Young, ambitious, successful and hungry for more.

Most of Indonesia’s young entrepreneurs live under the radar. Their success stories are rarely published in mainstream media. It’s quite a shame, actually. Their stories could (and should) be a major catalyst to build a generation of young Indonesian’s that values dreams, optimism and hard work.

They are extraordinary people from ordinary backgrounds. They live among us, under the same political and economic condition, but have somehow broken the mold on how success is obtained.

One of the youngest of this breed is a property developer. He started his business career by selling various items, from shoes to kerosene. Currently, he is on to his fifth real estate project and has revenues in the tens of billions of Rupiahs. He is 23 years old.

Another daring entrepreneur could be considered a pioneer in the food franchise business. His success has essentially spurned a new industry (and imitators!), opening up thousands of employment opportunities and left many drooling when hearing about his firm’s astronomical figures, with revenues in the high tens of billions of rupiah annually. He will turn 26 this month.

One of the most low profile of the bunch is a humble chicken breeder that lives and does business (mainly) in Subang, West Java. He built his business with an inti-plasma model and has seen his revenues soar to the hundreds of billions of Rupiahs annually in just ten years since inception. His business is now the second largest of it’s kind in Asia. Not bad for a 32 year old.

Even more important than the (large) monetary benefits that these young entrepreneurs enjoy, they have proven to the nation that anything is possible. While their peers were complaining about the government’s incompetence, they went out to the real world and started building their empire, brick by brick (for some of them, literally). While their peers were saying “I can’t”, they were asking “How to”. While their peers were confined in that small secure box called the comfort zone, they were figuring out how to get out of it. Some of them left the formal school system but all of them intensified their pursuit for knowledge in the school of life.

These young entrepreneurs have broken the mold for the definition of success and how to gain it. They have followed their hearts and passions in pursuits of their dreams. They have contributed to Indonesia’s economy and inspired hundreds of others to do the same.

The most exciting thing of all; they are all just getting started.

Life Is Like a Game of Cards

We were all born with different preconditions.
Some were born rich, some were born poor.
Some pretty, some handsome (but everyone is beautiful).
Some with well connected parents, some not.
Some were born in a country where meritocracy is possible, some were born in a country where it isn’t.

Some call it God’s will,
others call it fate.
Warren Buffet calls it “The Ovarian Lottery”.

Whatever you prefer to call it, we do not have a hand in this. It’s a given.

To succeed in life, like in every game of cards, we need to figure out what’s in our hands. Then, we should maximize what we have, create a strategy to play our cards. It will be very senseless of you to wish for a different set of cards. Not only is it impossible, it also impedes your journey to success.

Winning is not about becoming numero uno. It’s about reaching the highest possible state in life, given what you have. So stop complaining that other people have it better than you. Because even if they do, it’s not a guarantee that they’ll win this game called life.

What matters in life is not where you’re from, it’s where you’re heading.
Realize that and you’re on your way to winning

Dreams Do Come True

Mid 2006

I was in the middle of a vast tea plantation. Tea bushes were all that I could see around me. I was alone. It was cold. It was midnight. It was very dark.

What To Do In Your Spare Time

Every person has experienced (and most probably will experience again) a certain period of spare time, where you have no serious issues to attend to. For entrepreneurs, it could be caused by the bottoming of the business cycle. For fresh graduates, it could be the time in between graduation and

Let’s Start a Meme: Turn Every Problem Into a Business Idea

The rules of the game are simple:

1) Find life’s critic. This is a person who has a very negative outlook on life. One that always complains about everything, but never does anything. I hope it’s not you.

The success story of Firman, the 10 year old scavenger boy

A while ago, I was checking out one of my businesses…….

It was almost midnight. It was cold. The rain was pouring down very hard. My mind began to wander off on how this rain had affected my sales. Until suddenly, my thoughts were disrupted when I caught a glimpse of a shadow. My eyes became transfixed on this little person.

What made me notice him was that he was picking and sorting out trash from the trash bin. In the rain. In cold weather. Almost midnight… His name is Firman. He’s 10 years old. He is a scavenger boy.

The Start of a New Journey

It’s been a long time I since my last post on entrepreneurship and my entrepreneurial endeavors. A lot has happened since ; I sold my businesses, met new people, realigned my goals and moved to the Capital. I have done all of this to pursue my “new” passion in the world of Finance and Investments. To start a new journey. To become a  financial entrepreneur.

I first stumbled upon this passion last year.

Alasan Dollar Jadi Mahal

Dalam beberapa hari terakhir kita menyaksikan dengan tercengang melemahnya nilai tukar rupiah terhadap dollar. Beberapa minggu lalu, satu dollar masih dihargai Rp. 9.300-an. Siang ini, satu dollar dihargai Rp.11.800. Rupiah sudah melemah lebih dari 20% tahun ini. Namun, kita tidak sendiri. Semua negara di dunia mengalami pelemahan nilai tukar. Tepatnya, semua negara kecuali Jepang dan Amerika.

Berikut adalah informasi yang bisa saya himpun dari pembicaraan dengan beberapa kawan yang berkecimpung di bidang ekonomi, moneter, usaha dan

Asal Usul Krisis Keuangan 2008

Saya menulis note ini karena merasa bahwa penjelasan tentang krisis ini dalam bahasa Indonesia sangat sulit untuk didapat. Padahal, krisis ini menyangkut kepentingan banyak, kalau tidak semua, orang.

Rasanya memang sudah sangat terlambat bagi saya untuk menulis note dengan tema ini. Krisinya sudah dimulai dari beberapa tahun lalu dan kondisi keuangan global dunia sudah (untuk sekarang) stabil. Namun saya berharap note ini akan mampu memberikan pengertian terhadap krisis yang kita hadapi. Baik bagi teman2, maupun bagi saya yang akan sangat menghargai jika teman2 mengkoreksi pemikiran atau fakta-fakta saya yang salah.

Amerika Serikat, Pertengahan 1990-an.

Warga Amerika mulai mendesak pemerintahannya untuk mempermudah kepemilikan rumah bagi warga yang kurang mampu. Dalam membeli rumah

Doi Moi

Aaaahh Vietnam. The country where the American Army fled humiliated several decades ago. War torn, this country was somewhat like what Iraq is now, besides the fact that Vietnam is a Communist State. The ruling party tried to enforce communism post-war. But the economic slump the country endured shortly after prompted the ruling party to try a new initiative; Doi Moi. Simply, Doi Moi is a bunch of economic initiatives that allow a somewhat free economy to coexist side by side with a communist government.

So how is Vietnam doing now? It is doing very well. To quote from the book, Microtrends (Mark J. Penn and E. Kinney Zalesne):

• The number of citizens with income of less than $1 a day dropped from 51% to 8%
• In Vietnam’s two largest cities, the middle class population doubled
• Personal entertainment spending has coubled since 2003
• The Nation’s economy grew at a rate of 8,3% a year in 2005. Making it one of the fastest growing economies in the world.

Ironically, all of this occured in a country where income taxes are high, power shortages ar the norm, corruption is widepsread, IP rights are not enforced, income in rural areas hasn’t risen as high as in the urban regions and the court system is in the mercy of the communist party. It may be a long shot, but a Gallup poll may explain the forces behind the country’s economic growth.

The poll states that Vietnam is one of the most optimistic countries in the world. 90% of it’s people are sure that the following years will be better than the present years. This has also been shown by the staggering amount of entrepreneurial activity the country has witnessed. As you all might know, optimisim and entrepreneurship go hand in hand. From the food industry (Check out the Pho 21 restaurant chain) to the technology industry (Vietnam is dubbed the next India), Vietnamese entrepreneurs are on their way to pull their country to success.

There are a lot of lessons that Indonesians can learn from the Vietnamese. The most important is probably on optimism. Oh come on people, if a war-torn communist state can be optimistic, why can’t a rich democratic country like ours be? I believe that whatever our current condition is, as long as we keep the flames of optimism burning, we can achieve whatever we want. As the wise like to say; where there is a will, there is a way.