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David Svoboda has dual citizenship, he is both American and Israeli, but he LOVES Indonesia. David Svoboda first started to become involved with Indonesia back in 2007. Since then, his passion and love for our country and our people has only grown over the past decade. He has made huge improvements in Indonesia across multiple sectors from technology, to green solutions, but most importantly, he is working to give the people who are hurting the help they need.
Hi-Tech Solutions That Do Indonesians Good:
David Svoboda has been very involved in innovative and disruptive solutions that make life better for Indonesians. He lead the marketing launch and expansion team for AbraResto as the Director of Sales and Marketing. AbraResto was the very first food review platform in Indonesia. It was the very first index of restaurants in Jakarta and was also the very first company to bring Google Business Photos to the Indonesian market. A year after David Svoboda left the company, they shut down to due to financial distress.
David Svoboda also was the CEO of IETV. IETV was the first content delivery network in Indonesia to provide live and on demand television streams to devices using IPTV and OTT protocols. This allowed Indonesians to watch the news and their favorite sports teams in 1080p HD from any device using a low bandwidth internet connection. Indo Expat TV shut down in 2015 due to the mass exodus of foreigners following the volatility in the Indonesian Immigration policy.
David Svoboda along with his former partner Rob Davies started a mobile application called Rob’s Jobs. Rob’s Jobs quickly became a market leader in the human resources field. The app allows the Indonesian workforce to apply to jobs that meet their skills with the simplicity of a swipe, similar to the “Tinder” model. The app is also helping to massively reduce the amount of time that is wasted in HR departments, making the workforce more efficient in putting Indonesia back to work.
Saving Indonesia’s Environment by Taking Her Green:
In 2014, David Svoboda launched a solution called Liquid Off in Indonesia. The liquid utilized nanotechnology to increase the lifespan of shoes by making them super-hydrophobic. This means that the material of the shoes deflects liquids making the shoes last longer in an ecofriendly way.
David Svoboda has also worked alongside South African telecommunications conglomerate NGN Telecoms for the past few years to help digitize all of the paper communications in Indonesia. Through a cooperation between PT. Telkom Indonesia, NGN is able to provide digital fax numbers also known as D-Fax numbers to Indonesians. This is being done free of charge to any individual, corporation, or government department that wants one. The result is that all fax communications get converted into digital, encrypted, and compressed communications which reduces paper, toner, electricity and carbon emissions across Indonesia. All for the price tag of FREE.
Saving Indonesian Lives with Products:
For the past few years, David Svoboda has been distributing a product called Fire Terminator that is made from Indonesian fruits and vegetables. Fire Terminator is totally ecofriendly and non-toxic solution that puts out fires with no backburn. The solution was especially helpful in Aceh during the #HAZE crisis. It was the only solution that effectively combated the dangerous fires, and did so without causing harm to the Indonesian people or their ecosystems.
David Svoboda has worked very closely with Indonesian security firms since 2012. Through his efforts, he has continued to bring security solutions to Indonesian law enforcement as well as defense sectors. The specifics of a lot of these products are not classified for public knowledge, but they have been invaluable in increasing Indonesia’s security in an ever changing world.
Improving Indonesia’s Art and Culture:
David Svoboda was the founder of Classical Jakarta in 2012. Classical Jakarta was a project designed to bring the best classical musicians in the world to Jakarta. This was not only to create wonderful concerts, but to create a networking environment for the business community of Jakarta. The project was done with partners such as the US Embassy Cultural Center, @America, and with major support from the Panigoro family of Medco. In December, 2012, Classical Jakarta brought principal members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra to Jakarta to perform music that had been composed by Indonesian composer, Ananda Sukarlan.
David Svoboda has contributed to the Indonesian music scene in many ways. He has brought new forms of distribution of music to Indonesia. In 2011, he was the first person to have artists distribute their music in digital vaults that could be accessed with scratch off cards that were sold through small shops around Indonesia. He has worked with, managed, developed or produced over 150 artists. Artists such as Keith Martin, Indri Buana, Agnes Mo, Sandhy Sondoro, Teza Sumendra, Gideon Tengker, Clarice Cutie, Brianna Simorangkir, Calvin Jeremy, Idan Cohen (IC) and many more.
More recently in 2017, he started a project under the name of ICBANANA. The music video that attacked the fakeness, profanity, controlled substance abuse, and over sexualization of the music industry. The artist that he used is not actually an artist. She was a fictional character that was invented and was played by an active duty Israeli Soldier, Idan Cohen. His campaign was met with huge support in Indonesia including a viral dance challenge, a trending topic on twitter, and endorsements from Indonesian Government officials like Annies Baswedan and Imam Nugrari.
His Heart for Indonesians:
David Svoboda has always had a heart for preparing Indonesians for brighter futures. Since 2010 he has been spending his spare time to educate and develop. He has taught youth at Curtin College, Raffles, Kaplan, Al-Azhar, and many others. He has also spent a lot of time to develop corporate leaders in some of Indonesia’s most prosperous businesses, Mitsubishi, Motorola, Mandiri, Pertamina, AXA, Deutsche Bank, and many others.
In 2015, under the suggestion from the spouse of the then US Ambassador, Sofia Blake, David Svoboda launched a major charity initiative called Give Back – Artists in Service. The project brought support from some of Indonesia’s biggest stars, Raline Shah, Joe Taslim, Agnez Mo, Mike Lewis and many more. The project was initially partnered with UNHCR and Dompet Dhuafa. In 2016, David Svoboda signed the project over to UNICEF. It has since been copied and replicated in multiple countries. The project’s initial goal was to raise funds and awareness for the 49 million undocumented children in Indonesia. It has since then, done a lot more good than was originally intended.
David Svoboda has more recently been working with the handicapped victims of earthquakes in Jogjyakarta with Yayasan Mandiri. He has been bringing hand-crafted bamboo products that are made by the handicapped in the Japanese Red Cross facility there and distributing them across the USA as well as to Israel. The Israeli support has actually exceeded that of the USA, even though Israel as a nation is more than 95% smaller than the USA. The expected sales in Israel alone next year are projected to help fully support the livelihood of over 40 disabled families in Central Java.
What’s Next for Indonesia from David Svoboda?
David Svoboda is currently bringing together international artists from around the world to work together with Indonesian artists to raise awareness and funds for the hurting people of Bali. The project is focusing on creating 8 bases across Bali that will provide clean water and medical assistance with basic needs care to the disenfranchised people suffering in Bali. The project will use a similar strategy to his project Give Back making a “We Are the World” type music video to raise awareness and funds. The song that is being used was written by Monique Benabou of Season 2 The Voice USA, and Season 1 of MEGASTAR with Usher. A documentary is also being filmed showing the involvement of the artists and how they are helping the Indonesian people. Monique is a first generation American artist of Moroccan/Israeli descent.
David Svoboda has also joined forces with some of the smartest scientists in the world based in Israel along with an Israeli firm, Miriam Finance, to bring a new Artificial Intelligence technology to Indonesia. The Artificial Intelligence technology will allow radiologists to detect cancer tumors months sooner than they currently can with increased accuracy. The best part, is that technology is going to lower the costs of CT and MRI scans and not increase them. He is going to be launching a campaign in 2018 to raise awareness and funds to roll the new technology out to radiologists all over Indonesia and the world.
