P3DN Business Matching & SME Expo

In Nusa Dua area of Bali Island, the GoI carried out a business matching event for three days (22-24 March 2022) between Ministries, Govt Institutions, and Local Government on one side, and national industries and SME on the other side. This event also exhibited some national industry associations (organised by Ministry of Industry) and SME (organised by Ministry of Coop & SME).

I will write about the business matching some other time. But the exhibition itself is interesting. Here we displayed nationwide technology-focused entrepreneurs, scoping from weaponry simulation, health facility instruments, tools for agroindustry, and many others.

The Minister of Coop & SME, Mr Teten Masduki, personally visited and talked to the local entrepreneurs. He emphasise the importance of the local industry to improve the quality and production capacity to match the market demand. Also, for the platforms like PADI UMKM, he addressed that such system should be used as a gateway for SMEs to be listed at national industry catalogue to be linked to the market where Ministries etc are targeted to spend 500 trillion rupiah this year.

IMT-GT eCommerce Tech Planning

When I was in Kupang (May 25th), I was invited by the Coordinative Ministry of Economy (Kemko-Ekon) and Ministry of ICT to discuss the implementation of IMT-GT e-Commerce plan. I presented some options we might choose using PADI UMKM as a national hub connected to the IMT-GT Mall. But then the Government addressed us to propose PADI UMKM as the core platform of the IMT-GT e-Commerce program instead.

On the next IMT-GT JBC (Joint Business Council) Meeting (May 28th), we stated the proposal to take over the development and operation of IMT-GT core platform with some alternative business models. At that time, Thailand expressed their dissatisfaction on the business operation plan of the IMT-GT Mall from Malaysia. Also the CIMT (Centre of the IMT-GT Cooperation) mentioned that PADI UMKM has been in operation since last year, while IMT-GT Mall from Malaysia is still in development plan stage.

Today (June 4th) we continue the JBC Meeting with CIMT. Malaysia has stated their desire to maintain their role as IMT-GT e-Commerce hub as decided in 2019; and representing Indonesia, I have agreed to let them continue leading this program with this determined timeline. PADI UMKM will continue to support as the connection between Indonesia MSMEs and the IMT-GT Mall. I also proposed that the operation of each national hub will be independent, so each country may have different business models in designing the operation business of the e-Commerce program. For example, JBC Malaysia prefers that the operation will be carried out by private sector; while Indonesia prefers to use MSME ecosystem program. This result will be reported on the next Convergence Meeting, scheduled on July.

IMT-GT Strategic Planning — SWG ICT

Virtual Meeting on IMT-GT Strategic Planning Meeting (SPM) / Sub-Working Group on ICT was held today. The Standing Chairman of IMT-GT SWG on ICT is from Mme. Suhaila Yeop Johari (Communications Technology Division, Ministry of Communications and Multimedia Malaysia). I attended the meeting representing Telkom Indonesia as the platform owner of PADI UMKM — the platform chosen by the Indonesian Government for MSME exporting facility. The meeting was also attended by Mr. Iswarayuda Bayu Agutama (Head of Bilateral Division,Centre of International Affairs, MCI, Indonesia), Ms. Ishariyaporn Smiprem (Director of Regional Cooperation Group International Affairs Division, Ministry of Digital Economy and Society, Thailand), and Mr. Firdaus Dahlan (Director of CIMT).

Круглый Стол в ЮФУ

This weekend, Mr Ford asked me to provide a presentation in a forum organised by the SFedU. The title of the forum is «Круглый Стол : Развитие Компаний в Период COVID-19: Вызовы и Возможнпсти» — or more or less: Round Table: Business development in the COVID-19 era: challenges and opportunities. SFedU, or Southern Federal University (Южный федеральный университет = ЮФУ) is a university in Rostov Oblast, Russia, with campuses located at Rostov-on-Don and Taganrog.

The speakers for this forum are from the academicians and business people from Japan, Italy, Thailand, and Indonesia.

In my presentation, I discussed again how these COVID-19 crises actually provide some contexts for us to design a strategic transformation by exploring the new opportunities and using potential collaborative innovations. In theory, we have all we need to start establishing it with synergistic efforts. I described in brief the way we can start planning the ecosystem.