Indonesia’s e-wallet race is heating up. Here are the main players

In tech and startup circles, Indonesians are often associated with the “underbanked” buzzword. The country’s economy is still very much cash-based. Many Indonesians don’t have bank accounts, but those who do opt for interbank transfers – as opposed to credit cards – as their main mode of non-cash payment.

One answer to that seems to be e-wallets – apps that let users store money and make transactions digitally. Indonesia’s mobile penetration rate is high, but unlike its neighbor Singapore, for example, major financial players like Visa and Mastercard don’t have a chokehold on the local payments ecosystem. This results in a payments space that’s ripe for disruption.

In terms of basic features, there isn’t much that differentiates many of these e-wallets. Most of them let users store money electronically and tap them for transactions like transferring funds or making payments for bills, ecommerce buys and digital goods purchases (such as phone credits or prepaid electricity tokens).

The best e-wallets are integrated into a vast ecosystem, whether by teaming up with offline merchants or establishing exclusive partnerships with companies that have a large user base – like Ovo with Grab and Tokopedia, or Dana with Bukalapak. Those aligned with a ride-hailing service (Go-Pay and Ovo) have a clear advantage because of scale and transaction frequency. The same goes for those aligned with an ecommerce giant (Ovo and Dana).

The battle is far from being won. As these players aggressively widen their reach, it’s not uncommon for Indonesians to have multiple e-wallets on their phones. Therefore, they can take advantage of whichever offers the most incentive – usually in terms of cashback – at a particular merchant.

To date, there are 37 e-wallet operators licensed by the Indonesian central bank, 10 of which started operations in the last year.

Top Indonesian finance apps by monthly active users, February 2019

(Source: AppAnnie)

Note: Go-Jek and Grab are not categorized under finance apps. But if they were to be included in the analysis, their monthly active users (MAUs) would have been first and second respectively, above Ovo.

Dana

Type: E-wallet
Linked with: Alipay, Emtek Group, Bukalapak, BlackBerry Messenger

Dana’s founder is Vincent Henry Iswaratioso, formerly the country head for China’s Alipay in Indonesia. The startup leverages Alipay technology, though it’s unclear if Alibaba is involved any further than that. Dana’s primary investor is the Indonesian media conglomerate Emtek Group.

Before launching Dana, Emtek Group acquired two fintech companies: e-wallet developer Espay and payment gateway Doku, which provided infrastructure and, most importantly, an e-money license.

Go-Pay

LinkAja

Ovo

ShopeePay

Other players in the payments ecosystem

Recent developments