Mastercard to lead series B round for Indonesian fintech firm Digiasia

Mastercard today announced that it will be the leading investor for the series B funding round of Digiasia Bios, an Indonesian fintech company.

Digiasia plans to use the new funds to scale its B2B suite of fintech products and services and further develop and enhance its talent pool, the two companies told Tech in Asia.

They, however, did not disclose any financial details or the other investors involved in the round.

Photo credit: Mastercard

As part of the collaboration, the two companies will also work towards enhancing virtual cards, B2B payments, new payments, cybersecurity, and credit scoring services.

For example, Digiasia will integrate its core solutions with Mastercard’s Kionect, a platform that connects small stores, including street stalls, with wholesalers to enhance payment flows. It targets to serve approximately 250,000 merchants in the first year of the product’s launch, the companies said.

The payments giant will also provide capital and strategic assistance to Digiasia as the latter looks to expand its payments, lending, and remittance services in Indonesia.

“Financial inclusion is about more than just having people transact money via apps or make online purchases,” said Safdar Khan, the division president of Southeast Asia Emerging Markets at Mastercard. “It’s about finding simple mechanisms that broaden economic opportunities so that people at all levels of society can enjoy the benefits of a modernizing digital economy.”

The Jakarta-based company, founded in 2017, is currently affiliated with several fintech companies in Indonesia, including e-wallet and payment platform KasPro, peer-to-peer lending and financing service KreditPro, and remittance firm RemitPro.

According to the statement, the investment comes at a time when the Indonesian government is focused on driving financial inclusion in the archipelago. The digitalization of commerce in Indonesia could help to add an additional US$150 billion to the country’s gross domestic product by 2025, according to McKinsey & Company.

Update (March 9, 5:30 pm): This article was updated to include additional statements from Mastercard and Digiasia.