Funding Societies co-invests with Carro for a stake of Indonesian bank Bank Index

SMALL and medium-sized enterprise (SME) financing platform, Funding Societies, has co-invested an undisclosed amount together with used car marketplace, Carro, into Indonesian bank, Bank Index Selindo (Bank Index).

This move follows a few others like Welab, Sea and Grab in buying stakes in Indonesian banks to advance their fintech and digital bank ambitions. Bank Index has 53 offices across the greater Jakarta area, Jabodetabek, Java, Sumatra, Bali and Batam, with a focus on SME banking,

“Our investment and partnership with Bank Index will support Funding Societies’ business strategy into neobanking,” said Kelvin Teo, co-founder and group chief executive officer of Funding Societies.

The lending startup currently has operations in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam outside of Indonesia.

This transaction comes on the back of a recent US$249 million Series C funding round, with Softbank leading the round. The lending startup hopes to tap the unbanked population of Indonesian SMEs, and add on to the over S$3 billion in working capital disbursed across 5 million loan transactions.

“We are delighted to welcome Funding Societies and Carro as shareholders of Bank Index. Together, we will partner to forge strategic initiatives based on our shared vision and mission, primarily to greatly expand our services to our target market. This collective step is also a reference point to continue pursuing comprehensive digital transformation,” said Gimin Sumalim, president director of Bank Index.