KlikDokter's Efforts to Strengthen Its Position in the Indonesian Healthtech Market

KlikDokter shows stretching to strengthen its position in the market again healthtech Indonesia. One of them is marked by the appointment of Hendra Tjong as CEO of KlikDokter since September 2021. For your information, Hendra was previously known as KliknClean Co-founder and CEO.

In an interview with DailySocial.id, Hendra revealed some new breakthroughs that will be made by the platform owned by pharmaceutical giant Kalbe Farma this. Especially considering the condition that the Covid-19 pandemic is starting to slow down in Indonesia.

A glimpse of KlikDokter, originally established in 2008 as a portal around health information. In 2016, they sought to reach a wider market by launching a mobile application. Some of the services offered are teleconsultation and delivery of pharmaceutical products.

How does KlikDokter see the post-pandemic phase and what are its plans this year?

Next steps post-pandemic

According to WHO predictions, the acute phase of the Covid-19 pandemic in the world will end in 2022. Meanwhile, the Covid-19 Task Force said that Indonesia is heading towards a transition phase from pandemic to endemic. So, what does this mean for the platform healthtech if services related to Covid-19 start to no longer be relevant in the future?

Hendra admitted that the pandemic provided an opportunity for them to educate teleconsultation services to society. Platforms healthtech also received new sources of income from Covid-19 tests (antigen and PCR) and purchasing medicines/supplements. Just so you know, teleconsultation is a service healthtech which has the highest adoption in Indonesia.

Even so, he doesn't want a platform healthtech relevant only to sick people. Precisely service healthtech relevance can be increased through preventive care. Moreover, the pandemic has opened the eyes of some people to exercise, eat nutritious food and take vitamins. "Health is not just a matter of [handling sick people]. There are actually more healthy people," he said.

In addition, he highlighted that teleconsultation can be explored more deeply to improve its user experience. Currently, teleconsultation services are still basic. Communication between doctors and patients is mostly through live chat. In the future, he hopes that teleconsultation in Indonesia can be used video call, BPJS can be used to cover teleconsultation costs, and medical records can be available in the application.

"If this can be realized, the platform healthtech can make analyzes for patients, for example drug recommendations. But of course this all has to bebackup with data. "We hope there will also be electronic medical records in the future," he added.

Technology modernization and collaboration

From the explanation above, Hendra revealed a number of plans that are being prepared. There is not much to share, but currently the party is focusing on modernizing technology on the KlikDokter platform and Hallobumil overall. Through this modernization, the company is trying to improve the user experience and present new features to the public.

"We admit that our platform is lacking user-friendly. That's why, currently we are improving the technology and operations of KlikDokter and Hallobumil, well front-end nor Back-end. We are too redevelop features for diagnosis and preventive care. We want to reach a wider market, from young to old. The target, us launch application with a new look this August," said Hendra.

Meanwhile, he said that the majority of the technology was developed by KlikDokter himself. Apart from that, the company also opens up collaboration space with external partners to expand the reach of its services.

Some of these are partnerships with marketplace Shopee which was just announced. Shopee will play a role front-end channels teleconsultation services and delivery of medicines/supplements from KlikDokter partner pharmacies. Apart from that, KlikDokter has also collaborated with the We+ insurance platform for similar services. 

"We are open to [seeking] external funding. SActually, we are fundraising but still confidential. We don't want to just be under the auspices of Kalbe. We want to have more partners, both inside and outside, who match KlikDokter's vision and mission. Hopefully, this can open access to other/new ecosystems outside of the ones we have. "We also plan to expand overseas," he said.

Based on Kalbe's financial report in 2021, KlikDokter has connected users to 15.000 registered doctors, 800 clinics and hospitals, and 2.000 pharmacies throughout Indonesia. Total visits reached 10 million as of April 2022 based on rankings on the Similarweb site.

Utilizing Kalbe's assets

Hendra said that currently the majority of KlikDokter access and transactions come from Mobile browser. Even that is not all that has the potential to provide income to the business. According to him, this strengthens the opinion that not many people know about KlikDokter's involvement with Kalbe.

In fact, he said, Kalbe has experience, data and a strong ecosystem in Indonesian health industry. Kalbe also has a wide product distribution range which KlikDokter can utilize to accommodate medical/drug needs in the region.

This is considered to be competitive advantage KlikDokter to compete with similar players in the future which are considered to still be community-centered in big cities. Currently, Kalbe has 11 distribution points in Indonesia and will increase this to 40 points.

For information, KlikDokter through PT Medika Komunika Teknologi is under the auspices of PT Kalbe Farma Tbk (IDX: KLBF). Previously, KlikDokter was a joint venture company (joint venture) which was founded by Kalbe's subsidiary, PT Karsa Lintas Buwana (PT KLB) together with PT Creative Media Karya (KMK), a subsidiary of the media conglomerate PT Elang Mahkota Teknologi Tbk (IDX: EMTK). However, KMK released all its shares to KLB so that KlikDokter is now fully owned by Kalbe.

"Apart from technological and operational modernization, our next strategy is to utilize the Kalbe ecosystem as optimally as possible in order to compete with competitors. We focus on presenting services/products in all segments, from babies to the elderly. We want to become a data-based company that can beleverage in the health ecosystem in Indonesia," he concluded.