So, Tokopedia has just raised $100m funding by Softbank and Sequoia. Who is Tokopedia you ask?

A little background (if you’re from Indonesia you can skip this): Tokopedia is the leading e-commerce startup in Indonesia on a C2C marketplace model. Its tagline is the biggest online shopping mall in Indonesia, meaning that most of the shops in Tokopedia are small and medium businesses that actually are depending on Tokopedia on their livelihood. Sounds familiar? Yes, you can say Tokopedia is like Indonesia’s Taobao. Even its CEO has often said that he see Jack Ma as his role model.

So far the startup has raised multiple round of funding from East Ventures, CyberAgent Ventures on 2011, Netprice on 2012, Softbank Ventures Korea last year. As it still operating on a free transaction model, it has little to no revenue thus has to depend on the funding and they have raised almost every year if you keep track on them

Now that we have put that away, my take on how this would effect the Indonesia startup ecosystem:

• This proves that funding rounds and the money that is going into Indonesia and generally Southeast Asia are getting bigger and bigger. As Justin Hall famously called here: The Rise of Holy Shit Money in SEA
• E-commerce is very close to a tipping point/mature period. I predict that Tokopedia won’t be the last e-commerce that has raised a whopping round. My prediction Traveloka will raise a mid to high 8-figure-round too soon. Followed by other verticals.
• As e-commerce matures, VCs and investors will start to invest in other business models as well. Next wave can be on the B2B/Enterprise/SaaS startups.
• This one is more of a hope: as startups are getting more attention and success stories, we will see more and more people start a startup or at the very least, increasing value for startups as a place to work at.
• This is truly is the time to start your business as the money that is going into Indonesia are really getting bigger and bigger – it is huge. Though it doesn’t mean you should start a startup just for the sake of it.

What do you think? Tweet me @jshkvn and let me know your opinion

P.S. Congratulations to William and Leon. You guys have always been my role model ever since I first met you guys!