Jago, an Indonesia-based mobile café company, has on Wednesday announced the completion of a $6 million Series A round of financing.
The funding is led by Intudo Ventures and BEENEXT Accelerate, with participation from ORZON Ventures and D Global Ventures, Jago said in a statement.
With this round of financing, Jago plans to expand service coverage, establish new depots and launch more carts, as well as further invest in its technology stack.
The firm has currently achieved 7 percent coverage of Jakarta, with plans to cover up to 50 percent of the city by the end of 2024.
Jago is building geospatial machine learning models to map out expansion to prioritize key locations.
The company plans to expand to 15 depots, up from three; and deploy 1,500 carts, up from 300.
It will make investments in upgrading cart hardware; innovate around demand forecasting and supply routing; and improve depot hardware to streamline operations for greater cost efficiency.
“This funding is not just a financial boost—it’s a vote of confidence in our vision and our team,” said Yoshua Tanu, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Jago
“It empowers us to bring Jago’s unique coffee experience to more communities and to innovate further, ensuring that every cup we serve reinforces the connection between quality and accessibility,
“We’re excited to embark on this next chapter of growth and to continue delivering exceptional value to our customers and partners,” he added.
Launched in June 2020, Jago is a hyperlocal mobile café company utilizing technology to bring fresh beverages to Indonesian consumers.
With a fleet of fully-electric mobile cafés and professionally-trained baristas, called Jagoans, the firm serves neighborhoods to quickly prepare and deliver fresh beverages within minutes.
For on-the-go customers, Jago provides instant commerce allowing customers to walk up to a cart, order, pay, and receive their beverage within a minute.
It also offers a delivery model through its hyperlocal coverage, enabling consumers to receive café -grade coffees delivered in under 15 minutes and freshly prepared on the spot.
Jago has built comprehensive tech infrastructure to optimize operations, empower baristas, and build loyalty with consumers.
The company utilizes centrally-located depots that produce and package coffee for baristas, offering inventory management and supply-demand forecasting to dynamically predict peak demand periods and pinpoint high volume locations.
Baristas are given access to the Jagoan App, which features a performance dashboard to help optimize sales and payouts, a mobile POS for seamless checkout, and semi-automated training modules.
Customers utilizing the Jago App are able to quickly find nearby baristas, make orders, and enjoy loyalty program benefits.
By combining high density offline presence with a robust tech infrastructure, Jago is able to integrate into communities and provide consumers with a high-touch coffee experience.
According to the statement, Jago was conceived based on observations of existing Indonesian consumer behaviors, taking inspiration from Indonesian beverage carts called Starlings—which are used to serve mass market consumers with hot beverages such as instant coffee.
It is noted that many existing coffee chains offer price points beyond the affordability of most consumers, leaving a large market gap for quality coffee beverages at budget-friendly prices.
Jago fills this gap by focusing on the largest addressable market of low-to-middle income consumers in blue collar and Gen Z categories, offering quality beverages starting at IDR 8,000 ($0.50) per cup, meeting the demand of underserved consumers.
By tapping into mass consumer demand and utilizing its tech stack, Jago has been able to reach steady profitability across consecutive quarters while growing over 13 times in 2023.
The firm also leverages unfair advantages in the supply chain, using fresh ingredients directly sourced from farms to allow for improved margins, high quality, and sufficient quantity to support the business as it scales; while employing direct relationships with roasteries to reduce raw material costs below market price.
“As a tech-empowered retail brand, Jago has established a significant defensive moat through its in-house developed tech infrastructure that is difficult to replicate,” said Patrick Yip, Founding Partner, Intudo Ventures.
“Jago’s business model is distinctly Indonesian, built off the recognition of local consumer habits and creating an entirely new business category powered by technology and ingenuity,
“We look forward to supporting Jago as they expand throughout Jakarta and beyond,” he added.
Hero Choudhary, Managing Partner at BEENEXT, said they are greatly impressed with Jago’s rapid growth, operational discipline, cash efficiency, and high ROCE potential in a large, yet overlooked, market segment.
“We are excited to support Jago’s journey in transforming brick and mortar retail through mobility,” he added.
