The inside story behind MediaCorp’s buyout of KapanLagi, one of Indonesia’s largest digital media deals

Remember at the end of April when Singapore’s MediaCorp acquired a 52 percent stake in Indonesia’s KLN Group, the parent company of KapanLagi? It was a big deal. Sources say it may have been the largest digital media deal in the archipelago to date. Clearly, the stars had to align just right for it to go through. But what you may not know, however, is that Andi S. Boediman, managing partner at Indonesian VC firm Ideosource, played a part in shaping the alignment.

KLN CEO Steve Christian has been camera shy recently, but Tech in Asia was able to catch up with Boediman on the record for the inside scoop.

“Our role was actually like that of an investment banker,” explains Boediman. “We helped persuade and mediate both sides of the deal […] the result is that we got a fee and now Ideosource also gets shareholder options in KLN.”

Boediman did not disclose the details on Ideosource’s investment rights, nor on the amount of shares his firm is currently entitled to, but he did say that the acquisition would not have gone through without Ideosource.

Andi S. Boediman, managing partner of Ideosource

Flirting with acquisitions

Not many people in Indonesia’s tech scene know about Boediman’s history with the archipelago’s biggest entertainment news site. According to Boediman, he and KLN’s co-founder Eka Wiharto have been friends since kindergarten. In 2007 and 2008, when Wiharto and Christian set out to strengthen KapanLagi’s brand name, Boediman was also there to help. He recalls:

I was involved quite regularly at that time. I was helping them to do the strategy and really build the brand. We partnered with one of Indonesia’s famous celebrities. That was actually the first time that they were able to because it gave them really good brand recognition. Before that, even though they had built up the traffic, they were having difficulties monetizing.

According to Boediman, in 2009, KapanLagi came very close to being acquired by Yahoo. The deal was on the cusp of a press announcement, until Yahoo abruptly backed out, he says. Later in 2011, Boediman assisted KLN once again as an outside consultant by helping design the company’s roadmap for scalability. Three months later, KapanLagi received an angel investment from Trikomsel’s Sugiono Wiyono, a veteran in Indonesia’s tech industry. Boediman says, “Around that same time, we also met with Pak Sugiono and we decided to set up Ideosource together.”

See: Trikomsel CEO Sugiono Wiyono wants to disrupt his business

In early 2014, KapanLagi and Fimela merged to create one of the largest online media networks in Indonesia. Having previously established a separate relationship with Fimela’s CEO Ben Soebiakto in Surabaya, Boediman once again found himself in the fold with KapanLagi. He says, “Still even at this point we weren’t officially working together, but we were just friends and I was just helping out.”