After entering Thailand and Taiwan, Line joins digital bank race in Indonesia

Line Bank, the banking service of Japan-based chat app Line, has officially launched its expansion to Indonesia. The service, which is offered in collaboration with the local branch of Korea’s KEB Hana Bank, is now open for pre-registration. It has also created an official account on Line and an Instagram account.

Line Indonesia’s representative told Tech in Asia that the service will be available to public in the first half this year.

With this move, Line joins a tight race to become the top digital bank in Indonesia. The contenders are Gojek with Bank Jago, Sea Group with Seabank Indonesia, Akulaku with Bank Neo Commerce, and Kredivo, which has acquired a 24% stake in publicly listed Bank Bisnis Indonesia.

Line has been laying the groundwork for its digital bank plans in the archipelago since 2018, when Line Financial acquired 20% shares in Bank KEB Hana Indonesia. That’s one year before the current management of Bank Jago, which secured funding from Indonesian giant Gojek, acquired Bank Artos and turned it into a digital bank.

In Thailand, Line launched its banking service in partnership with Kasikornbank in October 2020. Four months later, it had amassed more than 2 million users. The company has also rolled out Line Bank in Taiwan and plans to provide similar service in Japan next year in collaboration with Mizuho Bank.

Indonesian Line Bank will offer three main services: savings, debit card, and time deposit. All of its users will automatically become customers of Hana Bank, so they can also do transactions in the bank’s physical branches and ATMs.

Update (June 2, 12:15 pm): This article was updated to include clarification from Line Indonesia.