Chairul Tanjung shows no sign of slowing down, even though he’s about to turn 60 in June.
Not content with having minted his eight billionth dollar in personal wealth to become Indonesia’s third-richest person – up from sixth – in January, when he launched his new digital bank Allo on the Jakarta bourse, Tanjung says he is poised to execute the greatest business move of his career.
His next big thing is to blend his airline-banking-retail-media-and-then-some empire into a single fintech-powered super app designed to facilitate nearly every commercial transaction that Indonesians might make on any given day.
“[Making] money is not too important for me anymore,” he tells Asiamoney. “I think the excitement is actually the achievement. The best is yet to come.”
Tanjung says he wants to be the guy who serves Indonesians their morning coffee, transports them around town, delivers their daily news feeds, sends them on their holidays and organizes their household finances.
“From your waking up to your sleep, from your birth until you die,” as he puts it. “In your phone and in one app.”
[Making] money is not too important for me anymore…I think the excitement is actually the achievement. The best is yet to come
Self-made Tanjung’s vision may sound ambitious, even fanciful, but he insists he already has the network in place.
