eFishery Founder Jailed Nine Years as KWAP Defends RM163 Million Loss

Gibran Huzaifah, the founder and former chief executive of Indonesian aquaculture startup eFishery, was sentenced to nine years in prison by the Bandung District Court in Indonesia in April 2026. A panel of judges found him guilty of embezzlement and money laundering following a financial scandal that wiped out an estimated $300 million in investor value and triggered the unravelling of one of the region's most closely watched unicorn companies.

Two other former senior executives were sentenced alongside him. Angga Hadrian Raditya, the former vice president of corporate finance and investor relations, received a nine-year term, while Andri Yadi, the erstwhile vice president of artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things, was sentenced to seven years. All three were ordered to pay fines of one billion rupiah each. Gibran's sentence fell slightly short of the ten years originally sought by state prosecutors, who had argued the defendants showed no remorse during proceedings.

eFishery, founded in 2013, built its reputation on technology that automated feeding systems for fish and shrimp farmers across Indonesia, positioning itself as a transformative force in the country's aquaculture sector. The company raised $200 million in a Series D round in 2023, achieving unicorn status in the process. Its investor roster read like a who's who of global institutional capital: SoftBank Group, Temasek Holdings, Peak XV Partners, Abu Dhabi's 42XFund, Northstar, responsAbility, and 500 Global all backed the venture. The fraud, which involved the inflation of revenue and profit figures across multiple years, went undetected through multiple rounds of auditing by internationally recognized firms.

The scandal has direct consequences for Malaysia. Kumpulan Wang Persaraan Diperbadankan, known as KWAP, the country's largest public sector pension fund, confirmed in July 2026 that it had invested RM163.4 million in eFishery, representing approximately 2.51 per cent of the company's shares. The fund described the fraud as involving deliberate financial manipulation and misrepresentation of the startup's financial reporting.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, responding to questions in the Dewan Negara, moved to defend KWAP against criticism over the loss. He emphasized that the investment had undergone a rigorous process involving professional fund managers, feasibility studies, and approvals by the fund's investment panel and board, and was made without political interference. He also noted that KWAP was not alone among the world's most sophisticated institutional investors in being deceived by eFishery's management.

Anwar urged lawmakers to evaluate the fund's performance holistically, noting that against the RM163.4 million loss, KWAP recorded RM12.9 billion in net profit and RM9.3 billion in fund growth. The fund has also maintained annual compound growth of more than 8.5 per cent and continues to back Malaysian startups under the Gear Up program.

The Prime Minister nonetheless confirmed that the Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission had been instructed to investigate the investment process fully, and that both KWAP and the Finance Ministry had been directed to cooperate without reservation. He drew a sobering parallel to the 1MDB episode, noting that even the presence of globally reputable auditors provided no guarantee against sophisticated financial deception.

For Malaysia's investment and pension fund community, the eFishery case raises questions that go beyond any single bad investment. It demonstrates the inherent risks of cross-border venture capital exposure, particularly in markets where governance standards and regulatory oversight of private companies remain inconsistent. As KWAP and other institutional investors in Malaysia reassess their due diligence frameworks for startup investments, the broader lesson is one that regulators and fund managers across the region cannot afford to ignore.