Taxi mafias, cash vaults & 100% MoM growth: The story of SEA’s biggest startup | Kevin Aluwi (Gojek)

1. 0:00 – 5:00

   Kevin’s background

   1. KAKevin Aluwi0:00

      In the early days of Go-Jek, there was a lot of resistance to our services. The most common form of that resistance in the early days was actually by motorcycle taxi mafias. So you would have, like, these areas that are essentially controlled, um, through violence by specific, you know, area mafias and when we started having drivers pick up orders and pick up passengers, these people, uh, would actually physically assault our drivers. Um, you know, we've had everything from, like, bricks thrown at, uh, uh, our drivers to, you know, knives, um, and machetes being brandished at them, and I think it would have been easy for us to say like, "Hey, you know, you know, they're, uh, they're all contractors, they're third parties, like, you know, let them, let them kind of just sort it out." But instead we, uh, we actually hired private security. So we actually work with private security companies to help our drivers in those situations, you know, to, to help, to help kind of, like, you know, extract them out of these, these sticky situations. And so we actually ran a fairly big private security operation, uh, for a fairly long time.

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky1:14

      (instrumental music) Welcome to Lenny's Podcast, where I interview world-class product leaders and growth experts to learn from their hard won experiences building and growing today's most successful products. Today my guest is Kevin Aluwi. Kevin is the co-founder and former CEO of a company called Go-Jek, which I've always been fascinated by. You may recall a former guest, Crystal Wajiha, who was Head of Growth at Go-Jek and I've always wanted to get more of the story. Go-Jek is infamous for their scrappiness, their unique approach to ops and growth, and as being one of the first and most successful super apps in the world. They've also long been maybe the biggest start-up in Indonesia and all of Southeast Asia. Kevin and the story of Go-Jek have a lot to teach founders in the US and all over the world, and so I was really excited to sit down with Kevin to dig into the story. He did not disappoint. You'll hear all kinds of wild stories about them having to hire a private security team to protect their drivers, having to build their own cash distribution centers to pay their drivers, plus how they won in large part thanks to their early investment in brand, why it's important to do the hard things as a start-up, also why super apps are surprisingly overrated, and much more. Enjoy this episode with Kevin Aluwi after a short word from our sponsors. This episode is brought to you by Coda. You've heard me talk about how Coda is the doc that brings it all together and how it can help your team run smoother and be more efficient. I know this firsthand, because Coda does that for me. I use Coda every day to wrangle my newsletter content calendar, my interview notes for podcasts, and to coordinate my sponsors. More recently, I actually wrote a whole post on how Coda's product team operates, and within that post they shared a dozen templates that they use internally to run their product team, including managing their roadmap, their OKR process, getting internal feedback, and essentially their whole product development process is done within Coda. If your team's work is spread out across different documents and spreadsheets and a stack of workflow tools, that's why you need Coda. Coda puts data in one centralized location regardless of format, eliminating road blocks that can slow your team down. Coda allows your team to operate on the same information and collaborate in one place. Take advantage of this special limited time offer just for start-ups. Sign up today at coda.io/lenny and get $1,000 start-up credit on your first statement. That's coda.io/lenny to sign up and get a start-up credit of $1,000. Coda.io/lenny. This episode is brought to you by rows.com. The world runs on spreadsheets. You probably have a tab open with a spreadsheet right now. But the spreadsheet product you're using today was designed decades ago and it shows. They live in silos away from your business data, they weren't made to be used on a phone, and if you want to do even the simplest automation, you have to figure out complex scripts that are a nightmare to maintain. Rows is different. It combines a modern spreadsheet editor, data integrations with APIs and your business tools, and a slick sharing experience that turns any spreadsheet into a beautiful, interactive website that you'll be proud to share. If you're writing a report on a growth experiment, you can use Rows to do your analysis on data straight from BigQuery or Snowflake. If you're deep diving on marketing, you can import reports straight from Google Analytics, Facebook Ads, or Twitter, or if you're working with sales you can natively plug Stripe, Salesforce, or HubSpot directly into Rows. And when you're done, you can share your work as a beautiful spreadsheet that's easy to read and embed charts, tables, and calculators into Notion, Confluence, or anywhere on the web. I've already moved some of my favorite spreadsheet templates to Rows. Go to rows.com/lenny to check them out. That's rows.com/lenny.

2. 5:00 – 8:35

   How Gojek got started and the current scale

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky5:01

      Kevin, welcome to the podcast.

   2. KAKevin Aluwi5:03

      Thank you. Thanks for having me, Lenny. Uh, we've, we finally made it happen after, uh, a few weeks or months of going back and forth.

   3. LRLenny Rachitsky5:10

      Yeah. I'm really excited to finally meet you and to dig into a bunch of stuff. I think this is gonna be a really unique episode. I don't often have founders on the podcast, especially founders of companies that are not based in the US. In this case, Indonesia. Uh, Crystal Wajiha, who was on this podcast previously, one of my favorite guests, is just like, "Lenny, you got to get Kevin on your podcast." And so here we are.

   4. KAKevin Aluwi5:32

      I'm glad to be in a, in a small group of, uh, category of people that you invite. Thank you. I'm, I'm a huge fan of, uh, what you do.

   5. LRLenny Rachitsky5:39

      Thanks, man. I really appreciate that. And to sort of redirect to you, you are the co-founder of a company called Go-Jek. Many people listening have never heard of Go-Jek, especially people in the US. So just to start, can you just, like, describe what is Go-Jek? What do y'all do? And then also, I think more interestingly, is just, like, the scale of Go-Jek. I think people in the US, their minds will blow once they hear the scale you've reached with this company they probably hadn't heard of.

   6. KAKevin Aluwi6:03

      So, Go-Jek started as a motorcycle taxi, uh, based service. So it's kind of a uniquely Indonesian thing, where, uh, we have millions of motorcycle taxi drivers in, uh, all the urban centers in Indonesia. And so we, we started, uh, with a very local problem and the first product, uh, was a on-demand super app, uh, if you will, where you could ask someone on a motorcycle to give you a ride, send a package for you, or buy something and deliver it to you. Um, this then evolved over the years into, you know, a more general on-demand consumer super app that also included, you know, car drivers and other services ranging from the ones mentioned to grocery deliveries and payments and financial services. And today, uh, we took the com- uh, the company public about a year and a half ago after we merged, uh, with, uh, with Indonesia's top e-commerce platform, and, uh, we've managed to also expand outside of, uh, just Indonesia where today we have about, uh, 2.7 million drivers across Southeast Asia. Uh, we've completed about three billion orders, uh, last year. So that's three billion orders. So the, the scale of, of our region is, is, is often, um, under- underappreciated. Um, where we also have about 15 million merchants, um, doing, you know, general e-commerce, but also, you know, restaurants and our food delivery service. Um, and on that IPO, um, you know, we were pretty proud to say that, you know, it was Indonesia's largest, uh, IPO, uh, of all time, uh, where we raised over a billion dollars at something like 27, $28 billion, uh, in terms of valuation.

   7. LRLenny Rachitsky7:50

      And these numbers that you shared, 2.7 million drivers, 30 billion orders.

   8. KAKevin Aluwi7:55

      Three billion.

   9. LRLenny Rachitsky7:55

      Or three- three- three billion, yeah.

   10. KAKevin Aluwi7:57

       Three billion?

   11. LRLenny Rachitsky7:57

       Yeah. How would that compare to like an Uber or Lyft?

   12. KAKevin Aluwi7:58

       I, I don't know what the, what, what their latest numbers are, but just in terms of the numbers of people and the numbers- the number of activity, I would place our scale among the largest, uh, US companies.

   13. LRLenny Rachitsky8:10

       That's pretty wild that there's this company out there that a lot of people didn't know about that is basically of the scale of Uber and Lyft.

   14. KAKevin Aluwi8:17

       In terms of, you know, volume, I would say that we're- we're up there with Uber, uh, globally, and definitely larger than, than, than Lyft. I don't remember how many drivers are, uh, in the US, uh, but- but it's definitely, uh, we definitely have m- more, uh, drivers in the region than, than all of the- all

3. 8:35 – 9:37

   Some of the services that Gojek currently offers or has offered

   1. KAKevin Aluwi8:35

      of America.

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky8:36

      Just to kind of like check this checkbox, you said it was a super app. What are all the things that Go-Jek does? Just whatever you wanna share, all the things that you can do.

   3. KAKevin Aluwi8:43

      From the point when we had the most services, we had everything from, um, you know, ride hailing, to y- package delivery, to food delivery, to grocery deliveries. Um, we had moving services on, you know- you know, trucks and vans. We had on-demand, uh, massages, cleaning services. You could get your hair done, um, on- on- on Go-Jek. You could order movie tickets. Uh, you could get a loan, you could pay for things. I think at- at our peak we had something like near 30 different services, uh, all in- all in one app.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky9:18

      I think it's like you're officially a super app if your founder can't even remember all the things that you do right now.

   5. KAKevin Aluwi9:23

      (laughs) Yeah. Uh, yeah, definitely. Uh, definitely. I- I- I- I would challenge anyone, uh, within the company to be able to name all of our services that we've ever had on the app, uh, because it- it- it was pretty wild at

4. 9:37 – 15:36

   Kevin’s thoughts on super-apps

   1. KAKevin Aluwi9:37

      one point, and I- I'd love to kind of talk a little bit about my thoughts on s- on super apps at- at some point during this- uh, during this session because I definitely, um, have some mixed views over it as a product strategy, uh, as, you know, as we've gone through that whole cycle.

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky9:54

      It might be actually a good time just to jump into it. I know that-

   3. KAKevin Aluwi9:56

      Oh.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky9:56

      ... I was actually saving that for later, but this might be a good time, and part of the reason I think this is really interesting is if you open up Uber these days it's like-

   5. KAKevin Aluwi10:03

      Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky10:03

      ... like 40 things that they're offering now. Elon at Twitter is talking about turning Twitter into a super app of payments, communication, messaging, all these things, so I think it's like a really interesting trend that continues to pop up here in the US.

   7. KAKevin Aluwi10:15

      Yeah.

   8. LRLenny Rachitsky10:15

      And- and I would absolutely love to hear your perspective on- on super apps.

   9. KAKevin Aluwi10:19

      Okay, I'm gonna come off a little strong on this, but I- I- I am kind of annoyed at how much it's being mentioned these days. It's- it's- it's really popular in VC consultant analyst, uh, uh, uh, circles because it- it- it sounds really great on a strategy deck, you know, because all of the things that are really, really appealing, uh, they- we'll talk about, you know, lower customer acquisition costs, you know, higher attach rates to different products, talk about, you know, higher, you know, retention across different services, um, uh, the ease of, you know, cross-selling and upselling. You know, all of these things sound great, but it- in reality, a lot of those benefits don't pan out. And- and one probably really good example that- that I like to reference is that I remember one of our products, uh, was mobile, um, you know, phone, uh, top up and recharge. Uh, you know, in Southeast Asia, a majority of people are on prepaid plans instead of post-paid plans, so everyone basically buys their minutes and their data plans, um, upfront in the beginning of the week or the beginning of the month. Um, so we had a product which was a mobile top-up, uh, product. Um, and so the reason I mention this specific product as- as a really illustrative point on super apps is that it's a product that 95% plus of our customers, uh, need because they're all on, you know, prepaid plans, so it's a very, very relevant product. And we had our US research team actually look into why the engagement in the product wasn't as high as we thought it should be. So one of the questions, uh, that the- our UXR team asked our customers was like, "Hey, do you know, uh, that you could top up your mobile minutes and buy data on the Go-Jek app?"And only about 40% of our customers, like 30 or 40% of our customers knew that this product existed. And that completely blew our minds because one, it's a product that is relevant for a- all of our customers. Two, it was literally there like on- on one of the six buttons in like on the- on the home page. And I think the- the- the insight that we got here was that there kind of needs to be a unifying concept, uh, across all of your services within the app for your users to be able to think about your product in a sensible, uh, uh, way. You know, and- and- and for us, the way that our customers thought about us was that... was they thought about the driver. And so when we launched, you know, when we went from ride hailing, to package delivery, to food delivery, to grocery delivery, you know, customers really understood that and- and we didn't have to sell this idea to our customers that you had all of these services under one app because they thought about the Gojek driver. That made sense. You can easily cross-sell somebody from a, uh, ride hailing customer to a grocery customer or a food delivery customer because they understood the unifying factor there being the driver. Uh, but then when you start doing other things that don't have that unifying factor in terms of, you know, the concept that a customer has when they think about your service, it starts breaking down. So, you know, one- one other fun- fun UXR, uh, uh, insight here was when we launched massage services. So, you know, we had, uh... At one point though we've already sh- we- we've shut it down a few years after. We had massage services where you can, you know, order a masseuse to come to your place and a- a- a question that many of our customers asked was that, "Oh, is the driver gonna come into my house and give me a massage?" And for us, like that was insane like, of course not, like, you know this... You know, our drivers are not trained masseuses. But that was the question that people asked because they felt like, oh, this app is an app for these driver related services so if there was a massage service, I'm assuming it's that same man, uh, um, who's gonna give me a massage. And so, you know, I think this kind of illustrates the importance of having these unifying, uh, uh, concepts that are easy for customers to think about the multiple different services. It's not... It's not as simple as just saying like, "Oh, we have a lot of engagement, we have a lot of eyeballs at a service," and then you have a super app that makes sense for customers. And so that whole nirvana of like high... of- of lower CAC, higher retention, uh, that are all in these great strategy decks, uh, often don't pan out because you kind of have to then resell this idea of like, oh, this is another service and- that you can use and- and- and- and that's another, uh, bit of investment that you have to actually put in terms of advertising and- and customer education that increases the... those customer acquisition costs. And it also leads to design constraints because there's only so many ways you can display a whole bunch of different services, uh, that actually have little to- to- to do with each other which is why when you see super apps today it's kind of like this giant menu or this giant grid, um, which does limit, uh, uh, the- the- the design decisions that you can make, um, which is unfortunate, uh, because, you know, if you kind of actually... Um, I think it's- it's an unsolved problem at this point.

   10. LRLenny Rachitsky15:28

       That's a hilarious story about the massage (laughs) product. Sounds like a lot of startups are going to have some issues, um, scaling to new products and trying to become

5. 15:36 – 23:08

   The importance of brand

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky15:36

      a super app. I want to shift a little bit and talk about brand. I did a little research on you ahead of this chat. I was watching, I watched your like Marshall graduation speech and a few other interviews you did and something that came out of your previous writing and talks is just how much you care about brand and how much value you put into brand and that you just have a lot of opinions about the importance of brand. And to- to me and to most people brand is this like really squishy thing and it's hard to know what exactly to do to build your brand, when to prioritize it, how to prioritize it amongst other things you're doing especially early on. So I'd love to hear your advice for founders that are listening and just like what should I actually do around brand? What's your advice for how to tactically do something about brand and also just, you know, why do you think it's so important?

   2. KAKevin Aluwi16:22

      Mm-hmm. I- I- I do agree with you that it- it- it is kind of the squishy thing that, you know, most people, um, see as an afterthought maybe because it is kind of this squishy thing that it's hard to- hard to define but I- I'm a... I'm very... I'm a very, very big believer that the two most important things in a consumer business are product and brand in that order. And I don't think I need to sell the idea, uh, especially to- to your audience, um, that product is absolutely critical and probably the most important. But yeah, the brand as an afterthought is- is definitely one of the areas where I think, um, there's a giant missed opportunity for- for consumer tech businesses. And I almost... You know, I- I get why we kind of opened the session by talking about the size of the business, uh, to give an appreciation of the scale for audience members who might be unfamiliar with us or with the region but I wish I didn't have to start there because we actually started as a very scrappy company where we were by far the underfunded player and- and without brand, um, that... you know, we probably would have never gotten to escape velocity beyond that scrappy, uh, uh, stage. Uh, we've maintained our leadership in Indonesia and I... through a lot of the things that we- we actually did, uh, uh, on the... on the brand side. To give you a sense of, you know, how scrappy, uh, we had to be, uh, in- in- in competition, you know, for the first six months after launching our app, we had only raised about two million dollars and our regional competitor had already raised 250. So they had literally like, um, more than a hundred times more capital than we have so it's easy to kind of talk about, you know, what we built as this kind of, you know, giant business but we came from a place where we were seriously underfunded. And-I think a big reason why we got, we survived, uh, was that we built a great brand for, for our consumers and for our drivers and for our merchants. And I'm... I, I think that great brands create associations in their customers' minds that transcend the typically transactional or utilitarian one that most people have with businesses, that become part of, uh, one's identity. I think some of the best in class examples of these are probably, you know, all the Apple fanboys and fangirls, uh, Nike sneakerheads. You know, for, for, for these, uh, individuals, you know the brand becomes par- really part of their, a big part of their identity and, and their loyalty towards the, the, the products of the company, you know, go beyond just like, "Hey," you know, uh, uh, uh, go beyond a, a, a relationship that can easily be swayed, uh, just through discounts or, or other, or more features that, that, that, that, that other competitors might have. And so I'm... I, I, I'm a really, really firm believer of how important this is because you can see it. If you step out of the tech bubble, uh, uh, for a second, you can see that there are so many great companies out there, uh, that, that, you know, really rely on the strength of their brand, um, to, to, to build these, you know, fantastic businesses and to, to create great experiences for, for their customers. And you ask, you know, what, what are kind of the things that one can do? Um, uh, I think for us, you know, we, we invested a lot in, uh, uh, in our brand, uh, across multiple areas, and I think one, one specific area that I think is really, really important is that you create consistency across all customer touchpoints, and so, you know, branding is not just, you know, cool logo, cool advertising, um, you know, fun, fun imagery. Uh, but it's, it's, it's, it's really about, you know, the impression that a customer or user has, uh, with your product and with your, with your business. So, having that consistency across all customer touchpoints is, is really important. So, you know, how you write copy and advertising and then the app, uh, how you've even designed the app. Uh, but we were the first company of scale to kind of have ads that don't take ourselves too seriously. Uh, you know, we make fun of ourselves, we make fun of, uh, um, you know, our cultural observations of Indonesia and again, to kind of just build this overall feel that like, "Hey, we get you. We are, you know, we are part of the, the, the overall culture of, of Indonesia." And, and even going beyond, you know, the, the, the, the more aesthetic or, um, communication-oriented investments, we also leaned into cultural artifacts, um, uh, in our product features, uh, to, to kind of, you know, really, uh, you know, build this, this, this brand that is part of, you know, day-to-day culture. One of my favorite cultural artifacts is that in, in Asia, it's fairly common, uh, to send food as gifts to your loved ones or, or maybe people you're interested in dating. So, people would send over, like, food as gifts, uh, uh, to, you know, their, their, their romantic interests. And, and so when we launched our food delivery service, a lot of people were actually using it for this. Like, you know, "I'm going to send it to, um, my, uh, uh, uh, my boyfriend or my girlfriend, uh, or the person that I'm interested in dating." And so it became this whole cultural phenomenon of, of like sending GoFood, uh, uh, for, for these people, and we kind of leaned into it in our product feature where all of our, all the other, uh, players, uh, in the market at the time basically only allowed you to deliver food to your home or your office. But we actually allow- we actually created a feature that allowed you to choose a delivery point that was far away from where you were. Um, there's a lot of, there's a lot of reasons why other companies didn't do, didn't allow it at the time because like, "Oh, you know, it might be used for fraud and, and, and, and stuff like that." Uh, but we leaned into it. We leaned into it and, and, and all- and actually created features that allowed to put your pick up point far away from where your actual location was, and then we kind of just, you know, had fun with this whole idea of GoFood dating. And so yes, it's kind of part of branding but, but thinking about branding beyond, uh, just like marketing communication but, but actually be as, you know, being relatable and being part of the culture and being sensitive of, of, of what that culture is, um, I think was something that, you know, we did, uh, really, really well in the early days that allowed us to continue maintaining leadership in spite of the fact that our competitors had more money, which meant that they could offer more discounts, they could off- offer more incentives to drivers. But we, we really kind of leaned very hard into, you know, being not just a utilitarian commodity, which is what a lot of people would say is, uh, uh, is the nature of our business to, to some level of accuracy.

6. 23:08 – 26:53

   How to create branding with consistency across copy and design

   1. KAKevin Aluwi23:08

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky23:08

      So, just to get even more concrete, um, one takeaway from what you just shared, which is interesting, is the first part of figuring out how to approach your brand is what are like, what's like the personality of your product? For you, you said it was like, "We're just like of the people, we're like you, we're here to help you make your life easier," and then that informs the copy, the messaging, be a little, uh... I forget how you described it, but just like almost like bad grammar and stuff just 'cause it like relates more to people.

   3. KAKevin Aluwi23:35

      Yeah.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky23:36

      And then some of these product launches that connect to that. Uh, so maybe if there's anything else you want to add there that'd be interesting, and then what's like, I don't know, one or two moments that most helped build the brand? I know you're kind of famous for like having helmets and jackets on the drivers that helped spread the Go-Jek brand. Was there anything else that just like, "Wow, this was really effective to build this brand that ended up dominating Indonesia"?

   5. KAKevin Aluwi23:58

      Yeah, the jackets and helmets piece I think is really, really important for two reasons. One, the more obvious reason which is that because they were just all over the streets of, um, uh, many cities in, in Indonesia, you know, people were familiar with the imagery and the name. But I think,It's also really, really important that people saw what was happening. So you know, if we just... if we were like, I don't know, an airline and we branded a bunch of people on the streets with, you know, our brand, uh, it's... Yeah, sure, you know, that might help with, you know, brand recall and people might know about, uh, uh, the name, but what was really, really powerful, um, was that when people would be seeing, uh, uh, these drivers with their jackets and helmets, they would be seeing passengers on the back seat as they were in traffic, right? So I'm stuck in traffic and I'm seeing these people whiz past me, uh, with this, you know, with- with- with this imagery on them and immediately I- I get that association. Like, "Oh, I'm stuck in traffic, but I could be out there cutting through traffic on a motorcycle." Or you see them, like, carrying packages or delivering food and you immediately get like, "Oh, like these are guys who, uh, uh, uh, who can deliver food or deliver packages for me." And so it was like this beautiful combination of, you know, one... just having that imagery and- and- and having that, uh, visual everywhere as a reminder of the brand, but more importantly, it was also, uh, uh, a physical kind of... It was... It was a physical reminder of the service of what we do and of how we can help you. Um, and so looking for these opportunities where, again, customers can kind of make that connection between, you know, the- the- the logo and the colors and the name, uh, with actually what the service is, I think is- is... are the opportunities that- that I would say, uh, uh, people should look out for. Uh, they're rare. They're... Admittedly, they're- they're- they're quite rare, uh, which is why, um, in my opinion, it... the laziest, uh, uh, uh, kind of branding tends to- to- to- to be the most popular, um, you know, just put your name and your, you know, copy on a billboard or, uh, on a CPM or CPC campaign. But there are these opportunities, I think, on- on- on being able to reinforce the- the value proposition of your business, uh, in- in a way that is, you know, beyond just kind of visual recall. And I think that... That I think was- was- was why, you know, that specific anecdote is something I like to talk about because it was really, really one of those special, uh, things that reminded people, uh, on- on- on why we're here.

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky26:37

      Yeah, I think you tweeted that it was one of the most important things you ever did as a company, is decide to put these logos on the helmets and jackets. Reminds me of Lyft's pink mustache, which went away-

   7. KAKevin Aluwi26:47

      Yeah. (laughs)

   8. LRLenny Rachitsky26:47

      ... but felt like a really important way for them to differentiate.

   9. KAKevin Aluwi26:50

      Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. No, totally. Totally, totally.

7. 26:53 – 33:03

   Challenges Gojek had in the early days that required scrappiness

   1. KAKevin Aluwi26:53

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky26:53

      You talked about how scrappy you've been.

   3. KAKevin Aluwi26:56

      Mm-hmm.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky26:57

      And I want to dig into that a little bit more. I think there's like US startup scrappy and then there's like Go-Jek scrappy. And, uh, it'd be fun to hear maybe a story of two, just to illustrate how-

   5. KAKevin Aluwi27:07

      Mm.

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky27:07

      ...ridiculously scrappy you were as a company early on, especially.

   7. KAKevin Aluwi27:11

      One thing that we did in the early days that was absolutely crazy was that, you know, we- we were, uh, one of the pioneering companies, one of the pioneering technology companies in Indonesia and- and- and Southeast Asia.

   8. LRLenny Rachitsky27:24

      Mm-hmm.

   9. KAKevin Aluwi27:24

      And so, you know, we came into a environment where a lot of the things that maybe companies or- or- or people in more developed economies take for granted. Um, for example, having electronic or digital payments. That was something that actually didn't really, uh, exist that much, uh, uh, when we first started. And so we had a problem of actually trying to pay drivers because, you know, drivers, um, you know, every day we would be, you know, paying out incentives or- or- or just having, you know, customers pay with, you know, their- their- their- their credit cards or their stored balance, and then we'd have a challenge in getting our drivers to actually, uh, uh, be able to take that money out for- for- for- for their earnings. And in the early days, we actually had cash booths. Uh, so we actually had, um, physical spaces with like a vault and, uh, uh, uh, cash sitting in the vault where drivers can show up, you know, show that, "Oh, um, this is my driver ID. I'm, uh... and this is the- the- the- the balance that I have, uh, uh, with- with you. Please give me the cash." And so we would have these place... these- these actual physical locations where there would be lines of drivers essentially taking cash. And we eventually, you know, figured this out of like, okay, we'll- we'll work with a bank and integrate with an ATM network and- and- and- and all of that. But, you know, in the early days, you know, we just did it ourselves of- of- of being basically... of building essentially a mini ATM network, um, which is a... I think, you know... I- I- I think even that sounds too fancy of what it was. It was just... It was literally like a booth with a vault with cash in it. And... And, you know, we had like, at the time already, you know, tens of thousands of drivers, uh, all across Indonesia. Another, uh, scrappy story, um, that, uh, actually Crystal reminded me of, uh, recently that we did, um, was at the time there was a lot of, uh, fake driver apps out there, um, because, you know, we didn't... uh, we didn't have all of the security investments that, um, we eventually made, you know, things like, uh, code obfuscation and- and- and better API security that wouldn't allow for, you know, these fraudulent driver apps, these basically third party driver apps to co... to connect to, uh, to our platform. So there were a lot of these drivers using, uh, these third party driver apps, uh, that were doing things that... so- so they were kind of doing unsavory things like, you know, stealing driver details, uh, you know, getting... some of them even as, um, bad as like financial details so that they can then, uh, at some point, um, you know, drain driver funds. And- and the way that they did it, uh, the way that they convinced drivers to actually use these apps was that they actually added some features that, at the time, we didn't allow. So things like, um...... uh, you know, we wanted drivers to be... uh, to be conscious of what was happening on the app. And so, we would actually ensure... we would actually make sure that drivers would, you know, push the accept order button. We... we... we made sure that that was the only way that drivers could accept orders. But this app had a... um, a functionality that would automatically accept orders as soon as they kind of came in. And so, they actually... It was kind of this interesting situation where they were doing things that, you know, were fraudulent and... and... and... and... and, you know, not safe, uh, uh, for... for the integrity of the platform. But at the same time, they were also providing some value, uh, uh, to... to... to... to the... to the people who are using them. And so, you know, at the time, we had to make a decision of like, "Okay. We need to... We need to nip this in the bud," right? And one way that we could have done it that would have taken time was really invest in a lot of the technical, uh, uh, security aspects of it. And... But, you know, we didn't have the bandwidth, uh, uh, to be able to do that. You know, engineering and security talent is actually super, super scarce in Southeast Asia at the time. Still is today, but at... at that time, extremely, extremely scarce. And so, we ended up making the decision of actually copying those features. So, we actually saw all these, like, third-party fraudulent apps. And instead of like, you know, building a whole system to kind of prevent them from being built or... or... or... or preventing them from being worked, uh, preventing them from working on the platform, we just said, "Hey, let's take their top th- two or three features and let's build them into our app." And that actually significantly reduced, uh, the number of users, uh, uh, on these third-party apps, um, just by kind of, you know, having this mentality of like, you know, if you can't beat 'em, then... then join them. And so, uh, uh, and... and... and that, I would say, you know, that wasn't a philosophical decision, uh, uh, or... or a principled decision. It was actually a decision made out of necessity because we... we simply couldn't build all the... the capability to... to combat these apps at the time.

   10. LRLenny Rachitsky32:13

       (instrumental music) Are you hiring? Or on the flip side, are you looking for a new opportunity? Well, either way, check out lennysjobs.com/talent. If you're a hiring manager, you can sign up and get access to hundreds of hand-curated people who are open to new opportunities. Thousands of people apply to join this collective, and I personally review and accept just about 10% of them. You won't find a better place to hire product managers and growth leaders. Join almost 100 other companies who are actively hiring through this collective. And if you're looking around for a new opportunity, actively or passively, join the collective. It's free, you can be anonymous, and you can even hide yourself from specific companies. You can also leave anytime, and you'll only hear from companies that you want to hear from. Check out lennysjobs.com/talent.

8. 33:03 – 37:30

   Why Kevin doesn’t believe in moats as a durable solution, and the value of doing hard things

   1. LRLenny Rachitsky33:03

      These are hilarious stories (laughs) , uh, that you had to compete with these like, uh, ripoff, jailbroken-

   2. KAKevin Aluwi33:09

      Yes (laughs) .

   3. LRLenny Rachitsky33:09

      ... uh, fraudulent apps (laughs) . And then you had to build a cash box, uh, network all over the... all over the country. That's amazing. I knew there would be good stories in this question, and I'm glad that you delivered (laughs) . There's also this, like, feeling of, uh, within Go-Jek of just, like, doing

   4. KAKevin Aluwi33:25

      You know, we would actually ensure... we would actually make sure that drivers would, you know, push the accept order button. We... we... we made sure that that was the only way that drivers could accept orders. But this app had a... um, functionality that would automatically accept orders as soon as they kind of came in. And so, they actually... It was kind of this interesting situation where they were doing things that, you know, were fraudulent and... and... and... and... and, you know, not safe, uh... uh, for... for the integrity of the platform. But at the same time, they were also providing some value, uh... uh, to... to... to... to the... to the people who are using them. And so, you know, at the time, we had to make a decision of like, "Okay, we need to... we need to nip this in the bud," right? And one way that we could have done it that would have taken time was really invest in a lot of the technical, uh, uh, security aspects of it and... But, you know, we didn't have the bandwidth, uh... uh, to be able to do that. You know, engineering and security talent is actually super, super scarce in Southeast Asia at the time. Still is today but at... at that time extremely, extremely scarce. And so, we ended up making the decision of actually copying those features. So, we actually saw all these like third-party fraudulent apps. And instead of like, you know, building a whole system to kind of prevent them from being built or... or... or... or preventing them from being worked... uh, preventing them from working on the platform, we just said, "Hey, let's take their top two or three features and let's build them into our app." And that actually significantly reduced, uh, the number of users, uh... uh... on these third party apps, um, just by kind of, you know, having this mentality of like, you know, if you can't beat 'em, then... then join them. And so, uh... uh... uh... and that I would say, you know, that wasn t a philosophical decision uh... uh... or... or a principal decision. It's actually a decision made out of necessity because we... we simply couldn't build all the capability to... to combat these apps at the time.

   5. NANarrator36:18

      Are you hiring? Or on the flip side, are you looking for a new opportunity? Well, either way, check out Lenny's jobs.

   6. KAKevin Aluwi36:18

      Um, so we actually work with private security companies to help, um, these situations, to help our drivers in those situations. You know, to, to help, to help kind of like, you know, uh, extract them out of these, these sticky situations. And so we actually ran a fairly big private security operation, uh, for a fairly long time. You know, until it became common to have Gojek drivers, you know, do all of these things across, uh, cities, we actually worked... we had, we ran this, you know, very operation-intensive thing, uh, just to make sure that, you know, our drivers could be as safe as, as, as, as possible, and it showed our commitment, uh, to the driver community, it showed our commitment that, you know, we cared. And again, you know, going... again, going back to that earlier point around, you know, having that branding association, you know, drivers, uh, knew that, hey, you know, we were... w- w- we weren't just a platform that just kind of let... that didn't care. You know, we, we, we, we actually cared about their safety, um, and, and that helped build that goodwill. Even as competitors started coming in and paying more money, uh, you know, we still had a lot of loyalty, uh, within the driver community because of things like that.

9. 37:30 – 39:38

   How Gojek hired private security to keep their drivers safe

   1. KAKevin Aluwi37:30

   2. LRLenny Rachitsky37:30

      How did you actually have a security person on a motorcycle? Were they, like, pretending to be the rider and then just, like, get out and punch him in the face?

   3. KAKevin Aluwi37:37

      (laughs) Uh, a, a minority of, of, of, of, of situations were like that, but a lot of that was just like, hey, having, like, a, a, an on-, an on-call service where they could just, you know, dial a number, um, and somebody within a, you know, five, 10-minute distance would actually show up. Um, and so we would have these, like, these, these patro- uh, patrols effectively in, in, in specific hotspots where, you know, if there was a, a, a situation brewing that, you know, they would, they would instantly or almost instantly show up, uh, to the site and help, um, diffuse it.

   4. LRLenny Rachitsky38:13

      I love that you have this, like, super app that's doing all these things for people, plus, within the company, you've built all these mini businesses, like a whole bank to-

   5. KAKevin Aluwi38:22

      Mm-hmm.

   6. LRLenny Rachitsky38:22

      ... pay people, private security company. There's probably (laughs) some other... I, uh... Krystal shared a story of you guys rented out a stadium for drivers-

   7. KAKevin Aluwi38:29

      Oh. (laughs)

   8. LRLenny Rachitsky38:30

      ... to collect all the drivers and give them phones. Uh-

   9. KAKevin Aluwi38:32

      Yeah.

   10. LRLenny Rachitsky38:32

       Okay. This is great. (laughs)

   11. KAKevin Aluwi38:33

       Yeah. That, I think, is kind of like a probably one of the hallmarks, uh, of, of, of, of this region in general, where, um, you know, I have no doubt that, you know, what we were building and what we are today is a technology company, but I do think that in the early days, you do have to be a lot more operations heavy, um, and, and then I think that, that lends to that scrappiness, uh, because there are a lot of things that, you know, to solve elegantly and, and, and technically will take a lot of time and, uh, there... and, and it just kind of over-focusing, uh, uh, on, on those type of solutions I think would, would, would be doing your, your customers a disservice, because there are opportunities, uh, to make things a lot better, um, just through, um, probably more innovation in, in, in operations to kind of, uh, kickstart things, uh, until you have the more elegant, scalable, uh, technical or product solution.

10. 39:38 – 44:12

    The value of founders doing and understanding multiple roles within the company

    1. KAKevin Aluwi39:38

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky39:38

       That reminds me that at Gojek you held tons of different roles throughout the time you were there. You were-

    3. KAKevin Aluwi39:45

       Mm-hmm.

    4. LRLenny Rachitsky39:45

       ... uh, obviously co-founder, you were co-CEO at one point, de facto CPO at one point, CIO, CFO.

    5. KAKevin Aluwi39:52

       Yeah.

    6. LRLenny Rachitsky39:52

       I heard that you were writing, like, push notification copy-

    7. KAKevin Aluwi39:55

       Everything.

    8. LRLenny Rachitsky39:55

       ... and became a dri-

    9. KAKevin Aluwi39:56

       Yeah.

    10. LRLenny Rachitsky39:56

        ... driver at one point just to keep things running. Uh, so feels like another good example of exactly what you're talking about, of just doing the, the hard thing in, in the operational component.

    11. KAKevin Aluwi40:05

        I mean, yeah. So actually, you know, I, I, I did have a stint as an amateur, uh, performance marketer in the early days of Gojek. You know, I would, I would, you know, write copy. I would upload ads onto Facebook and, and, and Google, and try and do my best in kind of optimizing our, our, our online marketing spend. But, um, I, I think I did all of those things not because I wanted to be scrappy necessarily, but, uh, I, I do think that as... a- a- and this is probably most relevant for founders less, less for executives, but, you know, I think for... as a, as a founder, I do think it's really important to understand the work, um-

    12. LRLenny Rachitsky40:44

        Mm-hmm.

    13. KAKevin Aluwi40:44

        ... that needs to be done in order to see what excellence looks like, um, and, and for us, you know, again, we do... we, we came from an ecosystem where the availability of experienced talent was relatively low.

    14. LRLenny Rachitsky40:57

        Mm-hmm.

    15. KAKevin Aluwi40:58

        Um, and so for, for me, it was very hard to be able to just say like, "Oh," like, "Let, let's hire person X from organization Y with, you know, job description Z, uh, and we know that they probably can, can deliver," um, because, uh, you know, again, the, the talent availability was really low, and so a lot of times I needed to... I felt like I needed to understand, okay, what is this job? Um, what exactly does it entail? What does... And, and, and, and seeing how bad I am at it, uh, allowed me to understand what good looked like, um, and so I, I held a lot of those roles just because, you know, I wa- I wanted to understand, um, every part of the business as best as I could, uh, in order to then find somebody who could do it, you know, orders of magnitude better than, than, than myself. Uh, I would say that is true for all of these roles, except for being a driver. (laughs)

    16. LRLenny Rachitsky41:49

        Mm-hmm.

    17. KAKevin Aluwi41:49

        Uh, I think being a driver, you know, I wasn't trying to understand, um, uh, uh, uh, what excellence as a driver looked like. Uh, obviously the drivers do a really challenging job, and, and I think I just wanted to understand, uh, what that role was like to kind of build a lot more empathy, uh, towards the, uh, the job and, and, um, make sure that our product was catered, uh, towards what those needs were. So when I... we first launched our, uh, car, uh, ride hailing services, I think I was the first actual driver, um, on, uh, on the app.And, and I, I would every now and then would be a driver. And, and I remember in the early days, um, when I actually picked up a customer, you know, was this lady, um, and she, she put in her destination as a, as a mall. And so I, you know, I went to her... I went to this house, um, you know, and I knew that, okay, I needed to drive to this mall, but then this lady comes out with this like giant bag, um, and so I had to like, you know, hop out the car, take this giant bag, you know, put it in my trunk, um, and then, you know, off we went. And in the middle of the, the drive she's like, "Hey," you know, um, "I need to drop off and, and do my laundry, uh, o- on the way to the mall." And, you know, I just had to, "Okay, cool," like we took a detour, you know, lugged this giant bag, uh, out of our trunk and, and helped this lady, you know, do her laundry and then we went to, uh, uh, uh, went to the mall. And I got very little money out of that experience and, and, you know, it wasn't instant but this, this is kind of eventually what led to I think the... a lot of the support I gave to our driver teams when they were pushing for, "Hey, we need more waiting fees, uh, uh, we need to add, you know, multiple stops, uh, uh, uh, in order to make sure that, hey, you know, a lot of this extra work was actually compensated." And, you know, it was something that, you know, I obviously, um, experienced personally and, and it was something that, something that I, I, I definitely, uh, was excited about as a, as a set of, you know, product features and principles, uh, when it came to building our driver app.

    18. LRLenny Rachitsky43:58

        It feels like having to do that ends up being a feature, as you said, that you actually experienced-

    19. KAKevin Aluwi44:02

        Yeah.

    20. LRLenny Rachitsky44:02

        ... a lot of these challenges and you said-

    21. KAKevin Aluwi44:03

        Yeah.

    22. LRLenny Rachitsky44:04

        ... the really good point about knowing what to hire and what these people are gonna actually do.

    23. KAKevin Aluwi44:07

        Yeah.

    24. LRLenny Rachitsky44:08

        That is, uh, that's interesting how that often turns into a good thing.

    25. KAKevin Aluwi44:11

        Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

11. 44:12 – 47:30

    How Kevin’s failed finance career led him to take a bet on building tech in Indonesia

    1. KAKevin Aluwi44:12

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky44:12

       I know you also have a pretty interesting journey into tech. What can you share on that?

    3. KAKevin Aluwi44:18

       Ah. So I am basically a failed finance professional, um, you know, I, I wanted to... I, I didn't really know what I wanted to do in my life and in, you know, 2000, 2005, uh, which is when I, um, entered college, you know, the hot, sexy thing to do was finance, um, and I guess that was what I wanted to do, um, and, you know, I went, studied finance and then the crash of 2008 happened and I graduated 2009 so it's probably the worst time to be a fi- or try and be a finance professional. And so I went through a really challenging time there, but eventually I got a job at a boutique investment banking firm and that was, I thought like, "Okay now I'm- I was set, uh, for life, you know, I got the job that I wanted, um, I'm working in finance," um, but I then, uh, long story short, uh, I was not very good. Uh, I was not very good, um, my, my, um, my bosses thought I was underperforming. I didn't feel like I was performing and I kind of left, uh, that, that field, that field that I thought I w- I built my, my entire, I guess, future dreams and identity around, um, and, you know, after I, I did that, I decided to take a bet in, in Indonesian technology because, you know, this was like to, you know, when all of this was happening was around 2010, 2011, and it was, you know, starting to see, uh, the, the development of the current technology giants in the US, uh, at the time and I, I thought that, you know, it'd be... it'd be pretty cool if Indonesia ever had a technology industry, to be part of it, uh, at the, at the ground floor. And so I moved back in 2011, uh, and, you know, it was super early. It was really, really early at the time, uh, where, you know, the level of talent, the level of funding, the level of product market fit, the number of people who transacted on the internet was, was also still super low. People still saw the internet as a place for, you know, chat apps and social media and so the level of belief that people had in the space at that time was, was, was, was pretty low. You know, people didn't think that real businesses, um, and real valuable products could be built, um, especially be built locally, um, and so taking that bet, uh, was something that I, I, I think, you know, it, it, it really panned out for, for, for us to kind of be really, really early, uh, in this space, uh, which, you know, today has become very, very vibrant. The scene in Southeast Asia has become, you know, I think one of the most exciting, uh, uh, um, spaces in, in, in technology in the world today. But at the time, it wasn't obvious and, and, and being able to see that development, uh, I think was something that was really, really important to me because, um, it really shows you what's possible in a very, very, very short time. And I think it's something that probably people in technology in the US, uh, can relate to, you know, the people who have been working in this space for like 20, 30 years. But being able to see those early days, uh, for me is... was just, you know, really, really valuable and I think, uh, uh, was an experience that I, you know, definitely, definitely cherished.

12. 47:30 – 52:09

    Tips on building a tech company outside of Silicon Valley

    1. KAKevin Aluwi47:31

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky47:31

       It's really hard to just build a company outside of Silicon Valley and it was even harder back then, uh-

    3. KAKevin Aluwi47:36

       Mm-hmm.

    4. LRLenny Rachitsky47:36

       ... like COVID and remote work almost made it the easiest it's ever been.

    5. KAKevin Aluwi47:40

       Yeah.

    6. LRLenny Rachitsky47:40

       Sounds like a lot of the fact that you were so far away from the Bay Area informed the way that you built this company, the scrappiness that you, that you talked about. I'm curious if you have any advice for a founder who's trying to build a company now outside of, say, the, the Bay Area or just US in general, based on your experience?

    7. KAKevin Aluwi47:58

       Yeah. Look, uh, it was, it was super hard back then, um, because... A- and it was particularly hard because Indonesia is such a valuable market. Indonesia and the rest, I would say primarily Indonesia just because of its scale, but I think overall Southeast Asia was just... it's such a valuable market, uh, and it was interesting for global companies to want to win it, um, so we had... we competed with global and regional companies, but the local talent and funding ecosystems were, were really underdeveloped.So that challenge of like having to compete with the best in the world, you know, for customers in the market while also not having all of the resources available within the market. To be able to build products and companies that can compete was the re-, was, I would say, one of the most challenging parts of building, um, probably in- in markets that are atypical, uh, or- or outside of Silicon Valley and maybe some of the other kind of technology centers in- in- in the world like China and India. So some of my learnings, uh- uh- uh probably there on, you know, on- that I, you know, for, that I would, you know, take going forward, um, is... I think we talked a lot about being scrappy. Uh- uh- yeah, in the beginning, you know, we were a lot more ops-heavy than tech-heavy. And- and- and doing the things that don't scale, uh- uh, through other means, uh, I think, uh, is- is definitely something that is absolutely necessary, uh, if you're building outside of these main, you know, technology hubs. Uh, another thing I would say is you need to get good at remote work really early. And- and I think today that's kind of become a lot more, you know, prevalent, uh- uh, as- as more and more, uh, people have experience with- with- with remote work. You know, for us, uh, we built an engineering center in Bangalore in 2015, and this allowed us to compete a lot better, uh- uh, with the global giants because we had access to, you know, a really deep, uh, talent market in- in India at the time. Um, but we were really early in this whole remote work thing, uh, because it wasn't common, uh, for- for people in our region but also globally to have, um, so much talent concentration outside of headquarters. Um, and I do believe that companies who want to compete against world-class competitors outside of, you know, these, you know, technology centers like Silicon Valley need to be good, become good at remote work really fast, uh, because, uh, you know, getting that talent, um, probably means, uh, having offices that are... or- or- or p- or- or- or individuals who are outside of, uh, your home market or your headquarters. Um, and probably the final, um, I would say tip here is, you know, don't just copy, um, because Go-Jek was not like an Uber clone, uh- uh- even though that was kind of how, you know, some investors or analysts talk about us. Uh, you know, we were focused on a solution that was uniquely, uh, an Indonesian phenomenon, the mo- uh, the motorcycle taxi driver, and this led to both product and, you know, branding innovation, um, on the product side. You know, we were an on-demand super app, uh, because we saw that, you know, a human being on a motorcycle could do a lot of things. And so we built a product around that idea, and- and hence we ended up with a super app even before, uh, super apps were really a thing. And then that branding point that we s- talked about a lit- earlier about giving our drivers, you know, jackets and helmets, uh, so people could see them zip around town, which actually doesn't make sense if you're a- a car ride-hailing service, uh, because, you know, we couldn't... it- it's not e- very easy to brand a car and, you know, the drivers are inside the car. Uh, but all of our competitors at the time, uh, when they first entered the motorcycle, uh- uh, ride-hailing space didn't brand their- uh, uh, their drivers because they came from a car-centric view. Um, and so again, understanding, you know, your unique market dynamics is also really, really important if you're building, uh- uh- uh, outside of, um, you know, these- these, uh- um, these technology centers.

13. 52:09 – 55:42

    What the market is like in Indonesia

    1. KAKevin Aluwi52:10

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky52:10

       We've been chatting about Indonesia and Southeast Asia. I'd love to hear just like what should people know about that market. Um, we've chatted about what you guys have built and a few other companies here and there, but like what companies should people be aware of? What's happening? What's the latest? What's exciting?

    3. KAKevin Aluwi52:24

       Yeah. Uh, I- I think on specifically Indonesia, Indonesia is... Most people don't know that Indonesia is the fourth-largest country in the world and that Southeast Asia holds almost 10% of the world's population.

    4. LRLenny Rachitsky52:36

       Wow.

    5. KAKevin Aluwi52:37

       But beyond, you know, the macro, uh- uh, picture, I think it's also, you know, we've experienced a- a- a- a pretty unique, uh, l- level of, um, pace of adoption for- for- for products, uh, with great product-market fit. Um, so, you know, products with great product-market fit grow tremendously fast, uh, in this part of the world. In- in 2015, for example, you know, when we launched our app, you know, we grew more than a hundred percent month on month for the first 16, 18 months. Um, so we more than doubled, um, every month for more than a year.

    6. LRLenny Rachitsky53:16

       That is insane. I've never heard of that. (laughs)

    7. KAKevin Aluwi53:19

       No, uh, and- and you know, our- our investors at the time, uh, Sequoia is one of our investors at the time, told us that this was the craziest w- the craziest growth story they've, that they've ever heard of, uh, in- in the world. Um, and it's... I wouldn't say because of our, necessarily because of our brilliance. Uh- uh, it was a combination of how, you know, in- in- in- in Indonesia and Southeast Asia, there are a lot of these things that are obviously broken and- and- and could be improved with- with better technology and better products. But also, you know, we also have in this region a very young population who are excited to try new things. Um, and so if you find a solution that really resonates with a lot of these common day-to-day problems, the adoption curve is- is just absolutely insane. Um, and it... and I think it's one of the things that are- that are definitely unique, um, to developing regions like- like- like this one. Um, one company, uh- uh, that- that's really, really interesting for example, just to give a flavor of, um, the type of off-the-wall, seemingly off-the-wall, uh- um, product, uh, or- or- or company being built in this part of the world, there's a company called eFishery.

    8. LRLenny Rachitsky54:33

       Mm-hmm.

    9. KAKevin Aluwi54:34

       And what they do is, um, they basically create a closed-loop ecosystem for fish farmers in currently... I think they're only operational in Indonesia or they're recently expanding beyond Indonesia. You know, they help, uh, farmers, uh, uh, feed their fish through this, um, uh, this IOT smart device, uh, that helps, you know, measure the amount of, like, fish feed that needs to go into, uh, the ponds. Uh, but they also then help, uh, farmers do things like get financing, uh, and also sell, uh, their, um, their produce, uh, out to local or, or even regional or global markets. And it's a company doing like something like a quarter billion dollars in revenue, and it's, it's, it's profitable and it's basically a fish farmer, uh, uh, a closed-loop, um, ecosystem. And, you know, it, it's pretty wild that something like, like, like this exists-

    10. LRLenny Rachitsky55:25

        Right.

    11. KAKevin Aluwi55:25

        ... um, but it does, it does speak to, uh, I think, again, what I early- what I said earlier about the hunger that, uh, the population have for, you know, better solutions. And if you f- can find, uh, these better solutions, you can really build companies of very meaningful scale, uh, very, very quickly.

14. 55:42 – 57:41

    What’s next for Kevin

    1. KAKevin Aluwi55:42

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky55:42

       So, at this point, you've stepped down as CEO. You're, you've stepped down from the board.

    3. KAKevin Aluwi55:47

       Right.

    4. LRLenny Rachitsky55:47

       What's next and, uh, how does, how does it feel?

    5. KAKevin Aluwi55:50

       Yeah. I'm still kind of on this journey, honestly, of like (laughs) how, how, how, you know, how, how does it feel. Um, I think that, you know, it is, you know, like building Gojek is by far the most important professional experience and, and, and frankly one of the most important life experiences I've had. It, it, it's, you know, made me a, a way, way better person actually. And now that I've, I've stepped away, I am not as bored or, uh, as aimless as people would expect after having such a kind of all-consuming thing, um, uh, uh, be, be part of my life experience. Um, uh, what's next? Honestly, Lenny, I don't know. Um, I, I don't know. I don't have a plan, uh, uh, uh, at, at this stage. Uh, I, I do some angel investing on the side. I, you know, work with, uh, other founders to be able to, you know, maybe just share, you know, some of these experiences that I, um, that, that I, that I shared today. Um, and, and just kind of figuring out, you know, um, what are the, I guess figuring out what makes me happy and what kind of, you know, what, what are the ki- activities that I find rewarding. I, I don't know. You know, maybe I'll start another company, uh, at, at some point. I think that's my default. Uh, but I think right now, I'm just kind of taking things easy and, and, and, and, and, you know, trying to figure out, you know, what my, another problem, I guess, that I could kind of be obsessed about.

    6. LRLenny Rachitsky57:25

       You've earned that time to explore and look for new problems. Is there anything else you wanted to touch on before we get to our very exciting lightning round?

    7. KAKevin Aluwi57:33

       No, Lenny. I think, I think we've, we've, we've covered a lot, uh, uh, today. And, um, yeah. I just wanted to thank you for, uh, for the time.

15. 57:41 – 1:02:50

    Lightning round

    1. KAKevin Aluwi57:41

    2. LRLenny Rachitsky57:41

       Amazing. It's absolutely my pleasure. Uh, and with that, we've reached our very exciting lightning round. I've got five questions for you. Are you ready?

    3. KAKevin Aluwi57:48

       Yes.

    4. LRLenny Rachitsky57:49

       Let's go. What are two or three books that you've recommended most to other people?

    5. KAKevin Aluwi57:54

       What You Do Is Who You Are. I think that was the, probably the second most popular Ben Horowitz book, but I'm really, uh, I'm really obsessed with, you know, building interesting and engaging, uh, cultures, so I think that, that was... That's one. Another is, um, a, a classic marketing book. Again, we talked a lot about branding today, so, um, there is this book called, uh, How Brands Grow by Byron Sharp. Um, I think it's a... I don't agree necessarily with everything in it, but I do think that, uh, it's a, it's a great primer on, on, on how to think about branding and, and, and marketing.

    6. LRLenny Rachitsky58:25

       Favorite recent movie or TV show?

    7. KAKevin Aluwi58:27

       Favorite recent movie, uh, The Menu. Uh, and favorite recent TV show, uh, Netflix show is, uh, Cyberpunk 2077: Edgerunners.

    8. LRLenny Rachitsky58:38

       Oh wow. I haven't heard of that one. I don't know if that-

    9. KAKevin Aluwi58:39

       Oh, you should check it out. It's super cool.

    10. LRLenny Rachitsky58:41

        Okay.

    11. KAKevin Aluwi58:41

        It's super cool.

    12. LRLenny Rachitsky58:41

        I think I'll go check it out.

    13. KAKevin Aluwi58:42

        Yeah.

    14. LRLenny Rachitsky58:43

        Favorite interview question that you like to ask?

    15. KAKevin Aluwi58:46

        Tell me about a subject or activity you've been obsessed with for a long time.

    16. LRLenny Rachitsky58:51

        What do you look for in an answer that's like, "Okay, this is good"?

    17. KAKevin Aluwi58:54

        I want somebody to basically almost pitch to me an obsession they have that makes it me, uh, uh, interested, uh, uh, in, in, in knowing more i- into that subject. And I, um... The more obscure, uh, the better, uh, and the more pas- uh, the more passionate they are about an obscure thing, uh, uh, even better. And I think, you know, it, it shows people's capability to be really passionate about something and, and, and, and sell something and, and, and think about something in a very, uh, structured and detailed way.

    18. LRLenny Rachitsky59:25

        What are some products that you love and have recently discovered?

    19. KAKevin Aluwi59:30

        Two products I think right now that I've, I've... that I, I found absolutely delightful. Uh, one is the Arc browser. Uh, I, I know that it's, it's, it's, uh, gaining a lot of traction out there. But I'm a, a very chronic tab hoarder. My, my Chrome tabs are just all over the place, um, and I love that they've, uh, figured out an op- they've figured out an op- I, I would say the best approach to kind of tab management. Um, and there's just a ton of little delightful, like, awesome design details of the... in the, um, in the app that I, I, I think is just really, really cool. And it's a browser. Like, when's the last time there was like a really, really cool browser that came out? Um, so I also love the ambition that the company has. Um, second product, uh, Steam Deck. Uh, I'm a huge gamer, and I, I think it, it is probably, I would say, the best game platform to actually, uh, build on the vision of, of, of truly portable mobile gaming.

    20. LRLenny Rachitsky1:00:25

        I love your point with Arc for, uh, tab hoarders. I also (laughs) used to have a lot of tabs and I love it just auto-deletes them. They just disappear. (laughs)

    21. KAKevin Aluwi1:00:32

        Yes. (laughs) Yeah.

    22. LRLenny Rachitsky1:00:33

        And it forces you to lose your tabs and it works out, surprisingly.

    23. KAKevin Aluwi1:00:36

        Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

    24. LRLenny Rachitsky1:00:38

        Final question, I'm curious (laughs) what comes up for this one. What's something you've-... recently changed or that you heard of someone at Go-Jek recently changed in their product development process that was maybe minor that had a tremendous impact on the ability, team's ability to execute?

    25. KAKevin Aluwi1:00:53

        One relatively minor thing that I thought had a lot of impact with execution is being very clear that whoever is accountable for the result should also be the desi- the, the decider. Uh, I found that a lot of literature out there says that product teams should be this communal, best ideas come from everywhere group, which I think is well-intentioned and absolutely everyone should contribute ideas. But I think not having it be super clear who is accountable and, and, and who is deciding often slows down execution a lot. And I think, you know, when we switch to making it really clear that who was the decider for, um, any kind of product development process, uh, I think our execution definitely improved significantly.

    26. LRLenny Rachitsky1:01:37

        Amazing. Kevin, thank you so much for being here. Go-Jek is such an interesting and important story, and I feel like most founders can learn something from this story, so I was really excited to bring you on and to hear a lot of these, uh, wild stories (laughs) that you shared. Um, two final questions. Where can folks find you online if they want to reach out and learn more, and how can listeners be useful to you?

    27. KAKevin Aluwi1:01:57

        I am, uh, @uhkalui, K-A-Lui, uh, on Twitter. That's also my email, kalui@gmail.com. Um, uh, would always be happy to, to chat about Go-Jek or, or, or just generally anything, uh, uh, technology related. Um, again, I'm not... I have nothing I'm working on, (laughs) uh, at the moment, so I just would love to jam with, with, with cool people.

    28. LRLenny Rachitsky1:02:22

        Amazing. Thank you again for being here.

    29. KAKevin Aluwi1:02:25

        Thanks, Lenny.

    30. NANarrator1:02:26

        (instrumental music)

Episode duration: 1:02:50