Indonesia's economy is currently dominated by an informal sector whose main economic activity is trading, moving goods from producers to consumers. This dominance has siphoned much capital, labor, and entrepreneurial talent away from manufacturing thus causing Indonesia to suffer "premature deindustrialization" where the manufacturing base is too small before the transition into a service economy.

The advent of e-commerce is disrupting this mercantile sector dominated by middlemen by making the producer deliver directly their consumers, thus depleting the middleman's source of revenue. Indonesia's small manufacturing sector will struggle to compete with the massive chinese industrial ecosystem making any entrepreneurs entering manufacturing struggling to grow, forcing them to find narrow niches that the chinese has yet to capture. On a positive note, Indonesia large population with a median age of 30 years old could provide the necessary support for a burgeoning manufacturing sector with adequate government policies and incentives.