BetterPlace, an India-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform for frontline workforce management, today announced the acquisition of TROOPERS, Malaysia’s flexi talent solutions technology player. 

BetterPlace's acquisition of TROOPERS will accelerate its presence in the region and establish a stronger foothold in Southeast Asia, the company said in a statement. 

The acquisition will integrate TROOPERS' automated gig matching and rostering features into BetterPlace's comprehensive SaaS platform. 

Founded by co-founders Joshua Tan and Kelvin Lee in 2017, TROOPERS is a flexi-talent solutions platform that offers on-demand, pre-screened, part-time frontline workers to enterprises, enabling them to scale up their gig workforce based on operational demands. With a machine learning algorithm achieving a 95 per cent matching rate, TROOPERS claims to have helped over 50,000 gig workers in Malaysia find employment since its inception.

Pravin Agarwala, Co-Founder and Group CEO, BetterPlace said Southeast Asia is expected to see a significant growth in demand for gig workers in the next five years, with the gig economy growing by 31 per cent since 2017, well ahead of the growth in conventional workforce. In Malaysia alone, 84 per cent of hiring managers prefer hiring gig-workers.

"We are pleased to offer a robust SaaS solution catering to the growing market demand. Our comprehensive SaaS platform and artificial intelligence (AI) based algorithms, combined with TROOPERS' innovative flexi-talent solutions, enables enterprises to effectively tackle challenges such as high attrition rates, escalating labour and management costs, and skilled workforce shortages. Concurrently, frontline workers can optimise their earning potential through TROOPERS' proprietary gig matching algorithms," Agarwala added.

According to Joshua Tan, Co-Founder and CEO, TROOPERS majority of the workforce ecosystem in Southeast Asia is informal, making it difficult for workers to discover supplementary jobs or increase their earning potential. Additionally, workers do not have the necessary skills to match growing enterprise requirements. 

"Building on the principles of transparency, accountability, and legitimacy, we started TROOPERS to address talent shortage and workforce productivity for enterprises while creating better livelihoods for workers in Malaysia. We are eager to utilise BetterPlace's technological prowess and industry knowledge to scale our offering, potentially transforming the landscape of frontline work in Southeast Asia," Tan added.

BetterPlace has been expanding its presence in Southeast Asia, and the acquisition of TROOPERS is part of that strategy. This move follows BetterPlace's earlier expansion into the region, when it acquired MyRobin, the top blue collar workforce fulfillment platform in Indonesia, in February 2023. This was BetterPlace's first entry into Southeast Asia.