If Min Usihen, Indonesia’s director general of intellectual property, has her way, women-owned micro, small and medium enterprises will soon be taking advantage of the country’s IP laws to improve their businesses.

According to a release by Antara, the country’s news agency, Usihen told participants at a webinar in April that the use of IP is important, and can help women MSME players add value ot the products they sell, increase economic growth, create jobs and boost welfare.

“Through this seminar, we hope more women would improve their knowledge of intellectual property,” she remarked at a webinar titled Women Work, Brilliant Indonesia.

According to data from Statistics Indonesia (BPS) in 2021, out of a total of 65 million MSMEs in Indonesia, 64.5 percent are run or owned by women, according to Antara. But, Usihen said, despite the large number women involved in MSME businesses, the number of women who participate in Indonesia’s IP system remains low. “[This] means, there are still very few Indonesian women who benefit from intellectual property,” she said.

According to Antara, Usihen said that the government continues to provide space for women to play an active role and participate in overseeing development in all fields to carry out the mandate of the Constitution. “We are looking forward to the consistency and presence of more roles of women, including women creative economy actors, to create a brilliant Indonesia, free from poverty, inequality, and backwardness,” she said.

The government is also stepping up its efforts to be removed from the U.S. Trade Representative’s Special 301 Priority Watch List, according to a story in the Jakarta Globe.

During the Intellectual Property Crime Forum in Jakarta in early May, Law and Human Rights Minister Yasonna H. Laoly said that intellectual property rights are a significant factor in determining investor confidence in Indonesia.

“I am confident that Indonesia will be able to get off the priority watch list,” he said.

Yasonna emphasized that the Ministry, through the Directorate General of Intellectual Property (DJKI), is dedicated to providing maximum protection to intellectual property rights holders and ensuring strict law enforcement against violators, both domestically and internationally, the Globe said. He stressed that a conducive business environment, fostering creativity, and attracting investment are crucial for increasing international trust in Indonesia.

“Therefore, efforts to protect and enforce intellectual property rights must be continuously improved,” he said.

The Globe reported that in recent years, DJKI has undertaken various efforts to remove Indonesia from the list, including establishing an Operational Task Force of law enforcement agencies and relevant ministries. These include the Ministry of Communication and Informatics, the Food and Drug Monitoring Agency (BPOM), the Ministry of Finance, and the Indonesian National Police (Polri).

Earlier this year, DJKI received an award from Interpol and the South Korean National Police for their actions in working with Interpol, South Korea’s Ministry of Culture, Sports & Tourism, the Busan Police and the Indonesian National Police to arrest the Jakarta-based operator of the pirate IPTV service known as TVDOL. The arrest of the operator behind TVDOL in Jakarta in October 2023 followed a complaint by the Korean broadcaster Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation (MBC) to Korean authorities of pirating of its content, including in Indonesia. Further investigations revealed the pirate operation was based in Jakarta and involved a number of individuals, including the main operator. The TVDOL operation had been run since 2010, and, according to the South Korean government, resulted in losses of more than US$11 million, the Asia Video Industry Association (AVIA) reported.

“Piracy knows no borders and it’s vital that enforcement authorities in different countries work together to take action against pirate operators wherever they are based, and we commend Indonesia’s Intellectual Property Office for the outstanding work that resulted in the takedown of a pirate operation causing damage in multiple countries,” said Matt Cheetham, general manager of the Coalition Against Piracy (CAP), AVIA’s anti-piracy arm. “It is very encouraging to see so many enforcement bodies in different countries working together to take action against pirates that are not only damaging the South Korean and Indonesian creative communities, but also placing consumers in both countries at risk from the harms such as viruses and ransomware that are well-known to be associated with pirate operations.”

It is with this ongoing interest in Indonesian IP work that we turned to IP professionals in the region in order to understand better what clients need today. Asia IP asked a large number of professionals – mostly in-house counsel and corporate legal managers – what they were looking for from their legal service providers. From their answers, we have compiled our list of Indonesia’s IP Experts, those lawyers who understand what their clients need and are able to provide them with the best practical advice.

To anyone familiar with the intellectual property market in Indonesia, it is no surprise that Rouse leads the list of law firms represented on the list; the powerhouse law firm placed six lawyers on our list, followed by SKC Law, which placed four lawyers on the list.

AMR Partnership, Januar Jahja & Partners and Makarim & Taira S., each had three lawyers named to the list. A number of local, regional and global firms are represented by two lawyers each: Assegaf Hamzah & Partners, Biro Oktroi Roosseno, FAIP Advocates & IP Counsels, HHP Law Firm (the Indonesian branch of Baker McKenzie), Iman Sjahputra & Associates, Inter Patent Office, K&K Advocates and Winuriska, Prabawa & Partners.

Our survey includes only lawyers working at law firms in Indonesia. Most of the lawyers named to our list have multiple practice specialties. Many of them are litigators, while others concentrate on prosecution work or provide strategic advice.

All of them have something in common: they are Asia IP’s IP Experts for Indonesia.

– Gregory Glass

Indonesia’s IP Experts is based solely on independent editorial research conducted by Asia IP. As part of this project, we turned to thousands of in-house counsel in Asia and around the world, and asked them to nominate private-practice lawyers, including foreign legal consultants, advisers and counsel.

The final list reflects the nominations received combined with the input of the editorial team at Asia IP, which has nearly 50 years of collective experience in researching and understanding the legal market in Southeast Asia.

All private practice intellectual property lawyers working at law firms in Indonesia were eligible for inclusion in the nomination process; there were no fees or any other requirements for inclusion in the process.

The names of our 50 IP Experts are published here. Each IP Expert was given the opportunity to include their biography and contact details in print and on our website, for which a fee was charged.