Apple's Big Boss Coming to RI Next Month, This is the Minister of Communication and Information's Leaks

Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – Apple boss Tim Cook plans to go to Indonesia next April. This was confirmed by the Minister of Communication and Information, Budi Arie Setiadi.

“From Apple, Tim Cook wants to come on April 20,” said Budi Arie when met at the Kominfo office, Thursday (21/3/2024).

However, he said Tim Cook's arrival was not to build a factory. As is known, Apple does not yet have a factory assembling devices such as the iPhone and iPad in Indonesia.

According to Budi, Tim Cook was present to inaugurate the Apple Academy in Bali. Previously, the training places were in BSD and Batam.

“Later it will be about that (factory),” he explained.

“Apple created the Apple Academy. So it is to train our human resources. That's good, it's been around for almost 2000,” added Budi Arie.

Previously, in the presidential-vice presidential debate some time ago, the issue of cellphone imports in Indonesia was touched on. Currently, the value of imported cellphones in Indonesia is recorded at IDR 30 trillion. Meanwhile, investment in HP factories in Indonesia is only IDR 0.5 trillion.

At that time, Prabowo Subianto claimed he was always solution-oriented and focused on action. He said the solution to the problem of importing cellphones was easy, namely by asking foreign vendors to build factories in Indonesia.

“If it's only IDR 0.5 trillion (investment by domestic HP manufacturers) and political will is needed, then build the factory immediately,” he said at the time.

Apart from Tim Cook, Satya Nadella as Microsoft boss is also scheduled to come to Indonesia. His arrival will be three days before the Apple boss, namely April 17 2024.

For Nadella, the meeting will be a follow-up to the cooperation between the Ministry of Communication and Information and Microsoft some time ago. This includes discussing the transfer of technology and knowledge for Indonesia's transformation.

“Yes, talk about how to transfer technology and knowledge for Indonesia's digital transformation. Continuing what we talked about yesterday,” he said.

He emphasized that AI technology, which Microsoft has also adopted, will continue to develop. So we need a lot of cooperation with industry.

“Because whether we like it or not, artificial intelligence will continue to develop, so we need a lot of cooperation and adopt various global players, we have to work together,” concluded Budi.

[Gambas:Video CNBC]

(fab/fab)