After Recent Funding, Ruangguru Potentially to Become a New Unicorn

The Lippo Group, through Multipolar (MLPL), has injected a total of IDR 700 billion into an educational startup, Ruangguru. This startup company is also said to have the opportunity to become the seventh Indonesian unicorn.

Multipolar President Director Adrian Suherman said the company through its subsidiary, Nusa Jaya Cipta, also invested around IDR 21 billion in Ruangguru. The percentage of share ownership is 3.38%.

“Even so, MLPL is not the controlling shareholder in Ruangguru. In the future, MLPL will continue to deliver Ruangguru until it holds the status of a unicorn,” said Adrian in an information statement on the Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX), Thursday (27/5).

Currently, Indonesia has one decacorn, namely Gojek. In addition, the five unicorns are Tokopedia, Traveloka, Bukalapak, OVO, and J&T. Meanwhile, Gojek and Tokopedia merged to become GoTo.

Last month (19/4), Ruangguru received funding of US$ 55 million or around IDR 801 billion led by Tiger Global Management. Other investors participating are GGV Capital, also as initial investors namely East Ventures, Venturra Capital, and UOB Venture Management.

Will Develop Human Resources and Accelerate Expansion

The funds are used to develop human resources (HR). Ruangguru is also aggressively opening job vacancies for dozens of positions for hundreds of workers in Vietnam and Thailand.

In addition, it’ll accelerate business expansion in Indonesia, Vietnam, and Thailand within the K-12 or TK segment up to grade 12. The co-founder and CEO of Ruangguru Belva Devara said the company continued to grow strongly last year.

“This investment will help us develop our business further and have a meaningful impact on education, through technology,” he said in a press release last month (19/4).

Currently, Ruangguru serves more than 22 million users. The company claims, Net Promoter Score (NPS) altogether categories reached the very best level. In addition, revenue growth has doubled. This marks the company’s first fiscal year to show a profit.

Based on Crunchbase data, Ruangguru’s valuation is close to US$ 1 billion (IDR 14 trillion) or the unicorn scale. This educational startup received nine times the investment.

Secretary General of the Venture Capital Association for Indonesian Startups (Amvesindo) Eddi Danusaputro said that educational startups were in demand by investors during the Covid-19 campaign because they answered consumer needs.

“In addition, the potential is great,” he said, Thursday (27/5). The same thing was conveyed by the Co-Founder and Managing Partner at Ideosource and Gayo Capital Edward Ismawan Chamdani.

“The education sector is very potential. The corona pandemic has accelerated the growth of this sector,” he said.

Tiket.com & SiCepat Reportedly the 7th RI Candidate for Unicorn

There are two startup companies that are considered to have the potential to become startups with a valuation of more than US$ 1 billion, namely Tiket.com and SiCepat. A Bloomberg source reported that Tiket.com has a valuation of more than US$ 1 billion.

This travel service provider startup, aka online travel agent (OTA), is also planning to list its initial shares or IPO through a merger with a special-purpose acquisition company, aka SPAC.

“If Tiket.com decides to go public, it will definitely enter this year. We are also considering a traditional IPO but it will take about a year or two. The SPAC option is faster,” said Tiket.com CEO Hendrata George as quoted by Bloomberg, Thursday (27/5).

Another startup that is considered to have the potential to become a unicorn is SiCepat. This logistics startup completed its Series B funding of US$ 170 million or around IDR 2.44 trillion in March.

Participating investors are Kejora Capital, Falcon House Partners, German development financial institution DEG, Asia Based Insurer, MDI Ventures, Indies Capital, Temasek Holdings subsidiaries namely Pavilion Capital, Tri Hill, and Daiwa Securities.

Its competitor in the logistics industry, namely J&T, was previously listed as the CB Insights version of the unicorn. Even based on a report entitled The Complete List of Unicorn Companies’, the valuation of this logistics company is US$ 7.8 billion or close to the decacorn scale.