The business performance of various industries throughout the country is now entering an era of exciting competition. Many companies or organizations use technology as the main tool in running business. This means that the presence of technology is considered to be a bridge to business sustainability in the future. This is what encourages the presence of new innovations in running a business. The innovation that is now becoming a trend in business is technopreneurship. Technopreneurship is a business approach that emerged between 1980-1990, marked by the technological revolution. As is known, technology began to develop in these eras (Kurniawan, 2023). Technopreneurship is a concept derived directly from entrepreneurship. The closeness of technology to this type of entrepreneurship is described by Abbas (2018), the transition from entrepreneurship to the technopreneurship level is due to the confluence of technology, capital and a supportive environment. Technology plays a very important role in transforming the world of entrepreneurship, especially since the end of the 20th century.

Referring to the concept of technopreneurship, it is known that entrepreneurship and technopreneurship are considered as 2 different concepts. Entrepreneurship refers to the activities of entrepreneurs in implementing an innovation or new idea in a business. Entrepreneurship is known as the activity of running a business that aims to solve social problems such as creating jobs. Technopreneurship refers to the activity of running a business by utilizing technology. In other words, the main characteristic of entrepreneurship is innovation or new ideas, and technopreneurship refers to the combination of using technology and carrying out innovations or new ideas (Abbas, 2018). Technology helps technopreneurship in providing, analyzing and sharing information among users (Abbas, 2018). This means that someone not only runs a business or business, but an entrepreneur needs to have good skills and knowledge of technology, and vice versa. Therefore, carrying out technopreneurship is not easy because it requires technological skills and knowledge.

Technopreneurship is an entrepreneurial concept that contains several skills and expertise in using digital technology to carry out entrepreneurship. The approach to using technology is crucial considering that when entrepreneurs do not have technological skills and knowledge, they will be eliminated in digital era business competition. Technopreneurship relates to the use of technology to run innovative businesses. Kurniawan (2023) mentions the various opportunities that open up to make technopreneurship an important approach as follows:

1. Increasing resource utilization, in this case related to efforts to utilize resources to solve social problems.
2. Opening employment opportunities, efforts carried out to solve social problems are implemented by opening employment opportunities for people in need.
3. Encouraging technological development, the large number of businesses or businesses that are run based on technology opens up wide opportunities for technological development.

One business that uses a technopreneurship approach is a startup company. This type of company is often seen in Indonesia, some of which are widely known by the public, such as Gojek, Ruang Guru, Grab, Shopee and the like. The development of this type of entrepreneurial approach is increasingly visible when several large companies in the world are starting to include artificial intelligence as part of running their business. Artificial intelligence is considered capable of handling, solving problems, and even making decisions (Abbas, 2018). Both startups and AI use technology as the main tool that is applied to the entire management environment. In other words, all management activities in both businesses use technology as a whole. The success of running a business such as a startup or AI can be said to be due to several factors. As explained by Sukamdani (2022), there are several factors that can influence technopreneurship, both internal and external. Internal factors refer to the ability to innovate, creativity, courage to take risks, managerial ability, and the spirit of not giving up. External factors relate to support from the surrounding environment, market conditions, and government regulations.

Apart from that, Sukamdani (2022) mentioned the failure of technopreneurship when an entrepreneur runs a business. This condition is related to the lack of resources, experience, failure to dominate the market, and inability to face changes in the business environment. Therefore, an entrepreneur not only needs skills but also attitude and enthusiasm in building a business amidst the various challenges faced. Entrepreneurs who have these aspects will easily run their businesses in the hope of having an impact on the general public. This is what makes entrepreneurship unique considering its efforts to improve social conditions. As well as trying to become a social condition as an effort to fill the gap by providing employment opportunities.

Yusuf (2022) said that technopreneurship also has the aim of providing benefits to society so that it can improve its quality of life. The success of technopreneurship in improving people's quality of life indirectly contributes to sustainable development. As is known, countries around the world have set goals on a global scale to overcome various social problems in society. These goals are what are called sustainable development goals which are planned to be achieved by 2030. The benefits of technopreneurship in improving people's quality of life also help global efforts through the 8th SDGs. Goal 8 is related to decent work and economic growth, namely increasing inclusive and sustainable economic growth, productive and comprehensive employment opportunities, and decent work for all (Localises SDGs Indonesia, 2024).

Technopreneurship can have an impact on society economically, socially and environmentally. The economic benefits include increasing efficiency and productivity; increase income; creating jobs; stimulate other economic sectors. Social benefits such as forming a new, more productive culture; contribute to providing solutions to solving social problems. Environmental benefits in the form of using raw materials from natural resources more productively; increasing the efficiency of resource use, especially energy sources (Yusuf, 2022).

Even though it has good potential in developing and empowering society, technopreneurship is also a challenge for entrepreneurs and the government. Several important points are the readiness of the community (business actors) to use technology. This cannot be separated from technological developments which are now increasingly massive and dynamic. Business actors must read this condition wisely and use it as an opportunity to successfully run a technology-based business. Therefore, business actors or entrepreneurs must improve their skills through participating in various technology training. The Ministry of Communication and Information said there are things that need to be improved if Indonesia develops digital entrepreneurship, such as digital literacy because it is still lagging several ASEAN and Asian countries. Indonesia's ICT development index is ranked 97. Even though it is higher than Laos, Cambodia and India, it is still inferior to Vietnam. Meanwhile, network readiness in Indonesia is still inferior to India and Thailand. Therefore, efforts need to be made to improve this so that society (business actors) can progress and compete in the AEC era in the future (Kominfo, 2014).

-Rosmalia Ahmad & Diana Anggraeni

References

Abbas, A. A. (2018). The bright future of Technopreneurship. International Journal of Scientific & Engineering Research, 9(12). https://doi.org/https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6860-2583

Kominfo. (2014). Prospek Cerah Technopreneurship di Masa Depan. Kominfo.Go.Id. https://www.kominfo.go.id/index.php/content/detail/4301/Prospek+Cerah+Technopreneurship+di+Masa+Depan/0/sorotan_media

Kurniawan, A. (2023). Technopreneur. Guepedia.

Localises SDGs Indonesia. (2024). Sustainable Development Goals. Localises SDGs Indonesia. https://localisesdgs-indonesia.org/17-sdgs

Sukamdani, N. B. (2022). Manajemen Talenta dan Technopreneurship. CV. Mega Press Nusantara.

Yusuf, E. (2022). Strategi Pengembangan Technopreneur. Cipta Media Nusantara.