Present at BUMN Startup Day, VCGamers Appreciates Government Support to Startups

VCGamers became part of the BUMN Startup Day which was held at ICE BSD, Tangerang Regency, today Monday 26 September 2022.

Co Founder & COO of VCGamers, Hartanto Lee, stated that his party welcomed the event. Because this event shows the government's support for the development of startups in Indonesia.

"Of course we are very proud to be part of BUMN Startup Day today. We also appreciate this event because it is a form of government support in the development of startups in the country," said the man who is familiarly called Hartanto.

He also explained that this event provided space for startups in the country to be able to meet venture capital from BUMN for business development or scale up.

"We hope that this activity can be held continuously and provide many benefits in the development of the digital economy in Indonesia," he said.

Also read: The New Face of VCGamers, One Stop Platform for All Gamers

BUMN Startup Day

BUMN Startup Day is an initiative of the Ministry of BUMN, together with BUMN and BUMN venture capital to facilitate the exchange of ideas, inspiration and collaboration between Indonesian BUMNs and curated startups in the scale up and growth stages. 

BUMN Startup Day takes an active role in taking advantage of the large digital economic opportunities in Indonesia to support the younger generation, creators, new job creators, and become part of the digital economy ecosystem with closer synergies and mutual benefits.

In his remarks, the Minister of BUMN, Erick Thohir, said President Joko Widodo had reminded him that the digital economy would become one of Indonesia's economic growth in 2019.

He said that it is projected that Indonesia's digital economy will be the largest in Southeast Asia by 2030. Or 40% of the total digital economy in Southeast Asia with a value of IDR 4500 trillion.

"And if we look at this momentum, the majority of Indonesia's population is young. Now 40% under 35 years. What does it mean? Indonesia has a large market and human resources potential, which at the same time is a continuity between the digital economy and its human resources," he said as quoted from the BUMN Ministry's YouTube channel.

According to him, these developments need to get encouragement as a whole. Thus, SOEs try to initiate and build ecosystems in SOEs to support the development of startups in Indonesia.

Currently SOEs also have venture capital. Among them are Mandiri Capital, BRI Venture, Telkom and Telkomsel. 

"And finally, I also asked BNI to make venture capital. And venture capital those in SOEs have invested in 336 startups. If you look at it today, many have started to become Soonicorns or Unicorns," he said.

He explained, BUMN Startup Day was held to make BUMN close to startups in the country.

"And we ask the BUMNs not to invest directly but must provide assistance with the investors venture capital in SOEs because we don't want the directors of SOEs who have no experience in the digital industry to invest directly without any assistance, because we are making sure that this is truly sustainable," he said.

He explained that as many as 150 exhibitors and 250 startups from 12 existing clusters were present at the event. "Then there are also 22 SOEs here, which are trying to see if there is any potential to do business matching," he said.

Broadly speaking, there are as many as five things that are the goal of holding BUMN Startup Day. Each of them is Business Matching, Investor Pitching, Rapid Mentoring Startup, Conference and Exhibition.

"Please support Mr (President Joko Widodo) and the government so that this can be a big wave for the advancement of Indonesia's digital economy as one of the future economic growth," he said.

Also read: Attend Coinfest Asia 2022, VCGamers: Let's Strengthen Indonesia's Web3 Ecosystem

President Jokowi Urges Startups to Be Able to Respond to Community Needs

The activity was opened directly by President Joko Widodo or Jokowi who was accompanied by the Minister of State-Owned Enterprises (BUMN), Erick Thohir.

In his remarks, President Jokowi said he was optimistic about the development of the country's digital economy. This is based on Indonesia's digital economic opportunities which continue to grow rapidly and are even the highest in Southeast Asia.

"Our digital economy is growing rapidly and is the highest in Southeast Asia. Jumping 8 times from 2020 from Rp. 632 T jumping to 4531 T in 2030, meaning that the opportunity is huge," he said as quoted from the Presidential Secretariat's YouTube channel.

The President said that this opportunity was an open opportunity for young people. Moreover, internet users in Indonesia have reached 77.7 percent and use it 8 hours 36 minutes in one day.

Moreover, the number of Indonesian startups is the sixth highest in the world after America, India, England, Canada and Australia. "This is also a great potential that we must develop," he said.

Currently, said the President, most startups in Indonesia come from the Fintech category. According to him, all parties must be able to see that in the future what needs to be solved using technology is the food crisis problem.

"That is an opportunity, that is an opportunity, that is an opportunity and agriculture is only 4 percent, be careful, there is a big opportunity there. Because in the matter of food there is something called production affairs, there is something called distribution affairs, there is such thing as market affairs," he said. 

Apart from that, the health category also needs to be a concern because it has quite a large opportunity. 

"We are a country of 17 thousand islands, what can we do so that our health can jump, telemedicine can be connected, remote surgery can be connected with platforms, with applications," he said.Then, what is no less important is the development of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) in Indonesia.

"We have 65.4 million MSMEs. Indeed, there are still many problems, matters of packaging, matters of production quality, matters of production capacity. But only 19 million have entered the digital platform. So there is still a very large space for us to work there," he said.

President Jokowi stated that there were two reasons for startups to close when they were pioneering. This is because its presence cannot answer market needs and lack of funds. Therefore, he hopes that all startups will be present to answer existing market needs.

“Then, the second one is due to running out of funds. This will later function as venture capital, the function of BUMN, so that the large ecosystem that we want to build can be connected to each other so that all of them can be properly accompanied and can not fail to enter the markets, the opportunities that exist in our country," he said.