Challenges Businesses in Indonesia Need to Anticipate

Recently, QBE Indonesia conducted interviews and surveys of 300 SMEs and large-scale companies in Indonesia. The interview discussed the risks, opportunities and challenges of business in today's digital era. There are several interesting findings from the survey, the first is related to the tendency of businesses in Indonesia to be reactive (not proactive) to various incidents related to incidents in the digital world.

From the survey, it was found that the percentage of digital incidents that commonly occur is internet fraud (54%), computer system hacking (48%), and theft of sensitive information (38%). Respondents' presentations also stated that the incident had a real impact on the business. In the last 12 months, the incident has at least presented some crucial problems in business.

The first is loss of revenue due to incidents that disrupt business (32%), damage and loss of inventory data (23%), damage to equipment (22%), to hacking of computer systems that disrupt business operations (20%).

"These risks are faced by companies that are in an environment with increasingly large business challenges. Based on our study, we found that 31% of Indonesian companies received lawsuits due to problems with their products or services in the last year," said Aziz Adam Sattar. as President Director of QBE Indonesia.

Business challenges in Indonesia in 2017-2018

In addition to discussing incidents and risks faced by businesses in relation to daily operational technicalities, the survey also tries to identify some of the challenges facing businesses in various category landscapes. Nearly half of companies (46%) perceive challenges stem from adapting to technological advances and innovations. This has an impact on investment forecasts which are assessed to increase in the next 12 months. A third of companies (29%) believe that the challenges and investments will have a big impact.

Basically each industry category has different concerns, but there are some similar challenges that arise in various industries such as business expansion and new laws and regulations.

Now adapting to renewable technology is something that is considered important for businesses. Looking more deeply into the business categories in IT and Telecommunications (including digital SMEs), the biggest concentration is currently still on optimization and system development (45%). Furthermore, other challenges faced are related to new laws which often make businesses have to adjust (39%). Business expansion (37%) also became concern ambitious for many companies in this category.

Interestingly 35% of respondents in the IT sector are now starting to have awareness on the protection of business data and information. This is in line with the increasing cyber threat. However, the figure of 35% is still considered small for the majority of businesses that use a digital approach. It turns out that this is caused by many things, ranging from a small business scale, business limitations to a limited budget.

“Indonesia's economy is growing rapidly and has become an important member of the ASEAN community. With the increasing number of middle class people, we are seeing a change of mind among employers and employees as they have come to understand the importance of risk management – ​​not only to reduce financial losses, but more importantly to demonstrate that companies have social responsibility. Indonesian consumers are becoming more aware of legal rights, which exposes companies to greater financial compensation if they fail to provide services or do not provide a safe work environment,” said Sattar in response to the company's lack of anticipation of possible risks.