Indonesia Is Believed to be Capable to Create a Bigger Tech Hub than Silicon Valley

CEO of Omni VR, a startup engaged in virtual reality technology, Nico Alyus, said that Indonesia has the potential to create a large technology hub. It could be even bigger than Silicon Valley. He said that a technology hub is necessary at this point.

“If we want to make something bigger than Silicon Valley, every place throughout the country needs to have a technology hub. Then, these technology hubs need to be connected from one to another,” Nico Alyus said at Holywings some time ago.

According to him, Indonesia has an advantage as an island country. It makes the country have very diverse demographics. “If we look at Indonesia, the bonus is in demographics. We have incredibly diverse customers,” he added. Thus, innovation is required to deal with diverse needs.

He said that the type of innovation needed for each market is also different. There are what is called product-driven innovation and market-driven innovation. Some prefer the compatibility with existing market conditions while others may not. That’s why innovation should be made based on market needs.

All Stakeholders Need to Work Together for Realizing the Tech Hub

The need for a liaison between startups and the market here, Nico said, is to allow Indonesia to create a technology center or a concentrated area for technological development. And this technology center is supposed to be even greater than Silicon Valley.

“So, if Indonesia wants to make something bigger than that (Silicon Valley), it should not generate only one Silicon Valley. But, it needs to make more than one technology hub,” he said. The technology hub itself is conceptualized as a place of concentration for technological development.

Technology developers should be placed in the hub so that innovations could be made between them, especially startups. Thus, the development of startups could be faster. However, a technology center as large as Silicon Valley will not be enough to meet markets throughout Indonesia, which is an archipelago.

“What we need is not only (interaction) with other startups, but also access to our consumers. It cannot be used by our consumers in eastern Indonesia if the tech hub is in Jakarta,” he said. All stakeholders, both government and private, need to work together in realizing this goal.

“No one will survive without the support of all stakeholders, whether government, private, even the perpetrators themselves. Ideally, it should be like that,” he concluded. This issue is also discussed during the media session of The NextDev Summit 2019 earlier this month.

The Tech Hub May Support Startups Acceleration in Indonesia

“The dream (to have a tech hub) indeed requires a process. The most important thing here is collaboration. But, this collaboration needs strong data.” Tubagus Husniyullah, GM CSR Telkomsel, said. With the power of data information, the startup’s acceleration could be speeded up.

He also believes that Indonesia can create a good digital ecosystem because it has the advantage of demographics. The same opinion was also expressed by Gerald Sebastian, Co-founder and Business Director of Kok Bisa. He said Indonesia can go beyond Silicon Valley.

“Considering the potential in Indonesia, it is really big. Now we have five unicorns and their market is in Indonesia only,” Gerald said. Although the digital ecosystem in Indonesia has great potential, Gerald said that this needs to be maximized first by creating many tech hubs.

With this tech hub, a new startup can grow and become big. The NextDev 2019 itself was an event held by Telkomsel to help develop startups in Indonesia. More than 105 professional speakers from various industries participated in this event.

50 reputable startups throughout the country also joined the event. This event is supposed to facilitate startups to survive and develop their platform. The NextDev itself has been held in five years. Then, there have been 4.900 startups managed by the program.