programs after securing an initial $195 million (over 2 trillion Rupiah) funding from its parent. Since the Surge program started last March 2019, it has attracted nine Indonesian startups, from a total of 69 startups spread across Southeast Asia and India, honing their best potential.

In a joint interview DailySocial, Managing Director of Sequoia India Rajan Anandan did not want to explicitly specify what the funds would be used for and in which countries. The fresh funds will be dedicated to empowering mission-driven founders in Southeast Asia and India and helping them build truly long-lasting companies.

He also confirmed that Surge wants to recruit more representatives in Indonesia, because this country has become part of the Sequoia Capital India family. “We are very impressed with the region's talent and potential for building world-class companies. Sequoia Capital has been an active investor in Indonesia since 2014,” said Anandan.

Surge Cohort 4 was completed last month, 17 startups were selected to enter the program. There are four startups from Southeast Asia in it, three of them from Singapore and one from Indonesia, namely Otolix. This startup was founded by Martin Reyhan Suryohusodo, Joseph Alexander Ananto, and Benny Sutedjo in 2019. Otoklix helps digitize the sector aftermarket Indonesian automotive by providing solutions online ke offline.

Otoklix adds to the ranks of local startups that are part of the Surge community. Previously, there were Qoala, BukuKas, CoLearn, Hangry, Bobobox, Storie, Chilibeli, and Rukita. Anandan says more than half of them have done the series A round and are using technology to change the way people live and work.

He gave an example, BukuKas, which joined Surge in April 2020, helps MSMEs understand and manage financial records more effectively via smartphones. Now BukuKas has more than five million registered users and in it there are two million active users. Its annual growth is 73 times and its annual transaction volume is $18 billion. Earlier this year BukuKas secured $10 million in Series A funding.

Meanwhile, CoLearn, whose service was just launched in August 2020, has grown rapidly with 3,5 million students asking more than 5 million questions per month, which are answered through the CoLearn AI platform. 80% of students surveyed who used the product have seen their grades improve. CoLearn's mission is to improve education standards so that Indonesia's young generation is globally competitive.

The rapid development of BukuKas and CoLearn is proof that a pandemic can be a unique opportunity to solve new challenges with a technological approach. This is because the pandemic has accelerated and accelerated technology adoption at an unprecedented pace over the past 12 months, creating opportunities in several sectors.

"Business offline Traditional has turned into online. Indonesia with a digitally savvy and mobile-first population has seen a new wave of tech-enabled startups take advantage of this.”

In more detail, from the 69 startups that joined, covering more than 15 sectors. Divided into, one third build SaaS products, the majority for the global market; 25% build consumer internet startups; 13% are building consumer brands, and 12% are in the B2B space. 30 startups out of 52 startups from three cohorts managed to raise $390 million as follow-up capital (follow on capital) after the program.

Surge Cohort 5

Surge opened two batch in a year with a quota of around 15-20 startups to be fostered for 16 weeks per year batch. Startups that join can still be ideas or concepts, as long as founder is committed full time to develop it into a real business.

Early-stage startups that already have a business are required to include their business performance, such as traction to measure how big the industry's potential is. Surge also does not limit what startup segments can join, the important thing is that they are engaged in technology.

Each startup that joins will receive initial funding of around $1 million-$2 million (around Rp14 billion-Rp28 billion). These funds can be used to build a solid team by utilizing other Sequoia program networks, namely 10x Engineer to get the best talent.

Funds can also be used to finalize the product so that it is ready to be commercialized and to build the company so that it is more profitable sustain. “Indonesia is Surge's top priority and we hope to attract startups and founder the brightest from Indonesia. We encourage beginners who are already in the pre-launch and has been launched to register for this program,” he concluded.

Currently Surge Cohort 5 akan kick-off from June to October 2021. Registration closed on March 15th.