When Former Google Executives Testify to Lighten the Burden on Nadiem Makarim...
JAKARTA, KOMPAS.com - Several former Google Asia Pacific executives have spoken out to refute the Public Prosecutor’s allegations against former Minister of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology Nadiem Makarim in the suspected corruption case involving the procurement of Chromebook-based laptops.
Three former Google executives were presented as character witnesses for Nadiem. They are Scott Beaumont, President of Google Asia Pacific, Caesar Sengupta, former Vice President of Google, and William Florence, Head of the Developer Training Division.
One of the main topics discussed in the hearing on Monday (20/4/2026) was the meeting in February 2020.
At that time, Nadiem had been appointed as Minister of Education for just a few months, and he held a meeting with Google to introduce himself and discuss several matters.
“As far as I recall, February was the initial meeting to discuss with the minister and his team, along with the Google team, matters related to the education project,” said Scott, who appeared virtually at the hearing in the Jakarta Corruption Court on Monday.
As President of Google Asia Pacific from 2019 to 2024, Scott stated that he had an interest in representing Google’s interests in the Asia Pacific region.
He was often invited to meet with government parties to discuss various matters. So, it was not only Nadiem whom he had met.
“I am often invited by local teams or even the ministries themselves to represent Google,” Scott said.
Scott denied that the meeting directly led to an agreement for Chromebook procurement cooperation.
“Did Nadiem explain in the February (2020) meeting that the ministry would later purchase a large number of Chromebooks?” asked Nadiem’s legal advisor, Radhie Noviadi Yusuf.
“Absolutely not,” Scott replied.
A similar statement was made by former Google executive and former Head of the Chromebook Development Team, Caesar Sengupta.
Caesar denied that there was already an agreement between Google and Nadiem in the February 2020 meeting for the Ministry of Education to purchase a large number of Chromebooks.
“There was never any such agreement, and I completely disagree with that accusation,” said Caesar.
He was asked by Scott to attend the February 2020 meeting to explain Chromebooks to Nadiem’s team.
At that time, Caesar answered many questions from Nadiem and his team.
“The ministry team had many questions about Google for Education and about Chromebooks. They also explained their vision for digitalisation and improving the education system in Indonesia,” explained Caesar.
In that meeting, Google was asked to present what Google could do to help the Ministry of Education achieve their vision of modernising the education system in Indonesia.
Scott stated that he felt quite pessimistic after the February 2020 meeting concluded.
“We actually felt quite pessimistic after that meeting,” said Scott.