Indonesia B2B agriculture marketplace gets $35m Series A
AgriAku, an Indonesia-based B2B marketplace that looks to improve agriculture supply chain efficiency for retailers of agricultural inputs, has raised USD 35m in Series A funding led by Alpha JWC Ventures.
A string of corporate VC units also participated, including Go-Jek’s Go-Ventures, MDI Ventures, BRI Ventures, and Mandiri Capital. Additional contributions came from Gentree Fund, K3 Ventures, Alto Partners, InnoVen Capital, Mercy Corps Social Venture Funds, and Thailand-based food and agribusiness giant Thai Wah Public Company.
Go-Ventures took the lead in AgriAku’s USD 6m pre-Series A in March, supported by two MDI funds, Mercy Corps, and unnamed angel investors.
The start-up was founded by Irvan Kolonas, who previously ran Vasham, a vertically integrated agribusiness player now owned by Japfa Comfeed, and Danny Handoko, ex-CEO of Indonesian affordable accommodation platform Airy. The marketplace launched in May 2021 and now claims 20,000 retailer customers across 500 cities, chiefly in Java, Sumatra, and Sulawesi.
AgriAku’s network encompasses wholesalers, retailers, and farmers. Retailers are the focal point, with the marketplace helping them source inputs such as seeds, fertilisers, agrochemicals, and farming equipment, and distribute those items to farmers. It takes a commission on each transaction and provides business and inventory management tools to upstream suppliers.
Kolonas told Tech in Asia that the company wants to digitise agriculture, but this is difficult with farmers because of limited smart phone penetration. Therefore, AgriAku chose to concentrate on wholesalers and retailers. It wants to broaden the service offering to include data, logistics, and financing, and ultimately, push those through to farmers.
“AgriAku is in a prime position to empower the Tokotanis [input retailers] to secure a consistent supply of agricultural input products with transparent pricing, expand their supplier network, and obtain the necessary financing to grow their business. We believe AgriAku will revolutionise the agriculture landscape in Indonesia,” said Eko Kurniadi, a partner at Alpha JWC, in a statement.
The new funding will go towards optimising unit economics and growing revenue streams, recruiting for product and technology teams, deepening market penetration, and expanding along the agriculture value chain.
Other agriculture-focused B2B platform operators in Indonesia include TaniHub, which closed a USD 65.5m Series B last year led by MDI Ventures. Through its eponymous e-commerce platform, logistics platform TaniSupply, and P2P crowdfunding service TaniFund, the company seeks to help farmers source inputs, sell produce to processors and wholesalers, and obtain working capital.
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