Southeast Asia crucial to GitHub’s growth strategy, CEO says

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We’ve built many communities around ourselves. Morning walking groups for elders, book clubs for literature enthusiasts, and culinary circles for aspiring chefs are some examples. These groups help us talk about common interests and share creative ideas.

For developers, their community is GitHub. It’s where they connect, share their projects, and help each other grow in the field. It’s tough to picture the tech world without a platform like GitHub.

In today’s big story, GitHub CEO Thomas Dohmke talks to Tech in Asia about the expansion of Singapore’s developer community in APAC. He also addresses the copyright infringement concerns related to GitHub Copilot.

Today we look at:
* An exclusive interview with GitHub CEO
* Blibli sees Q3 profit surge despite a 3% year-on-year dip in overall revenue
* Other newsy highlights such as Jobstore selling its HR platform and Capital A’s IPO plans

Premium summary

Singapore’s developer boom

Image credit: Timmy Loen

In Singapore, the developer community has surged, making up over 1 million people or one-sixth of the population. In a recent interview with Tech in Asia, GitHub CEO Thomas Dohmke highlighted the 39% growth in the city-state’s developer population.

• Copilot boosts developer productivity: GitHub’s Copilot, an AI code generator powered by GPT-4, is currently used by more than 37,000 organizations. Dohmke expects increased usage in Southeast Asia and aims to reduce latency in the region by tapping into a new Microsoft data center in Indonesia.
• GitHub’s financial challenges: Only 1% of GitHub Copilot’s 100 million users are paying subscribers. A Wall Street Journal report suggests that Copilot was incurring losses averaging over US$20 per user monthly in early 2023. However, Microsoft denies this, claiming that Copilot has an annual revenue run rate of US$100 million. Dohmke anticipates broader Copilot adoption among enterprises once the initial pilot projects are over.
• Copilot’s legal challenges: GitHub Copilot has faced criticism for using code for training data without informing original programmers, and there have even been lawsuits. Dohmke clarifies that users can opt in or out of Copilot-generated code. The platform checks if generated code exceeds 150 characters and compares it to public repositories, considering code under 150 characters as free of intellectual property rights.

Read more: Exclusive: SEA crucial to GitHub’s growth strategy, CEO says

News spotlight

Blibli’s Q3 rebound

Image credit: Timmy Loen

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