Singapore restaurant solutions startup TabSquare raises S$10m in Series B funding

SINGAPORE-BASED restaurant solutions startup TabSquare has raised S$10 million in Series B funding led by Kakaku.com. 

The latter is a Tokyo-listed company that operates a comparison shopping website.

The round - announced on Wednesday - is supported by Coca-Cola Amatil (a Coca-Cola bottler), Resorts World and existing investor Walden International.

TabSquare said the new funding will be used to enhance its artificial intelligence-powered restaurant solutions, and accelerate its growth in the Asia-Pacific, including Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand.

The startup will also use the money to double its headcount to support these efforts.

Kris Leong, vice-president of Walden International (Singapore), told The Business Times that although there is a plethora of tech solutions in the market, TabSquare's solution is one of the few that is addressing pain-points effectively and giving real results to restaurants in revenue and profits.

Ms Leong, who heads up Walden's investments in Singapore and Korea, added: "Going forward, TabSquare is doing some exciting things with the data they are collecting and the platform that has been built.  Their take on bringing personalisation to the restaurant industry using AI is a completely fresh perspective for an industry that has not evolved much in many years.  I believe that the company is in the right space with a very differentiated and yet very effective offering."

TabSquare was founded in 2012 by three Insead graduates, Anshul Gupta, Chirag Tejuja and Sankaran Sreeraman. Its core products are the SmartTab eMenu and the SmartKiosk, which are applicable to both sit-down and counter-service restaurants, and uses artificial intelligence to make personalised menu recommendations and improve customers' ability to order, pay and deliver feedback.