BintanGo, a Jakarta-based startup that operates a platform for creators to monetise their content, has announced raising $2.2 million in new debt and equity funding.
The funding round, backed by Contents Technologies, Transcend Capital Partners, and existing investors Investible and eWTP Tech Innovation Fund, is a followup to BintanGo’s $2.1-million seed funding round in April 2022.
According to the announcement, the fresh funding brings the startup’s total funds raised to date to $4.8 million. The startup’s last funding was a $500,000 pre-seed round in June 2021, before its launch in September that year.
BintanGO’s existing shareholders
BintanGo operates a platform for creator-powered marketing and user-generated content. It helps build brand awareness and drive engagement. It generates revenue by charging a platform fee for every transaction based on the service used.
With the fresh funding, BintanGo co-founder and CEO Jason Lee said the platform is offering live commerce enabled on TikTok, which allows brands to showcase their products or services in real time. It also expands its live commerce capabilities to multiple platforms in Indonesia.
As of April 2023, Indonesia has 113 million TikTok users, the second-largest in the world next only to the US, which has 117 million, according to Statista.
BintanGO is also expanding its collaboration with Indonesian creators to help brands with their live commerce campaigns. The startup said it has more than 60,000 creators on its platform and has registered over 150 million in total reach and more than 15 million in total product clicks.
BintanGo’s fundraising comes as the funding winter in Southeast Asia showed no signs of a thaw in the second quarter of this year. Despite a slight uptick relative to the previous quarter, both deal value and volume dropped year-on-year during the April-June period, finds the latest report from DealStreetAsia – DATA VANTAGE.
Privately-held companies in the region clocked 208 equity funding deals in Q2 to raise $2.13 billion, down 58.6% year-on-year, according to the report titled SE Asia Deal Review: Q2 2023.