Warung Pintar launches loan service via tie-up with fellow East Ventures’ portfolio firm

Indonesian microretail startup Warung Pintar announced a partnership with fintech firm Cicil to provide a buy now, pay later service called Bon Pintar.

The new feature allows owners of warungs (local mom and pop shops) to order their stock via the Warung Pintar app and pay for it over the next two weeks. These merchants will not be charged interest and only need to pay fixed administrative fees. For its part, Cicil will determine the borrowers’ credit scores using the transaction history on the Warung Pintar app.

Both Warung Pintar and Cicil count East Ventures as an investor.

Bon Pintar features in Warung Pintar app / Photo credit: Warung Pintar

Agung Bezharie, chief executive of Warung Pintar Group, said in a statement that thousands of warung owners have used Bon Pintar within the first few weeks of its launch. He says the firm plans to partner with more companies in the future to offer more financial solutions to its users.

Cicil started in 2016 by providing education loans for students and educational institutions. To date, it has disbursed over 85,000 loans for students from more than 260 universities in Indonesia. Since then, it has expanded its services by giving productive loans to business owners through ecosystem collaborations.

Read also: Warung Pintar grows user base 20x following evolution and strategic shake-up

Warung Pintar, meanwhile, has evolved from working exclusively with the prefabricated warungs that they manufactured and now helps all kinds of warungs by focusing on store supply chains. Earlier this year, the company acquired business-to-business ecommerce firm Bizzy Digital, another company in East Ventures’ portfolio.