“Fintech” – an intersection of financial services and technology – is taking the traditional financial world by storm. Indonesia is no exception, with a fast-evolving ecosystem that includes a host of financial services offered by new generation fintechs. Indonesia is the fourth largest mobile market in the world with 339.9 million connections – a SIM penetration of 131%! 43% of Indonesians already own a smartphone. Furthermore, Indonesia is going “mobile-first” with 64.1 million out of a total of 88.1 million users accessing Internet through mobile devices. This is fuelling social media usage by platforms such as WhatsApp, Facebook, Blackberry, Line, Path, etc. This trend is also leading to explosive growth in electronic and mobile commerce, with big names such as Alibaba, Softbank, Sequoia, Rocket Internet, and Temasek backing local ventures. In contrast, only 36% of 250 million Indonesians have access to formal financial services.
