This Indonesian startup wants to rent its way to success

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Hello reader,

I recently learnt about Circular, a Singapore-based startup that lets you rent tech gadgets, like iPhones, MacBooks, and Playstation 5s, for a subscription fee.

I’ll admit I’m a little baffled by the idea – why rent electronics? I haven’t done the math, but I feel like paying for something and owning it forever makes more sense than paying a monthly fee to use it for a while.

Although, I suppose it could be a good way to test out a new gadget before committing to buying it, but I don’t know.

Anyway, speaking of rental startups, we’re looking at one that hails from Indonesia today. Bioma was established in July 2022 by some former executives from F&B-focused order management firm Listee – and it’s looking to take on this question of rental in a different way.

Today we look at:

• Bioma’s approach to its rental services
• An Australian proptech firm that’s raised some money
• Other newsy highlights such as Apple’s desire to move manufacturing to India, and a South Korean court declaring that bitcoin is “not money’

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Rent, not own

Image credit: Timmy Loen

Ka-ching! Rental startup Bioma was launched in July 2022, and it just raised an undisclosed amount of pre-seed capital from Init6 and East Ventures.

• As a service: Describing itself as a product-as-a-service platform, Bioma enables customers to rent or subscribe to physical assets, such as electronics, furniture, and kitchen appliances.
• Changing consumer habits: Bioma is hoping to take advantage of shifts in consumer behavior as people move away from “the mainstream, buy-and-dispose, linear economy to the sharing economy.” Under the firm’s existing B2B model, it rents out appliances to cloud kitchens, furniture to property companies, and electronics to offices, and accepts monthly payments.
• A different approach: While Bioma also employs an asset-light model, with most of its items owned by third parties (brands or individuals), it manages all the service operations, including cleaning, logistics, and repairs. This keeps users on Bioma’s platform, unlike other similar services in Indonesia that merely bridge supply and demand, allowing renters and lenders to transact directly with each other outside the platform.

Read more: Exclusive: Init6, East Ventures back Indonesian rental firm from ex-Listee execs

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