BLOCK71 x Talkabot.id

Interview with Distra Vantari, CEO and Founder 

In this particular series of the Founder’s Story, BLOCK71 Bandung had an interesting chat with Distra Vantari, the CEO and founder of Talkabot.id. Talkabot.id, as the name suggests, is a chatbot platform that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to engage with clients. Besides its ability to serve thousands of clients at once, the Talkabot.id chat platform allows for human take-over features and contains a customizable inventory management system. This aspect of the chat platform is revolutionary as it allows users to design their own way of communication with their clients. 

Distra’s inspiration to create Talkabot.id stems from his personal experience with his friends who often create their own brands and promote their products on social media like Facebook and Instagram. He realized that while people can successfully promote goods online using e-commerce, it is challenging for them to engage effectively with their clients as their brands grow. Often, these expanding brands find themselves in situations where they are unable to cope with an overwhelming influx of queries from their clients. This perennial problem then sparked the idea for Distra to combine AI and the chatbot platform to create Talkabot.id.

Like many other businesses, the founder and CEO of Talkabot.id have concrete plans for further expansion. When asked about the goals for Talkabot.id, Distra replied confidently ‘by the end of this year, I want to be able to reach about 500 brands’. Beyond his business goals, one of Distra’s personal goals is also to transform the skeptical mindsets of Indonesian brands towards technology. At present, many Indonesian brands are reluctant to incorporate technology as part of their operations as there is a misconception that it would be a hindrance to their businesses. Distra hopes that with his chatbot system, brands will start to understand that technology can benefit their operations immensely.

Despite Talkabot.id’s stable progress now, the journey has not always been smooth for Distra and the Talkabot.id team. When asked about his journey of creating Talkabot.id, Distra described the journey as ‘fun and hard at the same time’. In fact, the hardest part of Distra’s journey happened just last year in December when the company incurred a debt of over IDR 200 million. The company almost stopped all operations. Despite almost giving up and going back to an office job, Distra persevered and found a way to bounce back into the business. His strategy lies in proper job designation and selecting the right people for the job. While the Talkabot.id founder focused his energy on fundraising, he entrusted the operations and sales component to the rest of his team. The company also restructures fast to avoid making mistakes. Today, Talkabot.id has continuously received funding twice in a row from Kemenristekdikti, an accomplishment that not many start-ups can claim. 

Distra takes his motivation in his entrepreneurial journey from the most game-changing businesses in Indonesia, including Go-Jek, Bukalapak, and Tokopedia. He hopes that with Talkabot.id, he can make a similar impact on the Indonesian landscape like his predecessors. His desire to create a product that can make a positive impact on society was also one of the reasons why Distra persevered through the company’s lowest phase. 

Finally, Distra leaves budding entrepreneurs with 2 main advice to avoid pitfalls:

1. Always think of the ‘why’ when you create your product

2. Don’t make assumptions without validating it!

Cliche as it sounds, but when creating a product, it is important to constantly remind yourself why you started out in the first place, instead of focusing on the profits. It’s ok to make assumptions too, but market validation is crucial to test the amount of truth in those assumptions. 

Find Talkabot.id on Instagram: @talkabot.id

BLOCK71 x Mycotech

Interview with Adi Reza, CEO and Co-founder

BLOCK71 Bandung brings back our second feature of the Founder’s Story! In this story, we follow Adi Reza, CEO and Co-founder of Mycotech as he brings us along his journey of creating a more sustainable vision of the world by harnessing mushrooms. Mycotech started out in 2012 when the team discovered the potential of mushrooms in creating eco-friendly materials in a humble kitchen. Since then, Mycotech’s access to production labs has expanded across the globe. 

The motivation to establish Mycotech comes from Adi and the Mycotech’s team love for the environment, as well as concern over the sustainability of producing leather. Cow-based leather production is unsustainable in terms of production and procession as the chemical treatment can heavily pollute water bodies if not done properly. In addition, Adi added that rearing cows make up the third largest contributor of global emissions. This calls for a new solution for leather replacement that is not only sustainable, but also affordable. And this is exactly what Mycotech is about - creating bio-based materials that can positively impact the environment. 

Besides the environmental aspect, Mycotech has also been making social change by empowering mushroom farmers. The CEO and founder of Mycotech highlights that there are as much as 43,000 mushroom farmers across Indonesia. By partnering up with these farmers to obtain their initial materials, Mycotech not only provides them with additional income, the company itself also saves on investment cost. 

The journey of Mycotech has been an extremely interesting one. It is also an unexpected story of discovery and learning. Mycotech started out as a food gourmet company that sells mushrooms as snacks. However, with the discovery of mycelium technology, the co-founders decided to save the profits from the gourmet business and invest them into research. A year of testing in Adi’s mom’s pantry did not work out as smoothly as they had planned. However, like many successful entrepreneurs, Adi and team learnt from their mistakes fast. Access to international labs, as well as joint research projects helped greatly in expediting the technology improvement process. 

When asked about his biggest inspiration, Adi pointed to his wife as the biggest influence in his care for sustainability. Her eco-consciousness encouraged Adi and the Mycotech team to solve environmental problems using technology. Seeing his clients share the same vision of wanting to make a positive environmental impact is also a huge source of motivation for him. 

Now, Mycotech’s technology is spreading quickly across the region. Just recently, Mycotech exhibited at the SG Innovfest Unbound 2019, where more than 100+ startups, brands, entrepreneurs, investors and corporates met for an exchange of ideas. As Mycotech propels onto the global platform, BLOCK71 is excited to follow their journey ahead. 

Find Mycotech on Instagram at: @mycotech

Website: https://www.mycote.ch/

BLOCK71 Bandung launches it very first Startup Showcase! University students from all around Bandung were invited to attend this event. The Bandung Startup Showcase aims to introduce undergraduates to the startup ecosystem and inspire students to pursue their startup dreams. Featuring BLOCK71’s signature event, the Kopichat, founders and CEOs from 4 startups shared useful and interesting insights about their experiences. Approximately 40 students attended the event and got the chance to network with the startup founders. 

In this series, Mr Alvin Junianto Lan from EcoMatcher, Mr Distra Vantari from Talkabot, Mr Gerryadi Agusta from KAABA, and Mr Hendra Araji from Everidea shared their entrepreneurial journey in an honest conversation. Ranging from the sustainability to virtual reality, the attendees got the chance to delve deeper into the challenges and joys of working in a startup across different industries. As the event came to a close, enthusiastic students lingered behind to networking with the 4 startup founders.

We hope that this has been a fruitful and inspiring session for everyone!

As a startup founder, have you ever struggled with understanding and creating legal documents for your company? Have you ever experienced confusion over the required legal documents to be fulfilled and what the functions are? Have you got involved in a legal dispute between partners or co-founders and did not know how to solve the issue?

Those things can possibly happen if you are lacking legal skills and do not adhere to the required legal documents for your business. It has been a common perception that legal skills and documents are challenging to comprehend. However, it is very crucial for a startup to have at least a basic and essential knowledge of binding law and regulations before problems arise.

To overcome this perception and to provide legal skill development for you all, IF Academy x Legalku will hold a series of six comprehensive workshops about Legal Essentials for Startup. So what are you going to learn in this series?

1. Understanding Legal Documents in A Flash 

   Tuesday, June 9th 2020, 2-4 PM (GMT+7)

Did you know that 30% of the tasks that need to be fulfilled in the early stage of our startup involves legal documents such as legal agreements, minutes of meeting, letters, pitch deck with non-disclosure agreements, and related company deeds? 

Legal document administration and comprehension skills are very crucial in all kinds of businesses. The lack of understanding in essential functions of legal documents will cost us a lot of time and increase financial risks once the business is established and running. However, it is a common perspective that comprehending and creating legal documents is very challenging to learn, which led the founders to ignore or procrastinate those skills until it is way too late.

In order to help you to easier learn your legal skills and handle documents, Innovation Factory and Legalku will deliver “Understanding Legal Documents in A Flash '' to facilitate you all, no matter what kind of background you have, to understand and make legal documents faster but also effective and thorough. 

In this class, you will learn about:

• Identifying legal documents based on the business needs
• Understanding the main clause and the general clause in an agreement
• Analyzing risk fast in an agreement
• Taking a faster decision on whether a document can be signed or not

After this class, you will be able to do:

• Legal Document Identification
• Fast Review of Legal Document
• Legal Clause Screening
• Risk Clustering for Management

2. The Correct Way to Make Founders Agreement 

Thursday, June 11th 2020, 2-4 PM (GMT+7)

Have you ever heard about the case between Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg and Winklevoss? This conflict over idea and code ownership of UConnect is a classic example of why it is crucial to create a founders’ agreement in startups. Also, did you know that 70% of businesses experience disputes or split in between its founders? This can affect negatively on the business. Founders’ are the voice of reason in a startup and disputes among them will likely end up in conflict over brand, products, employee, or business ownership. 

This is why Founders’ Agreement is needed, even in the very early stages of the startup. This agreement has a significant effect on the commitment of the founders and to avoid conflict if a split happens. This agreement will contain essential points to ensure all the founders play based on their roles and responsibilities, so the conflict between them can be minimized. 

With that in mind, Innovation Factory and Legalku will deliver “The Correct Way to Make The Founders’ Agreement '' for you all startup founders to optimize the role in the business and minimize the risk of conflict. 

In this class, you will learn about:

• Analyzing the expectations of the founders
• Deciding cooperation stages and steps between founders
• Identifying clauses that need to cooperate in the agreement
• Implementing example of clauses based on real-life cases
• Analyzing functions of every founder to be involved in the agreement

After this class, you will be able to do:

• Basic Contract Drafting
• Risk Mitigation
• Negotiation
• People Management

3. Understanding Legal on Investment

Tuesday, June 16th 2020, 2-4 PM (GMT+7)

Did you know that 8 out of 10 entrepreneurs faced a struggle in the phase of handling investors? It is usually due to their lack of experience and information about how to negotiate and decide the portions for the investor and for them. When this happens, a founder can potentially lose a huge portion of share of the company. This is of course not the result that we want to achieve after getting an investment, isn’t it?

Before finding an investment, a startup founder needs to prepare the required documents such as pitch deck, market research, and many kinds of legal documents. Legal aspect is one of the most important factors of consideration for investors before investing in a startup. This shows the level of responsibility, determination, and discipline of its founders that certainly will affect their performance in doing business. 

To prepare legal aspects before getting investment, it is important to involve a lawyer or someone who understands legal. However, it is also advised to the founders to understand it so they wont be making risky decisions too easily. Therefore, IF Academy X Legalku will have a session about “Understanding Legal on Investment”.

In this class, you will learn about:

• Categorizing Investors
• Creating an investment timeline
• Categorizing investment sources
• Identifying requirements that have to be fulfilled and prepared before finding an investor
• Identifying the steps that have to be taken by a company to get the investment. 

After this class, you will be able to do:

• Investment Planning
• Due Diligence Preparation
• Negotiation
• Non-Disclosure Agreement Drafting
• Investment Agreement Drafting

4. How to Have A Safe Collaboration Agreement

Thursday, June 18th, 2020, 2-4 PM (GMT+7)

Collaboration and cooperation is a very significant determining factor in the growth of a business. Many startups face problems and even fail because they are unable to identify the right partner and positioning in the cooperation. When that happens, there is always a possibility that a partner will become a competitor in the future, even hijacking our best employees down to the point when our business has nothing left. 

To avoid this from happening, a startup needs a special strategy to choose collaboration partners, create limitations and authority regulations, and joint operation clauses. These aspects have to follow the rules of ethics and binding law. This is something that needs to be understood by startup founders before doing any strategic partnership or collaboration. 

With that being said, IF Academy x Legalku will bring you a session about “How to Have A Safe Collaboration Agreement”. 

In this class, you will learn about:

• Categorizing the right collaboration partners before making an agreement
• Conducting risk assessments and mitigation between us and partner in the collaboration agreement
• Measuring the performance of collaboration and
• Breaking up the agreement with a partner safely

After this class, you will be able to do:

• Partnership Clustering
• Collaboration Agreement Drafting
• Negotiation
• Dispute Resolution

5. Smart Layoff Strategy

Tuesday, June 23rd 2020, 2-4 PM (GMT+7)

As a business owner, laying off the employee is never an easy task. Especially in this time of crisis, there are a lot of companies laying off employees due to financial reasons. In contrast with firing, laying off is not caused by bad performance, fraud, or attitude problems of the employee. A layoff can be temporary or permanent, and because there is a possibility of it becoming permanent, there are things to be considered before conducting it such as protecting the company secrets, assignment handover, and compensation mechanism. 

To handle this matter effectively, a company needs an effective strategy about conducting layoff. There is a need to consider many factors such as ethical code and regulations. These aspects are going to be talked about in IF Academy x Legalku session, “Smart Layoff Strategy”. 

In this class, you will learn about:

• Identifying regulations about laying off employees
• Creating a timeline and strategies before laying off employees
• Identifying the rights of laid-off employees
• Identifying legal documents that are needed before conducting a layoff

After this class, you will be able to do:

• People Management
• Human Capital Strategy
• Manpower Dispute Resolution
• Layoff Documentation

6. How to Win A Negotiation

Thursday, June 25th 2020, 2-4 PM (GMT+7)

The most popular and significant negotiation process in developing a startup is in the time of investment pitching and share acquisition. The lack of this acumen can cause founders to lose trust from partners or get an undesired amount of share in their business. Negotiations take an ability to convey our point clearly, to discuss at the same level, and to get win-win solutions for everyone involved. But there is also a competitive negotiation that absolutely requires one party to take all. These models are certainly different one and another in terms of implementation. 

Negotiation skill is not something that can be mastered by everybody. Theoretical comprehension, experience, and strategy can affect the whole process of negotiation. To enhance the skill of negotiation, it takes technique and tactics, confidence to convince, and problem-solving. These skills are going to be learned in our session “How to Win A Negotiation.”

In this class, you will learn about:

• Understanding negotiation steps (pre-negotiation, on-negotiation, binding final agreement, and implementation of the end goals)
• Delivering effective reasoning to conduct the negotiation
• Conducting negotiation simulations with the instructor and other participants

After this class, you will be able to do:

• Negotiation
• Background Research
• Body Language on Negotiation
• Win and Lose Conceptual

So why do you HAVE to join this workshop?

You are going to get comprehensive study materials, a certificate, tests to measure your comprehension and a free one-on-one session with legal experts from @Legalku. You also will be provided with drafts and templates to explore at home!

You can choose one of the six workshops based on your needs, or join the full series and get a very special price!

Click HERE for registration and get a special discount by using voucher code LegalBLOCK71.

Limited seat! Grab it fast!

With the prolonged pandemic that has been occurring these past months, offline concerts are one of many things everybody is longing for; singing along with the squad, family, or beloved ones. Since we have been implementing physical distancing in the past few months, everything has gone online. So does the concert. Unfortunately, despite many virtual concerts being held, there are many deficiencies in the concept and the concert itself so that the experience aspect doesn't feel qualified. Seeing opportunities in people who miss watching a concert, Modular comes to fulfill their needs using AR Performance. 

What is AR? 

AR or Augmented Reality combines the real world into a virtual world through a video, image, or even 3D animation. According to Modular, AR is a growing technology as it is forecasted to hit some big numbers globally in 2023.

Let’s get back to the concert!

Pandemic and social distancing have changed our behavior. With the absence of offline concerts, something surely has been missing, especially for those who enjoy offline performances. Eventually, since music is a part of many people’s lives, online concerts came up as a solution. They usually use Zoom, Youtube, and any other streaming platform to create an online concert. However, the experience offered by these platforms can sometimes be insufficient. This kind of barrier has created a huge impact on the creative industry ecosystem. 

Answering that problem, "Modular" is born so that we can enjoy concerts or any other entertainment performance in one application using Augmented Reality.

How does Modular work?

• You can download Modular on iOS or Google Play
• Jump into the app and sign up.
• Scan and point your camera at a flat surface so that the stage will pop up.
• You absolutely can pinch and zoom the stage. This is called Interactive AR Performance. 
• You can also record and share your experience using Modular to your Social Media. 

What is the value that Modular really wanna share?

• The immersive experience of enjoying music concerts or any other performance (soon). Where else can we enjoy a music concert in only one app? Modular is the answer to that. 
• Positive Vibes. They know that this pandemic has been a hard time for all of us. The pandemic is challenging. They hope that modular can help you get through it. 
• Creating a new revenue stream for the musicians and other entertainers.

However, one thing to point out here is that Modular comes not to give you the same exact experience you get when you watch a regular offline concert. With unlimited options and concepts offered by its augmented reality technology, Modular wants you to feel more imaginative and immersive with your online performance experience. 

So, what do you think? Are you ready to explore and have more fun with this AR platform? Share your thoughts through our social media here!

When we're talking about Google, we talk about how genius the platform is. From the research that has been done by Bain and Company, Google is the integrated platform that is currently most widely used by major brands because it can further increase customer engagement by offering relevant customer experiences. So many things you can do with this platform. You can increase digital presence with ads, measure and analyze your ads performance using analytics, and even optimize your website with their A/B testing tools. 

Google also pays attention to us as their customer. They provide us with some online training which we can join for free. For example, Google Skillshop and Digital Garage. 

Google Skillshop is free online training to develop your skills for Google workplace tools. If you have no idea what their tools are, how can you use them, you can go to Google Skillshop and they will teach you how. Besides free, you can also get a certification if you have completed the training. Different from Google Skillshop, Digital Garage is a free digital training where you can get new skills for a digital world. It helps you discover tools to make your business succeed and prepare for the career you want, especially in digital.

Speaking of career, Holy Theodore as Account Strategist of Google shares us a step by step how to start your career in digital marketing!

1. You have to find the right company. If you're sure that digital marketing is the thing you wanna explore, then you have to find a company that will help you to learn about that. Please focus on how they will help you develop your digital marketing skill, not on the position or money. So, what are the criteria? The company that has a growth mindset! Means, they're not only wanna grow 1,2,3, or 4 times. But they wanna grow until 10 times! And they will figure out how to scale up to that level. 
2. Seize the opportunity. Find the company that has room for us to experiment with. If they give us the opportunity, we can freely explore the digital marketing strategies that we wanna implement. Don't forget to prove to your employee that the experimental opportunities you get will provide useful insights for the company. And last but not least;
3. A company that focuses on digital. Find the company that starts its campaigns on a digital platform. If you wanna be the expert, then don't find a company that still focuses on conventional and don't seem like moving into digital. And don't forget that the world of digital marketing is moving fast, so try not to start in a company whose bureaucracy is too long and convoluted.

It's kinda normal if people mostly like to learn more about digital. If you ever wonder, conventional marketing has cost us a bunch of money, indeed.  You pay millions for one way ads communication that we don't even know what exactly the feedback is. If we can compare to marketing nowadays or so-called digital marketing, this would be so much more effective. Everyone is using it, who doesn't?

But first, we wanna break the stereotype that said, Digital Marketing is kinda like a money machine. You just have to put your ads on the internet, and BOOM! Your business will grow and you'll get a lot of profit. We're sorry to say that it's not that simple. If your product is bad, no matter how much money you spend on ads, nobody would come back for more. 

Well, Digital marketing could be the money machine if you already find the sweet spot of your product. Where to find it? It's between the 4P of marketing strategies. It's between Price, Product, Promotion, and Place. You have to make sure that the four of them are optimal, so then you can have your money machine!

Any other things you wanna discuss with us? Click here to contact us through social media!

On August 26th, these two great people with different backgrounds were invited by BLOCK71 to have a chat about things that many startups definitely will question. It's Agustiadi as Program Director of Innovation Factory and Agung as CEO of Warung Pintar, talking about the business model of a startup.

Have you ever heard of a unicorn startup? The unicorn that give an impact on many people, the unicorn that has a high revenue. Well, building a startup that will turn out to become a unicorn isn't that easy. Some startups still prioritize their growth without having a plan on how to build a sustainable business. Whereas, the founder needs to pay attention to how their business model is going to be.

So, how important is the business model?

Many people say that "every time we invest in a startup, we invest in people." Initially, if you want to invest, the first thing you have to focus on is the founder itself. Is the founder good? Does the founder care about the problem and the value they wanna give? Because as Agus said, he believes that a good startup founder will grow up with the right business model. If you have a good business model but the founder isn't as good as it is, it will end up nothing. 

While the founder is something that definitely will come first, the business model is still important in the startup journey. But it's not important to figure out the right business model in the beginning. A few things you have to focus on are those who are passionate about the problem they're trying to solve; those that are trying to provide value in whatever they're trying to do; and along the way, it's important to figure out the right business model so then you can build a sustainable venture. 

And speaking of value, it's the most important thing when you first start to build a business. You have to build the value based on the problem! What's the market's problem? What's the value we wanna bring? and of course, how can you make money from that? 

For Agung who still runs Warung Pintar for about 3 years, finding the right tune of the business model is hard. It happens iteratively. They still have to find out and turn in their business model. As he said that a startup by definition is a company that grows very fast, and again if the business model is stagnant or it can't follow the market, then we do it wrong. And at the end of the day, how you create value and how you make money from the value that you created matters the most. A business model is not something static. A business model that might work today, might not work in 1,2, or 3 years later. So then again, it's something that you have to fully pay attention to. What's the market needed, is what we're gonna bring them into. 

Meet the StartUp: BLOCK71 X EcoMatcher - Building Impact and Becoming a Partner of the United Nations!

An Interview with Technical Director and Software Engineer of EcoMacther

In early April 2021, BLOCK71 had the opportunity to do an interview with one of the BLOCK71 Bandung community startups, EcoMatcher. We invite Alvin Junianto Lan as the Technical Director and Jovian Christianto as the Software Engineer to share their insightful stories in developing EcoMatcher. In this article, we will discuss EcoMatcher as a startup that raises environmental issues, Alvin and Jovian's journey into the world of startups, in developing EcoMatcher, and BLOCK71's involvement in EcoMatcher's journey. 

Interesting, right? 

Get to Know EcoMatcher

EcoMatcher is a B-Corp Certified Social Enterprise that serves a platform that allows companies to improve their businesses while helping to tackle the climate crisis in a clear, transparent, and accountable manner. EcoMatcher provides a digital platform for digitizing tree planting. With this technology the users can find out the data about their planted tree, such as its picture, location, owner, down to its development and impact. By using those datas, through EcoMatcher, companies can plant trees and utilize them in innovative ways, such as digital gifts that are used by their clients for various purposes, such as co, special occasions gifts, customer loyalty programs, or even adding them as an employee reward. EcoMatcher offers a business that allows companies to improve their businesses by doing sustainable business in order to make an impact not only on the economic aspect, but also on the natural aspect.

Meet Alvin and Jovian

Alvin and Jovian used to be campus friends at the Bandung Institute of Technology. Alvin started joining EcoMatcher as an intern for 3 months in EcoMatcher, Hong Kong. Alvin joined as a front-end developer at Hong Kong to help develop EcoMatcher, which was still in the early stage startup. After going through a 3-month internship, Alvin returned to Indonesia to continue his studies as well as a part time employee at EcoMacther. Until now, he became a Technical Director at EcoMatcher. Different story from Alvin, Jovian, who is Alvin's friend, joins EcoMatcher when Alvin was offered an offer to join EcoMatcher as a back-end Engineer. Then, until now, Jovian is a Software Engineer at EcoMatcher.

Sees opportunities in the global market

Joining an early stage startup was not easy. Uncertain business conditions and immature business prospects are often avoided by most people, but not Alvin and Jovian. Alvin and Jovian can see a great opportunity in the EcoMatcher idea. They see that ideas are new and interesting ideas. EcoMatcher also has an excellent opportunity to compete in the global market and can take opportunities in the global market. Alvin also added that EcoMacther is not only a business that has an impact on the economy, but can also help preserve the environment and have an impact on tree planters in several countries in the world.

Working at startup, you can learn everything

Many people say working at a startup is quite different from working in a company. That fact applies to Alvin and Jovian. Alvin thinks working as an engineer at a startup is just coding, but in reality he has to take care of many things. Likewise, Jovian, who has experience working in large companies, is aware of a different working environment. While working at startups, both of them not only do their main tasks as engineers, but also do design, content, business development, legality, finance, even editing videos. Working at a startup will allow you to learn many things. 

Community is one of the important thing to grow your startup

Meet a group of people who are interested in one thing in common is an important part of our life. This also applies to startups, meeting with some communities and people with the same interests can provide good knowledge and insights. EcoMatcher discovered BLOCK71 in 2018 and started working in the co-working space provided by BLOCK71 Bandung. Equipped with comfortable facilities and a supportive work environment, EcoMatcher decided to become a startup community in BLOCK71 Bandung. For Alvin and Jovian, BLOCK71 not only provides facilities, but also embraces its startup community by conducting community gatherings and events, connecting with other startups and investors, and other communities' activities.

Dream big, Execute!

Having big dreams is a good thing. But, doing nothing would make it a waste. The consistent execution in every business process will slowly make our dreams come true. EcoMatcher, is slowly developing from one country to another, has now officially become a partner of the United Nation for tree planting for the next 2 years starting from planting trees in Ecuador through one of the UN foundations. In the future, Alvin and Jovian hope that their business will continue to grow and be known all over the world, including Indonesia. Hopefully the ecomatcher growth business will develop, be known out there, and the impact that people feel from ecomatcher can be felt, and become an example of a tech startup that has a lot of impact.

Any other things you wanna discuss with us? Click here to contact us through social media!

Find Ecomatcher on Instagram at: @ecomatcher

Website: ecomacther.com/welcome/

MEET THE STARTUP: BLOCK71 X IDCLOUDHOST

An Interview with Co-Founder and Chief Marketing Officer of IDCloudHost

In April 2021, BLOCK71 had the opportunity to do an interview with one of the BLOCK71 Indonesia event's participants, IDCloudHost. We invite Muhammad Mufid Luthfi as the Co-Founder and Chief Marketing Officer to share his insightful journey in developing IDCloudHost. In this article, we will discuss the success journey behind IDCLoudHost, IDCloudHost as a startup and their impact on society, and BLOCK71's involvement in IDCloudHost's journey.

Interesting, right?

Get to Know IDCloudHost

IDCloudHost (PT Cloud Hosting Indonesia) is a provider of Cloud Provider with various choices of Data Center locations, services provided include domain registration, cloud hosting, servers (VPS & Dedicated Server), domain reseller & hosting, and others. Established in April 2015, IDCloudHost has a vision to become the largest, most comprehensive, and trusted Indonesian web provider company by bringing social values ​​to support the digital ecosystem in Indonesia. Entering its 6th year, IDCloudHost currently has more than 100,000 customers and continues to grow.

Right Moment Make a Fast Acceleration

IDCloudHost started as a group of college students in 2015. Came from ideas and frequent conversations, finally a group of college-students created IDCloudHost. Unexpectedly, IDCloudHost's growth was growing very fast with growth reaching 6-8 times from the previous year. One of the factors that accelerate this business development is the moment. 2015 is the right moment for IDCloudHost, where in 2015 digital ecosystems such as startups, hackathons, and others are experiencing rapid growth. This moment is the right moment so that IDCloudHost is on the right path in its growth process. Starting in 2015, the need for digitization per year in Indonesia continues to increase, internet users continue to increase, and others. This is the basis for IDCloudHost to continue to innovate in digitization.What a surprise!

Be Consistent and Believe in the Process

In the first to third years, IDCloudHost is in the bootstrapping stage, where bootstrapping is a startup without external capital. At this stage, Mufid and friends are more focused on investing in income to turn over funds as an asset to run a business. From the turnover of these funds, the profits obtained will be bought by assets gradually. During the 3 years of implementing this strategy, Mufid and friends were able to have more than 5 Data Centers in several locations before any investment came in. Through this strategy, Mufid sees the high efficiency that IDCloudhHost can do.

From Just a Sharing Session at BLOCK71, Resulted in Getting the Investment

At the end of 2019, Mufid and friends attended a sharing session held by BLOCK71 Bandung. From the sharing session with Achmad Zaky, IDCloudHost received funding from Achmad Zaky. IDCloudHost was not looking for investment at all for its business development, Mufid and his friends only had the intention to tell about their experiences. At the beginning, Mufid did not have much expectations, but only intended to study  and learn with Achmad Zaky. From this event, IDCloudHost received a followup from Achmad Zaky until Achmad Zaky became one of IDCloudHost investors. Not only investing, Ahmad Zaky also indirectly became a mentor for Mufid and friends. Ahmad Zaky also introduced IDCloudHost to his network so that IDCloudHost gets more referrals, and the result is beyond expectation!

Expectations and Reality

Mufid was not so surprised by the startup environment because during his university years Mufid had started developing startups. With his various experiences and businesses, Mufid has undergone various jobs such as marketing, business development, UI / UX, etc. At the beginning of development, many things were done by one person because of the small number of tablespoons, but from there Mufid could learn many things. Thankfully, currently IDCloudHost has been developing very well.

Not only Focusing on Profit, Making Social Impact is a Must! 

One thing that makes Mufid happy and stays still until now at IDCloudHost is IDCloudHost help and invests in the social sector. Investments made around 15-20% of income are allocated to social programs such as free food, make facilities in mosques, cooperation with SMEs and NGOs, and providing scholarships to study at Telkom Univesity. As of 2020 there are around 1500 schools assisted by IDCloudHost, 200 NGOs, and many more. These social programs are one of the contributions that have an impact on society. Besides the business opportunity, startups should look for the opportunity to help the society and solve social problems.

Give Your Best Effort

When developing IDCLoudHost, Mufid and friends did not have much expectation of getting investors. IDCloudHost's main focus at that time was to develop and build IDCloudHost to provide maximum benefits and increase the offers provided. Most importantly, keep building the quality of the startup. Take advantage of the opportunities that come while improving the quality of the company. Focus on developing startups for pursuing investors. IDCloudHost rarely comes to investors to ask for money, but it is investors who present proposals to invite cooperation. Give the best to do, slowly partners will come. Focus focus focus!

Dream Big

Mufid hopes that IDCloudHost can expand and expand its market, from Indonesia to Asia. Currently, IDCloudHost is also developing products that help digitize startups and MSMEs with affordable prices and easy-to-perform services. IDCloudHost plans to expand, expand payment systems such as local banks, instant payments, e-money, etc. to make it easier for IDCloudHost customers. IDCloudHost continues to provide a server platform that is easy to use at affordable prices, where prices are affordable but are committed to providing the best and up to date technology. 

Any other things you wanna discuss with us? Click here to contact us through social media!

Find IDCloudHost on Instagram at: @idcloudhost

Website: https://idcloudhost.com/

MEET THE STARTUP: BLOCK71 X WAKTUKITA

An Interview with Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Waktukita.com

In May 2021, BLOCK71 had the opportunity to do an interview with one of the BLOCK71 Indonesia community startup, Waktukita.com. We invite Muhammad Ilham as the Founder and Chief Executive Officer to share his insightful journey in developing Waktukita. In this article, we will discuss the success journey behind Waktukita,  as a  HR startup and their impact on society, and BLOCK71's involvement in Waktukita  journey.

Interesting, right?

Get to Know Waktukita

Waktukita.com is an HR and Education platform focusing on youth empowerment through skill development and career acceleration. Established in 2018, Waktukita helps college students and graduates build their career from zero experience to landing their dream job. They have a mission to close the gap between youth unemployment and entry-level jobs in the technology industry. Along with its development, Waktukita has a sub-product called Assessed which provides IT tech talent head hunting and outsourcing services.

As an education platform as well as a partner in change and improvement for students, institutions, and companies in a massive digital changing environment. The mission is to help young generation to be productive and improve their skill and knowledge through platform to enable the youth and companies, leveraging innovative technologies and services

Creating Sustainable Enterprise While Helping Others

Waktukita.com is trying to solve youth problems in getting a job starting when they study in college and after graduation. Waktukita.com helps them build their careers by providing job vacancies and developing their skills through a program that is designed to help them to fit the criteria of a professional and make it easier to get hired by the company.

Waktukita can provide many class products at affordable prices with the same quality as leading competitors in Indonesia. Waktukita is not just a class, but a place to learn about upcoming industry trends in the future. Waktukita can also be a place for educational institutions to sell their products.

The Journey of Waktukita

At the beginning of the time journey we provide information about various opportunities and information about job acceleration in waktumagang, waktuparuh, and waktupenuh. Then, seeing the urgency and considerable demand, Ilham created and focused on Waktukita - Edu Class. In terms of funding, initial funding starts from collecting money from the competition to develop the platform, until finally Ilham and friends get an award from the Ministry of Research and Technology in the form of a grant which is used as initial capital for our time. What a smart way!

Expectations and Realities Working at Startup

Working at a startup is not Ilham's goal, but starting from a competition and internship in the startup industry, he was interested in the startup industry in Indonesia. The expectation of going  into the world of startups, Ilham expected that he could build a startup quickly and get an investment of less than 3 years. However, it turned out that with minimal experience he felt he was lacking in managing people and managing the team. In building a startup, he also needs to learn from the seniors. There are many things that need to be learned again as a leader of the team. There are many things that are beyond expectations but must be pursued in order to match expectations, especially for leadership skills. As a leader, Ilham must build  his skills as quickly as possible.

Benefit to join BLOCK71

Since beginning, Ilham has been part of BLOCK71 Yogyakarta and sees the ecosystem from the inside. Ilham can see the reputation of BLOCK71 which comes from Singapore and entered Yogyakarta, Ilham can see it's a good chance to join the biggest tech ecosystem. After joining, he also felt that he had benefited from BLOCK71. The programs that BLOCK71 offers are very attractive to Ilham. BLOCK71 is also felt to be very cooperative and responsive to collaborating by creating collaboration events, at home talks, time talks, and so on. 

Being Partner with NUS GRIP

BLOCK71 Yogyakarta  as Waktukita connector to make a collaboration with NUS. Waktukita become an official vendor of NUS by becoming an official partner of the NUS GRIP (Graduate Research Innovation Program). NUS GRIP is the Industry Liaison Office's flagship innovation program. The program will provide step-by-step guidance to NUS Postgraduate students and researchers to cultivate deep tech entrepreneurs to transform the university's world-class research into their own deep technology start-ups. Starting from 2019, one of the NUS venture managers came to Yogyakaarta to find one of its startups to mandate candidates in Yogyakarta. With the help of the BLOCK71 Yogyakarta team named Reni, the venture manager was introduced to Waktukita and within 3 days were able to collaborate because of the satisfaction of the service and delivery provided. From this collaboration, many startups from Singapore have reached out to Waktukita to find talents and other services.

Message for Startup Founder!

“Being a founder must believe in the product, believe that you can be successful in time. You must always look for opportunities to be able to revive your business. Not only from the innovation side, but also from the business side. Be proud of your product, but don't forget to make a business of it.”

Any other things you wanna discuss with us? Click here to contact us through social media!

Find Waktukita on Instagram at: @Waktukitacom

Website: https://www.waktukita.com/

In July 2021, BLOCK71 had the opportunity to do an interview with one of the BLOCK71 Indonesia community startups, Mycotech Labs or MYCL. We invite Ronaldiaz Hartantyo as Chief of Innovation Officer MYCL to share his insightful journey in building collaborations between MYCL and various brands. In this article, we will get to know about MYCL as well and explore tips for collaboration with other brands.

Curious yet? Let’s dive in!

Get to Know MYCL

MYCL is a biotech company based in Bandung that focuses on growing sustainable materials using mushroom technology. Adi Reza Nugroho, Ronaldiaz Hartantyo, Robby Zidna Ilman, M. Arkha Bentangan L, and Annisa Wibi Ismarlanti came together as gourmet mushroom producers in 2012. Inspired by tempe, the traditional Indonesian food made from fermented soybeans, they use a similar concept to create a sustainable material from agricultural waste with mushroom mycelium. 

MYCLteam started their experiment with the Growbox, a DIY mushroom kit that you can grow anytime and anywhere. Afterward, they did a lot of research and then found out that mushrooms are not only gourmet, but can also be used in materials. Their first creation with mushroom mycelium is a building material, but over time, mycelium can also be used as a leather-like material, and they see the potential to enter the fashion industry.

Creating sustainable materials as an alternative choice

Each year, almost one billion cows are killed. They are being hunted for their skin. Then, leather is a kind of bioproduct from the livestock industry, which contributes as much as 18% of greenhouse gas emissions. That's a big problem! Starting from the concern that the leather material is quite volatile and there aren't many sustainable and functional alternatives materials yet, MYCL has the ultimate goal to solve the problem. 

With a mission to provide sustainable materials from renewable resources at affordable prices, MYCL utilizes organic materials as building materials. Their first project was to build a pavilion called MycoTree. The installation was on display at the 2017 Seoul Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism in collaboration with ETH Zurich. They chose building material as their first interaction with mycelium because most founders have backgrounds in that field. Then, with some research and exploration that they have done, they finally develop their business into the fashion industry. They believe that the fashion industry can provide MYCL to achieve its market strategy with the existing opportunities.

Now MYCL has MyleaTM, a leather-like material, which can be used for various products, such asjournals, shoes, wallets, bags, watches, and other fashionable products. MYCL hopes that their product will soon be available in the market and provide choices by providing light leather material that is more sustainable, affordable, doesn’t use heavy chemicals, volatile organic compounds, and doesn’t kill animals.

To make this product, MYCL works with local mushroom farmers to cultivate mushrooms. The manufacturing process uses a continuous process from seedling to growing. Mycotech uses mushroom mycelium as a natural adhesive. First off, they create a growth medium made from agricultural waste. Then they spread the mushroom into the medium until it is covered and wait until it’s ready to harvest.

The surface will be peeled off and become the leather material that they will use. The process of growing mushrooms takes about two months. Now, they can make up to 2000 meters of square feet and are still trying to increase the production load because of the high demand.  

Collaboration with several brands

MYCL has a long-term strategy to reach the global market. For them, collaboration is one of the strategies to achieve this. So far, MYCL has collaborated with several brands, both local and international brands, to produce products such as watches, sandals, shoes, journals, and wallets. 

In 2019, MYCL collaborated with Pala Nusantara to create Kickstarter campaigns. The collaboration between Pala Nusantara and Mycotech is the world's first vegan watch, called PALAMylea. They won five awards in West Java and Indonesia because of the sustainable concept they highlight from that collaboration. Some of them are Indonesia Good Design 2019, 4th Place Blibli Big Start Indonesia, and the 2019 ASEPHI Emerging Award.

In 2021, MYCL will also collaborate with a well-known local sandal brand, Hijack Sandal. Currently, MYCL is also trying to build a pilot program with several global brands, which is also their long-term strategy to reach the global market.

After developing the product, MYCL immediately validated the market for brands and designers. Evaluation is carried out by the feedback obtained. They make improvements along with their development by focusing on direct inputs from those collaborators. 

Through a long journey of collaboration, MYCL got one crucial lesson: focus on metrics that matter based on market validations.

Collaboration Tips a la MYCL

Collaboration is a strategic step to strengthen the business. Seeing that MYCL has often collaborated with various brands and even received awards, what is the primary key to collaboration? Here are some tips from Ronaldiaz. Let’s start!

The first tip is to align expectations between the two stakeholders to build collaboration, don't put your expectations too high.

“We have to know what expectations we can accommodate and what expectations they can accommodate. Everyone has different goals by aligning the expectations. We try to align our goals and bring them in the same direction. So, don't look for a common vision, but look for the intersection,” quoted from Ronaldiaz.

Low expectation leads to happiness.

One of the things that MYCL holds is this slogan, which means that we must know our abilities or where our current stage is, and don't promise things that are beyond our capability. After learning where our minimum and maximum limits are, look for our potential collaborators who will accept us. But, keep in mind, do not lower our bar! That way, all parties will be happy to collaborate.

First Interaction with BLOCK71

From a collaboration with ETH Zurich, which has a laboratory at the National University of Singapore called the Future Cities Laboratory in 2017-2019, leads MYCL to join BLOCK71 Singapore. Seeing how vibrant the BLOCK71 Singapore’s community is in accommodating the startups to generate its MVP and providing access to the market, they decide to be a part of the community as well.

MYCL is based in Bandung, so when the time came for BLOCK71 present in Bandung, they decided to sign in as community members. Quoting Ronaldiaz's statement, he said it’s convenient for them. The building is accessible for the team to go back and forth from their production house to control the product and to BLOCK71 Bandung office to have a meeting with their clients.

Message to All Founders Out There

These days, everything can be obtained easily, quickly, and instantly. Thus, the waiting process becomes less valuable. We want to rapidly achieve our goals and when the reality is far from our expectations, we tend to give up easily.

The key skill that all founders have to possess is focus. There are things we can control and can't control. Let’s focus on the things that we have control over and let the rest unfold as it is. Give it your best!

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Whew, what a motivation!

Oh, we have exciting news from MYCL! This year, MYCL will launch their collaboration products with Pala Nusantara and Hijack Sandals. Are you as excited as we are?

Let’s take a glimpse of what they are up to on their Instagram @mycl.bio and website on mycl.bio!