Week in Review: Jokowi’s US visit will boost Indonesian ecosystem

By Karamjit Singh October 23, 2015

Indonesian President will feel the impact of tech, design-based careers
Regional expansion best offence against uncertain economic prospects

Week in Review: Jokowi’s US visit will boost Indonesian ecosystem INDONESIAN President Joko ‘Jokowi’ Widodo will be the latest leader to visit Silicon Valley during his inaugural trip to the United States from Oct 25-28. Silicon Valley has long been a ‘must visit’ destination for most world leaders during their official US trips.

Jokowi will leave starry-eyed and inspired to do all he can to help Indonesia achieve some of the success Silicon Valley has sparked in the San Francisco-Greater San Jose area, and beyond that, in inspiring students to pursue an education in digital, software, design and engineering-based majors.

And that will be great for Indonesia’s digital ecosystem which is already sizzling, according to some. One venture capitalist is even predicting that within a year, the country will have its first unicorns (startups with US$1-billion or higher valuations).

I know that in Malaysia, Dr Mohd Irwan Serigar Abdullah, the Secretary General (Treasury) of the Ministry of Finance, left Silicon Valley after his first trip there in November 2013 similarly starry-eyed and determined to help accelerate Malaysia’s digital ecosystem.

And he has, despite budget cuts here and there. He has prioritised investment into entrepreneurship programmes, especially around the startup space.

Expect Jokowi to do the same when he gets back.

Getting starry-eyed at visiting tech entrepreneurs and their gleaming campuses is but one part of the picture for these leaders, who will quickly realise that with life going digital, engineering-, design- and software-based careers are likely to be not just high-value and knowledge-intensive, but also future-proof careers for their youth.

This is the best offence (not defence) against the looming spectre of increased automation and robotics reducing jobs in the future.

The other offence against an uncertain economic future is to grow the business into different markets, and it was great to note the strong response from entrepreneurs at an Oct 20 panel discussion organised by Proficeo Consultants, the programme manager of Cradle’s Sdn Bhd Coach and Grow Programme (CGP).

Speak to any non-tech entrepreneur and you will most likely hear them state that expanding during a downturn, as counter-intuitive as it may sound, can actually work out.

Of course, a lot more planning needs to go into an expansion during a slow economy – and to help you ensure you can better focus your energy and time, do read Keith’s Liu Personal Tech advice on how to better manage work and play through his five smartphone tips!

Have a restful weekend and a productive week after.

Editor’s Picks:

Jokowi on a ‘startup mission’ in first official US visit

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5 smartphone tips to balance work and life

Challenges going regional, and why you should do it anyway

Indonesia tightens prepaid SIM card registration rules

Regulatory challenges in Singapore, especially for FSIs

Joel Neoh’s eight nuggets from his journey

Previous Instalments:

Week in Review: Business media giving more focus to digital

Week in Review: Pikom is right, Malaysia needs to buck up