JAKARTA (Reuters) – Russian internet giant Yandex plans to invest in Indonesia’s artificial intelligence (AI) ecosystem, the Southeast Asian country’s communications and digital minister said .
Meutya Hafid, Indonesia’s communications minister, met with Alexander Popovskiy, head of Yandex’s international search division, on Thursday and said the company expressed its intention “to expand the search engine platform in Indonesia,” according to a press release released Friday by the ministry.
He did not provide details on the implications of the investment or the size of the potential investment.
The ministry did not immediately respond when asked about the scale or timing of the investment.
Yandex, known as “Russian Google,” did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The company develops its own large language models and is one of the leading Russian companies in the field of AI.
But Russia’s industry development faces challenges as the West has sought to restrict the country’s access to technologies that could help it continue its war against Ukraine, and as major producers Global chip manufacturers have suspended their exports to Russia.
Indonesia, which has a large young and tech-loving population, has attracted interest from several global technology companies in recent months.
AI chip leader Nvidia and Indonesian telecommunications company PT Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison plan to build a $200 million artificial intelligence center in Central Java this year, the company said. former Indonesian Minister of Communications in April.
Microsoft announced earlier this year that it would invest $1.7 billion over the next four years in the development of cloud services and artificial intelligence in Indonesia, including the construction of data centers.
(Reporting by Stanley Widianto; additional reporting by Alexander Marrow in London; editing by Miyoung Kim and David Evans)
