Getting to Know Small, Local Internet Quota Saver Applications

Kecilin, a startup that focuses on making application-based quota-saving solutions, inaugurated its presence in Indonesia. This startup has ambitions to become a global player, because it wants to provide efficient internet access which has been a problem not only in Indonesia, but also in many other countries.

Founder and CEO Minimize Christopher Farrel Millenio Kusuma explained that the company was not here to compete with telecommunication operators because it wanted to help all internet users to surf smoothly without spending a limited quota purchased.

"Internet problems are often encountered by users, the network is weak because they live in remote areas, that's why it often happens buffering. Minimize is able to compress lower data consumption up to 10x, [loading] up to two times faster, without reducing the quality," explained Farrell, Thursday (12/3).

As a legal entity, Kecilin has officially operated since 2018 in Yogyakarta with a total team of 11 people. Ferrel himself was the winner of the 2018 Mandiri Young Entrepreneur. This is an entrepreneurship program from Bank Mandiri that has been initiated since 2007 to create new entrepreneurs who have global competitiveness.

Ferrel said that before it was inaugurated, Kecilin had gone through the process product market fit for 1,5 years. The status of the company has pocketed pre-series A funding from angel investors with undisclosed details.

However, Kecilin already has a line of commissioners ranging from Alexander Rusli, Monovan Sakti Jaya Kusuma, Toto Sugiri and Hadi Wenas. The four of them are technology activists and have been around the world in their industry.

Small business model and plan

Ferrel explained, Kecilin has two business models. First, for B2B in the form of API (application programming interface) that can be used by corporate clients to solve problems data storage bloated, expensive data transfer and long duration. The Kecilin API can reduce databases up to 99% without changing or losing data, compressed images up to 80%, videos up to 75% and documents up to 50% without compromising quality.

"We do not store client data because the data is only storedpass through. Server on premise use on client and use Ethernet (local area network/LAN), not connected to outside internet."

Monetization is carried out in the form of subscription packages or per project, depending on the client's requirements. He said that there are two companies that take advantage of the solution from Kecilin, one is in banking and one is an ISP provider.

Second, to target B2C consumers by releasing the Kecilin application. This application is shaped like a in-app browser which is complemented by popular sites such as Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, Medium, LinkedIn and Wikipedia. In it, users can surf the internet with a quota that saves up to 90%, without buffering and without compromising on declining quality.

"Actually users don't need to download the app nativeit when it downloads Kecilin. But on the one hand the experience is a little different because it uses display web based."

Monetization for this segment, through advertising. This application is also equipped with a history of data usage compared to non- Kecilin. Also accompanied by an illustration of the money that the user has successfully saved. Minimize, set the data capacity of 1GB equal to the price of Rp. 5 thousand.

Ferrel emphasized that in the future the Kecilin application will be equipped with document compression features, such as images, videos and documents. This feature is currently only available for users from B2B. Next, release the application for the iOS version which is planned to be present in the third quarter of next year and features video call quota friendly.

He even plans to make Kecilin work like a VPN. Just press the "On" button, the data saver can work immediately when opening the application native. "We will work on all of these initiatives in stages."

Become a global app

In order to realize its ambition as a global application, Kecilin is currently preparing itself by providing servers in various parts of the world. Spread over South America, North America, Africa, ASEAN and other continents. "As long as there is a server, the application can already be used, everyone in the world can download the Kecilin application."

Apart from providing servers, he admitted that in the early stages the company did not prepare a special strategy. He will use the global network of student organizations AIESEC as a disseminator of information related to the benefits of Kecilin.

The Kecilin application is claimed to have been downloaded a thousand times, the majority are still concentrated in Indonesia. However, download countries are starting to appear from the United States and Malaysia. Ferrell targets that the number of downloads globally by the end of this year can reach 10 million.

This quantitative ambition, to become an application downloaded by global users, has actually been penetrated by other startups such as PicMix, a photo editing app with more than 30 million downloads. In addition, the application game which are made developer local users often penetrate global users because they have gameplay more universal. Some of them are DreadOut, Infectonator, Mini Racing Adventures, Icon Pop Song, and many more.

Small business potential that can be worked on is quite large and quite universal. According to The report of Statista, in 2018 there are 20 countries with slow internet connection. The first position is held by Yemen (0,31 Mbps), Middle East (0,49 Mbps), Turkmenistan (0,56 Mbps), most of the countries on this list are in Africa.

Meanwhile, looking at the cost most expensive internet held by Dubai at $82,2 for an average network speed of 8 Mbps. Next in line are Dublin ($52,3), San Francisco ($52), New York City ($52) and Boston ($50,5).

In addition to Kecilin, global technology players Google, Facebook, Line, Twitter are also playing in this segment by providing applications with light capacity in versions lite to accommodate users with weak internet networks and limited quotas.