The digital revolution in Indonesia, Southeast Asia’s largest economy, continues to attract big money from investors. Hot on the heels of a $50 million round for Bukalapak, a billion-dollar company helping street stall traders to tap the internet, so Warung Pintar, another startup helping digitize the country’s vendors, has pulled in $27.5 million for growth. Bukalapak […]
We’re three weeks into January. We’ve recovered from our CES hangover and, hopefully, from the CES flu. We’ve started writing the correct year, 2019, not 2018. Venture capitalists have gone full steam ahead with fundraising efforts, several startups have closed multi-hundred million dollar rounds, a virtual influencer raised equity funding and yet, all anyone wants to talk […]
The chances are you may be familiar with Tokopedia, especially after it commanded a $7 billion valuation last November when it raised $1.1 billion from investors like Alibaba and SoftBank’s Vision Fund, but fewer people outside of Indonesia are aware of another sizable local online retail unicorn: Bukalapak. Smaller than Tokopedia in size, the company is […]
Jake Bright Contributor More posts by this contributor Harley Davidson reveals more about its push into electric vehicles Venture capital, global expansion, blockchain and drones characterize African tech in 2018 Fintech startup Flutterwave has partnered with Visa to launch a consumer payment product for Africa called GetBarter. The app based offering is aimed at facilitating personal and small […]
In India, startups are quietly building the tools and platforms to enable a different kind of gig economy: one that allows ‘micro-entrepreneurs’ to tap growing access to the internet to sell goods and services online. One such figure helping this burgeoning economy is Instamojo, a seven-year-old Bengaluru-based startup, has pulled in a $7 million Series B […]
American Express has made an acquisition in Japan after it picked up restaurant booking service Pocket Concierge in an undisclosed deal. The acquisition was announced in Japanese and in English by James Riney, the head of 500 Startups Japan which invested in Pocket Concierge as one of its first deals in the country. The service was launched in […]
An intriguing new startup is out from under the radar in Southeast Asia after BasisAI, a Singapore-based company, revealed itself this week. The startup disclosed a seed investment from two prestigious investors in the region and some impressive credentials to back it up. Started by twin brothers Linus and Silvanus Lee and Liu Feng-Yuan — all Singapore […]
Let’s face it, we love large numbers. We are obsessed with them, whether it’s Forbes list of wealthiest individuals or tech unicorns, if it’s a big number we can’t get enough. Such is the case with the somehow magical trillion dollar mark that Apple briefly reached last summer. We splashed the headlines and glorified it […]
Signs that the Federal Reserve could hold off on further interest rate hikes coupled with a booming jobs report sent stocks on Wall Street surging to close a volatile first trading week for the New Year. After yesterday’s Apple-induced slide, and in the face of economic indicators that signaled a potential slowdown in global and […]
The Intercontinental Exchange’s (ICE) cryptocurrency project Bakkt celebrated New Year’s Eve with the announcement of a $182.5 million equity round from a slew of notable institutional investors. ICE, the operator of several global exchanges, including the New York Stock Exchange, established Bakkt to build a trading platform that enables consumers and institutions to buy, sell, store […]