8Villages Offers Information Hub Through Mobile for Southeast Asian Farmers

You might have heard a bit about 8Villages. Not only has the startup been interviewed by us, but also by the BBC, which is a rare feat for a small company in this region. The startup offers farmers in Southeast Asian rural villages access to important information about farming-related topics like weather forecasts and crop prices – stuff that’s crucial to crop yield and farm profit. CEO Mathieu Le Bras and Sanny Gaddafi is now onstage at our Startup Arena event, and he is looking to convince the judges that he deserves to be the champion.

8Villages is now operating in Indonesia. Its main customer product is called LISA (Farmers Information Service) and farmers can subscribe to it using their basic mobile phones. Through LISA, not only will the farmers be able to receive the agricultural-related information, but they will also be able to ask their own questions and get expert advice.

8Villages uses its channels to connect brands and businesses to its users and earns revenue from that. So far, 8Villages has cooperated with two of Indonesia’s biggest telcos, Telkomsel and Indosat. The team has also secured its first large corporate client and has seen revenues generated out of it. They are on track to enter the Philippines in the upcoming season.

The judges mainly asked about how the business is going right now. Mathieu explained that They have three clients putting in US$6,500 every month. These clients are big multinational corporations. Regarding 8Villages’ cooperation with telcos of Telkomsel and Indosat, they are at initial agreement of 50-50 revenue sharing.

This is a part of our coverage of Startup Asia Singapore 2013, our event running on April 4 and 5. For the rest of our Startup Arena pitches, see here. You can follow along on Twitter at @techinasia, and on our Facebook page.