Link to podcast. Published 3 February 2023.

I found it an interesting listen given Intudo is the leading local VC of Indonesia; a la Aleph for Israel, and I daresay Blume for India:) Hence I was curious to learn more about them. I found the following utterly fascinating – their concentrated deployment strategy (only 26 cheques in six years of existence), their sourcing strategy (actively engage with and woo Indonesian students in elite campuses abroad, and the Indonesian tech diaspora) as well as their platform strategy (connect their founders to the top Indonesian conglomerates for biz dev, and have these top conglomerates as their LPs). Lastly I cant but ignore the four-tier sizing of the Indonesian market by Eddy Chan, which reminded me naturally of the India1,2,3 framework that we pioneered at Blume!

My notes and highlights below.

About Eddy Chan and Intudo

  • Grew up in Taiwan and then studied in USA
  • Got to invest in Paypal through a fund he was supporting, met Peter Thiel, and Founders Fund and 35 top funds (or their founders) and many Indonesian conglomerates are an LP in them
  • Launched 6 yrs ago, Indonesia only, said $230m under management. Says Samir Kaji has been involved since inception. First fund $20m (half of that the GPs put in), second fund $53m and last fund 3 $144m. (they were the biggest investors in fund 1 and 2 he says!); maybe there is an opportunity too for the balance
  • Intudo – stands for a mashup of integrity, sincerity, serendipity in Bahasa
  • Sold 1 country strategy to LPs. Never sold SEA – talks abt fallacy of SEA as a region. That built credibility for them.
  • No LP has more than 10% of the fund. A lot of Given that Indonesia is dominated by a few conglomerates it matters.

Portfolio construction / deployment strategy

  • Intudo investing range: $1-25m tickets (think supported by their LPs); Moved fm PreA to Series A over their fund journey
  • 6 yrs – 26 investments! Very concentrated (like Lightbox!). Heavily B2B or B2B2C – like ops rich businesses. Look at moats (fintech, edu, healthcare) for regulatory or ops moats. Do 3-6 investments a yr. Interesting discussion abt that – not too many good cos he says to play 20-25cos a fund. Grind-based businesses he says are their focus.
  • Strategy built around hyperlocal expertise w strong global connects!
    • Indonesia – 4 tiered market (17:00) Indonesia is 4 different markets – $135k per capita GDP for 5m GDP, then $7k per capita for 60m, then $1500 for 100m, $620 for 110m; remaining real TAM is 60-180m he says 
    • supports founders on biz dev + regulatory – have the top Indonesian conglomerates as LPs and on speed dial – takes the founders to meet the owners for biz dev 
    • v strong on supporting founders on regulatory issues 
    • support founders on connects to Silicon Valley funds – Eddy spends 6-7m in Silicon Valley and says best connected of all the local firms; brought in Pantera for Pintu, the coinbase equivalent 
    • 6) recruitment – build a social graph of every Indonesian in US corporates and campuses; locally has something called Bumi program and something called Pulkam for the SEA Turtle one.
  • says Hyperlocal (one country only) or vertical regional (fintech SEA) are only viable strategies in that region
  • No real Series A players in Indonesia – mostly Singapore-based A
  • IC is just him and Patrick.
  • 15-22.5% minim stake
  • 94% follow on rate for their cos in fund1 (will reach 100% he says), second fund 75% he says
  • Reserves have grown fm 33% to 45-50% of the fund. A good ratio he wants to move to is 60% reserves. 
  • Planning to do more PreAs he says.

Sourcing strategy

  • SEA Turtles (returning SEAsians / reverse brain drain) are an area of focus; (e.g., meets all Indonesian students at HBS)
    • Mostly first-time founders 

Other

  • Avg time for a new GP raising their 1st fund or 2nd fund is 12-18 months says Samir Kaji