The Fate of OVO after Gojek and Tokopedia Officially Merged

On-demand service company Gojek officially merged with e-commerce company Tokopedia and created a joint entity called GoTo. Along with its merger with Gojek, it is rumored that Tokopedia will sell its OVO shares.

President of GoTo, who previously served as President of Tokopedia Patrick Cao, said that GoTo would combine four business lines, namely e-commerce services, food and goods delivery, transportation and finance.

The Gojek and Tokopedia financial services will be under GoTo Financial which includes GoPay services as well as financial services and business partners’ business solutions. Even so, until now the strategic partnership between OVO and Tokopedia is still in existence.

“Until now, there has been no change in OVO services on the Tokopedia platform and other OVO partners,” the Head of Corporate Communication Harumi Supit, Tuesday (18/5).

Stick to an Open Ecosystem Strategy

OVO will remain committed to implementing an open ecosystem strategy, even though Tokopedia provides financial services from GoPay. “We will continue to prioritize collaboration to encourage financial inclusion,” he said.

Harumi said that until now, apart from Tokopedia, OVO has also collaborated with other e-commerce platforms such as Blibli, Bhinneka.com, Zalora, and Lazada.

OVO has also collaborated with other digital ecosystems such as Grab, OYO, Sayurbox, HappyFresh, and others. It is not worried that the market share of Tokopedia users will decrease after the merger with Gojek.

“The Indonesian people are now increasingly comfortable and smart in utilizing technology, so this (merger) is a tremendous potential for OVO,” he said.

Until now, this ecommerce and its affiliates still have 41% shares in OVO. They have 36.1% shares in OVO’s parent company, Bumi Cakrawala Perkasa, according to DealStreetAsia.

Then, William Tanuwijaya and Leontinus Alpha Edison own 5% through PT Wahana Innovasi Lestari which was acquired from Grab in February 2020. Grab Inc controls about 39.2% shares in OVO parent company.

Tokopedia Changes Cashback from OVO Points to TokoPoint

A Tech In Asia source who is close to OVO also assessed that OVO has reduced its dependence on the Tokopedia ecosystem. For example, Tokopedia now relies on its own loyalty program, namely TokoPoints instead of implementing OVO’s OVO Points.

Tokopedia users have begun to be directed to use TokoPoints to save cashback in the form of points when shopping. Although, previous cashback can still be deposited to OVO Points. Regarding the transition from OVO Points to TokoPoints.

Tokopedia’s Senior Lead Product Manager Retention & Loyalty, Gabriella Kawilarang, did not specify the reason. He only explained that the company had indeed re-launched the TokoPoints loyalty program.

“It’s to improve the user’s shopping experience and provide more benefits in the Tokopedia ecosystem,” said Gabriella, last April (16/4). In practice, TokoPoints can be used by users to save points from every purchase using any payment method.

Points can be redeemed without any minimum or maximum redemption limits. In addition, it can be combined with other promos such as free shipping (postage).

Trying Partnerships with Other Ecommerce

OVO is also rumored to be trying out a partnership with another e-commerce, namely Bukalapak to separate from Tokopedia.

The partnership’s move was supported by the move of OVO’s shareholder, namely Grab, who bought a 4% stake in Indonesian conglomerate Elang Mahkota Teknologi (Emtek) last April. Grab is said to purchase more than IDR 4 trillion of shares. Meanwhile, Emtek has shares in Bukalapak.

Former startup investor in venture capital who now serves as COO of Wallex’s cross-border payment platform, Hiro Kiga, said that Grab’s investment has strategic importance in developing e-commerce and payment services as Tokopedia is threatened with no longer entering the Grab ecosystem.

Meanwhile, according to him, OVO also really needs to carry out a business strategy to seize GoPay and ShopeePay market share. One option is additional partnerships with e-commerce platforms.