Zaky is only the second founder-CEO to leave a South-East Asian unicorn, following Gojek’s Nadiem Makarim, who became Indonesia’s education minister. — Bukalapak
Achmad Zaky spoke with unusual candor after taking the stage in Jakarta that October afternoon. People stopped chattering and lowered their phones when he began recounting the decade he spent building one of Indonesia’s most successful startups. What none of the hundreds in the cavernous hall knew then: it was his last big public act as chief executive of Bukalapak.com.
Unbeknownst to the crowd, the 33-year-old self-taught computer whiz was on his way out. After a series of failed experiments and missteps – including an abortive attempt to go toe-to-toe with Alibaba-backed rivals – Zaky had lost his board’s confidence that he could lead a vastly expanded company into its next phase of growth. Just months away from ceding the reins of the US$2.5bil (RM10.35bil) e-commerce outfit he built from the ground up, he spent much of the speech reflecting on his decade-long stewardship.
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