After pandemic growth, Indonesian biotech startup tests post-Covid waters

When Indonesia-based Nusantics started its journey in 2019, the East Ventures-backed biotech startup provided solutions such as diagnosing the microbiome present in a person’s skin and recommending the ideal skincare products for their condition.

Then the pandemic struck a year later. But unlike many other startups, Nusantics found itself in a good position: it was already working with the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) method, which can study infectious diseases like Covid-19.

“In the beginning, we were arguably the only company in Indonesia that had experience in PCR,” Sharlini Eriza Putri, Nusantics’ co-founder and CEO, tells Tech in Asia.

Nusantics co-founders (from left) Revata Utama, Sharlini Eriza Putri, and Vincent Kurniawan / Photo credit: Nusantics

Focusing on Covid-19 testing triggered a series A round led by East Ventures – which also invested in Nusantics’ seed round – and made the company profitable. By the end of 2021, the startup recorded a 7x year-on-year revenue growth while the overall transaction value reached US$50 million, the founders say.

That has changed. As the pandemic subsides and the demand for Covid-19 tests continues to decline, Nusantics says it is no longer profitable as transactions are slowing down. But the global health crisis has also pushed the company to go beyond skincare and venture into other areas in the microbiome industry, including diagnosing diseases in animals.

Nusantics is set to receive a series A extension round from East Ventures, with participation from MDI Ventures. The startup also recently received investment from global accelerator Illumina.

Pandemic growth

As founders of a biotech firm in Indonesia – a rarity in the country’s startup scene – Putri, Vincent Kurniawan, and Revata Utama take up roles from research and testing to developing solutions.

“The big idea of Nusantics stems from the fact that humans are holobionts, meaning that half of our bodies are made up of bacteria, viruses, and fungi … The key is to maintain a balance between them,” shares Putri.

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The startup was seeking to close the diagnostic gap in the market through microbiome testing. But then Covid-19 struck and forced Nusantics to take a new turn.

It eventually ​​joined a task force organized by Indonesia’s Agency for the Assessment and Application of Technology (BPPT) and was entrusted to develop a prototype for a PCR test kit.

Nusantics finished the prototype within weeks. But to produce the test kits at scale, the startup needed to work with the only company in the country that had capability to do so: state-owned Bio Farma.

Next up: animals