IDNtimes Closes Funding from East Ventures

IDNtimes, a local Buzzfeed-like online media, sealed an undisclosed funding from East Ventures. The funding will be allocated to its aggressive expansion, including adding more team members, upgrading its UX quality, strengthening the content creation and distribution, and improving the platform quality.

“IDNtimes uses this model (Buzzfeed-like) since February 2015. We currently have 25 team members and counting,” IDNtimes’ COO William Utomo told DailySocial.

Utomo claimed that prior closing the funding, he and his fellow co-founders bootstrap the startup. He later expected that the funding may lead them to be the best and most relevant media for Indonesian youth. Besides text-based content, IDNtimes also starts being active in inserting light videos to its YouTube channel.

“We really prioritize our editorial and IDNtv team, to make sure that we create the best quality articles and videos for our readers,” he said. IDNtimes claimed to have had more than seven million visits and 20 million pageviews per month, as the startup opts for native content marketing as its monetization method.

“IDNtimes.com shows an excellent product execution process. In short period, it has attracted huge amount of viewers, especially those millenials. The way of reading and distributing news are completely different now and media company must proactively adapt to this. IDNtimes has been sort of a refreshment to the segment,” East Ventures’ Co-Founder and Managing Partner Willson Cuaca stated in his release.

IDNtimes’ journalistic approach is quite similar to that of Hipwee or WowShack, which is to deliver light articles for readers aged 18-34 years old. The startups has planned to release an iOS and Android-based app in the near future.