The company is strategically positioned for growth, SIRCLO’s founder notes
Indonesian ecommerce solutions company SIRCLO has closed a Series B round of funding at US$6 million, the company officially announced late last week.
Investors in the Series B round include venture capital firms based in Jakarta, East Ventures and Skystar Capital, Indonesian bank OCBC NISP’s venture arm OCBC NISP Ventura, and Indonesian real-estate company Sinar Mas Land, amongst others, the company said.
CEO and Founder of SIRCLO Brian Marshal noted in the statement that SIRCLO was in a strategic position for growth as an ecommerce enabler.
The funding will help the company “strengthen our internal infrastructure and to keep serving the growing number of businesses that are entering ecommerce, including clients who have trusted our services,” he said in the announcement.
“Through this funding, we continue to improve our capabilities and network to serve more brands in Indonesia. We are also optimistic that online shopping transactions will continue to increase in the future, even after the [COVID-19] pandemic ends,” he added.
Launched in 2013, the company merged with ICUBE, an Indonesian solutions partner of popular store builder Magento, in May this year. SIRCLO has undergone key personnel changes since.
Under the terms of the deal, Founder & President of ICUBE Muliadi Jeo joined SIRCLO as its CTO, while former SIRCLO CTO Leontius Adhika Pradhana transitioned to the role of CPO, the company said.
Moreover, former Managing Director at Westcon-Comstor Indonesia Danang Cahyono joined the company as its COO.
SIRCLO has a wide product line catering to ecommerce enterprise clients. This includes its first product, a template-based Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) webstore SIRCLO Store, end-to-end multichannel marketplace solutions SIRCLO Commerce, interactive sales dashboard SIRCLO Connexi, and WhatsApp Business API SIRCLO Chat.
SIRCLO Store is now digitally integrated with all of the company’s platforms, the company noted. Further, the company will be opening a new fulfillment centre that has been in the pipeline and was announced in 2019.
“Our investment in SIRCLO aims to support their mission in helping Indonesian business owners enter the digital market and support the development of e-commerce as a whole,” said Managing Director of OCBC NISP Ventura Darryl Ratulangi noted in the announcement.
Indonesia is a prominent digital economy in Southeast Asia, propelled by a mobile-first population and a vast Internet economy.
Moreover, some of Indonesia’s most valued startups such as Bukalapak and Tokopedia are ecommerce companies. Ecommerce user penetration is expected to reach over half of the Indonesian population this year, and grow to over 73% by 2024.
While its ecommerce sector was already projected to see steep upward growth at north of $60 billion gross market value by 2022, it is expected that Indonesia will hit growth targets a lot earlier due to COVID-19.
Co-founder and Managing Partner at East Ventures Willson Cuaca noted in the announcement that in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, the company’s services were “ready at the right time and the right place.”
“With its capabilities built prior to the outbreak of the pandemic, SIRCLO is aiding the acceleration of the digital transformation that is taking place in Indonesia. The ecommerce adoption time has been compressed–meaning that it has advanced the initial two-year trajectory,” Cuaca said.
Header image courtesy of Sirclo
