In late September 2025, İntrotema participated in the Indonesia International Book Fair (IIBF) in Jakarta, held from September 24 to 28 at the Assembly Hall of the Jakarta Convention Center. Themed “Exploring Content, Enlightening Mind”, the 45th edition of IIBF brought together publishers, creators, and rights professionals to reimagine how stories traverse borders and media.
IIBF is Indonesia’s most ambitious publishing event, combining B2B rights activity with public reading festivals. The 2025 edition featured over 500,000 books, international exhibitors from more than 20 countries, and the Indonesia Rights Fair (IRF) for rights negotiation and matchmaking. Interactive installations like the Illustrator Wall highlighted the growing importance of visual storytelling.
At the fair, İntrotema focused on:
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Showcasing our catalog of fiction, YA, children’s, and illustrated works to Southeast Asian publishers.
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Engaging in rights negotiations and exploring co-edition and translation opportunities.
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Exploring adaptation and licensing potential in Indonesia’s media and digital landscape.
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Observing local trends in illustration, digital publishing, and multilingual readership.
During the fair, we met Indonesian and regional editors interested in Turkish children’s and YA titles, some keen on co-editions in Bahasa Indonesia and Turkish. Discussions highlighted a growing appetite for hybrid content blending prose, visual narrative, and multimedia formats. Translation rights were increasingly framed as cultural diplomacy, connecting language, memory, and identity across Indonesia’s diverse archipelago.
While IIBF may not match the scale of Frankfurt or London, its intensity, local flavor, and institutional support make it a key node in Asia’s literary map. We leave Jakarta inspired, with new contacts, promising rights leads, and fresh insights into Southeast Asia’s publishing landscape, ready to continue building bridges for Turkish authors and illustrated works in the region.