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Rp 1.5t Convention Center Planned for BSD City to Be Biggest in the Country
Francezka Nangoy | July 30, 2011

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Kompas Gramedia and Sinar Mas agreed on Thursday to build a Rp 1.5 trillion ($177 million) convention and exhibition hall on the outskirts of Jakarta to meet the growing demand for such meeting centers.

They will form a joint-venture company called Indonesia Expo to build the 150,000-square-meter facility in Bumi Serpong Damai City in Banten.

“This will be the largest convention and exhibition hall” in the country, said Danny Budiharto, director of Dyandra Media International, Kompas Gramedia’s events and venues unit.

Kompas Gramedia is one of the country’s leading media companies and owns Kompas daily, the country’s largest newspaper by readership.

Danny said that with Indonesia’s growing economy, the country needed this kind of facility. Both foreign and domestic event organizers want to hold large conventions here but there is a lack of large venues, he said.

“Sometimes events have to be divided between two places because existing convention halls cannot accommodate large events,” he added.

According to data from the Indonesian Exhibition Companies Association, the number of exhibitions nationwide this year had risen by more than 20 percent to 324 events, from 265 in 2010.

The new convention center is planned to consist of a 10,000-seat concert hall, theater, conference hall and museum, and will have a capacity of 200,000 visitors per day, Danny said.

Ishak Chandra, managing director at Sinarmas Land, said the value of the investment, including the purchase of land, would be more than Rp 1.5 trillion and that the design and financing of the facility was still being discussed.

“This is still the very first step. We will decide the design and other details within the next three months,” he said.

Danny said both foreign and domestic bank loans might be sought to finance the project.

Construction is expected to begin next year and be completed by 2013.

Ishak said the project would complement the master plan for BSD City, a 6,000-hectare planned community in Serpong.

For Kompas Gramedia, the convention center would be its fifth exhibition hall project after its Gramedia Expo buildings in Surabaya, Medan and Makassar, and the Bali Nusa Dua Convention Center.