Scoop Raised Fund from Gobi Partners and MGI

Apps Foundry has announced USD 1 million (approximately IDR 7 billion) funding from Gobi Partners and Mitsui Global Investments (MGI) in order to develop leading applications, Scoop, who would become prominent iPad e-reader in Indonesia. Apps Foundry is an Indonesian developer based in Singapore leading by Mr Willson Cuaca who is also a partner in East Ventures.

Scoop has consistently been in the top 10 largest income applications in iTunes App Store Indonesia up until now. In just 1 year, Scoop have achieved a lot. Scoop application has been downloaded from the App Store more than 120k times and it has delivered 700 thousand digital magazines to iPad users. Many have claimed that 70% from the magazines available in Indonesia has joined Scoop and sold a digital version in Scoop’s newsstand.

Earlier this month, Scoop has managed to partner with Samsung for bundling applications supported by Scoop for Samsung Android. Currently the application is already available for the Samsung Galaxy Note and for the next development it will be applicable for other Samsung tab devices. This is in line with Samsung’s commitment that we had informed earlier in order to support the local works. In 2012, Scoop will develop products to support the interactive magazine with HTML5 technology.

E-Reader and e-Kiosk are becoming an attractive area along with the increase of middle class people who are interested to subscribe digital media. Personally I have switched to the digital media for purchasing the magazine because it’s easily stored and the ease of payment method; this is also part of my concern to reduce paper usage and support the go green campaign. There are two major players in this area, Scoop and Wayang Force was developed by PhaseDev.

Mr Ku Kay Mok from Gobi Partners will join Mr Batara Eto, co-founder of Mixi,in the board seat . Previously, Scoop has gotten investment from East Ventures and from Mr Nic Lim, co-founder Catcha.com.