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The first impression I had when I saw the emergence of bookkeeping apps in Indonesia, such as BukuWarung, BukuKas, and Credibook, is that they were just copying similar apps in India like Khatabook or OkCredit.
Other than the similarities in their services, the user and funding growth of these local apps are just as quick as their Indian peers. However, in the course of writing this story, I realized that it’s actually not just a simple task of copy and pasting the business model.
One of the big differences is that the Indonesian apps were launched as sales and expense trackers, rather than accounts receivable and accounts payable trackers like Khatabook and OkCredit. With the limitation of the payment ecosystem in Indonesia, local platforms also face more challenges to monetize their users.
But the opportunity is there. In fact, Khatabook actually wanted to expand to Indonesia last year by creating an app called BukuUang. However, the service has been closed, and the CEO decided to invest in BukuWarung instead.
Right now, the focus of local bookkeeping apps is squarely on fine-tuning their products and monitoring their competitors on what features they’re launching and what markets they’re approaching. The result will depend on the execution.
With a tide of funding coursing into the space,, the competition will no doubt be interesting.
— Aditya Hadi, journalist at Tech in Asia
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