Airlangga Targets 15,000 Chip Engineers to Participate in Training from Danantara and Arm Ltd Cooperation

Coordinating Minister for the Economy Airlangga Hartarto (Photo: VOI doc)

JAKARTA - The government reiterated its commitment to strengthening strategic cooperation in the technology sector through the signing of a framework agreement between the Indonesian Inter-Agency Investment Management Agency (BPI Danantara) and Arm Limited in London, England, on Monday, February 23.

The signing was witnessed directly by the President of the Republic of Indonesia Prabowo Subianto, who was also accompanied by Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Airlangga Hartarto, as a form of the Government's great attention to the prospects for technological progress and the transformation of Indonesia's economy based on innovation.

This cooperation is part of Indonesia's big strategy to strengthen its mastery of semiconductor technology.

Arm Limited is known as one of the main players in the global semiconductor industry, especially in chip design for data centers, artificial intelligence, and the automotive sector.

Coordinating Minister for the Economy Airlangga Hartarto said that the collaboration is expected to be able to accelerate the increase in national capacity and encourage independence in the development of strategic technologies that are the foundation of the digital ecosystem.

Airlangga explained that through this partnership, Indonesia targets training for around 15 thousand engineers in the Arm ecosystem to be able to master chip design.

"With this cooperation, it is hoped that Indonesia can train 15 thousand of our engineers within the Arm ecosystem, so that they can master chip design technology, and the work plan will be continued to the next generation of semiconductors or chips, so that Indonesia has capabilities in the semiconductor and design fields," he explained in his statement, Tuesday, February 24.

In addition, the partnership also marks an important step in transforming Indonesia from merely a user of technology into a high-value producer in the global supply chain.

Meanwhile, technology is positioned as the main driver of economic growth, which connects the potential of Indonesia's human resources and natural wealth with the need for high productivity towards the vision of Indonesia's Gold 2045.

Furthermore, Airlangga emphasized that this cooperation is a follow-up to President Prabowo's direction to strengthen national technological independence, as well as complement the agenda for food and energy security development.

In addition, he added that the initiative is also positioned as a strategic leapfrog step in strengthening the Indonesian digital ecosystem.

In the initial phase, the development of six national chip designs will focus on strategic intellectual property (IP) ownership by Indonesia.

"These six are IP, intellectual property, which we can choose whether one is for automotive technology, the second is the internet of things, the third is related to data centers, then it can also be about home appliances, the other two we can choose whether we want futuristic, especially autonomous vehicles, and quantum computing, and others. So all of this will still be discussed later with Danantara, so that this IP will be held by Indonesia," he said.

In addition, Airlangga said this cooperation is also aimed at building national software development capacity through collaboration with leading universities, such as the Bandung Institute of Technology, Gadjah Mada University, and the University of Indonesia.

He added that preparations had been made for almost two years, and the national talents would later receive direct training from coaches in the Arm Limited ecosystem.

In the next phase, the development of new generations of chips also opens up wider investment opportunities, including in the semiconductor manufacturing sector which is currently still dominated by global companies.

Airlangga conveyed that the government hopes that these companies can invest in Indonesia to strengthen the national semiconductor ecosystem sustainably.