Recent news items reveal genuine efforts are being made to develop creative industries and generate revenue from copyrighted works in Indonesia.
The Directorate-Genearl of Intellectual Property has announced plans to set up a Collective Management Body, which would facilitate the collection and distribution of royalties to copyright owners. This is according to the Director-General of Intellectual Property, Ahmad M. Ramli, who is quoted in a Jakarta Post article (see here). He notes that realising economic gains from domestically owned intellectual property will contribute to Indonesia’s ambitious GDP growth targets.
Then there is the news that PT Tokopedia, an Indonesian e-commerce business backed by Japan’s Softbank and America’s Sequoia Capital, intends to invest heavily in establishing Indonesia’s version of Silicon Valley (see here). PT Tokopedia intends to establish the facility, which it intends to call ’Tokopedia Campus' over then next five years.
And of course our new Copyright Law, about which we have commented in a number of posts. It introduced significant changes that broadened the scope of protection of copyright in Indonesia, put in place new enforcement tools, and modernised the law with fair use exceptions.
This is all good news for both foreign and domestic businesses, which stand to benefit from more comprehensive protection and investment in IP infrastructure.