In May 2025, the Directorate of Downstreaming and Partnerships at Kemdiktisaintek (Kementerian Pendidikan Tinggi, Sains, dan Teknologi — Ministry of Higher Education, Science, and Technology) formally launched the Program Pendanaan Hilirisasi Riset, targeting research at TKT (Tingkat Kesiapterapan Teknologi — Technology Readiness Level) 4 through 9. The programme’s stated aim — articulated by Director Yos Sunitiyoso at the launch event — was to ensure that research “does not stop at journals but becomes applied technology with impact.” This was not an incremental policy adjustment. It was a structural signal: grant funding in Indonesia is now explicitly weighted toward research outputs that demonstrate market readiness.

For BINUS lecturers, this shift has a direct implication. The habits you build through the PI Product Commercialized framework — TKT documentation, HKI registration, technical write-ups, market context notes — are not just BINUS internal requirements. They are the exact evidence profile that Kemdiktisaintek’s applied research grant reviewers are evaluating when they assess proposals for the Penelitian Terapan (Applied Research) track.

Hilirisasi — broadly meaning “downstreaming” — refers to the process of increasing the value-readiness of a research output until it is adoptable by industry or society. In BINUS RTT’s framework, hilirisasi begins at TKT 4. It is distinct from komersialisasi (commercialization), which typically begins at TKT 7 and involves active market entry. The distinction matters because it means a lecturer at TKT 4 or 5 is already operating inside the hilirisasi zone — already eligible for both the BINUS PI and the national applied research grant track — without needing to wait for a market-ready product.

The policy context runs deeper than a single funding programme. Hilirisasi is embedded in Asta Cita, the national development agenda of President Prabowo’s administration — specifically Mandate 5: “continuing downstreaming and developing industry based on natural resources to increase added value within the country.” This positions university research downstreaming not as an academic nicety but as a direct contribution to national economic strategy. For grant reviewers at Kemdiktisaintek, proposals that speak explicitly to hilirisasi outcomes — prototype development, market validation, industry co-development — now carry institutional weight that fundamental research proposals do not.

The 2025–2026 research guidance published under “DIKTISAINTEK BERDAMPAK” confirms this priority. The stated vision is achieving “riset dan pengembangan sampai hilirisasi bernilai tambah” — research and development through to value-added downstreaming. Among the 17 national priority research focus areas defined by Ditjen Dikti for 2025, Hilirisasi dan Industrialisasi appears as a distinct category alongside food security, health, and maritime sectors. The 2025 Hilirisasi Riset programme itself defined eight priority focus areas, explicitly including “sosial humaniora, pendidikan, seni-budaya” — meaning non-STEM outputs are in scope (Kemdiktisaintek, 2025 — Program Pendanaan Hilirisasi Riset, kemdiktisaintek.go.id).

The practical intersection with BINUS’s PI framework is significant. A lecturer who builds a strong Product Commercialized submission — with documented TKT progression, a registered HKI, a technical specification, and a market needs assessment — has assembled most of the evidence base for a competitive Penelitian Terapan Luaran Prototipe proposal to BIMA (the national research funding platform, bima.kemdiktisaintek.go.id). The BINUS rubric and the national grant rubric are not just aligned in spirit; they overlap substantially in the evidence they require. Submitting to BRIDGE Apps and submitting to BIMA are, for a well-prepared product, nearly the same exercise — with the same documentation serving both purposes.

This means the December cut-off for BRIDGE Apps submissions can serve a second strategic purpose: it functions as a rehearsal for the following year’s national grant cycle. Lecturers who go through the full RTT review process — including the interview session with expert reviewers from industry and academia — emerge with sharper product positioning, clearer competitive analysis, and a stronger TKT roadmap. These are precisely the elements external grant reviewers at Kemdiktisaintek scrutinise.

The opportunity is to stop treating the PI Product Commercialized as a compliance exercise and start treating it as a portfolio-building process — one that makes you grant-competitive at the national level. The national research ecosystem is moving toward applied impact. The infrastructure to position yourself within that movement already exists through BINUS RTT.

For a full overview of how BINUS supports the journey from research prototype to commercialization, visit the Product Commercialization page at BINUS Technology Transfer.

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