OVO, officially a product of PT Visionet International, is a digital payment service based in Jakarta, Indonesia. It was established in 2017 with an e-money license from Bank Indonesia,[1] and in 2019 was Indonesia's top digital payment service.[2] Owned by Grab and local investors,[3] in 2019, OVO became Indonesia's first finance-tech business unicorn.[1]
History
OVO was founded by Lippo Group and received permission to operate as a fintech company throughout Indonesia on 25 September 2017 with an e-money license for Bank Indonesia.[4] OVO is a product of PT Visionet International, which is the digital financial services subsidiary of the Lippo Group.[5] OVO debuted a digital wallet in September of 2017.[6] In December 2017, it was announced that Tokyo Century Corporation had invested US$116 million for a 20% stake in the startup.[7] OVO added new financial services in 2018[6] and Grab invested in the company.[8]
In March 2019, Indonesian e-commerce company Tokopedia invested in OVO.[9] That month, OVO's value was estimated at US$2.9 billion by CB Insights.[5] In October 2019, the Minister of Communications and InformationRudiantara announced that OVO had become the fifth official Indonesian unicorn[5] after Gojek, Traveloka, Bukalapak and Tokopedia.[3] OVO was also recognized as Indonesia's first finance-tech business unicorn.[1] PT Visionet International shareholders appointed Karaniya Dharmasaputra as president director of the company in 2019, replacing Andrian Suherman, who had led OVO for three years.[6] In 2021, Grab increased its stake in OVO to 79.5%, acquiring Tokopedia and Lippo Group's shares together with a number of local investors.
In October of 2021, Grab bought out Tokopedia and raised its stake in OVO to 90% in the process, also buying stakes from Lippo Group.[10] Dyak NK Makhijani became President Commissioner at PT Visionet International in August of 2022, after Mirza Adityaswara left the OVO board of commissioners. At that time, 90% of OVO was owned by Grab.[11]
Products and services
OVO's core business is digital payment based on its e-money license. According to a 2021 report by research company Kadence International, at the time OVO was the leading e-money / digital wallet in Indonesia[12][13][14] for both online and offline transactions.
Also involved in financial services, OVO offers lending services through Taralite (PT Indonusa Nusa Sejahtera), a P2P lending company that it acquired in 2019,[15] as well as investment products under OVO | Invest and insurance products under OVO | Proteksi in collaboration with partners.[16]