Indonesia: MDI Ventures leads pre-Series A round in marketing automation startup Kofera

Photo: Kofera website

By Antonia Timmerman

June 12, 2017

MDI Ventures, the venture capital arm of Indonesia’s state-owned Telkom Group, has led a pre-Series A investment round in marketing SaaS firm Kofera. The amount of investment was not disclosed.

Other investors including Indosterling Capital, Discovery Nusantara Capital, and Gunung Sewu also participated, the startup stated.

Kofera plans to expand its market, advance research, and boost product development with the new investment.

Kofera helps online advertisers create, configure and optimize marketing campaigns using machine learning algorithms. It claims to be the first and only SaaS provider to automate marketing using Big Data, artificial intelligence (AI), and machine learning. Its clients include Blanja.com, Berrybenka, Tokopedia, Bhinneka, Luxola, Sejasa.com, and aCommerce, among others.

Kofera was started in 2015 by Bachtiar Rifai, Gayuh Tri Satria, Ryan Haryadi, and Ferry Ardhana Wahyu Hutama. The startup had previously worked with Indigo, Telkom’s incubator arm.

This is MDI Ventures’ second investment where it has led the funding round this year, following a $8.15 million Series B round for Wavecell last week.

MDI Ventures told this portal that it has $100 million ready to be deployed within the next four years. The VC targets mostly B2B businesses rather than B2C.

With big investors now eyeing Indonesia as their target, MDI Ventures is more confident in disbursing its funds. The company aims to spend close to $25 million allocated for the year, hoping to find more Indonesian startups with global visions, led by founders with greater ambitions than just conquering local markets.

Also Read:

Exclusive: MDI Ventures to invest $100m in startups, set to close 3 more deals by year-end

Singapore: Wavecell closes $8.15m Series B round led by Qualgro & MDI Ventures

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In Singapore, we are looking to double our reporting team by this year-end to comprehensively cover the fast-moving world of funded startups and VC, PE & M&A deals. We want reporters who can tell our readers what is really happening in these sectors and why it matters to markets, companies and consumers. The ability to write precisely and urgently is crucial for these roles. Ideal candidates must have to ability to work in a collaborative, dynamic, and fast-changing environment. We want our new hires to be digitally savvy and ready to experiment with new forms of storytelling. Most importantly, we are looking for hard-hitting reporters who work well in a team. Collaboration and collegiality are a must.

Following vacancies can be applied for (only in Singapore).

Following vacancies can be applied for (only in Singapore).   

  • A reporter to track companies/startups that have raised private capital, and have the potential to become unicorns. SEA currently has over 40 companies with a valuation of over $100 million and under $1 billion.
  • A reporter who can get behind the scenes and reveal how funding rounds are put together, or why they’ve failed to materialise. She/he in this role will largely focus on long-format stories. 
  • A journalist to track special situations funds, distressed debt and private credit (from the PE angle) across Asia.
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