Beyond the Destination: The Journeys of Toto Sugiri and Yozua Makes

The stories of Toto Sugiri and Yozua Makes belong to the latter. They come from entirely different worlds. Toto Sugiri built his career in technology and data centers, an industry that operates mostly beyond the traveler's view, while Yozua Makes entered hospitality and tourism, an industry experienced through landscapes, food, architecture, culture, and the simple pleasure of being somewhere else. Yet their journeys meet in an unexpected place: the EY Entrepreneur Of The Year Indonesia awards, a leading entrepreneurship award program organized by Ernst & Young (EY). The program recognizes entrepreneurs based on entrepreneurial spirit, purpose, growth, and impact.

On November 23, 2022, at The Langham Jakarta, EY named Otto Toto Sugiri, CEO of DCI Indonesia, the EY Entrepreneur Of The Year Indonesia 2022. A year later, on November 14, 2023, at Hotel Mulia Senayan Jakarta, the recognition went to Yozua Makes, Founder and CEO of Plataran Indonesia. Two entrepreneurs, two industries, and two very different ways of shaping Indonesia. Yet beneath the contrast is a shared story about experience, vision, and the courage to begin a new chapter at a stage of life when many people might assume the most important chapters have already been written

Think of a journey through Indonesia today. A hotel room is booked online, a ride is ordered from an app, a digital payment is made at a restaurant, and photographs from a remote beach or mountain trail are uploaded and shared within seconds. None of these experiences seems connected to a data center, yet behind them are servers, networks, cooling systems, power infrastructure, and layers of technology working continuously in the background. This is the world Toto Sugiri helped build.

Long before DCI Indonesia existed, Toto was already part of Indonesia's early technology industry. Forbes recognizes him as one of the country's technology pioneers. He founded Sigma Cipta Caraka in 1989 and later became one of the founders of Indonet in 1994, at a time when the internet was still far from becoming part of everyday life.

His next chapter began in 2011, when he founded DCI Indonesia. The company later developed JK1, which began operations in 2013 and became Southeast Asia's first Tier IV data center. It is an unusual kind of infrastructure because its value lies precisely in what travelers never see. A resort invites people to look around, while a data center exists to make sure the digital world continues to function quietly and reliably. For an increasingly connected Indonesia, however, this invisible infrastructure has become fundamental.

Cloud services, digital commerce, financial transactions, applications, and countless everyday online activities depend on facilities designed to keep data secure and systems available. Toto's journey was therefore not simply about building another technology company. It was about recognizing what would be needed underneath Indonesia's digital transformation and having the conviction to build it for the long term.

Then there is Yozua Makes, whose world begins somewhere very different, perhaps with morning light falling across a tropical landscape, the sound of birds beyond a villa, a meal shaped by local ingredients, or a boat moving slowly across Indonesian waters. Yozua's professional background was not in hospitality. He came from law, education, and business.

He is known as a lawyer and academic and is the founder of Makes & Partners. In 2009, Yozua and his wife, Dewi Makes, founded Plataran Indonesia. What followed was a hospitality journey built around an idea that feels particularly relevant to a country as geographically and culturally diverse as Indonesia: a hotel or resort can be more than a place to stay. It can become a gateway to understanding the landscape around it.

Plataran developed as an integrated hospitality group spanning hotels and resorts, dining, catering, vessels, and destination experiences connected to national parks. Its philosophy is expressed through three words: Nature, Culture, and Community. The idea sounds simple, but its implications are broad. A forest is not simply a view from a villa.

A coastline is not merely a backdrop for a photograph. A local tradition is not simply an activity arranged for visitors. They are part of the destination itself. That philosophy is also reflected in Plataran's Hospitality with Impact approach, which connects hospitality with environmental and social considerations. In a country where some of the most extraordinary travel experiences exist within sensitive ecosystems and culturally rich communities, the future of tourism is closely tied to the future of those places.

This is where the idea of Legenda Khatulistiwa becomes meaningful. Indonesia sits across the equator, but its story is much larger than a geographical line. Its equatorial landscapes encompass rainforests, islands, coastlines, coral reefs, wildlife, indigenous knowledge, culinary traditions, and communities whose lives have evolved alongside nature. Travel offers a way to encounter these stories, but travel also creates a responsibility. The more people visit a place, the more important it becomes to understand what keeps that place extraordinary. A destination depends on its environment, its communities, and the cultural identity that gives it a sense of place.

This makes sustainability particularly relevant to hospitality because it is not an idea that exists outside the guest experience. It is woven into the landscape itself. A mangrove forest protects a coastline, a healthy marine ecosystem supports local livelihoods, traditional knowledge gives meaning to a landscape, and local communities preserve traditions that visitors travel thousands of kilometers to experience.

When tourism recognizes these connections, travel can become more than consumption. It can become participation. That is the space where hospitality and impact meet. For Plataran, the relationship between Nature, Culture, and Community places the destination at the heart of the experience. The resort becomes part of a larger story rather than an isolated property. The journey does not end at the hotel gate. It continues into the landscape, the culture, and the communities surrounding it

At first glance, Toto Sugiri and Yozua Makes could hardly be more different. One builds data centers, while the other builds hospitality experiences. One works with servers, connectivity, power, and digital infrastructure, while the other works with destinations, landscapes, gastronomy, culture, and people. But both understood something fundamental about building for the long term. Toto recognized the infrastructure that a digital Indonesia would eventually need. Yozua recognized the value of bringing Indonesia's natural and cultural wealth into a hospitality experience while placing impact closer to the heart of the business.

Neither story began with youth as its greatest advantage. Toto founded DCI Indonesia in 2011 after decades in technology. Yozua founded Plataran in 2009 after building a career in law, education, and business. They did not begin with empty hands. They began with experience. Perhaps that is the more interesting way to think about age in entrepreneurship. Time does not only take something away. It also gives perspective, the ability to recognize patterns, understand risk, appreciate complexity, and see beyond the immediate moment.

In 2022, Toto Sugiri received the EY Entrepreneur Of The Year Indonesia award. In 2023, Yozua Makes followed as the next winner. Their consecutive appearances on the same stage created an unusual portrait of Indonesian entrepreneurship, moving from the invisible infrastructure of the digital economy to the visible landscapes of hospitality and travel. And perhaps there is a lesson here for travelers, too. A meaningful journey is not always about arriving first. Sometimes it is about having traveled far enough to know where you want to go.

Toto Sugiri and Yozua Makes remind us that there is no single timetable for building something meaningful. Their stories suggest that experience can be a compass, while purpose can give a journey its direction. In technology, that purpose can mean creating infrastructure capable of supporting the next chapter of a digital nation. In hospitality, it can mean creating experiences that connect travelers with nature, culture, and communities while helping protect the places that make those experiences possible. Age is just a number. The real measure is what we choose to build with the years behind us, and what we leave for the journeys that come after.