by Dharma Simorangkir, President Director, Microsoft Indonesia
Read in Indonesian here
Over the past three decades, the technological landscape has undergone significant transformations, marked by three major platform shifts—from the PC-server era, to the rise of the internet, culminating in the mobile and cloud era. Today, we are on the cusp of a fourth seismic shift, driven by AI. This shift is reshaping industries and redefining the way businesses operate. Generative AI, in particular, has accelerated this transformation, compelling businesses to adapt quickly to stay competitive.
In Indonesia, the pace is remarkable—92% of knowledge workers already use generative AI at work, exceeding the global (75%) and Asia Pacific (83%) averages1. This strong adoption is backed by business leaders, with 92% recognizing AI as essential for staying competitive, significantly higher than the global (79%) and Asia Pacific (84%) figures2.
In this adoption, Indonesian individuals and organizations are not only using AI as a tool, but also actively building with AI as a platform. Here are just some of the recent examples:
- In digital native landscape, GoTo Group’s engineers have embraced GitHub Copilot, saving an average of seven hours per week in coding time.
- In enterprise scale, Telkomsel’s Azure OpenAI Service-powered virtual assistant, Veronika, has transformed customer interactions, increasing self-service rates from 19% to 45% by delivering faster, more accurate responses.
- In state-owned enterprise, PT Bank Rakyat Indonesia is creating a work instruction search engine for faster customer service using Azure Cognitive Search, and a ’content factory’ for streamlining the creation of marketing material.
- In education institution, BINUS University has achieved up to 90% prediction accuracy in admission planning using Azure Machine Learning, and created thousands Diploma Supplement Documents using Azure OpenAI Service.
- In non-profit organization, Mitra Netra Foundation leveraged Azure OpenAI Service to convert Arabic text with harakat in image to accessible Arabic Unicode, potentially benefiting millions of people with vision impairment.
- In creative industry, toy photographer Mate Tampan is using Microsoft Copilot to visualize imagined worlds into backdrops for shoots.
What’s interesting is that all these advancements have emerged only in the past two years, because we are merely in the second year of new AI era. This indicates the real value of AI in driving rapid and transformative innovation across various industries.
What’s next in 2025 (and beyond)
The question now is: what’s next? As we approach our 50th anniversary, coming soon on April 4th, Microsoft’s mission remains to empower every person and organization. Our success hinges on how we harness AI and other technologies to amplify human achievement and create positive change for society.
We also realize that the innovations we are developing today will define the next five decades. That’s why we continue to recommit ourselves to the framework that has helped us to success – investing in our people, living up to our mission, earning the trust of our customers and the countries we operate in, innovating responsibly, prioritizing fundamentals with security above all else, and building products where the world can benefit.
Advancing cloud and AI in Indonesia: an exciting progress
Specific to Indonesia, there are at least two critical enablers that we’ll continue focusing on, as part of our long-term commitment: robust infrastructure and AI-skilled talents, with security and responsible AI as the foundation.
In 2021, Microsoft announced our commitment to establish Microsoft’s first cloud region in Indonesia, as part of the Berdayakan Indonesia initiative. This commitment was further bolstered in April 2024 when Microsoft CEO & Chairman Satya Nadella announced a US$1.7 billion investment to advance Indonesia’s cloud and AI ambitions.
Today, we are excited to share the progress made towards these commitments:
Scaling Infrastructure: The Indonesia Central Region. Microsoft’s cloud region in Indonesia, called Indonesia Central region, is set to launch in the second quarter of 2025. This is going to expand our global network of over 60 Azure regions worldwide, the most of any cloud provider. According to IDC’s latest research report3, once Indonesia Central region goes live:
- it will help to accelerate cloud adoption and generate around $2.5 billion new economic value. This is approximately 16.5% of the total $15.2 billion new economic value that Microsoft, our partners, and cloud-using customers are expected to generate over the next four years (2025-2028).
- it will help Microsoft, our partners, and customers to add 106,295 new jobs across manufacturing and resources, finance, communications and media, services, as well as government industry over the next four years (2025-2028).
Skilling at Scale: elevAIte Accelerating AI Talent Growth. As AI adoption surges, so does the need for AI-ready talents. Over the past two years of new AI era, Microsoft, together with partners, has helped to skill 704,342 people across Indonesia with the digital skills needed to thrive in today’s AI-enabled economy.
- This skilling initiative is further accelerated with the launch of elevAIte Indonesia in December 2024, a collaboration with the Ministry of Communication and Digital Affairs (Komdigi) to help skill 1 million people with specific AI skills by 2025.
- In just three months since its launch, elevAIte has welcomed 18 partners across government, industry, education, and communities, ensuring inclusive AI training across Indonesia.
Empowering Indonesia’s Changemakers
Technology alone does not drive progress, people do. The true impact of AI will not come from infrastructure and investment alone, but from the changemakers who use it to solve real-world problems and create meaningful impact.
Across Indonesia, changemakers are using AI to solve real-world challenges, shaping industries, and creating opportunities for their communities. Among them are three women from all walks of life engaged in the elevAIte Indonesia program – an educator integrating AI into classrooms, a civil servant enhancing decision-making with data-driven insights, and a homemaker leveraging AI for parenting and business exploration. Read their inspiring stories here.
By nurturing a generation of skilled AI talents, Indonesia can unlock a future where innovation flourishes, digital transformation accelerates, and technology serves as a force for inclusion and progress – because change, needs makers.
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1 2024 Work Trend Index Annual Report from Microsoft and LinkedIn
2 ibid
3 IDC Info Snapshot, sponsored by Microsoft, The Microsoft Cloud Dividend Snapshot: Indonesia, Doc. #US52734024, March 2025
Featured Image: [Left-right] Arief Suseno, AI National Skills Director Microsoft Indonesia, Habib Ali Hasan Al Bahar, Chairperson of LAZISNU PBNU, Marheni Sandra, Representative of Smart AI Women (PandAI), NU Care Global, Tia Dwi Setiani, Learning Designer Lead, Dicoding Indonesia, Malasari Lala, Learning Program Director, Biji-biji and Them, Dharma Simorangkir, President Director Microsoft Indonesia