Malaysia-based services marketplace, Kaodim, today announced a US$4 million Series A round of financing led by Venturra Capital, to fuel its regional expansion.
BEENEXT, existing seed investors 500 Startups and East Ventures also participated in the round. Kaodim had previously raised US$550,000 in seed funding from 500 Startups, East Ventures and KK Fund.
Available via web-app and mobile app, Kaodim matches users with “vetted and verified service providers like plumbers, cleaners, electricians and photographers”. Users can either compare prices or get premium service providers on demand.
Since its launch in November 2014, 12 months ago, the company has achieved “really impressive numbers”, according to Stefan Jung, Managing Partner, Venturra Capital. Tens of thousands of people have successfully hired a service professional through its platform, which in turn has channeled new business to its vendors regularly.
Kaodim is the only platform in the region to grow its business by 60% month-on-month while being fully monetised, it claims. Presently, Kaodim has operations in five cities including Kuala Lumpur, Penang, Johor in Malaysia, Metro Manila in the Philippines and Singapore.
“As of February 2015, even before the first seed funds came in, the Gross Merchandise Volume (“GMV”) was touching US$10 million. What we’ve achieved since then has impressed investors as evidenced from them participating in this funding round. With US$4 million, we expect our GMV and the number of requests we process to grow significantly, fulfilling Kaodim’s mission of helping local businesses thrive” said Jeffri Cheong, Managing Director and co-founder of Kaodim.
“We truly believe that Kaodim is the right team to scale this business to great heights in the region. They’ve achieved a lot in a short time with very little expenditure. We are really excited about what lies ahead,” commented Jung.
The company said it will use its funding to launch in other major cities in Southeast Asia and expand its product offering to include other services in the home, lifestyle, wellness, education and business categories, among others.
“We are tremendously grateful for this opportunity to work with this extremely talented and passionate team at Venturra Capital. They have strong networks and resources that will certainly help us make an impact in the diverse Southeast Asian markets. They are also genuinely excited about what we can achieve together. They are constructive and there’s a lot of synergy,” added Cheong.
Over the last few months, first mover Kaodim, has seen a number of competitors enter the space. The injection of funds will drive plans to maintain and build upon its lead in the region.
“We remain focused on building features that will enhance the user experience for those searching for services and the thousands of service providers who rely on Kaodim to grow their business,” said Choong Fui Yu, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder, Kaodim.
“Over the last 12 months, we’ve built a tech, operations and marketing infrastructure that allows us to scale into new cities quickly and effectively. This funding round will help maintain our lead in the region,” he added.
“All the credit goes to our team members who’ve worked tirelessly towards our mission of helping grow local businesses. We’ve also been very fortunate to have great investors that have provided us immense value and we are very excited about the journey Kaodim will take in the coming months,” said Cheong.