Indonesia moves deeper into the cloud

• The use of open data boosts transparency, improves delivery and promotes innovation
• More skilled people are needed to maximise the use of cloud and data

AS ONE of the largest economies in Southeast Asia (SEA), Indonesia is in the process of utilising cloud and data services within the government and private sectors.

“The government sees the benefits of open data not only for transparency but also to improve service delivery and promote social and economic innovation by citizens,” said Indonesian Agency for Creative Economy (Bekraf) director for ICT infrastructure Muhammad Neil El Himam in at the DCD Indonesia conference 2017.

In 2014, the government data site data.go.id was opened to the public, giving access to government and sub-government institutions in Jakarta, Bandung and Banda Aceh.

“I think Jakarta has some of the best practice here in Indonesia. Everyone can create and share their data openly,” Neil says.

According to Neil, it is important for the digital or startup ecosystem to study open data and skilled people are needed to handle these systems.

“We realise that in an open data ecosystem skilled people are still needed to ensure the engines will run smoothly. Open data is a must for a startup ecosystem as it helps them to fit into the industry,” adds Neil.

Utlilising the cloud and data centres

In the panel discussion at DCD Indonesia 2017, three players from different businesses backgrounds discussed the level of cloud or data center use in their companies and how to overcome obstacles.

The three companies are PT Multi Adiprakarsa Manunggal (Kartuku), Sinar Mas Land, and BT Singapore (part of BT Group).

Kartuku is a Third Party Processor (TPP) and Payment Service Provider (PSP), delivering end-to-end, mission critical payment solutions in Indonesia by building and operating payment systems that process electronic transactions. Kartuku is under the umbrella of Singapore’s The North Star Group.

Sinar Mas Land is one of the largest property developers in Indonesia. The company owns around 10,000 hectares of strategic land bank (as of 2011) with projects in city development, townships, residential, commercial, retail, industrial estates, and hospitality properties, including property-related services. They are now focusing on turning BSD City into an integrated smart digital city.

BT Group are providers of communications services and solutions with a portfolio strategy of the Cloud of Clouds which combines cloud services, IT integration skills, a global network and professional security expertise in which their customers can connect easily and securely to the applications and data they need.

For Kartuku senior vice president of IT infrastructure Gunawan Santoso, it is important for a company to understand what the cloud or a data centre is.

“In my definition, Next-Gen in IT infrastructure is not about having your own data centre but understanding the challenges.

“For private equity, we face three challenges in that we have to educate our people in lowering costs, bringing in higher revenue and satisfying customers,” adds Gunawan.

Gunawan also thinks that a company should be “cloud ready” with the capability to build its own private cloud and spend over a public cloud transparently without changes to the application itself or the user.

“The reason is cost efficiency as operating expenses can be better controlled by utilising the cloud which helps avoid overspending on current infrastructure by putting investment in capacity which cannot be precisely predicted,” Gunawan says.

For Sinar Mas Land corporate IT operations head Teguh Budyantara, cloud or data usage in a company has to be highly scalable and cost effective.

“We have just finished migrating from data centre to cloud and we have our own hybrid cloud. In my opinion, the penetration of cloud in the market is getting better and some businesses perhaps could not survive without the help of cloud,” adds Teguh.

For BT Singapore director, cloud and IT services, Asia Pacific Middle East and Africa Gowthaman Manickam, everything is moving to the cloud now and it has to be hybrid.

“There was a great cloud implementation in Indonesia, especially in banking sector. The good thing is the company wants to work with the risk and share,” Gowthaman says.

There are three main obstacles slowing the process of cloud or data usage in Indonesia. These are finding the right partner or cloud provider, risk to the business, and educating people in the shifting process.

“We have to understand the maturity of the infrastructure. We need to increase the quality of the people we have and we need to have a long term partnership with cloud providers to be able to improve,” Gunawan says.

“There are so many data ‘huggers’ now and we have to trust the provider. By finding the right partners, we can decrease the risks and be able to expand,” adds Teguh.

“There is huge potential in Indonesia. We just have to educate people about cloud or data usage so it will give visibility to them,” concludes Gowthaman.

Related Stories:

Indonesia promotes the use of data for policymaking

Google to outline what's next for its cloud biz

Cloud computing: No more cloudy skies?

Hybrid cloud and the changing horizon of Asia-Pacific enterprises

For more technology news and the latest updates, follow us on Facebook,Twitter or LinkedIn.