Jeff Bezos Invests in E-Commerce Startup Ula

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos participated in a $87 million Series B funding for Indonesian startup Ula, marking his first-ever investment in Southeast Asia’s e-commerce space. Bezos’ interest in Ula, which operates a business-to-business e-commerce platform, comes at a time when Amazon has either not entered most Southeast Asian nations — or maintains a limited presence there.

Bezos Expeditions, Northstar group, AC Ventures, and Citius joined the round co-led by Prosus Ventures, Tencent, and B-Capital, the e-commerce marketplace Ula said in a statement on Monday. The previous fundraising included a $10.5 million seed round in June 2020 and an additional $20 million Series A round in January this year.

The startup that offers technology solutions to small retailers is seeking to expand its base to include more cities in the Southeast Asia’s biggest economy, explore overseas expansion across the region, develop the buy-now-pay-later offering, as well as building local supply chain and logistics infrastructure. Ula is serving more than 70,000 traditional stores on its platform and offers more than 6,000 products.

Nipun Mehra, co-founder, and chief executive of Ula, in a statement said:

“We launched in 2020, with a single-minded mission to empower small, neighborhood retailers with technology to increase their income. We take a long-term approach to solve the underlying problems of traditional retailers by investing in technology, supply chain, and data-enabled credit offering. Ula’s new investors come with global expertise and share this long-term mindset of the company. We are grateful to them for believing in Ula’s mission and hope to learn from their experience re-imagining retail in other emerging markets.”

The startup also named Pandu Sjahrir as an adviser. Sjahrir is holding commissioner roles at the Indonesia Stock Exchange, ride-hailing giant PT Aplikasi Karya Anak Bangsa, known as Gojek, and the local branch of Singapore’s Sea Ltd., which owns Shopee and online games developer Garena.