Dana will use the funds to invest in new tech and roll out more financial services in Indonesia, CEO Vince Iswara told Bloomberg News. Dana is part-owned by Jack Ma’s Ant Group and is planning to offer lending, wealth management and insurance as it expands its portfolio, the CEO said. With this investment, the Indonesian startup also strengthens its ties with Alibaba, which owns 30% of Ant Group.
Founded in 2017 and launched in 2018, Dana’s other shareholders include Ant and Indonesia’s media conglomerate PT Elang Mahkota Teknologi, better know as Emtek. The startup has over 115 million registered users in Indonesia. Dana is used by consumers and merchants to pay bills, transfer money and open a bank account and processes an average of 10 million transactions per day. It was the most downloaded finance app in Indonesia in 2021, according to data.ai cited by Bloomberg.
Dana’s digital wallet has been part of the cross-border QR payments linkage between the central banks of Malaysia, Thailand, and Indonesia that occurred in February 2022. The linkage allowed Malaysian travellers to tap into their e-wallet mobile app or bank to make safe and secure QR payments when visiting Thailand and Indonesia, which makes the countries among the first ASEAN ones to implement cross-border QR APMs (alternative payment methods). Bank Central Asia, Bank Indonesia, Bank Permata, ShopeePay, LinkAja were also part of this project alongside Dana, proving the wallet’s popularity in the region.
According to Bloomberg, the USD 250 million investment comes as Ant Group is working to expand across Southeast Asia, where it has local partners in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand. In June 2022, the company also launched a digital bank in Singapore to provide fintech services to smaller enterprises.
Bank Indonesia data cited by Bloomberg reveals that the value of digital payments in the country has already exceeded both credit and debit card transactions in Indonesia. Digital payments are a pivotal point of entry into Southeast Asia for IT companies, a region of 650 million people where many have limited access to credit cards. Fintechs are trying to bring users into their ecosystem with everyday mobile banking services before expanding to offer higher-margin financial products aimed at helping them move toward profitability.
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