Super app platform Appboxo completes $7m Series A funding round

Singapore-based startup Appboxo announced today that it has raised a $7m Series A funding round led by early-stage technology venture capital firm, RTP Global.

The round was further supported by its initial backers Antler and 500 Southeast Asia, as well as new investors SciFi VC, Gradient Ventures – Google’s AI-focused venture fund, and business angels Huey Lin and Kayvon Deldar. This marks SciFi VC’s first investment in Southeast Asia. Appboxo, a super app platform that allows developers to create mini apps to turn apps into super apps, will use the funding to further product development and aid its international expansion.

Miniapps are small applications designed to be integrated into larger host applications, or ‘super apps’. This allows users to access multiple services through a single super app, reducing mobile storage space and data usage. Most miniapp services are tied to a third-party company that generates revenue through a miniapp hosted on a popular larger app platform. For instance, mobile wallet platforms can integrate e-commerce and lifestyle miniapps, such as food delivery and restaurant reservation, to offer these services under their umbrella. In 2021, WeChat, one of the biggest super app platforms in the world, reported a 12.5% growth in daily active users of its miniapp services, bringing the total active user count to a remarkable 450 million.

Established in 2019 by founders Kaniyet Rayev (CEO) and Nursultan Keneshbekov (CTO), Appboxo connects miniapps to super apps and powers the integration between them. The Appboxo platform allows apps to offer multiple third-party services and increase revenue by generating commission from each transaction. The company is currently working with some of the largest super apps across Southeast Asia, India and South Africa, including GCash, Paytm, and VodaPay. Appboxo boasts a combined base of more than 500 million users and has worked with more than 250 small and medium businesses that use Appboxo to integrate their miniapps into super apps.

Appboxo offers two products, Appboxo Miniapp Platform and Shopboxo. Their Appboxo Miniapp Platform simplifies the process of transforming any app into a super app with user-friendly software development kits (SDKs) and application programming interfaces (APIs). Unlike resource-abundant super app giants WeChat and Alipay, which built their respective miniapps from scratch in-house, Appboxo’s Miniapp is the first open miniapp platform that offers a SaaS software that is accessible to all developers, allowing them to easily create and launch miniapps.

Appboxo’s second product, Shopboxo, helps entrepreneurs, brands and SMEs create online stores to offer their goods and services directly to consumers. Businesses can set up an online store in less than 30 seconds via their mobile phones; Shopboxo provides all the essential tools for entrepreneurs to run their business thereafter. Each Shopboxo storefront is customisable, and integrating it with super apps through Appoxo’s Miniapp opens up a wide variety of sales and marketing capabilities, as well as additional customer acquisition channels for businesses.

With the $7m in funding, Appboxo will further develop Shopboxo, expand its merchant ecosystem by bringing more businesses to the app, and build out its international partnerships and presence. Global expansion will initially focus on the Asia-Pacific region where super apps are on the rise, followed by Europe and the US.

Kaniyet Rayev, Co-Founder and CEO of Appboxo, said: “The last couple of years have been incredible for us, and we are continuing to gain momentum as we head into the new year with our Series A funding. We have built a strong global team with fantastic experience behind it and can’t wait to dive into strengthening our products, scaling our business, and establishing new partnerships across the globe in 2022. We are grateful to all our investors for their trust and support.”