Komdigi Pitches Indonesia as a Regional AI Hub at US–Indonesia Investment Summit
Indonesia wants to be more than a big market for other countries’ AI. Speaking at the 14th US-Indonesia Investment Summit in South Jakarta on Tuesday, October 6, Deputy Minister of Communication and Digital Affairs Nezar Patria said the country has a real chance to become a regional AI hub and a base for digital production, innovation and investment in Southeast Asia, Katadata reported.
His numbers showed both the opportunity and the gap. Indonesia has about 580 megawatts of operating data-centre capacity, with another 1.3 gigawatts in the investment pipeline, representing potential investment of $15 billion to $20 billion. Nezar acknowledged the country still trails Malaysia, which he put at around 3 gigawatts. He pointed to commitments already made, including Microsoft’s $1.7 billion for cloud and AI and the $5 billion AWS has invested since 2021.
On policy, the ministry, known as Komdigi, is preparing a national AI roadmap for 2026 to 2029 with more than 30 ministries and agencies, built around five priorities: health, education and digital talent, bureaucratic reform, smart cities and food security. RRI reported that the draft presidential regulation on the roadmap is being harmonised at the State Secretariat with the Ministry of Law, and Nezar said ministries will later write sector-specific AI guidance for fields such as health, education and financial services.
What it means in practice
The sharper message was about what stays in the country once the servers are switched on. Nezar said success should not be measured only in megawatts or foreign capital. “Every large project must become an opportunity to train people, develop suppliers, transfer technology and create services that can compete abroad,” he said (our translation), citing cooperation with Arm and an ambition to connect about 15,000 Indonesian engineers with the global semiconductor ecosystem.
He also tied AI to Indonesia’s nickel, noting that the country produces 62 percent of the world’s mined nickel, and warned against giving data centres grid capacity at the expense of households and industry. The answer, he said, is to expand supply and improve coordination, a live issue after disputes such as the review of the Jatiluhur AI data centre.
What to watch: the signing of the presidential regulation on the AI roadmap, the first sectoral guidelines, and whether new US investments come with the local training and supplier commitments Komdigi is asking for.