Ebizu wins RM500,000 Cradle grant

Rohit is confident Ebizu can transform customer experience.

Malaysian digital retail solutions provider wins funding from Cradle for ‘timely solutions’ and ‘strong vision for regional expansion’.

Ebizu Sdn Bhd, a Malaysian digital retail solutions provider that offers business management and marketing services, has been awarded the CIP 500 funding by Cradle Fund.

The company will use the RM500,000 funding to purchase 10,000 Beacons, a device that leverages Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) technology for a micro-location platform. This platform can then be used for marketing, loyalty, positioning, and analytics. Ebizu’s aim is to connect Malaysian as well as South-East Asian businesses and brands with their new-age, on-the-move, constantly connected consumers.

With this technology, businesses can, for instance, send updates on products as well promotions to customers as they shop in the premises, while gaining information on customer traffic and the areas of the shop that are busiest.

“Ebizu provides retail businesses with a platform to reach new customers, engage with them using personalised and relevant content and drive loyalty programmes with new and existing customers,” said Ebizu co- founder Rohit Maheswaran.

“With a significant increase in purchasing power in South-East Asian countries in recent years, consumers are now looking for increasingly personalised experiences, deals, and loyalty and reward programs that go beyond traditional norms. We have strong confidence in the potential of Beacon technology to transform customer experiences through analytics, proximity marketing, and navigation.

“We thank Cradle for recognising the strong potential of our endeavour and for awarding the CIP 500 fund for us to expand and commercialise across the region,” he added. Cradle chief executive officer Nazrin Hassan said that CIP 500 funding, which started in 2010, was a trailblazing effort to help widen the commercialisation funding pipeline for Malaysian technopreneurs.

“We congratulate Ebizu for being a CIP 500 grant recipient and hope that it is just the beginning of great things to come. The founders have a strong vision for regional expansion, and we believe their solution is also very timely for not just Malaysia but for the rest of South-East Asia,” Nazrin said.

Ebizu’s Beacons are already in use or are currently being installed across five malls in the Klang Valley, one in East Malaysia, and six in Indonesia. With this funding, the company is looking to expand their footprint in Malaysia as well in Asean capital cities, particularly Jakarta, Bangkok and Manila.

With its business expansion, Ebizu is also looking to create employment opportunities in several fields such as sales and marketing, technology development, operations and customer service among others.

Ebizu is committed to delivering the next wave of connected commerce by helping merchants, malls and hypermarkets use latest technologies to manage and grow their business. Its core products are Ebizu Business Cloud Apps, Ebizu Manager (Point Of Sale) and Ebizu Beacon Network.

Ebizu is headquartered in Malaysia and has a strong regional presence in Singapore and Indonesia. It has plans to expand to Thailand and Philippines in 2015. The company has a 45-member strong team made up of business, technology, and marketing veterans and professionals.