Serviced office center banks on helping out new investors
Serviced office center banks on helping out new investors
JAKARTA (JP): An increasing number of foreign investors have
been eying business opportunities in Indonesia, as indicated by
the growing demand for serviced offices, said Mee Kim, president
of PT Citra Eksekutif Otorita (CEO), a major operator of serviced
offices.
"Serviced offices spare businesspeople the problems of finding
suitable office space and recruiting English-speaking local
employees," Kim said in an interview at CEO's second serviced
office center at the Wisma GKBI building on the Sudirman
thoroughfare which officially opens on Thursday.
She said the concept of the serviced office enabled any
businesspeople to simply walk in and have a nice office in five
minutes and start their own business activities on the same day.
Serviced office is also quite suitable for mobile
businesspeople as the facility enables them to receive every
incoming call or message through high-tech telephone system
without having to be in the serviced office all time.
Kim said her company especially helped foreign investors to
fit in with Jakarta by providing them with a functioning office
that allowed them to concentrate on their business the very same
day they arrived here.
"We act as an incubator. We reduce the culture shock, so that
they can easily fit in," she added.
She said unlike traditional offices, CEO serviced offices
could offer more flexibility in rent payments, which could range
from daily to monthly fees.
Kim said the concept of serviced offices was already familiar
to Western businessmen and had begun to attract Asian companies
as well.
She said part of her company's mission was to help foreign
businesspeople visiting Indonesia to focus on their businesses
without being bothered by the time-consuming preparations of
establishing an office.
CEO provides furnished offices that include secretaries and
receptionists, and a range of other services to allow businessmen
establish their own office operations immediately after arriving
in Jakarta.
"Foreign companies entering Indonesia prefer this type of
service over the hassle of trying to immediately rent a new
office and recruit personnel upon arriving in the city," she
said.
However, she added, the economic crisis, along with the
political uncertainties, made it harder to attract clients or
even to maintain clients much longer in the country.
"But I eventually managed to convince them with an argument
that if they pulled out they would lose their contacts and their
names would be quickly forgotten."
Most clients stay between two to six months at CEO's offices,
before they settle in their own offices, she said, adding that
some, mostly representative offices with only two to three
personnel, were permanent tenants at CEO offices.
Building a corporate image was another product of a serviced
office, since such businesses usually were housed in prestigious,
prime-site office buildings with impressive interior designs, she
said.
Kim said CEO started with its first serviced office center at
the Jakarta Stock Exchange building in 1997 but the growing
demand for this service had prompted her company to open its
second office center at the GKBI building on the Sudirman
thoroughfare.
Kim, who has been in the serviced office business for over 10
years, started CEO in 1997 after having worked for about eight
years for an Australian serviced office company.
While working for the Australian company, she managed office
centers in Singapore and Bangkok, before she was eventually
assigned to open another branch in Jakarta.
"In 1992, when I started this business for the Australian
company, we were alone in the market; it was a pretty easy
business," she said.
However, Kim added, competition was now keen and there were
currently five serviced office operators from the 10 before the
1997 economic crisis.
She said in order to survive the economic crisis, CEO relied
on companies that were downsizing, and with only a couple of
people left had to move to a serviced office. (03)