SAP Express was established in September 2014. At the time, I had acknowledged that the prospects of the courier services business in Indonesia continued to be highly promising, especially given the enormous growth of the country’s e-commerce sector and the online shopping trend that was taking place. I had also observed that most existing courier companies remained dependent on manual ways of operation, such as through e-mail communication and other conventional means. My belief was that the present is the digital era, therefore when I established SAP, the full utilisation of digital technology underpinned how I would differentiate SAP Express from similar companies. We were the first company in the industry to launch an Android application. The technology grants us real-time tracking of our couriers and their deliveries through GPS. This feature, of course, proved to be very helpful for both our individual and corporate customers. At present, we are continuously developing the app to include new features.

SAP Express’ current market share is quite sizeable which confirms the effectiveness of our current strategy; even more as it is normally very difficult for a new company to compete with established players. Without something new to offer, there would be no incentive for consumers to use our services. Our pioneering use of technology provided that selling point. Another strategy that we are employing pertains to the company’s branch network as Indonesia is massive in terms of area. Usually, new courier companies extend their coverage through a partnership or agency scheme. SAP Express has chosen a different strategy by also establishing branch offices in main cities throughout Indonesia’s provinces. This significantly speeds up the delivery time of our goods as they are directly supervised by each branch office.

The reason for the high cost is mostly due to procedural and bureaucratic problems at our airports and ports. The cost of domestic logistics delivery in Indonesia excluding these points is actually not too high. When a cargo is already within the Indonesian territory and is intended to be sent to the country’s regions, the cost is still reasonable. Especially in Java, various modes of transportation are available; whether through land, railway or air. That said, the government’s plan to develop a maritime highway, and toll road networks on the islands of Sumatra, Kalimantan and Sulawesi should ease the distribution of goods.

The prospects in the logistics sector remain enormous with the size of the populace; especially related to Indonesia’s e-commerce growth as well as to the public’s avid use of ICT and social media. We ourselves are looking to expand our operations into secondary cities and the Sumatra region in 2016. The new branches and retail outlets will serve as additional sources of revenue.

I see the ASEAN Economic Community as providing opportunities with the free-flow of goods between its members. SAP Express can serve as the local courier when Indonesians purchase goods from other countries. It is worth noting that SAP Express has been appointed by Skynet International to handle all of its incoming and outgoing international shipments for Indonesia.

Our innovation will be focused on enhancing our express delivery services. The second is on logistics warehousing which until now has been dominated by foreign companies. The third is on seeking to implement the latest technology that can benefit our operations.

We are very open to cooperation and realise that we cannot expand by only relying on local investment. We need to engage with foreign investors in order to widen our scope of operation beyond the domestic market. Furthermore, I am aiming for SAP Express to become a publicly traded company within the next three to five years. With foreign firms, we can work together to develop the company’s technology, network and system; to build upon SAP Express’ strong local network in addition to the Skynet International network. The most interesting areas of international cooperation for us is in acquiring capital, technology transfer and developing our business network.

The presence of a new investor will allow us not just to accelerate the expansion of our express delivery operations, but also to develop our logistics warehouse facilities which are already in high demand from our customers. We are developing these facilities at a slower pace due to limited capital.

SAP Express is a new company with a remarkable sales and shipment volume growth of 30-40% per month. Based on my experience in the industry, to accomplish our present volume of ten tonnes per day is not an easy task. SAP Express also has significant potential with regards to e-commerce businesses, particularly in relation to cash-on-delivery transactions for online shopping activities. We have a nationwide network to carry out deliveries and collect payments. Additionally, our target for the coming year is to increase the number of counters to 2,500 and create an e-commerce system for B2B, B2C and C2C.