During this exclusive interview, The Energy Circle by IN-VR spoke with Ana Paula da Costa Xavier, CEO of Similie, about how people-centered technology and Similie Academy are strengthening climate resilience, service delivery, and local digital capacity in Timor-Leste, and how locally owned data, tools, and talent can underpin the country’s energy and mining development and its integration into regional and global markets.
Q1. Similie was founded to bring affordable and innovative tech solutions to emerging markets.How do you see technology transforming service delivery in countries like Timor-Leste, particularly in sectors such as energy, mining, and infrastructure?
A: At Similie, we were founded on the belief that technology should strengthen communities, not leave them behind. In countries like Timor-Leste, sectors such as energy, mining, and infrastructure are deeply affected by three interconnected challenges: climate vulnerability, service delivery, and local capacity.Climate remains the largest variable. Extreme weather can destroy infrastructure, disrupt power systems, and threaten lives. Yet, many of these risks stem from a lack of data and preparedness.By improving access to real-time environmental and operational information, our systems reduce investment risk and enable governments and companies to make smarter, safer, and more resilient decisions. When you understand risk, you can mitigate it. When you can anticipate disruption, you can prevent loss.Service delivery is another core challenge. Whether during a flood event or simply ensuring water systems and logistics run reliably on a normal day, knowing where assets are, how they are performing, and where response is needed is critical. Our platforms help manage this complexity by connecting personnel, infrastructure, and data into one coordinated ecosystem, so essential services reach communities when they need them most. Knowledge is not just power in these contexts, it saves lives.Finally, none of this transformation is sustainable without local capacity. That’s why we launched Similie Academy. There is extraordinary talent in Timor-Leste. It simply needs the tools, mentorship, and opportunity to thrive. Our Academy ensures that Timorese youth and professionals can participate fully in the global digital economy and, most importantly, lead the technological solutions shaping their own future.Technology is transformative when it is rooted in context and owned by the communities it serves. That is the vision that guides us.
Q2.Your people centred approach combines tech, training, and change management. How Important is local capacity building in ensuring that digital solutions in Timor-Leste are sustainable long after projects are completed?
A: Local capacity building isn’t just important, it’s everything. One of our greatest frustrations is that, in the development space, there’s often a focus on the quick wins: cutting the ribbon on anew piece of technology, deploying a system, announcing a launch. But real change doesn’t happen at the ribbon cutting. It happens over years, through training, mentorship, and building confidence and ownership in local teams.
That’s why we built the Similie Academy. We are a social enterprise, and our goal is not just to deploy tools, but to ensure that Timorese people are the ones who maintain them, improve them, and eventually create the next generation of solutions themselves. We want to invest in generational wins. When a young person in Timor-Leste learns to build web applications or manage digital infrastructure, they are no longer limited to opportunities within local borders, they can participate in the global digital economy. That income, that skill, that mindset, circulates back into Timor, strengthening families, institutions, and industries.The more we build local capacity, the more sustainable every investment becomes. Systems stay operational longer. Service delivery becomes more resilient. Critical thinking expands. The technology stops being “foreign” and becomes something owned, understood, and adapted byTimorese people themselves.We’re not just installing systems. We’re making sure the knowledge to grow and sustain those systems lives here, long after any project officially ends.
Q3: Similie has worked on projects ranging from smart metering of community water systems to early warning systems. How could similar innovations be adapted to support Timor-Leste’s goals in energy efficiency, mining operations, and community resilience?
A:Everything in an economy is connected. When we talk about improving sectors like energy efficiency, mining, or community resilience in Timor-Leste, we’re not talking about isolated challenges. Just like how building a tourism industry requires roads, transport, hotels, communications, and skilled people working together, strengthening the energy and mining sectors requires reliable infrastructure, information, and coordination across multiple parts of the economy.What Similie has built in areas like smart water metering and early warning systems is fundamentally about improving situational awareness. It’s about knowing what’s happening, where, and who needs to respond. The same approach can be applied directly to energy and mining. To invest wisely, you need good data. To operate safely, you need reliable communication. To protect assets and communities, you need to understand environmental risks and have systems ready to act before disasters strike.Our tools bring those elements together. They help government and industry understand where to invest, how those investments are performing, and how to safeguard them against climate, operational, or logistical disruptions. And because our systems are built with community resilience in mind, the benefits don’t stop at a single sector. They ripple out: stronger local services, more efficient resource use, reduced risk, and ultimately, a more stable environment for growth.So the same innovations we use for water systems or flood warnings can support energy grids, mining sites, and national infrastructure planning. Because at the end of the day, it’s all connected — and resilient systems lift the entire economy, not just one part of it.
Q4:With your strong expertise in South-East Asia and the Pacific, what lessons learned from other markets could be applied to support Timor-Leste’s rapid growth and its ambition to attract foreign investment?
A:One of the most important lessons we’ve learned across South-East Asia and the Pacific is to never assume what is or is not possible. When the right talent, leadership, and vision come together, extraordinary things can happen anywhere. It does take time, persistence, and a willingness to fail and iterate. But when solutions are built from within, they endure. They fit the culture, they respond to real needs, and they build momentum that lasts beyond any single project or funding cycle.In contrast, imported solutions can only be adopted for as long as there is external will or external capacity to support them. The moment that support shifts, those systems struggle. But when the innovation is local, when the capability is local, and when the ownership is local, the change is lasting.For Timor-Leste to achieve rapid growth and attract foreign investment, one of the biggest opportunities is to invest more deeply in its private sector. For decades, significant funds have gone into building government capacity, and that has been important — but now we have the chance to empower local businesses, entrepreneurs, and innovators to lead. When the private sector grows, it pulls the rest of the economy forward: it creates jobs, fosters skills, absorbs new technology, and sends a strong signal to investors that Timor-Leste is not only open for business, but capable of driving its own future.Sustainable development happens when local people build, own, and scale the solutions. That is the lesson, and that is where the real potential lies.
Q5: Looking ahead, how do you see Similie contributing to Timor-Leste’s digital transformation journey as it develops its energy and mining sectors, and integrates further into regional and global markets?
A: Knowledge is power. In advanced economies, entire industries run on real-time data, planning systems, and well-trained workforces. But in many development contexts, we often skip that step: we install new infrastructure, cut the ribbon, and hope for the best. That approach turns national growth into a gamble. Similie’s role in Timor-Leste’s digital transformation is to remove the gamble. We focus on building both the technical systems and the human capability needed to manage energy, mining, and infrastructure safely and sustainably. Whether it’s monitoring assets, preparing for climate impacts, coordinating service delivery, or training local teams to operate and improve these systems, our goal is to ensure that decisions are informed, risks are visible, and investments are protected.
And the value of this approach extends beyond Timor-Leste. The challenges faced here are shared across the region. If we can develop solutions that are resilient, affordable, and community-driven in Timor-Leste, then those same solutions can scale to other emerging markets facing similar constraints. That is where Similie contributes not only to national development, but to regional leadership.We are building knowledge ecosystems, platforms, tools, and people that allow Timor-Leste to integrate confidently into regional and global markets. Because when you build capacity at home, you don’t just adopt technology. You become a creator of it. It is IP you own and can generate revenue against
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