Traveloka

In the interview, Van Zyl also shared PasarPolis’ short-term and long-term plans, the company’s strategy and the challenges it faced. He also shared his views on the overall insurance industry in Indonesia and Southeast Asia.

Indonesia Investment Authority (INA), BlackRock, Allianz Global Investors, Orion Capital Asia, and other leading global financial institutions have signed an agreement to provide a financing facility of $300 million to Traveloka, an Indonesia-based travel and lifestyle platform.

Traveloka had been valued at $3 billion, according to CB Insights, but Bloomberg reported in 2020 that it was seeking funds at a lower valuation.

The funding aims to further develop SIRCLO’s technological capabilities and accelerate the retail digitalization for various businesses all across Indonesia.

The Southeast Asian online travel company will likely explore going public via a traditional initial public offering (IPO) in the US market, according to the report.

Now is a better time than ever to be investing in Indonesia's digital ecosystem and help back the next generation of entrepreneurs building disruptive businesses. In the next ten years, we'll see over half of the top 20 largest market cap businesses on the IDX being digital-first businesses.

The fundraising, a so-called private investment in public equity (PIPE), would be part of a deal to merge the online travel startup with Bridgetown Holdings Ltd as soon as this year.

The travel startup plans to use this fund to expand and add new partner integrations onto its platform and look further into its current expense analytics model

Trouble is, summer is cancelled and the travel market is still far from normal.