Social commerce startup KitaBeli raises seed funding led by East Ventures joined by ACV

JAKARTA, 25 August 2020 — Social commerce startup KitaBeli today announced that it has raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding led by East Ventures. AC Ventures joined the round with participation from angel investors.

KitaBeli is a social commerce platform that allows its users to buy daily essentials, FMCG, and other household items, in groups with their friends. Within the platform, users invite their friends to form groups in order to receive discounts from suppliers

“Indonesian consumers are extremely social. They love to share information about deals, discounts, and purchases with their friends and family. Yet, we saw that other platforms have not been able to tap into this behavior. Therefore, KitaBeli gives users a convenient way of sharing purchases with their friends and inviting them to buy together and save money. As a result, everyone can get lower prices for daily needs,” said Prateek Chaturvedi, Co-founder of KitaBeli.

Currently available in the Jabodetabek area, KitaBeli already has a growing loyal fan base of its platform and services. Since founded, the company growing rapidly in downloads driven by organic sharing. They also see increasing monthly spending by individual users on its app.

“Our users love our social features, and fast delivery. About 95% of orders are delivered within 2 days, which is very important for user satisfaction. For now, we operated in Jakarta area but looking at expanding into more areas and tier 2—4 cities very soon,” said Ivana Tjandra, Co-founder of KitaBeli.

KitaBeli’s direct to consumer approach makes the company stand out from other players. For instance, the company making its users place orders on the apps rather than through agents or resellers. For this reason, they are able to build a loyal fan base in a more profitable business model.

Introduces team buying

“KitaBeli introduces team buying to one of the fastest growing ecommerce markets. So, we are excited to partner with Prateek and Ivana to bring this new approach of social commerce to Indonesian consumers,” said Willson Cuaca, Co-founder and Managing Partner of East Ventures, who led the round.

KitaBeli was co-founded by Prateek Chaturvedi, Ivana Tjandra, Subhash Bishnoi, and Gopal Singh Rathore in March 2020. Prateek was the founder of getfocus.in, a B2B marketing SaaS company based in India. Getfocus.in was acquired by Moka in 2018. Meanwhile, Ivana experienced in setting up new businesses and verticals for tech startups such as Bridestory and Handy. Subhash and Gopal worked with Prateek in his previous startup.

KitaBeli team is split between India and Indonesia. In detail, the Technology team based out of Bangalore while the Operations and Marketing teams in Jakarta.

“FMCG eCommerce is a massive sector with significant room for growth, particularly in tier 2 and 3 cities. KitaBeli’s team-buying model uses social networks to create a fun and sticky user experience. As a result, their apps records high frequency of purchases for daily essentials. Prateek and Ivana are visionary experienced entrepreneurs with strong local expertise in operations. For that reason, they are well positioned to build the next consumer tech story in Indonesia” said Adrian Li, Managing Partner of AC Ventures.

“We are very lucky to have marquee investors such as East Ventures and AC Ventures, as well as our Angels who help us on a daily basis. We look forward to growing even faster and making online shopping more social and friendly,” said Prateek.