As part of its initiative to drive the technological progress and growth of Indonesia’s ecosystem via sustainable technological solutions, UMG Idealab recently announced that it had invested an undisclosed sum of seed capital in Legalku, the Indonesia-based legal tech startup. Legalku is just one of several local startups that UMG Idealab, the venture capital firm established by Kiwi Aliwarga, founder of Myanmar-based UMG Group of companies, had funded. The venture capital firm said that it had so far funded around 60 startups spread across the region of Southeast Asia, with the majority of these startups being based in Indonesia.
According to Muhamad Philosophi, founder and chief executive officer of Legalku, UMG Idealab’s investment in the legal tech startup signifies the profound trust and confidence placed on the Legalku team to develop and provide more efficient and cost-effective technology-driven solutions and services for their customers and clients. Muhamad further elaborated by saying that their company sees to it that Indonesia’s micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) are provided the necessary legal assistance and consultation in order to grow and scale their businesses through their comprehensive Legalku Integrated System (LIS). Their platform enables MSMEs to open up and explore new avenues of growth for developing their businesses such as strategic joint partnerships with other organizations and companies, business automation in franchising as well as import-export partnerships.
The fresh seed capital from UMG Idealab will enable Legalku to further accelerate their expansion plans across Indonesia by extending their reach to several more cities in the nation. Currently, Legalku claims that it has helped more than 2000 micro, small and medium enterprises and entrepreneurs across 5 major cities in the country in managing their legal documentation, licensing process, real time tracking and analytics data.
Legalku provides an online legal service platform that enables entrepreneurs to form businesses in the micro, small to medium scale in Indonesia. According to the legal tech startup, they offer affordable and fair high-quality legal services that cover 5 important areas, namely business licensing, company establishment, registration of intellectual property rights, database system for legal documents and assistance in finding private legal lawyer, notary or legal counsel. Founded in 2017 in the city of Bandung, the legal startup gained credibility and became a trusted partner of business associations and chambers of commerce in the city. The startup eventually grew to serve 5 other cities and has worked with a wide variety of government agencies, business associations and startups across the country.
UMG Idealab has funded numerous local startups from various sectors and industries across Indonesia in order to address 3 important matters in the country: inequality, climate change and the growth and development of small-to-medium enterprises (SMEs). Some of the startups that the venture capital firm has funded thus far include Prosehat, sustainable battery-producing startup Lectro, Botika, Starchain, Skilloka, Aruna, Fistx and Frogs, the Best Newcomer 2019 winner of the Indonesia Rice Bowl Startup Awards 2019 that specializes in passenger drone technology. Additionally, UMG Idealab is working together with Universitas Indonesia to build an Artificial Intelligence (AI) Research and Education Center with the purpose of supporting the growth and expansion of the country’s Industry 4.0 through development of deep tech such as voice recognition technology and robotics.
With support and funding from UMG Idealab, legal tech startup Legalku seeks to expand its platform to more cities across Indonesia, helping more SMEs and entrepreneurs with their legal services. For the venture capital firm UMG Idealab, the funding is just one of many investments that the company is making in the startup ecosystem of Indonesia so as to accelerate the country’s technological progress and development of sustainable solutions.
