It is a very big challenge to create, grow and develop a business from a small garage to become a successful regional company. It requires a strong and visionary leader to have a proper business direction so that the company knows where it is going. This is what happend to Kalbe.

In the mid 1960s, six siblings - led by Doctor Boenjamin Setiawan, Ph.D., better known as Doctor Boen, and Franciscus Bing Aryanto (Bing) - were determined to help Indonesian people increase their health awareness and the prosperity of their lives. Then they decided to set up Kalbe that focused its business in the pharmaceutical sector. All six of them believed that the pharmaceutical business was extremely important for developing the health of the general public of Indonesia and that there was an enormous opportunity for growth in this country.

The six Kalbe founders were siblings who all had similar educational backgrounds in the life sciences. These credentials made them able to strengthen each other and to cooperate with each other, and were thus able to create a truly solid synergy.

Doctor Boen is a medical doctor and a pharmacologist who fully understands the pharmaceutical world. Doctor Boen was extremely reliable in scientific matters, while his brother, Bing, was well known for seeing opportunities for developing Kalbe’s business. Bing was also renowned for having a wide network of contacts and was thus well known among business groups.

In managing Kalbe, both Doctor Boen and Mr. Bing were the most active ones. However, the support from the other four relatives was no less important. The synergy of these six family members always succeeded in yielding strategic thinking that they were able to utilize for Kalbe’s growth so that the company could become a pharmaceutical company Indonesia could be proud of.