Fintech startup GajiGesa raises US$2.5m in seed funding to expand reach in Indonesia

GAJIGESA, a fintech platform that allows users to access their wages in real-time, has raised US$2.5 million in seed funding to expand its reach in Indonesia. The round was co-led by US-based Defy.vc and Singapore-based Quest Ventures.

Other investors GK Plug and Play, Next Billion Ventures, Alto Partners Multi-Family Office, Kanmo Group, as well as several strategic angel investors also participated in this round of funding, it said in a press statement.

With the new capital, GajiGesa aims to scale its tech team in Jakarta, as well as invest in its sales and customer success.

GajiGesa offers services such as Earned Wage Access (EWA), financial literacy content, bill payments and real-time analytics. Founded in 2020 by Vidit Agrawal and Martyna Malinowska, the startup aims to provide financial resilience for workers in Indonesia and help partner companies more effectively and easily manage their cash flow.

Mr Agrawal has held leadership positions at tech firms Carro and Stripe. He was also Uber Asia's first employee. Ms Malinowska led product development at Standard Chartered's SC Ventures and LenddoEFL.

GajiGesa's app allows employees to track their earnings, access earned wages on-demand, pay bills, buy prepaid cards, and get access to financial education tools. It also allows employers' human resource teams to get real-time visibility over engagement, productivity, and employee financial health, said GajiGesa.

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Bob Rosin, partner at Defy.vc said: "The lack of access to fair and honest financial services continues to be a critical problem in emerging markets. The vast majority of the 129 million workers in Indonesia remain underbanked."

Mr Agrawal said that GajiGesa is aiming to build financial resilience "at scale".

He added: "EWA is crucial to increasing the short-term financial wellness of Indonesian workers by eliminating their dependence on loan sharks or other informal and expensive sources of capital."

Goh Yiping, a partner at Quest Ventures, agreed, saying: "GajiGesa's platform is helping middle- to low-income workers who live pay cheque to pay cheque deal with stressful cash-flow issues. It provides much needed financial stability for employers and their employees during a time of unprecedented and continued economic uncertainty."