Surabaya, 2-3 November 2023 – The Ministry of Cooperatives and SMEs in collaboration with the Indonesian Technology Innovation Foundation (INOTEK) and supported by the Sampoerna Entrepreneurship Training Center (SETC) held a Business Matching activity entitled Intimate Business Matching Program SME EPIC (Small Medium Enterprise Expo Investment Financing Crowdfunding) which aims to bring together SMEs that have been incubated with potential investors, funding institutions, buyers and partners. This program, which has been running since July, also aims to encourage expansion of access to financing and investment for SMEs.
While participating in the SME EPIC Program, participants have been provided with various training materials aimed at monitoring their readiness for the world of investment, starting from socializing various types of financing, business analysis to increase the CEO/business owner’s understanding of investment needs, training to create a standardized pitchdeck to mentoring and pitching.
Andromeda Qomariah, Head of the East Java Provincial SME Cooperative Service supports the implementation of this event and encourages East Java SMEs and startups to make optimal use of discussions and networking with potential partners, investors, financing institutions and security crowdfunding as well as with potential buyers. He expressed the hope that in the future activities like this could be carried out every year in East Java so that it could improve the economy of the East Java region at the opening of this event.
Assistant Deputy for SME Financing and Investment, Deputy for SMEs, Ministry of Cooperatives and SMEs, Temmy Satya Permana revealed that “MSMEs contribute greatly to the Indonesian economy with a contribution reaching 60.5% of National GDP. “However, with such a large contribution, it turns out that Indonesian MSMEs are still facing various challenges, where the MSME credit ratio is still relatively low and is only targeted to reach 30% in 2024.”
He conveyed the importance of business matching activities like this to bridge SMEs with business partners with an equal and mutually beneficial partnership pattern, where SMEs can get strategic markets to expand their business while business partners can find potential MSME products to meet their business supply needs.
In closing her remarks, Temmy also expressed her gratitude for the presence of business partners and hoped that this activity could become a forum for opening up market and financing opportunities and providing opportunities for Indonesian startups/MSMEs to maximize the sustainability of their businesses in order to strengthen the backbone of the Indonesian economy.
Intimate Business Matching was attended by 42 SMEs from the creative industry, FnB, agriculture and technology application sectors with investment requirements worth 21.7 billion Rupiah. Meanwhile, the financing institutions that took part in this event came from banking, venture capital, private investors, angel investors, crowdfunding and potential buyers.
Financing institutions and partners who attended this event were Sampoerna Entrepreneurship Training Center (SETC), UMG Idealab, Fath Capital, Skystar Capital, Shafiq Syariah Securities Crowdfunding, UMG Idealab, Indonesian Venture Capital and Startup Association (Amvesindo), FUNDEX, Urun RI, Spil Venture, Fath Capital, Nickel, Bank Mandiri, Bank Jatim, Bank Syariah Indonesia, INDIGO – Telkom, KADIN Indonesia, Ibu Rudy Souvenir Center, PT Moringa Gizi Bangsa, BPBRIN UNAIR, INAGI.
In line with this, Ivi Anggraeni as Executive Director of the INOTEK Foundation said that from his experience in fostering and assisting SMEs so far, many SMEs in Indonesia need financing but unfortunately they don’t even know about the various types of financing that exist in Indonesia so they are less able to target potential candidates. Prospective partners whose “business appetite” is appropriate and in accordance with the services/products they create. “Through the EPIC Program that we run, we help MSMEs to dissect their businesses and evaluate appropriate financing needs, one of which is by providing Investment Readiness Reports (IRR) to as many as 20 startups/MSMEs which can be used by themselves or by potential partners,” said Ivi.
Ivi hopes that MSME friends who take part in this program can apply the knowledge they have learned and pass it on to other MSME players. “In this way, they can jointly contribute to the progress of the Indonesian economy,” said Ivi.
