So, Are We Different or Not? Indonesia’s Startup Scene Needs to Pick a Lane
Copy or create? Indonesia’s tech sector is stuck between local pride and global mimicry. What would a truly Indonesian startup model look like?
There’s a familiar rhythm to how Indonesia’s startup scene presents itself, depending on who’s listening. To investors and foreign media, it’s all about the parallels. “We’re the next India,” one deck claims. “No, China,” says another. “Actually, we’re like Silicon Valley, but more scalable.” These borrowed analogies roll off easily when the checkbook is open. But the moment criticism rolls in about poor exits, a talent bottleneck, or weak unit economics, the tone shifts. “Indonesia is different,” they say. “Context is everything.”
This flip between borrowed ambition and local exceptionalism has reflects a deeper identity problem: the ecosystem wants to be globally appealing without giving up the comfort of being locally unaccountable.
Are we catching up to a model that works elsewhere, or inventing one from scratch? Because if we’re doing both at once, we’re effectively doing neither with much clarity.
That tension trickles into how companies are built, how founders are picked, and how capital flows. The result is an ecosystem that’s always promising to grow up into something, but never quite sure what it’s supposed to become when it gets there.
Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V: The Copycat Economy With Local Flavor
Indonesia’s tech scene has mastered a very specific skill: making foreign ideas look local just enough to get funded. It’s not innovation in the truest sense, but localization-without-transformation. Take a proven model from the US or India, swap in Bahasa Indonesia, maybe throw in a batik pattern or two, and you’ve got yourself a market-ready startup. Or at least, a deck that sounds good to a regional VC.
Pitch meetings often start with a familiar line: “It’s like Uber, but for rural logistics.” Or: “We’re the Stripe for warungs.” It’s an easy sell because the people holding the money tend to trust patterns they already understand. That trust is rarely extended to anything too original, too context-specific, or too unfamiliar. So the incentives are clear: copy, localize just enough, and promise scale.
This approach has worked to an extent. Indonesia’s most successful startups borrowed ideas before building them into something culturally relevant. But that model doesn’t scale forever. Many founders now copy without adapting, assuming that what works in Bangalore or Palo Alto will function just fine in Kupang or Palu.
It won’t. Indonesia is not a blank canvas waiting for the next global solution to arrive. It’s a layered, messy, beautiful economy where logistical friction, informal trade, and diverse human behavior shape every aspect of business. There is no one-size-fits-all here, but that message doesn’t land well in a boardroom three time zones away.
The result is a proliferation of startups that pitch global ideas, deliver half-local experiences, and struggle with real-world adoption. Not because the ideas are bad, but because they were never built for this terrain. They were repackaged, not rethought. Familiarity got them funded, but it doesn’t guarantee they’ll work.
Venture Capital as Temporary Tourism
Let’s talk about the money. Because underneath all the startup optimism and slide decks filled with batik-infused branding lies a more awkward truth:
Much of the capital fueling Indonesia’s tech boom is just passing through.
On paper, Indonesia looks like a dream. A massive population, young demographics, rising digital adoption, and plenty of "problems" to be "solved." The perfect pitch. Global VC firms certainly think so. They’ve set up shop, partnered with local operators, and filled their quarterly reports with phrases like “the next billion” and “emerging middle class.”
Money comes in with enthusiasm but leaves quietly at the first sign of market friction. Profitable exits often end in Singaporean real estate portfolios. LPs are headquartered in Tokyo, Silicon Valley, or Singapore. Founders who were once celebrated as ecosystem heroes are now splitting their time between private wealth managers and new passports.
And what about the capital that should be reinvested? In many cases, it isn’t. Instead, it gets reabsorbed into safer, more traditional sectors. Land. Malls. Maybe a chain of coffee shops.
Even local wealth, which should in theory have the strongest stake in national innovation, rarely backs early-stage tech. Not because they’re ignorant, but because they’re cautious... and perhaps because they’ve seen this movie before.
All of this raises a difficult question:
if no one is sticking around to support the next wave, are we really building an ecosystem?
Real ecosystems recycle. They evolve. They compound. What we have right now feels more like a series of expeditions. The photos are good. The outcomes, less so.
The Founder Formula: Elite, Fluent, Fundable
Funding in Indonesia’s startup scene often flows less to those solving the hardest problems and more to those who signal familiarity to investors. If you're young, well-spoken in English, educated abroad, and have a few years at a well-known tech firm (preferably Gojek or Tokopedia) you're already halfway to a term sheet before the pitch even begins.
The right resume, the right LinkedIn headline, the right shorthand for risk-averse capital. These founders are fluent in the unspoken rules of venture funding. They understand what VCs want to hear, how to package ambition, and which words belong in the “market size” slide.
Meanwhile, the person who actually understands how credit rotates through a traditional market in Surabaya, or how fishermen in Maluku really transact, rarely makes it past the front desk. They may be building something genuinely valuable. But they’re not considered investable because they don’t come with the references, the polish, or the social proof.
This leads to a kind of founder monoculture. A startup class that largely comes from the same few schools, works the same jobs, moves in the same circles. Their ideas may vary, but their background rarely does.
We talk often about “local context,” but when capital moves, it still chases the same few people with the same story arcs. This isn’t just about who gets funded. It’s about whose version of innovation gets taken seriously, and whose gets quietly sidelined, no matter how relevant it is to the people and problems outside Jakarta’s inner ring.
So What Would a Truly Indonesian Ecosystem Look Like? (And Could It Actually Work?)
What if Indonesia’s startup ecosystem stopped trying to retrofit foreign models and started designing its own? What if the phrase “we’re different” wasn’t just a fallback when global comparisons become inconvenient, but the starting point for strategy?
That would require more than tweaks. It would mean building capital structures aligned with how businesses actually grow here. Longer time horizons, smaller ticket sizes, and flexibility that matches the rhythm of an archipelagic economy where delivery trucks share road space with goats.
It would mean replacing the growth-at-all-costs venture capital model with something closer to venture stewardship. Capital that is patient, relational, and grounded in trust. Tools like revenue-based financing or cooperative funds may not have the same buzz as “Series A,” but they’re better suited for SMEs, community enterprises, and sectoral innovators who actually live where the problems are.
It would also mean redefining who gets to be a founder. Not just those with pitch training and polished English, but those with lived experience and hard-earned insight. The ones solving problems from the inside out, not the outside in.
A truly Indonesian model would prioritize sustainability, inclusion, and relevance. It would build slowly, but it would build with depth. And no, it wouldn’t attract every global VC. That’s fine. The goal isn’t to make Indonesia look like a mini Silicon Valley. It’s to make it work. For Indonesians.
If that means fewer unicorns and more durable, locally rooted companies, maybe that’s the upgrade.
So. Are we different or not?
Because at the moment, we’re trying to have it both ways. We wrap ourselves in narratives of local wisdom, resilience, and cultural nuance, while quietly importing venture logic, founder archetypes, and success metrics from playbooks written in California. When something lands, we call it proof that Indonesia is special. When something flops, we blame infrastructure, education gaps, or “local complexity.”
That’s not strategic flexibility.
It’s time to stop hedging. Time to choose. That means being intentional about who we fund, what business models we support, and how we define value. Are we chasing valuation spikes, or building businesses that last through volatility and elections? Are we trying to impress the global venture circuit, or actually address local needs?
Indonesia doesn’t have to mimic someone else’s trajectory. The opportunity is not to be the next Silicon Valley or Shenzhen. The opportunity is to become an ecosystem that is deeply contextual, grounded, and long-term in its thinking.
But that can only happen if we stop flipping between borrowed narratives and actually commit to building one of our own.