CTO of NulisBuku: Openness for Collaboration the Key to Success in Startups

As we continue with our female entrepreneurship series this month, we’re honoured to feature an entrepreneur from the Indonesia startup scene. She’s Aulia Halimatussadiah (pictured right), also known as Ollie, who has written 25 books on top of co-founding startups and driving various initiatives in the Indonesian startup community.

In the interview, Ollie tells us how the idea of entrepreneurship was not embraced coming from an Asian family, how she overcame obstacles while building startups, and how collaboration can help aid startups scale to greater heights. She also hopes to spread the spirit of female entrepreneurship around Indonesia, encouraging more women to enter the technology and startup scene.

Can you tell us a little about yourself?

AH: Aside from startup work, I have written both fiction and nonfiction books, which range from novels and poetry to how-to and business motivational books. Due to this passion in writing, I have also co-founded NulisBuku.com.

What does NulisBuku do, and what is your role?

AH: At NulisBuku, we pride ourselves as the first online self-publishing platform in Indonesia, helping aspiring writers to self-publish and print their books on demand. We will also be available in e-book format soon.

As for my role, I am currently serving as the chief technology officer, where I help to build, maintain, and chart out the technological progress of the company.

How and why did you get started in this industry?

AH: I have a penchant for technology, and have always wanted to create the best websites since my high school days. Hence, I took the path of studying IT in college, and upon graduation I worked as a web developer.

After gaining some experience, my passion for reading drove me and a couple of my partners to build my first startup, Kutukutubuku, an online bookstore back in 2006. Back then, the idea of a shopping cart was not introduced in most Indonesian online bookstores. As an avid reader who would buy many books within a week, it became a hassle to keep having to fill out forms in each online store. We eventually fixed that pain point with our shopping cart system in Kutukutubuku.

As mentioned, I am also a writer. Nulisbuku came about when I wanted to publish a research book for writers called Inspirasi.net. Despite having a couple of bestselling books under my name, my publisher rejected and deemed it as uninteresting. The other option was to self-publish it in the traditional way, but there is a minimum printing requirement of 3,000 copies.

Hence, my partners Angeline Anthony, Brilliant Yotenega, Oka Pratama, and I decided to come together to build NulisBuku.com (team pictured right). We solved the problem by allowing writers to self-publish for free, print on demand, and also have the opportunity to obtain royalties from their book sales on our website.

Did you face any challenges in particular?