The Universitas Gadja Mada (UGM) has been giving importance on start-ups and how forming these businesses can help improve the society.
According to a recent article, 200 University students and alumni will participate in the second batch of the Innovative Academy (IA) Appcelerate.
The participants will be divided into 74 teams and will be trained for one year in creativity and innovation development based on digital technology.
Later on, the participants will be selected to get funding for their start-up business from the University and its partners.
It has been clarified by the University’s Director of Business Development and Incubation that the Innovative Academy Appcelerate is not a competition.
It will serve as a training opportunity for participants, coming from across different disciplines, to collaborate in digital technology business ideas.
The main objective of this training is to develop the participants’ capability to be hard working and to foster competitiveness in them as they collaborate with one another.
Through the program, the culture of innovation is expected to cultivate among the young people in order to resolve the problems of the society, the government, and the industry.
Hopefully, the second run of the training will be able to generate more innovative business ideas than the first.
The participants are expected to come up with smart ideas related to supply chain, smart city and logistics.
The program will aid in instilling the spirit of socio-entrepreneurship among its young participants. All being well, the participants will be able to increase awareness on critical environment and vulnerable societies who are marginalised by technology.
The University appreciates the support it gets form the industry, such as Lintas Arta, because this serves as the link to the demands of the industrial world.
There is a gap between industry and higher education and this program can help minimise that gap.
In a different event that also focuses on start-ups, it was highlighted that creativity is not an inborn trait but is something that an individual can be trained with.
Innovators are not born such but they are people who were given the opportunity to explore ideas and then implement them for the betterment of the society, according to a recent report.
Steve Jobs, for instance, became an innovator in technology because he trained himself to become one. When he encountered a problem with his computer, he did not stop until he found a way to solve the noises that his computer produced due to fan motors.
The young generation should follow his example and instead of complaining when faced with a problem, they should take this as an opportunity to be creative and turn it into a business idea.
Although implementing an idea is not an easy endeavour, especially for a start-up, a start-up business can be the solution to job creation and social problems.
A major problem for start-up businesses in Indonesia, apart from taxes and consumer protection, is funding.
A start-up CEO shared his experience on how failure becomes the drive that pushes a person further. Failure should never be the reason for stopping.
The CEO explained how they initially had 3,000 users during the launch of the app that they developed but it eventually dropped to just 5 at one time.
Instead of giving up, they evaluated what could be the possible reasons that the users have stopped using the apps and then they improved from there.
