Erick Thohir: Digital Economy Becomes The Super Priority Sector Of SOEs

Minister of SOEs, Erick Thohir. (Photo: Doc. Ministry of SOEs)

JAKARTA - Digital transformation is one of the important issues in the development of the world community, including in 20 G20 member countries. Indonesia realizes the importance of digital transformation in order to create an inclusive ecosystem, empower the community, and be sustainable.

In today's era of technological development, realizing a just digital society is the goal of all G20 members. However, digital transformation cannot run alone, but it needs collaboration from all parties to realize connectivity, literacy and affordability for many parties to remote areas of the world so that together they can recover faster, rise stronger.

For this reason, Indonesia presents the Digital Transformation Expo at the Bali Nusa Dua Convention Center (BNDCC) 2 as part of the series of G20 Summits from November 13 to 17, 2022.

Minister of State-Owned Enterprises (BUMN) Erick Thohir said digital transformation plays an important role in the socio-cultural and community order and even encourages the development of the digital economy which is the catalyst for economic growth.

Erick said that the network infrastructure that was built played a role in building digital connectivity to remote areas of the archipelago to explore economic potential from various levels of society.

With comprehensive network connectivity, people in the regions have the same opportunities and opportunities to run a business or get qualified facilities to support life.

Now, the digital ecosystem and the digital economy play an important role in the recovery of the national economy. With a digital economy projected to grow to IDR 4,500 trillion by 2030, Indonesia has enormous potential and resources to become the leading digital economy.

The World Bank 2021 report states that Indonesia is one of the top five countries in the world with the highest internet usage rate where an average of 80 percent of the time Indonesian people are used to utilize internet technology, both for communicating, surfing on social media, and business.

"Telkom and Telkomsel as digital telecommunications companies must be the backbone of Indonesia's digital economy with various innovations," he said in an official statement, Monday, November 14.

"Moreover, the digital economy is one of the four leading sectors prioritized by SOEs to support the development of economists towards an Advanced Indonesia 2045, in addition to downstreaming of natural resources (SDA), food security, as well as tourism and the creative economy," continued Erick.

Meanwhile, Deputy Minister of BUMN II Kartika Wirjoatmodjo said Telkom as a BUMN engaged in the telecommunications sector also realized the state's commitment to be present to encourage digital transformation.

As of June 2022, Telkom has helped provide various infrastructures for network strengthening throughout Indonesia, covering 171,654 kilometers of fiber optic cables that span the archipelago and 255,107 Base Transceiver Stations (BTS) serving 8.9 million IndiHome subscribers and 169.7 million Telkomsel customers connected to the world via internet connection.

"We have seen Telkom's efforts to build BTS in remote areas as an effort to open telecommunication access. This is an investment in the back end sector. This of course aims to create a digital ecosystem that is increasingly evenly distributed throughout Indonesia," Kartika explained.

Kartika added, Indonesia is one of the countries that is fast in carrying out digital adoption during the pandemic. Currently, more and more Indonesians are used to using gadgets and also shopping at e-commerce. Therefore, the government will encourage this digitalization trend into the industrial sector.

This is very visible in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic that hit the world, including Indonesia in 2020. illustrates how Telkom carried out digital adoption during the pandemic by creating the PeduliLindung application. This application can track people who are positive for COVID-19 and are proven to be very effective.

Not only Telkom and Telkomsel, Indonesia's current conditions and potential are also being captured by other SOEs to develop businesses to improve services to the Indonesian people. SOEs must take advantage of this momentum digitalization trend by building a digital ecosystem so that it can continue to grow.

SOEs have carried out a number of strategic initiatives in building a digital ecosystem and supporting local startups, which now reach 2,321 startups and grow 11 percent every year.

Starting from Indonesia Digital Tribe (IDT), BUMN Startup Day, to the Red and White Fund (MPF). SOEs also have Mandiri Capital Indonesia, MDI Ventures, BRI Ventures, Telkomsel Mitra Innovation and BNI Ventures which have so far invested for around 230 startups.

"In the banking sector, we are innovating through Livin' by Mandiri, a super app that is not only for banking transactions but can also buy plane tickets, booking hotels, trains and others. Indonesia can create a digital ecosystem through a super app. For this, we can be said to be more advanced than other countries, "said Kartika.

Digital transformation in the banking industry benefits customers because they are able to save a lot of time. From the banking side, it also benefits because the costs or costs incurred are not that large. Furthermore, banks can expand the market segment, including to micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs).

Finally, digital transformation makes banking more innovative by creating applications to super apps, as Livin' by Mandiri currently has.

The digital adoption carried out by Telkom with PeduliLindungi and Mandiri with Livin' is part of the transformation of SOEs that other SOEs need to continue to follow to grow sustainably.