The JW Marriott Hotel in Jakarta may not be the obvious place to stage

a roadshow: only weeks before, a car bomb exploded nearby, killing 14

people, injuring 150 and destroying the lobby. But that was the

location chosen by Bank Rakyat Indonesia to spread the message about

its recent IPO when 40.5% of the state-owned bank was floated on the

Jakarta Stock Exchange.

The Marriott option was the personal choice of BRI’s award-winning CEO

Pak Rudjito, who admits he got a substantial discount on the hotel’s

charges but assures me that the aim was to express confidence in

Indonesia, not save a buck.

“It was a win-win situation,” he says.

The 500 investors at the Marriott roadshow were nervous at first but

soon put at ease by Mr Rudjito’s informal manner as he roamed around

the ballroom with his clip-on microphone. Soon they were asking

questions about why the honeypot in BRI’s adverts looks like a shampoo

bottle and why BRI’s share trading commissions are not as discounted as

those at rival Bank Mandiri.

Later the roadshow moved on to European and American cities. BRI is a

bank that specialises in microfinance and, as such, was hurt less badly

by the Asian crisis than many other Indonesian banks. All the same, Mr

Rudjito’s team, as well as underwriters UBS, must have put on a good

show: the deal was 16 times oversubscribed.

BrianCaplen

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