PT Thales Indonesia's president director Olivier Rabourdin spoke to The Jakarta Post's Aditya Hadi on July 7 about the company’s next moves, tie-ups with local players and global issues of cybersecurity.

Question: How important is Indonesia for Thales, and what are your plans here?

Answer: Thales Group considers Indonesia a strategic country, as it is in the top-five of our export markets.

Thales wants to invest continuously in the country […] by partnering with local industry. We are still in discussions, but we are expecting the launch of a joint venture in early January next year.

We want to be a contributor, not only as a technical assistant, but also a solid and trusted partner to co-develop sovereign products of Indonesia.

Clearly, Thales has this kind of policy to send a good sign to the government that we want to be a strong contributor to the transformation of the country, especially in defense.

Remember when President Jokowi [Joko Widodo] met President Emmanuel Macron in Hiroshima at the last G7 meeting, they said that both countries have a good example of partnership in the defense industry. At that time, President Jokowi mentioned "joint venture" as a concrete strategy in defense projects that he has in mind, [such as] between Thales and PT Len Industri.

How does that differ from what you're doing right now?

Usually, we would cooperate through different projects. Once the project was up and running, the cooperation would go down a little bit.

It is important to underline that we have received a good sign as well from the government, because in every single project, we have to deliver local content, usually around 30 percent.

In 2030, the country wants to have 50 percent local content, so Thales will be the one that supports that as well.

Does that mean you will inject more capital into Indonesia?

Yes. We want to develop some strategic partnerships with local industry, meaning we want to create jobs, and we want to inject some capital into different companies.

We are today working on one project in the digital market, so this is something we will inform you [about] later.

I can't disclose this information, but we have concrete projects and need some engineers. Today, I have 57 employees in my team, and the objective is to increase it to around 250 people in three years.

We're trying to create jobs, but in the specific domain of advanced technology.

And you know, PT Thales Indonesia is an Indonesian company. I may be French, but, maybe later on, there will be a local person to replace me, I don't know.

What is the proportion of your different businesses in Indonesia; will that change?

Historically, defense and space were our pillars for growth. The proportion of them is 50:50.

Now, we want to add another pillar, which is digital.

However, I think defense will remain the biggest contributor to our sales performance, and it was strategic for our market segment. Thus, expect 40 percent for defense and 30 percent each for space and digital.

Digital demand is quite high in the market, and Thales' positioning needs to be improved. We have to accelerate our penetration into the market, but we cannot do that on our own. So, we have some local partners and will develop more with a win-win approach.

What are your plans for the space pillar?

Satria-1 is an opportunity to show the region and the world that Indonesia is clearly performing well in the space domain.

In the future, we want to maintain our leadership in the market. We will try to continue taking care of big satellites like Satria-1, especially the ones from the Communications and Information Ministry.

There is a need for one satellite every three years. Thales hopes to be the one that is selected as well for Satria-2.

The experience with Satria-1 shows that we are a key player. But we have to be humble, because this market is very competitive.

Any plans for Indonesia’s new capital city (IKN)?

We are proposing some solutions, especially in the smart city, data protection and information technology aspects.

This is something we are currently discussing with the IKN Authority, because, as you know, around 80 percent (of the need) is related to investment. So, we are preparing for that as well and already have some investors, but I cannot disclose the names.

We also [have a business] in producing SIM cards and securing transfers between banks. So, in the new capital, I think we should develop these kinds of things.

How do you secure transfers of knowledge amid cybersecurity risks?

We are building sovereign products that are designed by Indonesia’s private or public sector, and will be operated by Indonesians as well.

It is quite important because of the sensitivity. When you provide the technical solution, how to prove that "okay, we don't have Thales behind [it]".

There are examples of IT infrastructure in health care, defense or energy being targeted in cyberattacks. Operating [advanced technology] solutions is quite difficult, but you know, it is a key issue.

What is important at the end of the day is to have people well trained for that. This is Thales' position with our partners, to ensure that we are delivering not only a technical solution, but also the knowledge to operate it.