Tencent, Jeff Bezos back $87m round of Indonesian B2B ecommerce startup Ula

Ula, an Indonesian B2B ecommerce marketplace, has raised US$87 million in its series B funding round co-led by Tencent, Prosus Ventures, and B Capital.

Other new investors that joined the round include Bezos Expeditions, the investment firm of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, as well as Southeast Asian funds Northstar Group, AC Ventures, and Citius. Meanwhile, existing investors such as Lightspeed India, Sequoia Capital India, Quona Capital, and Alter Global also participated in the round.

(From left) Ula COO Riky Tenggara, CCO Derry Sakti, and CTO Alan Wong / Photo credit: Ula

The fresh capital infusion comes just seven months after its previous funding round of US$20 million and brings Ula’s total funding to US$117.5 million, which the company raised in less than two years.

Launched in January 2020, Ula serves neighborhood mom-and-pop shops (locally known as warungs) by offering them a full catalog of physical goods through an ecommerce application and a doorstep service, allowing these shops to carry less inventory.

It also provides warung owners with simple tools and technology that digitizes their supply chain, inventory, and working capital management.

The proceeds from the fresh funding round will be used to grow the company’s presence across Indonesia, explore international expansion across Southeast Asia, and add new categories to its offerings, Ula said. It will also look to expand its buy now, pay later offering, as well as build new technology and a local supply chain and logistics infrastructure.

“We launched in 2020 with a single-minded mission to empower small, neighborhood retailers with technology to increase their income. We take a long-term approach to solve the underlying problems of traditional retailers by investing in technology, supply chain and data-enabled credit offering,” said Nipun Mehra, CEO and co-founder at Ula.

In just 20 months since launch and in the midst of Covid-19, Ula says that its business has grown 230x. It offers over 6,000 products and serves more than 70,000 traditional retail stores on its platform.