Indonesia-based farming-as-a-service startup Beleaf and fintech platform Pocket have raised early-stage funding to fuel their expansion plans.
Beleaf bags $2m in seed round
Farming-as-a-service startup Beleaf has secured $2 million in seed funding led by Alpha JWC Ventures as it seeks to into Indonesia’s $33-billion fruit and vegetable market.
The round was joined by BRI Ventures’s Sembrani Nusantara, MDI-Finch Capital’s Arise, and angel investors.
The company plans to use the proceeds to improve its technology, hire talent, and open more R&D farms in West Java. So far, Beleaf has worked with 14 farms, spread over 80 hectares, that generate 70 tonne of products a month.
Founded in 2019 by Amrit Lakhiani, Beleaf seeks to improve farmer yield and productivity using their agricultural expertise and technology to control, automate, and manage crops.
The company began as a premium hydroponic brand but has expanded its product to technology-enabled farm management since 2022. Beleaf’s technology can monitor temperature, nutrients, airflow, and humidity, among others within a farm to achieve an process efficiency thus promoting higher profits.
East Ventures backs Pocket
Fintech startup Pocket has secured an undisclosed pre-seed funding round led by East Ventures to increase its user base and adoption, the company said in a statement on Monday.
With its prepaid virtual and physical cards as well as a platform to check balance and track spending, Pocket targets families looking to introduce financial literacy and money management to their children.
Founded in October 2021 by ex-Bukalapak executives Markus Kevin and Bravyto Takwa Pangukir, Pocket managed to record up to three-times monthly growth in new users and total purchasing value to date. It has also made efforts to collaborate with the country’s education ministry and more than 100 schools to promote early financial literacy.
Kevin and Pangukir hold extensive experience in product management and software engineering. Prior to setting up Pocket, Kevin served a stint as a lead product manager at Tiket.com after spending more than two years as a product manager in Bukalapak. Pangukir also worked at Bukalapak for more than four years before working at GovTech Edu with Kevin.