E-wallet unicorn OVO’s future in question amid Lippo's divestment, talk of DANA merger

Indonesia

6 min read

Dec 16, 2019

By Putu Agung Wija Putera

©OVO

As even the conglomerate giant feels the pain of OVO's aggressive cash-burning, should digital payments players rethink their strategy to gain market share, beyond the usual discounts and subsidies?

In early September, Indonesian media went abuzz when OVO, the e-wallet arm of the Lippo Group conglomerate, was crowned the country’s fifth unicorn. Since then, however, OVO has had to deal with mounting uncertainty about its future – mainly, whether Lippo was bailing out of its costly loss-making unit.
In fact, just the day after the news of its unicorn status broke, Reuters, citing unnamed sources, reported that Singapore-based ride-hailing giant Grab was negotiating a merger between OVO and DANA, another Indonesian e-wallet, backed by Ant Financial, a Grab ally.
Grab, which owns...

The rest of the content is only available if you are logged in.

Edited by Bernice Tang

DATABASE

INSIGHTS

RESEARCH & ANALYSIS

FOLLOW US