Founder of Gojek – Transportation services are one of the things we always use and benefit from in our
daily lives. There are three types of transportation services that are well known by the public
in general throughout the world, including land transportation, air transportation, and sea transportation.
Of the three types of transportation, land transportation is the transportation service most often
used by people for their daily lives.
As the name implies, ground transportation is a delivery service that operates in the mainland.
This one transportation service can transport people, objects, or goods from one location to
another and from one address to another. In Indonesia, there are many types of land
transportation that we can use, including motorcycle taxi services, taxis, public transportation, buses,
rickshaws, and many more.
In the 2000s, motorcycle taxi services in Indonesia began to change and develop into an online system.
In the past, ojek services could only be found in the traditional way. For example, we
have to go to the motorcycle taxi post first so we can use the service. But it’s different from
today, where we can order motorcycle taxi services from anywhere and anytime.
This online motorcycle taxi service is very well known among the public with the name Gojek Indonesia.
Gojek itself has another name, namely PT Aplikasi Karya Anak Bangsa. The main focus of
the Gojek service is to make it easier for anyone to order a motorcycle taxi online. The
application can also be downloaded for free via your smartphone.
The first online motorcycle taxi innovation in Indonesia is the work of a nation’s son named Nadiem
Makarim. For his innovation, Nadiem was finally able to help and assist many Indonesian people.
Then in 2020, Nadiem was appointed Minister of Education of the Republic of Indonesia.
Even so, the development of the Gojek company continues to run optimally, even progressing from year to
year. Before discussing Gojek’s development from time to time, it would be better if we
discussed the career journey of the founder of Gojek, Nadiem Makarim.
Biography of Nadiem Makarim
By utilizing technological sophistication, Gojek has certainly succeeded in carrying out an industrial
revolution in the field of ojek transportation. Various features have been provided by Gojek,
ranging from online motorcycle taxis, delivery of goods, online shopping, to ordering food delivery.
All of these innovations started with Nadiem Makarim. So, to find out more about
Nadiem Makarim’s profile or biography, here is the full review.
Nadiem Makarim’s childhood
Nadiem Anwar Makarim was born in Singapore on July 14, 1984. His father, Nono Anwar Makarim, is a lawyer
who is quite prominent and also works from Pekalongan. Meanwhile, her mother named Atika
Algadri works in the non-profit sector. Where the mother of Nadiem Makarim is the daughter of
one of the pioneers of Indonesian Independence. Then Nadiem Makarim also has two
sisters.
For education Nadiem Makarim took, namely he started elementary school in Jakarta, then he graduated from
high school in Singapore. After completing his high school education, in 2002 Nadiem Makarim
continued his education at Brown University, United States of America majoring in International Relations.
Then for a year Nadiem decided to take part in an exchange program at the London School of
Economics. In addition, Nadiem also continued his education at Harvard Business School, at
Harvard University and graduated with a Master of Business Administration or MBA degree.
Career Journey
After Nadiem Makarim finished his education, Nadiem is known to have worked at the Mckinsey company and
also the Company which is a well-known consulting firm located in Jakarta. Nadiem worked at the
company for about three years. Apart from that, Nadiem is also known to work as the Co-Founder
and Managing Editor at Zalora Indonesia. After that, Nadiem worked as Kartuku’s Chief
Innovation Officer. Because he had experience from this job, Nadiem then ventured to quit the
job he was doing. Then in 2011, Nadiem founded a company called GO-JEK.
Stories From GO-JEK Business Ideas
Initially, Nadiem got the business idea for the Gojek transportation service during a discussion with his
regular motorcycle taxi drivers. Nadiem himself rarely uses his car because of his high
mobility. So that he often or almost every day uses motorcycle taxi drivers to take him to his
workplace so he can get through Jakarta’s traffic jams. At that time, Nadiem was still working
as Kartuku’s Chief Innovation Officer and Co-Founder and also Managing Editor of Zalora Indonesia.
From Nadiem’s conversations with the motorcycle taxi drivers he used, he began to discover the
fact that most motorcycle taxi drivers spend a lot of time just waiting for customers. In fact,
it is very difficult to find customers who want to use their services. In fact,
However, Nadiem Makarim sees that the availability of this type of transportation is not too much compared
to other types of transportation. That way, it’s often quite difficult to find.
Nadiem Makarim has the desire to provide motorcycle taxi transportation anywhere and anytime when
needed. When viewed from the side of Jakarta’s traffic jams that are getting worse, fast
transportation services and fast delivery will certainly be needed so that they can help the people of
Jakarta and its surroundings. It was from this problem that Nadiem saw an opportunity to create
a service that could connect motorcycle taxi drivers and passengers.
The beginning of GO-JEK
In 2011, Nadiem Makarim officially founded the Gojek company which later served as one of the CEOs or
founders of Gojek. At the beginning of the founding of the Gojek company, Nadiem only had 20
ojek drivers. While the system provided is still a telephone call center.
Therefore, for customers who want to use the ojek driver, they must directly contact the call
center that has been provided. At that time, the number of employees he had was still limited,
the drivers were also few. But the belief that Gojek’s founder has in his company is enormous.
Until finally this has made Gojek able to survive until it develops very rapidly in the next few
years.
History of the Establishment of Gojek Indonesia
Are you one of those people who often use motorcycle taxi services to take them somewhere, for example to
school or work? Transportation services have an important role in our daily lives.
Without transportation services, it is impossible for us to move easily from one place to another.
As with the example above, just imagine if you have to walk from home to the office or other
workplace that is far away. How to travel like that would definitely be quite troublesome and
also tiring. On the other hand, not everyone also has a private vehicle or can drive their own
vehicle.
Especially in big and dense cities like Jakarta, where the level of congestion is very high due to the
large number of private vehicles passing by on the highway. This congestion factor makes most
people do not want to have a private vehicle. This is because they think that their vehicles
have contributed to making Jakarta’s traffic jams worse. All of the factors mentioned earlier
make many people finally choose to use online motorcycle taxi transportation or other public transportation.
Most people consider Gojek’s online motorcycle taxi transportation service as one of the answers
and solutions that are quite appropriate, easy, fast, and also practical to meet the needs of inter-city
transportation services.
The Gojek application was launched to the general public in Indonesia for the first time in 2010, to be
precise in the DKI Jakarta area. As of today, the Gojek Indonesia application has been
downloaded and used by users more than 50 million times. The Gojek application has also been
operating in the field of online transportation in various cities in Indonesia. In fact, Gojek
has also expanded to countries in the Southeast Asian region, such as Singapore, Vietnam and Thailand.
In these countries, the Gojek Indonesia application has also successfully competed with
transportation services that had developed earlier, such as Grab and Uber.
Kevin Aluwi Founder
of Gojek who Plays an Active Role in Developing Startup Businesses
The name Kevin Aluwi is not as popular as Gojek founder Nadiem Makarim. But in reality, this
man has played a major role in Gojek’s progress. Kevin Aluwi was born in Jakarta on September
1, 1986. He is one of the founders of Gojek besides Nadiem Makarim. After Nadiem Makarim said
goodbye from Gojek, Kevin’s name slowly sounded and was increasingly taken into account when he took on the
role previously held by Nadiem. After Nadiem Makarim was appointed as Minister of Education and
Culture (Kemendikbud), Kevin began to be given the power to become Co-CEO to replace Nadiem Makarim.
Kevin is one of the people who has contributed greatly and is also a different color in the
telecommunications industry, especially for startup businesses. From a business that is rich in
ideas and innovations that can provide solutions to every problem faced by consumers.
Entered the List of Young Leaders and
High Influence
Kevin Aluwi was once included in the “Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia” list. It is a list of young
people who are considered as promising young leaders, game changers, and talented entrepreneurs.
These startup businesses generally rely on technology to help grow their business.
Therefore, there is nothing wrong if some people think that a startup business is one of the
businesses engaged in technology. That’s what makes a new breakthrough in the field of
technology. So that Kevin’s name began to soar like his pioneering business, namely
Gojek.
Kevin Aluwi is a graduate of the University of Southern California, Marshall School of Business.
He is indeed one of the people behind the founding of the Gojek company. Within
Gojek’s own corporate structure, Kevin was once an analyst at Salem Partners LLC by fully contributing in
carrying out every strategic role by adopting the Gojek ecosystem data business intelligence.
To develop a product innovation and growth of Gojek.
His success in developing a startup business makes him often share knowledge. In July 2021,
Kevin launched a Young Forward Together Program for 1.00 startups which was jointly carried out with Telkom
through the Telecommunication and Digital Research Institute (ITDRI). This is done in order to
acquire digital talent as well as explore innovation, especially for areas in eastern Indonesia, such as
Papua, Kalimantan, Maluku and Sulawesi.
The program exists as a forum for Indonesian talents to be able to develop their skills and capabilities in the
digital field and to be able to freely explore and also express their ideas and innovations to provide a
sustainable solution.
The Young Forward Together with 1,000 Startup Program is expected to be able to help the government which
needs around nine million digital talents in the next fifteen years. That means, every year, it
is hoped that there will be 600 digital talents that must be obtained. That is a number that is
quite challenging, because you only expect from formal education.
Therefore, every year college alumni must be prepared to become digital talents, the number of which may
still be under one hundred thousand. Thus, the country only has a shortage or digital gap which
is quite large every year. So there’s nothing wrong with Kevin having high hopes for new
startups. Especially local startups that can develop technology and innovation like what Gojek
has done.
The development of Gojek in the hands of Kevin Aluwi
Under Kevin’s auspices, Gojek has grown rapidly and processes around 2 billion transactions per year.
Where in his leadership, the Gojek Company has carried out fundraising or a budget collection
process that has made several top companies start to look to Gojek. For example, Google,
Tencent, Sequoia, and also Temasek and Astra International as one of their local investors.
Not only that, in an effort to expand its wings, Gojek has also succeeded in carrying out an expansion as
evidenced by the launch of services in Singapore, Vietnam and Thailand. Gojek himself has
acknowledged that he is one of the most widely used on-demand applications in Indonesia. For
example, food delivery services and payments have replaced transportation services. In Kevin’s
hands, Gojek has become a company with a valuation of more than 10 billion dollars.
Apart from cooperating with Global companies, Gojek has also successfully partnered with Tokopedia.
Where the two decided to merge and create a new name, namely GoTo. GoTo is a fairly
large technology group in Indonesia that provides a reliable ecosystem for various solutions in living
everyday life. The formation of the GoTo group is a business collaboration and also the largest
collaboration carried out by internet companies and media services in Asia to date.
GoTo itself in this case will unite the strengths of the two technology companies by creating solutions
that are unique and also complement each other globally. The trick is to combine e-commerce
services, transportation, finance, and delivery of food and goods. In addition, GoTo has also
created a digital consumer platform that is quite large in Indonesia and serves most of the household
consumption needs. Going forward, the network of business partners and driver partners within
the GoTo group will complement each other by presenting a wide selection of goods and services that are
considered unrivaled.
This is an explanation of who the founders of Gojek were and how Gojek developed from time to time until it
finally became one of the largest digital companies in Indonesia. How about it, are you one of
those people who often use Gojek services?