Internet Trends and IT Industry News and Development [Archive]

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sandrin

March 16th, 2006, 08:28 PM

It’s time for Pinoy’s to fully embrace the information technology age. Pleas post all related info here.

Oh, there’s no better way than to begin with than the open source os (operating system) campaign. The government must consider using the open source operating system (os)because open-source IP gives easy access to low cost intellectual property software. It also allows the use of several softwares from different vendors which create competition to bring down costs. And also for security reasons which makes the system less susceptible to a total breakdown or virus infection. The most well known example of an open source operating system is Linux.

German initiative spawns open source courseware
First posted 11:14pm (Mla time) Mar 16, 2006
By Alexander Villafania

The joint undertaking by the German Technical Cooperation (GTZ), Wireless Services Asia (WSA) and the European IT Service Center Foundation (EITSC) recently resulted in the creation of an Open Source courseware that will be integrated into selected colleges and universities in an effort to build the country’s open source skills.
The courseware for the Philippine Open Source Initiative (POSITIVE) will take effect starting next school year in 250 member schools of the Philippine Society of Information Technology Educators (PSITE).

POSITIVE was started by the GTZ, WSA and EITSC to help build a pool of skilled IT practitioners on open source technology. The courseware took about two years to develop and was jointly created by Don Bosco Technical College, Cebu Asia Pacific College, Angeles University Foundation, Cebu Institute of Technology and Mindanao State University, which are POSITIVE member schools.

The courseware will be integrated into the Bachelor of Science Programs in
Computer Science, Information Technology and Information Management courses of the partner schools and the PSITE member schools.

The courseware will have IT fundamentals, operating systems, database management and web programming.

POSITIVE project lead Joseph Paul Sianghio said the courseware would improve the employability of IT graduates and increase the usage of open source by companies in the Philippines.

Sianghio added that other schools in the Philippines are open to use the courseware that has been developed by simply registering online at the POSITIVE website (www.positive.ph).

A faculty development road show from April to June would be conducted in at least 50 schools nationwide to promote the use of the open source platform and the courseware that was developed will be held from April to June.

sandrin

March 17th, 2006, 07:37 PM

Philippine Open Source group bares open source courseware
By EDU H. LOPEZ

The Philippine Open Source Initiative (POSITIVE) has unveiled a set of open source courseware at the Philippine Society of Information Technology Educators (PSITE) national convention in Iloilo City recently.

To take effect during the next school year, the implementation of the courseware was signed during the event by POSITIVE project lead Joseph Paul Sianghio and PSITE national president Alex Ybasco.

POSITVE is a partnership project between the German Technical Cooperation (GTZ), Wireless Services Asia, and in cooperation with the European IT Service Center Foundation (EITSC).

The courseware is expected to be integrated into the Bachelor of Science programs in Computer Science, Information Technology (IT), and Information Management courses and will include IT fundamentals, operating systems, database management and web programming in time for the next school year.

Primarily developed by leading technology schools Don Bosco Technical College, Cebu Asia Pacific College, Angeles University Foundation, Cebu Institute of Technology, and Mindanao State University together with the Department of Science and Technology 7 Open Source Computer and Security Laboratory, the courseware will be implemented in 250 PSITE member schools.

"Once fully implemented, we expect the courseware to improve the employability of IT graduates and increase usage of Open Source by companies in the Philippines," Sianghio said.

Sianghio added they chose to launch the courseware during the PSITE convention due to the organization’s strong nationwide membership and its overall thrust of developing an IT-enabled nation.

Other schools in the Philippines are open to use the courseware that has been developed by simply registering online at the POSITIVE website (www.positive.ph).

EITSC manager Dominic Sabado said a faculty development roadshow involving at least 50 schools nationwide to aggressively promote the use of the Open Source platform and the courseware that was developed will be held from April to June. Initially targeted are schools in Metro Manila, Angeles City, Cebu City, and Cagayan de Oro.

Open source refers to any program whose source code is made available for use or modification as users or other developers see fit.

The EITSC is an initiative of the European Chamber of Commerce of the Philippines, German Development Cooperation, and the Asia-Europe Foundation of the Philippines to bridge the eSourcing needs of Europe with the IT and business process outsourcing capabilities of the Philippines.

On hand to witness the signing were GTZ country head Juliana Hinterberger and Commission on Information and Communications Technology commissioner Emmanuel Lallana.

sandrin

March 19th, 2006, 06:31 PM

Postal computerization project OK’d

The cabinet committee of the National Development and Economic Authority Investment Coordination Council (NEDA-ICC) has approved the P3.7-billion computerization project of state-owned Philippine Postal Corp. (Philpost).

The corporation badly needs the project to regain profitability given competition from domestic couriers like LBC Express, Inc., JRS Business Corporation, DHL Philipuupines, Airfreight 2100 Inc. and Aboitiz Air Transport. The firm has also experienced declining demand for postal services with the advent of internet technology.

"The Cabinet committee gave an approval to the project and the ICC will formally inform Philpost through a letter by next week," Jonathan L. Uy, NEDA director for public investment staff, told BusinessWorld last Friday.

Japanese software developer Renaissance of Age (ROA) Systems Co. will undertake Philpost’s computerization project.

Under the proposal, ROA Systems will build modern postal application and business systems for the postal company.

The firm wants to introduce a hybrid mail system that will allow the postal corporation to send billing statements from credit card firms and utilities more efficiently.

ROA Systems also plans to install public calling stations using Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) in post offices nationwide.

The modernization program seeks to eliminate fraudulent practices in the agency by establishing a track and trace system. The system will feature tracking of mail from post office acceptance to sorting and actual delivery.

Another part of the modernization plan is a postal identification system that will allow remittances from overseas Filipino workers to be sent through the postal office.

The project will also set up electronic post shops similar to an internet café to develop new sources of income for Philpost. These will provide support services like personal computer rental, printing, scanning, telephone, fax and other services such as sale of stamps, stationeries and postcards.

ritche

March 28th, 2006, 05:44 AM

Dumaguete has its own open source users group...here's the link:Oriental Negros Linux Users Group (OneLUG) (http://onelug.b3rx.com./)...

mhe-ann

March 28th, 2006, 08:45 AM

I like this thread. keep on posting. :okay:

amigo32

March 28th, 2006, 11:37 AM

Anyone tried UBUNTU?

I've installed it on one of our PC at work and i love it. I am gonna be installing it on my Dad's PC in the province. It's free, no blue screen of death, and stable.

ritche

March 28th, 2006, 11:40 AM

my friend dominique is campaigning for its wide usage...here is his website: Villageidiotsavant (http://villageidiotsavant.blogspot.com). People from the Oriental Negros Linux Users Group (OneLUG) are also into it. Visit their website posted above...

amras

March 28th, 2006, 02:33 PM

Anyone tried UBUNTU?

I've installed it on one of our PC at work and i love it. I am gonna be installing it on my Dad's PC in the province. It's free, no blue screen of death, and stable.

what is UBUNTU?

ritche

March 28th, 2006, 03:02 PM

"Ubuntu", an ancient African word, meaning "humanity to others", is a complete, freely available, Linux-based operating system (similar to Windows OS). Ubuntu is different from traditional proprietary software in that not only are the tools you need available free of charge, you have the right to modify your software until it works the way you want it to. Check this link if you want to learn more about Ubuntu (http://www.ubuntu.com/).

MarkiiBoi

March 28th, 2006, 03:06 PM

Philippines moves down in global IT ranking--WEF

Agence France-Presse, INQ7.net

THE PHILIPPINES has moved down in a 2005 World Economic Forum (WEF) report that ranks countries in terms of their information technology infrastructure and policies.

From a ranking of 67 in the 2004 edition of the report, the Philippines now ranks 70. In 2003, the Philippines ranked 69.

The ranking released by the WEF on Tuesday also said that the United States has taken over from Singapore as the top country for the development of information and communications technology.

The Global Information Technology report 2005 praised the "impressive performance" of the technical infrastructure in the United States, as well as the business environment.

It also highlighted US openness to technological innovation, helped by the higher education system and the ready availability of venture capital.

Singapore secured second place in the "Networked Readiness Index" thanks to its regulatory environment, and "world class" education and training.

The index of 115 economies is based on a survey of business executives.

"Information and communication technologies presently represent one of the most important drivers in boosting efficiency and productivity in today's fast changing global economy," Augusto Lopez-Claros, co-editor of the report.

Asian countries generally faltered in the table. Hong Kong, Australia and Japan ranked between 11th and 16th after falling several places.

China fell nine places to 50th position, losing touch with India (40th).

By contrast, South Korea (14th) gained ten places.

Leading Asian nation Taiwan (seventh) -- "an ICT powerhouse in the last three decades," according to the report -- gained eight places over 2004 thanks to "intelligent" public policies and public-private partnerships in the sector.

Nordic countries again dominated the top of the ranking, with Denmark, Iceland and Finland in third to fifth places, and Sweden ranked number eight.

The report said the reasons for the Nordic technological strength mirrored those behind their strong performance in overall economic competitiveness rankings: "highly-developed" education, a strong culture of innovation and government transparency that promoted a "friendly climate" for new business ventures.

"The Nordic countries have been for many years ICT powerhouses, managing to harness the latest technologies to enhance the efficiency of their economies and to boost living standards," Lopez-Claros said.

Neighboring Estonia led eastern European countries in 23rd position thanks to its "excellent political and regulatory framework."

Russia (72nd) fell 10 places in the ranking, reflecting concern about a deteriorating institutional environment, notably on property rights and the independence of the judicial system, the WEF said.

With a report from Agence France-Presse in Geneva

MirageBistro

April 11th, 2006, 04:13 PM

This is not my last thread so have fun.
You may post pictures or news here.
You may write comments here.
You may edit anything within rule standards.
This thread is about internet cafe's, wireless tech, the new(bottom PCs), electronic output and GDP of the Philippines. It's amazing that the Philippines is the first to use Vista under pirated conditions. :)
But things are getting better, and it starts all here! :)

MarkiiBoi

April 11th, 2006, 04:22 PM

MirageBistro

April 11th, 2006, 04:23 PM

Yep, same with netscape

cyrusal

April 11th, 2006, 04:59 PM

Did you know?

That on March 29, 1994 at 10:18 A.M, the Philippines was linked to the world via the Internet for the first time at the first International E- mail conference in the University Of San Carlos, Cebu City.

That on June 1994, Mosaic Communications (MozCom) became the first commercial Internet Service Provider (ISP) in the Philippines.

Yea.. I can imagine mga people nagpalakpan sa pag launch/implement ng Internet sa Pilipinas which became the phenomenal gateway to information, entertainment and lifestyle..

MarkiiBoi

April 11th, 2006, 05:23 PM

^^ phenomenal indeed. kung walang internet, walang SSC! hehehe

kiretoce

April 11th, 2006, 05:30 PM

^^ Spoken like a true-blue SSC addict! :lol:

MirageBistro

April 13th, 2006, 06:03 PM

Did you know?

That on March 29, 1994 at 10:18 A.M, the Philippines was linked to the world via the Internet for the first time at the first International E- mail conference in the University Of San Carlos, Cebu City.

That on June 1994, Mosaic Communications (MozCom) became the first commercial Internet Service Provider (ISP) in the Philippines.
Back in 1994, I used to play Rise of the Triad:the Hunt

http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h137/jamesarkoss/rott5.jpg

but look at our Filipino Children.....playing Halo2, half life2, online games,etc. :)

sandrin

April 14th, 2006, 01:23 AM

My siblings own an internet and gaming (sorta) cafe'. It's doing well. It helps that they have the knack on anything electronics and they are able to maintain the equipment. The patrons are mostly kids in grade school and high school who play the games with swift aptness. While on queue, the kids also read magazines such as game informer and pcworld to past the time. My brother always reminds them that their studies must come first and gaming only second.
Now with the new mac mini, my siblings are trying to enter the world of computer graphics. Their mission; to move one step further and be able to create games and animations. By the end of the year, they should be doing 3d. Go! Go! Go!

Lili

April 14th, 2006, 01:39 AM

My sister had an internet cafe before but it did not really made a killing. Just made even so profit-wise, it was not good. It did not help that she is not really a computer person but just a wannabe.

The thing with internet cafes is that the owner is largely reliant upgrading and maintaining his/her technology hardware/software and skills. The rate of obsolescence of the machines and programs is fast. The owner is also reliant on a service provider. If the service provider is slow or has difficulties, then he/she is hostaged by the situation. At that time, hacking, worms, viruses, etc. were rampant in the Philippines. These are externalities outside his/her control.

Plus, I don't think my sister is keen on managing business anyway. So, she sold her business to another. This new owner seems to be faring better.

Louman

April 14th, 2006, 06:14 AM

Back in 1994, I used to play Rise of the Triad:the Hunt

http://i63.photobucket.com/albums/h137/jamesarkoss/rott5.jpg

but look at our Filipino Children.....playing Halo2, half life2, online games,etc. :)

There's an online cafe with games across where I used to live in Manila. There are kids as young as 5 playing games as violent as the one in the screen shot. I found that rather shocking. heheh.

Sinjin P.

April 14th, 2006, 08:51 AM

In most Internet Cafes, I still see kids and teens playing Counter Strike.

charitorae

April 14th, 2006, 10:30 AM

^^ or StarCraft.

MirageBistro

April 14th, 2006, 10:43 AM

In most Internet Cafes, I still see kids and teens playing Counter Strike.
True.....do you know Grand theft Auto San Andreas?
It promotes smoking, drinking, car stealing, murder, sex, gambling, and cheating :)

Sinjin P.

April 14th, 2006, 10:45 AM

^^ Never heard of San Andreas but I've heard of GTA-Vice City.

A lot of the teens and kids here either play:
>Ragnarok
>Gunbound
>Warcraft (DOTA)
>Starcraft
>Tantra
>M.U. Online
>Rose Online
>Gunz Online
>etc..

But still, majority choose Counter Strike....

MirageBistro

April 14th, 2006, 11:02 AM

^^ or StarCraft.
Haha.....Starcraft still popular? :)

sandrin

April 14th, 2006, 01:14 PM

We don't offer violent games in the cafe'. Most of our games are sports, tv and movies themed such as; the matrix revolution, starwars, dragonball x, final fantasy, castlevania, simcity, nascar, nba, the two towers, etc. I know coz I buy most of the games. But I don't know which online games they go to.
I tell you the kids are FAST LEARNERS.

MirageBistro

April 14th, 2006, 05:07 PM

bartman

April 14th, 2006, 05:44 PM

Did you know?

That on March 29, 1994 at 10:18 A.M, the Philippines was linked to the world via the Internet for the first time at the first International E- mail conference in the University Of San Carlos, Cebu City.

That on June 1994, Mosaic Communications (MozCom) became the first commercial Internet Service Provider (ISP) in the Philippines.
NOT TRUE!!!
i was sending and receiving e-mails as early as the late 80s
i was a management consultant for the USAF at clark AB

unless the USAF does not count, although physically in country

Æsahættr

April 14th, 2006, 06:41 PM

Haha.....Starcraft still popular? :)

Haha, it should be permently popular, it's a classic! Just like pacman and pong! :)

normandb

April 14th, 2006, 06:58 PM

Counterstrike and Starcraft are already ancient :D Here in MM the most popular right now is the Level Up Games like Warcraft and Ragnarok.

olineil

April 15th, 2006, 02:52 AM

NOT TRUE!!!
i was sending and receiving e-mails as early as the late 80s
i was a management consultant for the USAF at clark AB

unless the USAF does not count, although physically in country

Technically, it doesn't count...coz as you said you were in USAF, meaning you were using the military grade internet that started during the height cold war (mid 1960's) in preparation of the US military in case there will be a Nuclear Holocaust. It was only in the 90's that internet technology was commercially released.

In a sense, most of the technologies we are using currently could be assumed that its been existing a decade earlier, even our cellphones. One great example is the F-117 stealth bomber, its been existing since 1980 but was only publicly released during the Gulf war in 1990.

bustero

April 15th, 2006, 04:14 AM

From the tone of this thread it's probably better put in samahan.

Sinjin P.

April 15th, 2006, 04:19 AM

Sinjin P.

April 15th, 2006, 04:20 AM

Counterstrike and Starcraft are already ancient :D Here in MM the most popular right now is the Level Up Games like Warcraft and Ragnarok.

Hey, Warcraft is not a game of Level Up Games Corp. :D

bartman

April 15th, 2006, 05:43 PM

What do you mean? You were in the Philippines back then?

yes, i was
i lived there from jan 85 til one month before pinatubo erupted in 1991

bartman

April 15th, 2006, 05:44 PM

Technically, it doesn't count...
agree; it wasn't commercial :)

bitoy

April 15th, 2006, 08:23 PM

Darpa/Arpanet! Bosing! :D

Defense Communications Agency (DCA) and MilNet.... niyahahaha those were the days of monochrome terminals my friend.

Happy Easter

amigo32

April 16th, 2006, 03:15 AM

atari pa lang yata ang game noon... hehehe

sandrin

April 16th, 2006, 04:16 AM

TTSI makes available prepaid cards for medical transcription tutor online
Manila Bulletine

If you want to succeed in a medical transcription career, you can now enhance your skills with the Medical Transcription Tutor Online (MTTO), an affordable prepaid tool for current and would-be Medical Transcription (MT) students and practitioners.

The first and only prepaid medical transcription learning tool, MTTO is offered to all MTs and medical transcription professionals from any training center seeking additional practice time. This prepaid program offers valuable exposure to various dictations with different specialty and difficulty levels. You may also explore different level selections such as beginner, entry-level, intermediate and advanced, and see the description of materials used for the tutorial. MTTO provides access to lectures, voice files, and answer keys that are useful for assessing your transcribing accuracy. View your proficiency level by clicking on the "Report Cards" icon.

MTTO’s other features include re-loadable wallet, web-based access, four (4) levels of difficulty, automatic calculation of student’s productivity (number of lines per day), self-pace and self-assessment of quality. It is powered by Total Transcription Solutions, Incorporated (TTSI), a Philippine offshore facility that provides high-quality medical transcription services to the US health care market. TTSI is affiliated with the American Association of Medical Transcription (AAMT), Medical Transcription Industry Association (MTIA), Medical Transcription Association of the Philippines, Inc. (MTIAPI) and TESDA, and technically supported by its partners – Integrated Document Solutions (IDS) and Cybersoft Data Networks, Inc.For more details about TTSI and its other learning tools, visit www.totaltranscription.com or e-mail :info@totaltranscription.com.

KulasKusgan

April 16th, 2006, 04:41 AM

Anyone tried UBUNTU?

I've installed it on one of our PC at work and i love it. I am gonna be installing it on my Dad's PC in the province. It's free, no blue screen of death, and stable.

im using ubuntu/kubuntu. dual boot with windows xp. im loving it.

my desktop:

ubuntu (with master dudz photo)
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a157/kulaskusgan/art/metromanila.jpg

windows xp
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a157/kulaskusgan/art/untitled.jpg

ubuntu
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a157/kulaskusgan/art/snapshot1.jpg

XP
http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a157/kulaskusgan/art/xp2.jpg

sandrin

April 16th, 2006, 01:47 PM

Yeah, I heard that the Gnome (or Ubuntu) or KDP environments (or Kubuntu) are on par on usability with windows. Guys please provide us with more positive feedback on those distributions and what other softwares do you use with linux os.

sandrin

April 16th, 2006, 03:16 PM

An update on the latest version of Mac. I'm awaiting for feedback on the possible glitches

Apple to let Windows XP run on Macs

Munich (DPA) Macintosh users have a limited amount of time to download a free program that lets Windows XP programs run on Macintoshes.

Boot Camp is in a public beta version, an early form of the program. It can be downloaded at http://www.apple.com/macosx/bootcamp.

The new program requires a new Mac with an Intel processor chip, according to Apple in Munich. Additionally, it needs Mac's latest operating system, Mac OS X 10.4.6, and 10 free gigabytes.

Boot Camp users can decide when restarting their computers whether they want to boot up with the Windows XP or Mac OS X system. Apple has no plans to provide technical support for the program.

The final version of Boot Camp will be incorporated into Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard - a new operating system scheduled for release in August.

JAMAICUS

April 17th, 2006, 06:04 AM

RP should explore other BPO areas--NEDA chief

First posted 11:24pm (Mla time) April 16, 2006
By Erwin Lemuel Oliva
INQ7.net

THE PHILIPPINES should explore other areas of the business process outsourcing industry, Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Romulo Neri said last week.

Noting that BPO is "the way to go" for the Philippines, Neri said that government should not limit its promotion efforts to the call center industry, which is currently at the forefront of the country's outsourcing industry.

Neri said that other big BPO firms are starting to enter or expand their operations in the country. Operations such as the HP Global Delivery Center, Manulife, and Deutsche Knowledge Services are now based in the country, he said.

Siemens Business Services, a company of Siemens Inc., is also running its English language support business in Manila. It currently has 300 Filipino agents manning the operations, Cameron Dougherty, service desk consultant of Siemens Business Services, said. The Philippine operation expects to increase the number of agents to 1,500 by next year. One of its biggest clients is Toshiba.

"We should indeed diversify our outsourcing work beyond call centers," Neri added.

The socioeconomic planning secretary said the business sector should expect the boom in outsourcing to drive growth in other sectors.

"This is clearly a market for the telecom companies offering landline connectivity. Real estate is also benefiting from the surging demand for office space while restaurants open 24 hours a day to cater to the food and leisure needs of call center agents," he added.

In a previous interview with INQ7.net, Arthur Yap, presidential adviser for job creation, had said that there is a need for about 1.2 million seats in the United States that remains untapped. India is currently the top destination for offshore BPO jobs, while Philippines remained a far second, he added.

Neri, for his part, noted that the country should also aim to get 10 percent of the market for medical transcription. Reports indicate that there are 150,000 medical transcriptionists in the United States. This is below the requirement of 230,000. The Philippines currently owns just a one-percent share of the US market worth 12 billion dollars.

In a joint forecast by the Business Process Association of the Philippines (BPAP), Board of Investments (BOI), and the Commission on Information and Communications Technology (CICT), the Philippine outsourcing industry is expected to generate 103,000 new jobs in 2006, a 44-percent increase from 2005.

http://news.inq7.net/infotech/index.php?index=1&story_id=72728

JAMAICUS

April 17th, 2006, 06:57 AM

Ayala Land to build 2 new BPO campuses

Ayala Land, Inc., the country’s largest real-estate developer, will initially spend P500 million this year to build two business process outsourcing (BPO) campuses in northern Metro Manila and in Canlubang, Laguna.

Ma. Victoria E. Añonuevo, vice-president for corporate business group, said growth in the coming years will be fueled by the full-year operations of its BPO offerings and the sustained strength of its traditional office leasing segment.

"The Philippines will remain a strong contender as BPO locator as long as we can give highly qualified call center employees. In the BPO campuses, we are going to add educational and training facilities to supply employees and agents. Our aspiration is to be a BPO haven," she told reporters.

In its annual report, Ayala Land said it expects to grow the leasable area in its portfolio over the next five years with some new buildings to be constructed in areas such as Quezon City and Alabang. One such project is a science and technology park scheduled to be built across the University of the Philippines campus in Quezon City envisioned as a university-based catalyst for technological innovation along the lines of the Stanford-based Silicon Valley corridor.

In 2005, the company responded to the demand for office space from the BPO sector by adding over 36,000 square meters of BPO-dedicated leasable area to its inventory with the completion of three build-to-suit buildings for specific clients in the Makati Central Business District and in Sta. Rosa, Laguna. These are PeopleSupport Center, Convergys and InfonXX Building. Meanwhile, construction started on a fourth building in the Bonifacio Global City in Taguig for the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corp. (HSBC).

Ayala Land President Jaime I. Ayala said 2006 will be a busy year because it will make substantial investments to leverage many opportunities with Ayala Land being a major player in each of the key real- estate segments. Ayala Land has two office product lines: traditional office buildings and build-to-suit BPO buildings.

http://www.itmatters.com.ph/news.php?id=041706a

sandrin

April 22nd, 2006, 03:22 PM

To those who are planning to use an FTP server, you may want to check-out the sites below;

Filezilla is open source
http://filezilla.sourceforge.net/

For mozilla users: FireFTP runs with the nrowser and straightforward
https://addons.mozilla.org/extensions/moreinfo.php?id=684
(openSource)

For Macs:
Transmit is by far the best GUI-based FTP app.
http://www.panic.com/transmit/
(pay software)

JAMAICUS

April 24th, 2006, 06:14 PM

Outsourcing ‘near-hires’ get second chance

"NEAR-HIRES" -- applicants who missed by just a notch the hiring passing grade of firms in the information technology-enabled outsourcing industry -- are set to get a second chance.

Starting May 1, the government, thru the industry group Business Processing Association of the Philippines (BPA/P), will distribute "work coupons" or training certificates to some 100,000 near-hires.

This coupon will serve as applicants’ payment to BPA/P-accredited training or retooling schools, BPA/P executive director Mitchell Locsin told BusinessWorld in an interview. The industry group is still finalizing the list of partner schools.

Coupons will be distributed weekly upon start of the release and will continue until December this year.

To avail of the training, applicants need to get the recommendation of their prospective employers. They should be near the hiring rate of their prospective employers, or those applicants who have potential but need to brush up their skills.

This, as the government and the industry want to speed up the delivery of training assistance to job seekers.

Also, Mr. Locsin said this will minimize the wastage of resources since the training program is directly linked to existing industry demand and supply and the beneficiaries will be "assessed and pre-qualified according to the industry competency requirements."

Hiring rates in the IT-enabled outsourcing industry vary from one company to another.

Among the sectors in the IT-enabled outsourcing industry -- composed of call centers, data processing, software development, digital animation, medical and legal transcription -- call centers are expected to benefit the most from the program since they have the biggest demand for labor.

With 105 company players and total workforce of 70,000 to date, call centers account for 80% of the estimated $2 billion IT-enabled industry.

For this year, alone, this sector needs to hire at least 30,000 agents.

In the call center sector, the hiring rate is between 2% to 5%, meaning for every 100 applicants, only two to five persons are hired. Applicants between the 6% to 10% passing rates are considered "near-hires."

And in areas where there are no IT-enabled company locators, interested applicants are advised to register at the nearest DOLE and TESDA regional provinces using the CNMRS Form or the Computerized National Manpower Registry System.

In the case of call centers, about 80% of them are spread out in just three locations, namely: Makati central business district, Ortigas Center in Pasig and Eastwood City in Libis in Quezon City.

Mr. Locsin said areas which do not host companies, yet are seen to be the "hotspots" for BPO locations, where most of the manpower supply of the industry will be sourced.

Regarded as the country’s fastest-growing industry, IT-enabled services are experiencing difficulty in getting people.

By 2010, the BPO industry is expected to generate 1.2 million jobs from present 336,000 jobs.

Call centers will remain the largest employer in the next five years, accounting for 431,000 jobs out of the total 1.2 million for the BPO sector. Back office, medical transcription and digital content will follow with 342,000, 69,000 and 46,000 jobs, respectively.

Funding will be sourced from the P500 million donation made by the President, under the President’s "Pump Priming Program" aimed at scaling up the available workforce for the booming industry sector. -- Maricel E. Estavillo

http://www.itmatters.com.ph/news.php?id=042506c

JAMAICUS

April 25th, 2006, 05:50 PM

Yahoo! considers setting up local office
Global internet firm Yahoo! Inc. is considering putting up a local office soon to facilitate the take up of local advertisements.

"We are seriously considering setting up one here after the establishment of our Singapore and Malaysia offices. But we are still trying to figure out the legal requirements," Dennis Susay, Yahoo! head of marketing for South Asia, said in an interview yesterday.

Set up in 1997, the Singapore office hosts the company’s regional product development center while its Malaysian office , put up early last year, is its second marketing site in the Southeast Asia region.

Mr. Susay declined to disclose the timetable for the establishment of the local subsidiary, citing Yahoo! corporate restrictions.

The company sourced most of its revenues from online advertisements, which he described as "still low" in the Philippines.

"Local ad take up is still low but shows a lot of promise. Everybody got to start somewhere. We are seeing a lot of opportunities in Philippines and in Indonesia. Internet usage in these countries really took off after the dot-com bust," he said.

Aside from online advertisements, Yahoo! also gets revenues from its "premium service" offers such as the web-based call service and revenue shares from its telecommunication partners.

At present, Mr. Susay said the company has commissioned one Philippine-based consumer research company to undertake a study on the Filipino online habits.

"Results will be available by July. This will basically answer what internet users from the Philippines want," he said.

Yahoo! described Philippines as one of its top three markets in Southeast Asia, along with Singapore and Malaysia.

"Yahoo! penetration in the Philippines is quite unique. This is basically driven by two things -- the huge overseas Filipino worker (OFW) population and the presence of barkadas [group of friends]," he said.

Yesterday, Yahoo! announced the launch of a new local front page site for the Philippines and the availability of the Yahoo! Go for Mobile Service.

The launch of the local front page is aligned with the company’s target to offer more content to the local users.

"Instead of adopting a ‘one-site’ or ‘one-service’ fits all approach, Yahoo! provides the necessary local relevance that can encourage internet access and adoption for all users in Southeast Asia," Reza Behnam, Southeast Asia, managing director said.

On the other hand, Yahoo! Go is designed to let consumers take their internet content and services with them on their mobile phones.

This also connects Yahoo! Communication services to the phone’s built-in e-mail, messaging, address book and calendar applications.

For instance, if a user loses his mobile phone, saved contact information will still be available to them on the Web and can easily synched to his new mobile phone.

For this service, Yahoo! Initially partnered with Nokia. New units of Nokia N70,6680, 6681,6630, 7610, 6670 and 6600 are already pre-installed with the service. -- Maricel E. Estavillo

http://www.itmatters.com.ph/news.php?id=042606b

KulasKusgan

May 1st, 2006, 02:48 AM

DabaweGNU (http://www.dabawegnu.org/)

DabaweGNU, Inc., is a non-stock, non-profit organization registered with the Philippine Securities and Exchange Commission on December 5, 2003. Its primary objective is to provide its members a venue for technical growth in "Open Source" computing technologies and to advocate the use of this technology to the rest of the community.

DabaweGNU began from an Internet mailing list that was established after a series of successful seminars which featured one of the most well known Open Source projects: the GNU/Linux operating system. The organization came about from the list members' common desire to have a venue to further enhance knowledge and experiment on open source technologies.

chixbebe

May 15th, 2006, 09:26 AM

Software Innovations Philippines 2006 opened a three-day event showcasing new products and services available in the market.

On May 8-10, companies such as Microsoft, HP, Globe Telecom and the Philippine Software Industry Association (PSIA) presented their new products and services offered in the market today. In the three-day event, products were divided into three categories: Mobile Pavilion, Lifestyle Pavilion and Business Pavilion.

On the Mobile Pavilion, most of the products showcased were handhelds, PDA phones and mobile services. At the same venue, Dopod, a mobile device manufacturer, introduces the world’s first mini notebook with 3G capability and WiFi.

On the other hand, the Business Pavilion focused more on IT related products. They showed new PC software and hardware and new PC units for personal use and online gaming. They also introduced new software to help small businesses with their accounting. These software would help entrepreneurs and individuals; priced to fit the budgets and computing needs of even the smallest firms.

While on the Lifestyle Pavilion, they presented entertainment gadgets like PDA phones, personal computers, flat screen television and gaming consoles particularly the Microsoft Xbox 360. They also included hands-on gaming sessions with Level-up online games.

The exposition also gave learning sessions for photo editing, mobile messaging solutions, music mixing and 3G services for participants to have a better experience of the new products and services.

By Steven Bansil
http://www.manilatimes.net/national/2006/may/15/yehey/business/20060515bus14.html

JAMAICUS

May 22nd, 2006, 03:11 PM

Indian group opens $8-M outsourcing facility in RP

HINDUJA TMT Ltd. (HTMT) has announced the opening of an eight-million dollar outsourcing facility in the Philippines, officials told reporters in Manila.
The local operation, HTMT Philippines, is a result of an acquisition of firms C-Cubed and SourceOne, Ramkrishan Hinduja, co-chairman of the HTMT said.

HTMT came to the Philippines three years ago after it decided to buy into C-Cubed, Hinduja said.

The C-Cubed facility now employs 2,400 agents for 2,000 seats, the executive said.

It will handle in-bound calls for mainly American clients, Hinduja added.

HTMT is also involved in other businesses, including technology and telecommunications, but the co-chairman stressed that the group's business is now moving towards the fast-growing outsourcing industry.

President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo will inaugurate the local facility which is located at the HTMT Cyberpark in E. Rodriguez Jr Ave., Quezon City on Saturday.

HTMT has invested over 25 million dollars in the Philippines, with eight million dollars going to the construction of the Manila facility. The rest went to the acquisition of C-Cubed and SourceOne, according to Hinduja.

That investment is just the firm's initial investment in the Philippines. More is expected as HTMT acquires more firms in the country, and expand operations, the executive said.

HTMT has a total of around 7,000 employees for its outsourcing business, with 2,400 now employed in the country, Pushkar Misra, president and CEO of HTMT added.

Misra said that the HTMT projects to end fiscal year 2006 with 85 million dollars in revenues.

C-Cubed is now a wholly-owned subsidiary of HTMT Philippines, and will now act as its marketing arm in the country, Hinduja said.

HTMT also maintains operations in the Mauritius, the US, and Canada.

http://news.inq7.net/infotech/index.php?index=1&story_id=76338

sandrin

June 4th, 2006, 08:04 PM

New version of Ubuntu software coming
http://www.manilatimes.net/national/2006/june/05/yehey/business/20060605bus15.html

NEW YORK: A new version of the Ubuntu software package, a flavor of the freely distributed Linux operating system, is due out this week.

Ubuntu 6.06, which will be released on CD and as a free download, includes a video interview with former South African President Nelson Mandela, who explains what “ubuntu” means. (It’s an African expression that roughly translates as “humanness.”)

Ubuntu, launched two years ago, has a reputation for being easy to use. Although Linux is used mostly for servers, Ubuntu is traditionally a desktop product. Canonical Ltd., the British company that puts out Ubuntu, said it has shipped millions of free CDs so far.

Canonical has 50,000 pre-orders for CDs of the latest version, nicknamed “Dapper Drake.”

Dapper Drake is the first Ubuntu release with a server version. It’s also the first release for which Canonical will sell long-term support: up to five years for the server version, and three years for the desktop version.

Among other changes, Dapper Drake has a new graphical installer program.

Ubuntu 6.06 will be available for PCs with Intel and AMD processors, Macintosh computers with PowerPC chips and Sun servers with Sparc processors.
--AP

amigo32

June 5th, 2006, 01:22 AM

sandrin

June 5th, 2006, 01:43 AM

Keyword ranking contest jumpstarts interest in SEM

First posted 08:54pm (Mla time) June 04, 2006
By Erwin Lemuel Oliva
INQ7.net
http://news.inq7.net/infotech/index.php?index=1&story_id=78059

A relatively young organization of "search engine marketing" or SEM professionals is holding a keyword ranking contest to jumpstart activities related to search engine marketing in the Philippines.

So far, the group's blog is getting numerous visitors.

Marc Macalua, founder of SEO Philippines, said that the contest aims to "spread the search engine optimization (SEO) gospel" in the country.

SEO involves using various web development and copywriting techniques to boost the ranking of a certain website or blog in a keyword search in search engines like Google or Yahoo!

For this contest, Macalua said that the blog or website that will rank number one in a keyword phrase search of "isulong seoph" on Google.com.ph will go home with the top prize.

"To win the top prize, you must be #1 for the keyword phrase isulong seoph (without quotation marks) in Google.com.ph on Friday September 29, 2006 at 8:00 PM," Macalua said in the SEO Philippines blog.

contest is a great way to get people interested in search engine marketing (SEM)," added Macalua. "The Philippines has a lot of talented professionals in the web development field but surprisingly, we're behind other countries like India and some Eastern European states in terms of SEM knowledge and exposure. We want to change that."

sandrin

June 5th, 2006, 04:30 AM

Yehey! to list shares with PSE next year
By Zinnia B. Dela Peña
The Philippine Star 06/05/2006
http://www.philstar.com/philstar/NEWS200606050705.htm

Yehey!, the country’s leading local search engine, is set on listing its shares with the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) in 2007 as it expects to break even by yearend, according to a top company official.

Yehey! is 88 percent owned by iVantage Corp., a publicly-listed holding firm with interests in banking, money remittance and information technology.

Ivantage director Wilson Sy said Yehey is looking at listing on the third board of the exchange or by way of introduction. Intro listing refers to the listing of shares at the exchange without first undertaking an initial public offering (IPO). Sy is confident his company will be more than ready for its planned IPO. Yehey! is expected to finally go in the black this year on higher advertising revenues.

Yehey! earlier said it was looking to raise between P40 million and P80 million from the maiden offering of its shares. Proceeds from the offering will be used to fund the search engine portal’s continued expansion in order to take advantage of the anticipated growth in the number of Internet users in the country.

Yehey! is in talks with a telecommunications company, media outfit and a financial services group as possible strategic investors in preparation for its planned IPO. About 10 to 20 percent of the company may be sold to prospective investors.

Yehey! needs strategic investors to ensure continued growth and further strengthen operations.

The number of Internet users in the country has been growing. From only 3.4 million in 2004, there are now over five million Internet users and this is expected to increase to 9 million by 2006.

Yehey! is hitting an average of 30 million page views per month (which means that an average user surfs close to 30 pages). It has around 300,0000 registered members.

The company’s bread and butter remains online advertising, mostly coming from global-based accounts including Dell, Levi’s, Ford, Intel, Nokia, and Citibank, HSBC and Sun Life Financial.

Yehey! provides daily Philippine and Asian news, business and financial reports, sports, jobs and daily weather forecasts. It offers 24-hour business feed and real-time stock quotes for free, unlike with other sites.

It is also the center of a vibrant online community of Filipinos worldwide, who come together via the site’s Club Yehey services that include free e-mail, chat, and electronic forums.

Back to top

amigo32

June 6th, 2006, 01:14 AM

sandrin

June 9th, 2006, 02:56 AM

Thanks for the Ubuntu link amigo..

YouTube spawns Filipino version

First posted 10:42pm (Mla time) June 08, 2006
By Alexander Villafania
INQ7.net

THE SUCCESS of free video streaming website YouTube (www.youtube.com) didn’t go unnoticed by a group of Filipinos who replicated the idea and made a local portal solely for Filipino videos.

Not surprisingly, the name of the YouTube look-alike is PinoyTube (www.pinoytube.com) and soon it started collecting a little over three dozen videos, most of which seemed to have come from the owners of the site.

Being a new website working through its paces PinoyTube is flat, despite the insertion of a category listing for funny, action, scary, people, places, events, machines and animals.

The PinoyTube owners have even come up with a short marketing video for their website.

Although it still does not have a user registration form, anyone can upload their videos as long as these are encoded in formats such as .wmv and .avi for PC and .3gp for mobile phone videos.

The video streamed by PinoyTube is then converted for it to be playable in an embedded Microsoft Windows Media Player. The videos can be rated by users and comments can also be added.

Incidentally, PinoyTube is also trying to be e-commerce ready as it also has a separate set of categories for videos of items being sold. There are separate categories for real estate, vehicles, leisure and pets though no video on these topics are posted thus far.

PinoyTube is just one of the many copycat video streaming websites popping up on the Internet, following the success of YouTube and iFilm (www.ifilm.com). As such, different types of users, from ordinary users of camera-ready mobile phones, amateur videographers to independent film makers can immediately post their videos without fear of regulation.

JAMAICUS

June 9th, 2006, 10:29 AM

BPO workforce seen hitting 1M-2M in 2010
Posted: 2:50 AM | Jun. 09, 2006

Inquirer

THE business process outsourcing (BPO) sector is expected to have between one and two million employees in 2010, including 500,000 in call centers, officials of the Contact Center Association of the Philippines said Thursday.

More processes are being outsourced, resulting in a surge in demand for workers, said CCAP director Rainerio Borja, president of PeopleSupport Philippines Inc.

The demand is growing so fast that the industry is facing a labor shortage, association officials said.

They said that out of the country's 400,000 college graduates every year, only 25 percent are deemed "immediately employable" in the BPO and information technology-enabled services sectors.

"Labor shortage is a glaring issue facing us. But this is something we hope we can address," said CCAP director Raffy David, director for marketing and quality at Pilipinas Teleserv.

When asked if the labor shortage would mean having to sacrifice quality to meet the demand, David said BPO companies take up projects only taken if they know that the requirements could be fulfilled with the quality for which the country was become known.

In Cebu City, PeopleSupport Philippines has increased its seats from the original 300 when it started to 1,600 and plans to expand to 2,000 seats within the year, said Lance Rosenzweig, chairman and chief executive of the US-based PeopleSupport Inc.

Rosenzweig, in Cebu City for the inauguration of the company's second site, said: "We're hiring this year an average 50 new employees every week. We don't see that slowing down."

"I think over the next few years, we can continue to grow our operations here very significantly," he said. "The reason is that the teams are performing so well that the clients are very, very happy with their performance and they're encouraging us to continue to grow here."

Rosenzweig said PeopleSupport was partnering with universities in developing people. "We're seeing a very large pool of workers," he said.< With INQ7.net

http://money.inq7.net/topstories/view_topstories.php?yyyy=2006&mon=06&dd=09&file=4

sandrin

June 10th, 2006, 01:20 AM

Philippine firm replicates iTunes

First posted 11:11pm (Mla time) June 09, 2006
By Alexander Villafania
INQ7.net
http://news.inq7.net/infotech/index.php?index=1&story_id=78621

A locally created online music store is tapping the Filipino audiophile crowd to promote Filipino musical talents but legitimizes its operations by providing payment for downloaded music.

Fliptunes (www.fliptunes.net), developed by Internet service provider Mosaic Communications, works similarly to Apple’s iTunes download software but does not need to have a download client installed in a PC.

A subscriber has to register to the website and open a PayEasy online payment account. There is no need to install a download client since Fliptunes already has its own online download interface.

The site, which started a little over a month ago, features mostly local recording artists and their works, which could be downloaded either per song or as a whole album.

There are also music videos and podcasts that could be downloaded to Apple’s popular iPod digital music player.

So far, Fliptunes already has 22 recording artists,
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20 albums with about 1,000 songs and about one dozen videos. The site plans to feature songs exclusively available only in their website.

Each song costs 40 pesos per download while videos cost 80 pesos.

The site also boasts of Microsoft Windows Media Digital Rights Management program to prevent redistribution of songs that are downloaded from their site.

In an e-mailed response to INQ7.NET, Fliptunes President Robertson Chiang said the company is currently building its audio library and is in negotiations with several record companies for distribution of original songs.

Chiang noted that their intention is to provide a legitimate alternative to downloaded music, especially in a country where most songs installed in personal music players are copied from other sources.

“Without a legitimate alternative, there was really no other way to get digital downloads. Hopefully, through education, this crowd will slowly shift to legitimate options,” Chaing said.

sandrin

June 13th, 2006, 03:00 AM

4th version of Bayanihan Linux OS to be launched soon

First posted 11:23pm (Mla time) June 12, 2006
By Alexander Villafania
INQ7.net
http://news.inq7.net/infotech/index.php?index=1&story_id=78912

The Department of Science and Technology-Advanced Science and Technology Institute (DOST-ASTI) will soon be launching the next desktop and server versions of the Bayanihan Linux operating system.

The ASTI Open Source Group recently launched the second beta release of Bayanihan Linux 4, based on the Debian GNU/Linux open source software, which is one of the most popular versions of Linux.

Previous versions of Bayanihan Linux, which were launched in 2001 were based on Red Hat Linux and Fedora, two other free Linux flavors.

ASTI started developing Bayanihan Linux in an effort to provide a cost-effective alternative to the more expensive but widely popular Microsoft Windows operating system.

Bayanihan Linux could also be custom-made for Filipino home users and companies, Subsequent versions of Bayanihan Linux only had one CD installer.

ASTI said in its website (www.asti.dost.gov.ph) that the new Bayanihan Linux 4 has significantly improved features such as local networking; running Microsoft Windows programs through a free software called WINE; an anti-virus application called Klamav, integrated CD and DVD copying; web camera and photo-editing functions; as well as remote desktop access and serial ATA drive support.

The agency is also planning to release the first server version of Bayanihan Linux, though details of its functions have not yet been released. It may, however, also be based on Debian GNU/Linux.

sandrin

June 13th, 2006, 03:04 AM

US firm acquires RP-based security appliance developer

First posted 11:36pm (Mla time) June 12, 2006
By Erwin Lemuel Oliva
INQ7.net
http://news.inq7.net/infotech/index.php?index=1&story_id=78922

A United States-based technology firm has acquired Cebu-based security appliance developer InfoWeapons Inc., the company announced in its website.

Innofone.com Inc. (http://www.innofone.com/) is a public company that focuses exclusively on Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6). It is also a wholly owned subsidiary of IPv6 Summit, Inc.

IPv6 also known as Internet Protocol version 6 is an upgrade to the existing Internet standard IPv4, which has been in place since 1973.

According to the company's website, Innofone has agreed in principle to acquire InfoWeapons, Inc., (http://www.infoweapons.com/) a Philippine-based provider of IPv6 network hardware and solutions.

Innofone.com said that the US Department of Defense and the Federal Government, and countries such as Japan, South Korea and China, now require the IPv6 standard.

"InfoWeapons has been one of the early adopters and leaders in IPv6 technologies," said Lawrence Hughes, chairman and CTO of InfoWeapons said in a statement.

The Cebu-based company is now developing IPv6-enabled network appliances for major markets in Asia, Europe and the US.

Hughes said that the acquisition will enable both companies to combine their strengths in research and development with Innofone.com's global reach and established reputation as a voice for IPv6.

"This acquisition will take Innofone.com to a new level of product and support offerings. Our company has become globally known for IPv6 services such as conferences, training, and consulting. With the acquisition of InfoWeapons, we expect to combine high-quality products and services with a long outreach in the world markets," added Alex Lightman, CEO and President of Innofone.com, Inc, in a statement.

chixbebe

June 16th, 2006, 09:05 AM

A four-storey Information Technology (IT) center, called "SB Centrex Project’ will rise shortly within the sprawling San Francisco High School compound in Project 6, Quezon City.

Once completed, the facility is expected to transform the QC division of schools as the country’s first and only division to gear towards computerization in the hope of acquiring a 100 percent computer literacy rating among graduates of the city’s secondary public school system.

On orders of Mayor Feliciano Belmonte Jr., the city government has set aside R48 million for the construction of the IT Center.

Belmonte said the project is in line with the city government’s continuing effort to improve the quality of education in the city’s public educational system.

City Schools Division Superintendent Dr. Victoria Q. Fuentes said at least 16,965 public high school students graduating this coming school year, unable to avail of computer education in their respective schools, will initially benefit from the project.

To date, QC has 37 out of 46 high schools with computer laboratories.
With the establishment of Centrex, a 100 percent computer literacy rating of all high school graduates and teachers in the city’s public school system will hopefully be achieved.

Also, the program was envisioned as an effective tool in education intervention converting QC as a showcase integration of technology in basic education.

Aside from QC students, the SB Centrex Project shall also serve as a training center for teaches and personnel of the Quezon City’s division of schools. (Sel A. Baysa)

http://www.mb.com.ph/MTNN2006061666984.html

sandrin

June 16th, 2006, 11:15 PM

InfoWeapons to hire more Filipinos to beef up RP operations

First posted 08:29pm (Mla time) June 16, 2006
By Erwin Lemuel Oliva
INQ7.net
http://news.inq7.net/infotech/index.php?index=1&story_id=79374

CEBU-BASED network appliance developer InfoWeapons Inc. will hire more Filipinos to beef up its local operations with the infusion of new capital from US firm Innofone.com Inc., an official told INQ7.net.

The local firm aims to have 150 employees by the end of 2006, according to Lawrence Hughes, chairman and chief technology officer of InfoWeapons, in a telephone interview.

"We have more capital now. We've just gotten a 1,300-square-meter site in Cebu (Skyrise in AsiaTown IT Park). We are up to 60 plus now, target is 150 by end of year and many more by the end of 2007," he added.

Innofone.com, a United States-based technology firm is set to complete the acquisition of InfoWeapons in a few weeks, Hughes said.

Innofone.com (http://www.innofone.com/) is a public company that focuses exclusively on Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6). IPv6 is an upgrade to the existing
Internet standard IPv4, which has been in place since 1973.

Innofone has previously announced that it has agreed in principle to acquire InfoWeapons Inc., (http://www.infoweapons.com/) a Philippine-based provider of IPv6 network hardware solutions.

Hughes said that the Innofone acquisition will give the local firm international reach, allowing InfoWeapons to sell to big US government agencies, which are mandated to move to IPv6 by June 2008.

Hughes also disclosed that he will become the new CTO of Innofone after the acquisition of InfoWeapons is completed, but that he will remain as CTO of InfoWeapons.

"InfoWeapons will basically be the product and research group for the whole company. We'll be opening additional sites in Eastern Europe and Japan later, but Cebu will be our main site for product development," the executive said.

Hughes said that Innofone.com has recently received 50 million dollars in venture capital from Cogent Capital, due in part to the acquisition of InfoWeapons and additional investment from him in Innofone.com.

"I will also be moving most of the year to Atlanta, but still planning on spending about one month a quarter in Cebu," he added.

Hughes stressed that InfoWeapons will become a major force in Philippines IT. "Hopefully others will follow our model, and someday there may even be spinoffs," he added.

JAMAICUS

June 24th, 2006, 07:36 AM

Dutch group urges RP‘s BPO sector to explore European market
By Marianne V. Go
The Philippine Star 06/24/2006

Encouraged by the potential of the business process outsourcing (BPO) sector in the Philippines a Dutch organization is challenging the industry to further enhance its capabilities as an international supplier of BPO services and create a niche in the European market.

The Center for the Promotion of Imports from Developing Countries (CBI) of the Netherlands, a group providing expertise to local exporters from developing countries, is continuing its export development program for the Philippine BPO sector through its integrated program dubbed as CBI Export Development Program for the Philippine BPO Industry.

The program is being implemented by the Department of Trade and Industry’s Bureau of Export Trade Promotion (BETP).

BPO services, one of the sub-sectors of the information technology-enabled services, are included in DTI’s Revenue Streams, a list of priority products for export promotion under the Philippine Export Development Plan (PEDP).

"While the Philippines remains predominantly into call centers, it can develop special niches in BPO-related services for European firms," according to Trade and Industry Secretary Peter B. Favila as he noted that demand from the European market for BPO services is quite huge.

"The BPO program of CBI would complement our objective to further position the Philippines as a hub for IT-enabled services," Favila said.

The DTI is pushing for the development of the BPO industry in the country particularly in the areas of call centers, financial services, administrative and payroll, logistics, services such as medical and legal transcription and animation, and engineering services.

"We are encouraging our BPO companies to take advantage of this very rare opportunity as an initial step towards getting a foothold and capturing a sizeable market of European companies planning to outsource offshore. We are happy to note the growing DTI-CBI partnership in many export promotion programs, including auto parts and engineering and natural ingredients," he added.

CBI experts led by Laszlo Klucs and Harry van Geijn are currently in the country to conduct company visits and business meetings with the country’s BPO firms interested in rendering IT-enabled services to European companies.

They initially recommended several firms to participate in the program.

The CBI will make the final selection after assessments of the Philippines, India and South Africa have been concluded.

Companies that will be selected to participate in the BPO program would be provided by CBI with technical assistance, outsourcing audit, and training; market information on the European Union and registration to the EuroITX.com that would post the BPO company’s profile, logo, visibility; EXPRO seminar in Rotterdam; co-financing of quality certification; and assistance in conducting marketing activities in Europe.

Among the companies that met with CBI executives are engaged in a wide array of BPO businesses including: digital printing, data conversion/ medical transcription, data processing, medical transcription, financial services (finance and accounting, payroll and benefits administration), animation, data conversion, document imaging, IT outsourcing, digital 3D modeling and imaging and architectural/ construction designs, logistics management, and human resource development.

Prior to the company visits and business meetings, Klucs and Geijn also conducted a seminar among BPO companies to discuss an overview of the key outsourcing trends in Europe; the outsourcing process; why European companies outsource offshore; offshore outsourcing risks; outsourcing vendor selection; and prospects for BPO companies to participate in CBI’s BPO program.

The Philippines is fast emerging as an important offshore IT service provider in Asia with its wealth of highly skilled, culturally adaptable, and language-proficient professionals. Filipino knowledge workers are servicing some of the biggest multinational companies, in widely diverse fields including software development, engineering and design, web development, animation, business processing, contact centers, medical and legal transcription, and other services powered by information and communications technology.

To date, the Philippines hosts many registered BPO operators, mostly third-party contractors serving global accounts.

Their services range from data base management, insurance claims processing to logistics management and sales and marketing.

Some of the world’s most recognized brands such as Caltex, Procter & Gamble and AIG chose the Philippines as their offshore outsourcing destination.

http://www.philstar.com/philstar/NEWS200606240702.htm

sandrin

June 25th, 2006, 11:57 PM

UP-ITTC inaugurates new state-of-the-art networking lab
http://www.mb.com.ph/INFO2006062667759.html

The University of the Philippines Information Technology Training Center (UP-ITTC) recently set up a world-class networking laboratory. Composed of various up-to-date network devices such as routers, switches, a WAN emulator, modems/CSU/DSUs, firewall, VPN devices, IDS sensors, VoIP/IP Telephony devices, IP PBX devices, wireless LAN devices, and media streaming devices, the UP-ITTC Network Systems Lab also has router and network simulators to allow configurations of an unlimited number of simulated network devices. The souped-up equipment cost R28 million, R14 million of which is allotted for Cisco, the world leader in Internet networking.

The lab is set up for the following network technologies: routing and switching, wide area network emulation (PSTN/POTS, v.35 56/64k, T1, E1, ISDN, Euro ISDN, and Frame Relay), remote access services (RAS)/ dialup access, wireless LAN, security (Firewall, VPN, IDS), network/cable testing and protocol analysis, voice-over-IP/ IP telephony, and media streaming. These lab facilities comply with the requirements for Cisco Certified Network Associate, Cisco Certified Network Professional, and Cisco Certified Internetworking Expert levels of training.

Funded by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) through the UP-JICA Human Resources Development Project, the laboratory will benefit trainees under the Network Systems track.

According to Dr. Jaime D.L. Caro, Program Director of the UP-ITTC, setting up this laboratory is a big step toward the future of information technology in the country. As envisioned, it will greatly contribute to the knowledge of future Filipino IT professionals.

The UP-ITTC is a Microsoft IT Academy and a Local Academy under the Cisco Networking Academy Program. Aside from Network Systems, UP-ITTC also offers Applications Development and Mobile Computing and Embedded Systems tracks.

chixbebe

July 3rd, 2006, 11:05 AM

LOS BAÑOS, Laguna — Cellular phones are now an integral part of the national agriculture and resources research and development network.

Now equipped with cellphones are the government’s 14 regional R&D consortia, 80 Farmers’ Information and Technology Services (FITS) centers, and 70 magsasaka-siyentista who are backstopping FITS.

A total of 174 mobile phones were provided under the "Knowledge Networking toward Enterprise Agricultural Communities (K-Agrinet)" project.

K-Agrinet is a collaborative venture of the Los Baños-based Department of Science and Technology-Philippine Council for Agriculture, Forestry and Natural Resources Research and Development (DOST-PCARRD), the Department of Agriculture-Philippine Rice Research Institute (DA-PhilRice), the Department of Agrarian Reform, and the Development Academy of the Philippines.

It aims to utilize information technology as a tool to fast-track the dissemination of agriculture and natural resources information and technologies to farmers, upland dwellers, and rural entrepreneurs.

K-Agrinet has four components being carried out by its institutional proponents.

PCARRD handles the e-Consortia and e-Farm projects; DA-PhilRice, through its Open Academy for Philippine Agriculture, the e-learning component; and DAR and DAP, the e-agriculture component.

The e-Consortia and e-Farm projects enable electronic access to information technology and other services in 80 FITS centers in strategic parts of the country in partnership with the 14 PCARRD-coordinated R&D consortia.

A FITS center is a one-stop information shop that provides farmers and other clients quick access to agricultural information services.

Dr. Bessie Burgos, director of PCARRD’s Technology Outreach Program Division, said that since the FITS project was launched in 1997, 194 centers have been set up across the country.

Backstopping the FITS are the magsasaka-siyentista, who are successful model farmers and farmer-leaders. Their farms serve as showcases of "best practices" and they share technologies and indigenous practices with other farmers through demonstration, training, and farmer-to-farmer advisory services.

A consortium is composed of government R&D agencies and other entities and state colleges and universities (SCUs) in a given region.

For instance, the Highland Agriculture and Resources Research and Development Consortium is composed of 12 government agencies and six SCUs in the Cordillera Administrative Region.

The other consortia cover the Ilocos region, Cagayan Valley, Central Luzon, Southern Tagalog, Bicol, Western Visayas, Central Visayas, Eastern Visayas, Western Mindanao, Northern Mindanao, Southern Mindanao, Central Mindanao, and Caraga.

The e-learning component, led by DA-PhilRice’s OAPA, focuses on e-extension and distance learning for agricultural extension workers.

The e-agriculture component, led by DAR and DAP, mobilizes agrarian reform communities into the program.

Noting that cellphones have become the widely used communication tool in the country today, PCARRD, through K-Agrinet, has developed a system that could facilitate quick information dispatch in the agriculture, forestry, and natural resources sectors through the Short Messaging Service (SMS) technology.

With PCARRD’s SMS system, clients can send queries via text messages from a mobile phone or a computer and get quick replies.

http://www.philstar.com/philstar/NEWS200607039906.htm

sandrin

July 3rd, 2006, 02:12 PM

Yehey prepares for IPO in 2007
Inquirer
Last updated 00:43am (Mla time) 07/03/2006

PHILIPPINE search engine yehey.com is preparing for a possible initial public offering next year through aggressive efforts to return to profit, officials said.

Yehey president Donald Patrick Lim said Yehey's sales have increased by 20 percent in the first five months this year, boosted by online advertisements from large clients in Singapore. He said he was expecting Yehey to be "back in the black" by next year.

Ivantage Corp., Yehey's parent firm, said in a statement that it was positioning Yehey as the primary Filipino portal for online advertisements and e-commerce payment deals.

Yehey recently received 27.9 million pesos in cash from iVantage for the portal's expansion plans.

Yehey plans to transform itself into a full-scale online marketing solutions provider from being an online advertising medium.

Yehey was founded in 1996 by college friends as a search engine. The company's bread and butter is online advertising. Elizabeth L. Sanchez

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oracle exec sees more open source use among SMEs in RP
By Alexander Villafania
INQ7.net
Last updated 00:42am (Mla time) 07/03/2006

A GRADUAL shift among small-to-medium scale enterprises (SMEs) from proprietary software towards open source software is to be expected in the Philippines, an official of Oracle Corp. has said.

Oracle Asia-Pacific mid-market senior director Lee Thompson said many local independent software vendors (ISVs) are getting more requests to provide business applications developed on open source software, particularly Linux and Java.

Thompson said the shift was being driven largely by budget constraints as well as the inherent compatibility of open source applications with other applications.

“It’s the SMEs that are asking to use open source because these are more cost effective to use,” he said.

Thompson said many of Oracle's ISV partners have taken its open source training programs in the past and he is expecting to see more ISVs to take the same training program.

He added that SME demands for cost-effective software will continue to push ISVs to provide open source applications.

“We’re also seeing much of Oracle’s Asia Pacific growth to come from the mid-market segment, of which 40 percent is from the SMEs. There are so many of them in any Asian country that it won’t be hard to find new opportunities for us,” Thompson said.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
RP-developed PC game to ship in the US
By Erwin Oliva
INQ7.net
Last updated 00:42am (Mla time) 07/03/2006

PHILIPPINE-based game developer and publisher Ladyluck Digital Media said it will ship its first-person PC action game in the United States this week, more than two years after it began development.

Luis Manalac, founder and president of Ladyluck Digital Media, said "Terrawars: NY Invasion" will soon ship in Europe, Russia, Australia, and New Zealand--but not yet in the Philippines.

"Piracy issues" are holding back local distributors from carrying the game in the country, added Manalac who has lived in New York for 14 years.

He said that his company is still negotiating with some online game publishers who can carry the game along with online games, he added.

Using Filipino gaming talent (including voice talents) to develop the PC game, Ladyluck said it hopes to "get lucky" with its debut PC game.

There's a possibility that the PC game will soon be translated into Filipino to cater to the local market, the executive added.

The PC game follows the footsteps of PC games like CounterStrike, which involves a cooperative multiplayer game set in an imagined virtual world. In this game, it is New York City following an alien invasion.

"Fight against a wide variety of invaders, from swarms of mindless Spawn to titanic Aspirants. Each enemy type has its own unique weapons and tactics," the game's description states.

Manalac said the game will sell for about 20 dollars, about half the price of a typical PC game whose prices are between 40 to 50 dollars.

http://technology.inq7.net/infotech/infotech/view_article.php?article_id=7766

"TerraWars: NY Invasion" has been rated T for Teen. A demo of the game can be downloaded at http://www.terrawars.com.

Meanwhile, Manalac said Ladyluck is now developing a death-match PC game, called New York Battleground.

sandrin

July 3rd, 2006, 02:13 PM

Open source project integrated into 71 schools
http://technology.inq7.net/infotech/infotech/view_article.php?article_id=7652
By Alexander Villafania
INQ7.net
Last updated 01:31am (Mla time) 07/02/2006

Seventy-one members of a nationwide open source project are implementing an open source courseware as part called of the Philippine Open Source Initiative (POSITIVE), a joint effort of the European Information Technology Service Center Foundation (EITSC), mobile content developer Wireless Services Asia (WSA) and the German Technical Cooperation (GTZ).

The POSITIVE courseware focuses on open source software development, programming, applications and maintenance.

The 71 schools have already started offering the courseware this school year. It would be integrated into computer-related courses covering first year to fourth year.

Each year level would have different and progressing open source technology subjects.

It was conceived to provide colleges and universities in the Philippines with additional tools to teach open source technology and not just proprietary software. The joint development partners also forecast a growth in demand for open source developers at the corporate level, both locally and abroad.

POSITIVE project lead Joseph Paul Sianghio said they have conducted the courseware training in Angeles University Foundation, Asia Pacific College, Cebu Institute of Technology, Department of Science and Technology Region 7, Don Bosco Technical Institute and Mindanao State University-Iligan Institute of Technology.

The EITSC has also conducted nationwide training for teachers who will teach the courseware. The training covered IT fundamentals, web development, database systems and operating system.

Sianghio said Open Source is getting acceptability in corporations and schools as a viable and cost-effective alternative to commercially available software, adding that global demand for open source engineers and developers has been growing steadily.

“We want to roll out in as many schools as possible. We have developed the Open Source courseware to be consistent and compatible with the Computer Science and Information Technology curricula of schools for easier adoption,” Sianghio said.

Sianghio said the nationwide road show has trained 183 faculty members on the use of the POSITIVE courseware and will continue on to other areas in the coming months, such as in Davao City, Baguio and Legaspi.

The project implementers are also looking for a September launch of a similar POSITIVE training program for EITSC, GTZ and WSA partners in open source technologies.

kiretoce

July 4th, 2006, 08:04 AM

Smart Click: Broadbanding the countryside
Tuesday, July 04, 2006

Gone are the days when far-flung provinces of the Philippines were isolated from the rest of the cyber-world due to the absence of links to the Internet.

In its goal to make Internet and communications services available to every Filipino, especially for those who cannot afford home-based Internet access, Smart Communications, Inc. (Smart) has started the roll out of mobile Internet cafes nationwide.

Called Smart Click Internet and More, this latest innovation by Smart is unique. It is housed in a movable air-conditioned 40-foot container van with 15 computers for rent, and serves as a one-stop digital shop in places with limited or no provisions for high-speed Internet.

Since it began its rollout three months ago or last April, there are now 18 Smart Click branches nationwide. These are located in places as far as Basco, Batanes in Luzon; Balangiga, Eastern Samar in the Visayas region; and Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay in Mindanao.

“Smart aims to bring high-speed Internet services especially in so-called uncharted territories through Smart Click. Smart does this by using wireless broadband technology. We plan to eventually open 1,000 branches,” said Tina Z. Mariano, Smart's Public Access Group head. With wireless broadband, Internet connection is up to twice as fast as dial-up service, making surfing the Web and chatting online faster and easier.

“Projects like Smart Click prove that we can bridge communities in the Philippines by making Internet services more accessible to Filipinos,” Commission of Information and Communications Technology (CICT) chairman Ramon P. Sales said. “More people will have access to unlimited information, online education, and increased business opportunities through the Internet, thanks to Smart Click,” he added.

At Smart Click, people can also quickly connect with friends and relatives abroad via e-mail, chat, or webcam. Desktop publishing services such as sending, printing and scanning of documents and photos, saving of files in CDs, among others, are also available, as well as online gaming.

World at the fingertips

Communities have been reaping the benefits of being connected to the World Wide Web. Teenager Orly Gecha, for example, lives in the country’s northernmost province, in Batanes Islands. The province is 190 kilometers away from Aparri, the northernmost tip of mainland Luzon. The Internet is Orly’s connection to the rest of the world. He uses the Internet for research on school projects, online gaming with his buddies, and for chatting with friends. “The connection is fast!” he enthused.

Batanes governor Vicente Gato said, “with Smart Click, Batanes and its 7,000 population are no longer isolated. Previously, we have been isolated, not only geographically, but also in terms of communications. Our residents can now get in touch with relatives in the United States, Germany, Japan, and in other parts of the world.”

For Mayor Sebastian Serrano of Catanauan, Quezon, having the latest in wireless communications technology will contribute to the progress of their town, a third-class municipality in the southernmost part of the province. Prior to the launch of Smart Click last June, the nearest Internet café was three hours away in Lucena City. The Smart Click Internet Café in the town is also the first in the entire Bondoc Peninsula.

Serrano is glad that they will be able to update the town’s homepage more often now that their municipality is connected to the Internet. “I believe this is a big step for us Catanauanins. The Internet is the best way for a remote town like Catanauan to be linked to the rest of the world.”

Balangiga has also just recently been linked to the World Wide Web through Smart Click. A fifth class municipality, Balangiga is located in the southern part of Eastern Samar, about 72 kilometers from Tacloban City. It is the center of trade in the cluster of towns Lawa-an, Giporlos and Quinapondan, with agriculture, fishing, and logging as its main industries.

“Businesses from the provinces can be more competitive. They can get customers abroad by marketing their products on the Internet.

Through the Internet, the town can also invite more tourists to visit its historic sites,” Smart’s Mariano said.

Through the Smart Click Internet Café, the historic town of San Miguel, Bulacan can also now market its famous pastillas de leche online, to expand its customer base, she added.

For computer training, too

Bulacan Provincial Information and Technology Office head Rex Mangalindan said Smart Click would benefit the provincial government. “We have limited computers and most of them have no Internet access. Having Smart Click near the provincial capitol is very strategic since we can use it as a training center.”

In Tandag, Surigao del Sur, provincial administrator Johnny Pimentel said Smart Click would benefit teachers. He said teachers now have access to computers, and the Internet.

Movable Internet cafes

Smart Click is designed to be mobile so it can be easily transferred in case of natural calamities, which is common is some of the provinces, Mariano said.

Broadband technology is used to connect to the Internet, so it is “wireless.” Wireless broadband does not require telephone or cable connections to get Internet access. It instead makes use of Smart cell sites in the area. The computer is connected by cable to an outdoor antenna on top of the trailer van. The "wireless" component is the direct "line-of-sight" connection from the outdoor antenna to the nearest Smart cell site for the strongest possible signal.

Mariano said the mobile Internet cafes may be franchised, and is ideal for local entrepreneurs who have genuine passion for propagating wireless broadband technology.

Smart started the roll out of Smart Click branches on April 1 in Ayala, Zamboanga. It subsequently opened branches in Basco, Batanes; Ipil, Zamboanga Sibugay; Sta. Maria, Bulacan; Bantayan, Cebu; Dolores, Eastern Samar; Malolos, Bulacan; Bulan, Sorsogon; Barobo, Surigao del Sur; Balangiga, Eastern Samar; San Juan, Leyte; Tandag, Surigao del Sur; Concepcion, Tarlac; San Jose, Antique; Baler, Aurora; Virac, Catanduanes; San Miguel, Bulacan; and Catanauan, Quezon.

“With Smart Click, residents of communities with limited connectivity can now access the Internet with just one click," said Mariano.

sandrin

July 6th, 2006, 02:32 AM

US IPv6 developer expands to RP market

By Alexander Villafania
INQ7.net
Last updated 00:28am (Mla time) 07/06/2006

Seeing the potential for the Philippines to become a hub for developing services and applications on IPv6 (Internet Protocol version 6), US company Innofone.com is earmarking between 20 and 30 million US dollars to expand its business in the country.

Innofone.com, a software and consulting firm on the IPv6 platform, already acquired Philippines-based security appliance company Infoweapons early this year and is looking at more acquisitions, partnerships or joint ventures with local firms.

It also received a US 50-million-dollar investment from venture capital group Cogent Capital in the US in the form of an equity swap.

IPv6 is a new Internet network layer standard whose main use would be to increase the number of addresses available for non-computer devices such as handheld devices, vehicles and home appliances. IPv6 uses a 128-bit addressing length, which provides 50 octillion addresses for each of the 6 billion people living today. It is intended to replace the ageing IPv4 standard, the current IP standard being used worldwide, which only has 4.3 billion addresses.

CEO Chairman Alex Lightman told reporters that the company’s goal is to encourage development of IPv6-related products and services, mostly coming from the Philippines where it would conduct most of its research and development activities.

He added that the opportunity for IPv6 is providing IPv6-ready equipment as well as the software and services that go with it, among which include high bandwidths and secure voice-over-IP, IPTV, mobile phone commerce, online education, business software managed services.

Lightman stressed that only a few countries are implementing full IPv6 migration. These include Japan, South Korea and some European countries, though IPv6 has been deployed in selected areas in the US. He expects that as IPv4 addresses become scarce, more countries would migrate to IPv6 to accommodate more addresses and to introduce new telecommunications services.

“There is no one group that is leading the IPv6 standard worldwide and there are only a few services available. This is where the Philippines could excel because here we could develop applications and the hardware then deploy them to other countries,” Lightman said.

Among the company’s plans is to expand the Infoweapons operations by increasing to 500 the number of employees at its Cebu City office by 2007, up from 80 this year.

Likewise, Mobile Technology Group, a US firm also acquired by Innofone, will be developing mobile phone applications using IPv6 standards.

sandrin

July 7th, 2006, 02:47 AM

IT manufacturing money moving to RP with Asian ‘tensions’

By Erwin Oliva
INQ7.net
Last updated 10:41pm (Mla time) 07/06/2006

SINGAPORE -- Information technology investments in manufacturing are likely to move to the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam due to the political tensions between China and Japan, the missile testing in North Korea, and the slow down of Japanese manufacturing investments in China, executives from Hewlett Packard (HP) said in an interview with reporters.

"The Philippines is back in the radar of manufacturing companies," said Kumar Narayanan, general manager of Manufacturing and Distribution Industry of HP's Technology Solutions Group for Asia Pacific and Japan.

The executive said about a third of the computer maker's overall business comes from providing technology and services to manufacturing and distribution companies this region.

In the Philippines, customers include Procter and Gamble, Toyota, Intel, San Miguel Corp., and Pepsi Co., the executive added.

Manufacturing companies in Asia Pacific are expected to expand their operations this year, which means new investments in information technology, the HP executive said.

The oil and gas sector is now the biggest spender on IT in the Asia Pacific region, followed by the semiconductor industry which is building new plants in the region.

While China continues to enjoy a bigger share of investments in manufacturing, the HP executives said the recent North Korea missile testing will make companies jittery, said Mitsuhiro Honda, general manager of Manufacturing and Distribution Industries of HP Asia Pacific and Japan's Technology Solutions Group.

Honda said the cost of running manufacturing plants in Japan is also getting more expensive, while government policies in China requiring manufacturers to form joint ventures with local companies is stifling growth.

The HP executive said the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam are now in a position to become possible locations of expansions in the manufacturing industry amid all these developments.

The computer maker offers various supply-chain technology and solutions, consulting, and "managed services" to manufacturing and distribution companies in Asia Pacific and Japan.

The manufacturing industry in Asia Pacific region represents 17 percent of the 238 billion dollar global market in 2005, figures from market research firm International Data Corp. showed.

Meanwhile, the distribution industry in the same region is about 20 percent of the 124 billion dollar global market last year, IDC figures noted.

JAMAICUS

July 10th, 2006, 03:16 PM

As India’s BPO luster dulls, RP drawing more investors
By Artemio F. Cusi III
Reporter

TIGHTENING profit margins are squeezing out the options of major outsourcing firms to maintain operations in India, according to a keynote speaker of a recent outsourcing conference in Singapore.
Richard Mills, chairman of Chalre’ Associates, noted in his presentation the observation of business process outsourcing (BPO) leaders that India is becoming a more difficult proposition.
He cited numerous instances when top outsourcing firms such as Sykes, GXS, Safeway, Dell, HP, IBM, and ClientLogic have either reduced or completely closed down operations in India, and placed their bets on the Philippines.
Although India remains the world’s top outsourcing hub, Mills said that BPO companies are well aware of the limits to past achievements.
Among the difficulties encountered by firms in India are the constraints in infrastructure, fat salaries of BPO executives and workers, and the retention problem. The last one refers to the quick turnover of workers in BPOP companies, owing to, among others, the health problems of night-shift work and the tendency of the predominantly young work force to easily get “bored” from the work or miss the night life.
Other countries, however, are not just passively monitoring the regional movements of companies. According to Mills, among these contenders for a significant portion of the global outsourcing clientele are Malaysia, South Africa, Costa Rica, eastern Europe, Russia, Brazil, and Mexico.
Despite the list of competitors, Mills said the people in Singapore “were very impressed by the work being done here (Philippines).”
“I was surprised how much interest there is for offshore back-office services in Singapore all of a sudden and I was deluged with people asking for more information,” Mills said in a subsequent email to BusinessMirror. “And today, the most important destination for offshore outsourcing in the world is the Philippines (in my opinion).”
While India might be an increasingly expensive investment, its employment in the outsourcing sector is projected to more than double to 2.4 million in 2010 from the current one million. The Philippines, with 180,000, might achieve the one-million mark in the same year.
Mills added that with the maturity of the voice services and IT, companies are moving a broad range of functions offshore.
He pointed to Sykes, which decided to transfer operations in India to the Philippines. “We moved calls to other facilities in Asia to get a higher rate of return,” Mills quoted the company’s vice-president for global strategies Dan Hernandez as saying.
The US-based contact center and information technology (IT) group has 7,000 employees in the Philippines.
“But knowledgeable observers in the region say that the rate of return differential must be large for a company of Sykes’ size and prominence to forgo India after already putting capacity in place,” Mills said in his presentation.
“Better results and economics” also convinced GXS to expand in the Philippines from its facilities in India. This followed the company decision to centralize all functions with a customer interfacing component.
“GXS reported an increase in roughly all of its quality metrics within just a few months of moving the work to the Philippines from its various worldwide locations,” Mills said.

http://www.businessmirror.com.ph/front02.php

sandrin

July 16th, 2006, 07:23 PM

Like in mobile apps dev’t, RP can rule the world with IPv6, says US firm
http://www.mb.com.ph/INFO2006071769417.html
By MELVIN G. CALIMAG

If the Philippines was able to transform itself as the leading mobile applications developer in the world, there’s no reason for the country not to accomplish the same feat in the deployment of IPv6 — the "new Internet."

This is according to an Innofone.com, a corporation focused exclusively on IPv6 and the only US company whose bulk of employees is based in the Philippines.

The US Commercial Service of the US Embassy in Manila helped Innofone.com formally launch its local presence last July 3 at the Makati Shangri-La Hotel. It was also during the launch that Innofone announced the holding of the companysponsored IPv6 Summit in November.

Innofone, whose main operating center in located at the AsiaTown IT Park in Cebu City, is eagerly pushing IPv6 because it plans to be among the first firms to produce secure operating systems, firewalls, and messaging systems with IPv6 at their core.

Alex Lightman, chairman and founder of Innofone.com, said the current Internet standard, the IPv4, is already old and needs to be replaced in order to accommodate new technologies being introduced.

Internet Protocol version 6, or IPv6, Lightman said, is a revolutionary upgrade to current standard IPv4, which has been in use since 1973 and is now over 30 years old.

According to the official, IPv4 was never intended to support today’s demands for trillions of Internet addresses so it’s appropriate that a new standard be put into place.

"IPv4 has no built-in, always-on security and not enough addresses for all the billions of people or trillions of products and networks. It’s also difficult to control the quality of few applications such as VoIP," Lightman said. "These problems cannot be solved system-wide with IPv4."

Innofone is expanding by 1,300 square meters its office in Cebu, although it also has about 30 people in its Manila location. The company claims to have the largest manpower involved in IPv6 applications development in the whole world. Lightman said Microsoft, the planet’s biggest software maker, only has about three people dedicated to IPv6 technology.

"We’re out on a mission to propagate demand for IPv6 and to create applications for IPv6," the American executive said. The first order of battle, he said, is to get smaller ISPs to hop on to IPv6 since they are more flexible in adapting to new technologies compared to large telcos.

Market dynamics is the main reason why IPv6 is still not being widely adopted, according to Lightman.

"Right now, if they can still make profit with the existing infrastructure, they’re likely to stick with it. So we want to create applications that people would use. It’s just the like Internet browser, no one demanded it but everybody’s using it now. "

If he can have his way, Lightman said he would prefer to have "a Y2K (year 2000) type program to trigger a massive transformation to IPv6."

He said, however, that major telecom players are now starting to recognize the benefits of migrating to IPv6. He cited the case of dominant carrier PLDT which last month held a seminar on IPv6.

Another good thing going for IPv6 is the many drivers that are now accelerating its growth. This includes the impending introduction of Microsoft’s Vista operating system which has hundreds of features that are available only with IPv6.

As for now, IPv6 adoption differs from country to country. Japan and South Korea are ahead with some ISPs supporting IPv6 in many areas. "But with the huge number developers here, the Philippines has the potential to become the leader," Lightman said.

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Yahoo! Philippines
spacer
infotech infotech, That’sIT •By the INFOTECH staff

Yahoo! Inc. recently unveiled the new look for its flagship destination in the Philippines to put consumers at the center of their Internet experience. The new Yahoo! home page lets users get things done quickly and stay up-to-date on the latest news, trends and buzz about what’s going on in the Philippines and the rest of the world.

The all new Yahoo! Philippines is available at www.yahoo.com.ph and integrates useful tools for searching, connecting, sharing and communicating online. It empowers users with the ability to "tune in" to locally relevant content and enables Filipinos to connect with friends and family using Yahoo! Mail and Yahoo! Messenger – all on one simple, easy-to-use Web page.

"The new Yahoo! Philippines home page represents a convergence of web applications based on what Internet users need," said Mr. Reza Behnam, Managing Director, Yahoo! Southeast Asia. "Yahoo! has raised the bar by integrating Search, Content, Communications and Community services from a single site and is the clear benchmark for locally relevant and user-friendly Internet experiences," Behnam added.

amigo32

July 18th, 2006, 04:25 AM

You can order your FREE UBUNTU CD here (https://shipit.ubuntu.com/?loggingout=1)

or download here (http://www.ubuntu.com/)

My free ubuntu CDs has just arrived. :) :) :)
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a325/cbuilt/ubuntu.jpg

sandrin

July 18th, 2006, 08:43 PM

Good for you. Have you downloaded it yet?

More news:

New budget proposal to salvage ailing e-Library project
By Alexander Villafania
INQ7.net
Last updated 00:33am (Mla time) 07/18/2006

THE DEPARTMENT of Science and Technology (DoST) is proposing a new budget of 52 million pesos to salvage its ailing National Electronic Library project.

The e-Library was on the verge of shutting down after the DoST was denied the 67-million peso budget it needed to continue paying for subscriptions to digital content from several sources.

Fortunato De la Peña, DoST undersecretary for science and technology services, said in an interview that the new proposal will cover the subscription cost of more than 800,000 bibliographical records with 25 million pages from 16 database sources.

However, the amount would not cover its e-Library expansion plans, which comprised adding new content, an electronic payment system, and another data center for redundancy purposes.

De la Peña gave assurances that the e-Library would remain operational. "It's a long term project that will benefit the country's scientists, engineers and even students."

The e-Library project was a beneficiary of 166.7 million pesos from the 2005 e-Government fund.

Its partners include the Department of Agriculture, the University of the Philippines, the National Library and the Commission on Higher Education.

amigo32

July 19th, 2006, 01:46 AM

Good for you. Have you downloaded it yet?

.

You mean installed? I've tried the earlier version at work and it's really good considering it's free. I am gonna install the latest version when I get back to work, and maybe post some screenshots. :)

chixbebe

July 19th, 2006, 11:33 AM

CLARK FIELD, Pampanga: President Arroyo was “delighted” when officials of the Clark Development Corp. recently announced plans to transform the special economic zone into a “hot spot” under a $2-million wireless broadband project.

CDC president Antonio R. Ng said the project, dubbed as “Wireless Anywhere in Clark [WAC],” will be powered by the state-owned firm, in cooperation with ComClark, operator of the Angeles City Cable Television Network, one of the biggest cable television operators in Central Luzon.

Ng said CDC will utilize Tropos, a technology currently being utilized at the Harvard campus, National Aeronautics Space Administration, parts of California, Minnesota and in more than 200 other sites in US.

Ng said the WAC project will make Clark the biggest “hot spot” area in the country.

The President was informed of the project during her visit to Clark last week to inaugurate the Clark Aviation Institute that coincided with the Regional Development Council-Cabinet meeting at the Clark Museum function hall.

Ng said that the $2-million infrastructure will have four phases starting September 2006. The first phase is at the CSEZ main gate up to the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport.

http://www.manilatimes.net/national/2006/july/19/yehey/prov/20060719pro3.html

pau_p1

July 21st, 2006, 11:49 AM

New study shows dramatic variations in IT pay globally
Western Europe and North America pay the most; Asia and Latin America pay the least

United States
New York, 7 June 2004

A new study helps to explain the growing interest in the off-shoring of information technology (IT) work to firms in other countries. According to the 2003/2004 IT Function Salary Differentials Worldwide report from Mercer Human Resource Consulting, pay levels for corporate IT professionals vary considerably around the world. IT pay generally is higher in Western Europe and North America than in Asia and Eastern Europe. Specifically, IT pay is highest in Switzerland, followed by Germany, Japan, Hong Kong, the USA, and Denmark. Pay for IT professionals is lowest in the Philippines, followed by Vietnam, Bulgaria, Malaysia, Indonesia, and India.

See the whole article and chart in the link below...
http://www.mercerhr.com/pressrelease/details.jhtml/dynamic/idContent/1140565

ay old data pa pala 'to.. but anyways... this may still be true...

JAMAICUS

July 24th, 2006, 07:38 AM

DENR okays ICT master plan, needs P7-B investments

By EDU H. LOPEZ

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) has drawn up an information and communications technology (ICT) master plan that would make the agency responsive to public needs and be at par with the worldwide developments.

DENR Sec. Angelo Reyes said the ICT master plan outlines information systems that are crucial to the department’s implementation of policies and programs on environmental protection and management to attain sustainable development of the country’s natural resources.

It was drafted and discussed by computer experts from DENR’s various offices nationwide, including bureaus and attached agencies during the three-day workshop held recently in Lipa, Batangas.

Completion of the master plan would entail R7.06 billion investments for a period of five years to achieve an integrated, secured and reliable enterprise-wide information system by 2010.

Citing the huge investments needed and the urgency of computerization, Sec. Reyes said the implementation of the plan should be on a staggered basis or in three phases.

He acknowledged the top information systems identified by the ICT team as most urgent and should be implemented starting September this year. These are information systems on air and water quality management, geohazard maps, topographical maps, land records, and forest management.

Based on the master plan, Phase 1 will focus on building the DENR ICT pillars by institutionalizing the ICT organization in the Department, setting up of quality processes and procedures and building up an integrated DENR ICT infrastructure.

Phase 2 will focus on extending DENR to the communities by providing efficient delivery of DENR services with the establishment of an ENR one-stop, on-line service. Phase 3 is towards global competitiveness where the DENR can provide the public with real-time ENR information that is accessible anytime and anywhere.

In support of e-governance, the DENR will set up inter-agency connectivity to promote transparency, accountability and integrity.

"Everybody is doing IT, we have to focus on IT to achieve our plan. Information and communications technology travels with a speed of light, and we have to cope with it lest we be left behind by the rest of the world," Reyes said. He added "the world wide web or the www has in fact broken geopolitical boundaries making information available to all."

Reyes emphasized that ICT is the most important tool that would support the successful implementation of the DENR’s 12-point agenda.

The 12-point agenda are the priority thrusts the Department intends to implement in the next five years. Some of these are restoring air quality within standards; management of the major river basins; forest development in watersheds, restoring the integrity of land titles through computerization of land records, and completion of geohazard maps.

http://www.mb.com.ph/INFO2006072469979.html

sandrin

July 31st, 2006, 11:31 AM

Broadband use in RP rising fast
http://www.manilastandardtoday.com/?page=interactive01_july31_2006

THE number of broadband subscribers is expected to grow at an average of 23 percent a year, rising from 165,000 in 2005 to 475,000 by 2010, a market research company said last week.

IDC Philippines said service providers would see broadband revenues grow 21 percent per year during the same period, from $91 million in 2005 to $239 million by 2010.

Catherin Foronda, IDC Philippines associate analyst, said wireless broadband technology has helped spread the use of broadband Internet services.

Foronda said wireless broadband would initially be used as a substitute for wired DSL services in areas where fixed broadband networks are limited or not present.

As prices go down, wireless broadband will begin competing with traditional DSL and cable services, IDC said.

IDC maintains that wireless broadband, especially Wi-Max, is an integral part of the converged network services that are likely to emerge.

In a separate development, IDC said the online gaming market in the Philippines came to $15.56 million in 2005, growing about 72 percent over 2004. The popularity of “casual” games has contributed to the growth, the research firm said.

chixbebe

August 3rd, 2006, 10:25 AM

http://www.manilatimes.net/national/2006/aug/03/yehey/business/20060803bus7.html

PHILIPPINE information technology (IT) spending is expected to increase in the next five years, according to the local unit of an IT research firm.

International Data Corp. Philippines said the bulk of this spending would come from a large part of the population who have yet to invest in personal computers (PCs).

“The relative under penetration of the country bodes well for IT vendors and service providers in the Philippines. IT spending is seen to grow at a 10.4-percent compound annual growth rate over the next five years, providing room for business growth and addressable opportunity,” Jubert Daniel Alberto, IDC Philippines senior analyst, said. “Capturing requirements from specific verticals and user size segment will greatly depend on vendors’ inroads in improving products, customer service, partnering strategies and thorough understanding of end-user wants, needs and peculiarities.”

The research firm said computer hardware is expected to take the largest share of this spending at 67 percent because much of the population has yet to invest in IT. PCs, networking hardware, printers and smart handheld devices (SHDs) are expected to be the top hardware people will be buying.

Services spending is forecast to post a 22-percent market share while software share would come in at 11 percent.
--Euan Paulo C. Añonuevo

Christendom

August 3rd, 2006, 10:30 AM

Bacolod targeting $2-B IT investments

BACOLOD CITY -- The city’s so-called "IT team" -- composed of both government officials and private sector leaders who believe this city has all the qualities to become an IT center -- is targeting $2 billion worth of IT investments this year.

City councilor Jocelle Batapa-Sigue, who chairs the team, said team members expect more call centers to establish facilities in this city after the local unit of Teleperformance announced plans to open in four months its contact center here.

Ms. Sigue said they hope to duplicate the success of Cebu in attracting call centers, other business process outsourcing (BPO) companies, and other information technology (IT) investments.

"Cebu is so immense. In 2000, the mayor of Cebu held an IT summit. Now, they have more than 20 call center companies. Even the Philippine Economic Zone Authority realized that there is a big thing happening in Cebu," she said.

The IT team has formed the Information Technology Schools Network to strengthen the partnership between the city government and the academe as well as to ensure that a huge pool of qualified English-speaking workers will be available for the IT industry. The network includes the Visayan Maritime Academy, La Saltech, University of St. La Salle-Bacolod and the University of Negros Occidental-Recoletos.

On the average, Ms. Sigue said Western Visayas produces nearly 35,000 graduates every year. In Negros Occidental province and Bacolod City alone, the Commission on Higher Education reported that there were 14,803 graduates last year.

Bacolod is among the key cities in the country that have been identified by the Commission of Information and Communications Technology as having a huge potential in hosting IT investments. Other cities are Legaspi, Tacloban, Davao, Baguio, Cabanatuan, Dagupan, Iloilo, Sta. Rosa, Taguig and Parañaque. -- Robert Leonoras

SOURCE:
http://itmatters.com.ph/news.php?id=012006b

www.metrobacolod.cq.bz

Taz08

August 8th, 2006, 07:51 AM

Where do u think will be the next IT hub here in the Philippines?

GlamChiqAA

August 8th, 2006, 08:04 AM

Cebu for sure, been there a lot of times and I'm impressed

Christendom

August 8th, 2006, 08:04 AM

Where do u think will be the next IT hub here in the Philippines?

CEBU
BACOLOD
DUMAGUETE
ILOILO
DAVAO
CAGAYAN DE ORO

www.metrobacolod.cq.bz

GlamChiqAA

August 8th, 2006, 08:06 AM

Cebu is better than Manila I think, but it seriously needs a lot more transportation and infrastructure developments :tongue3:

ergit222

August 8th, 2006, 08:12 AM

Top 3 IT Hub
1. CEBU
2. CEBU
3. CEBU

Christendom

August 8th, 2006, 08:14 AM

Christendom

August 8th, 2006, 08:17 AM

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a325/zyanz/bacolod/infotech_callcentersbacolod.gif

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a325/zyanz/bacolod/festival_masskarabacolodtwohead.jpg
www.metrobacolod.cq.bz

Taz08

August 8th, 2006, 08:21 AM

For me it's Bacolod City.....

GlamChiqAA

August 8th, 2006, 08:23 AM

If I were made to rank,
..Cebu
..Bacolod
..Iloilo
..CDO
..Davao

Taz08

August 8th, 2006, 08:35 AM

Teleperfomance starts
operations in Bacolod
Teleperformance formally opened in Bacolod City and has started training call center agents last month, Narda Goñi-Miranda, Teleperformance recruitment manager, said yesterday.

The blessing of the call center facilities in Bacolod City was officiated by Fr. Ronald Quijano yesterday.

Miranda said they started training 50 call center agents on July 31, and the training will run to six weeks. She said they intend to let their workforce grow to approximately 300 by February 2007. Out of the 50 agents they have hired, 45 are from Bacolod and only four are not, she said, adding that recruitment is ongoing.

Bacolod is their only site outside of Manila, Miranda said. Asked why they chose Bacolod, she said that back in 2005, she conducted job fairs in five major cities around the Philippines including Bacolod and they got the best quality agents from the city.

Miranda said they currently have 12 agents in Manila that they have recruited from Bacolod who all want to come home. She said their site director for Bacolod is Claire Bedia Gutana.

Teleperformance is one of the top players internationally with its parent company in Paris, France, Miranda said. "There are over 46 countries where they are currently doing operation, which include the US, and the largest offshore is in the Philippines," she said.

Miranda said they have a long history of management processes in place, as well as very good retention programs. She said their salaries are very competitive and they have very good benefits for their agents.

In order to qualify, an applicant should be a college graduate or at least be in college with two years finished, they have to have a technical background, Information Technology-related course in computer science or engineering, and they need to have very good communication skills, Miranda said. They should have a good personality - lively and confident, she said, adding that there is no age limit but they have to be 18 by law.

Miranda said the local government of Bacolod has been very supportive to them and has helped them in many ways.

Bacolod Mayor Evelio Leonardia said this is like waking up to the reality in Bacolod that our call center promotion is, indeed, now bearing fruits. We hope this is going to trigger economic growth and professional development in our city.

Leonardia said, "With the opening of Teleperformance we hope more and more will get employment opportunities." He said Teleperformance recruitment supervisor Paul Felton validated again the report that the passing percentage in Bacolod is higher than that in Manila. "It tells us how much potentials we have here and I hope more and more will take note of this growing industry in Bacolod," he added.

"From the viewpoint of our people, I hope that more will get prepared and from the viewpoint of the investors, we wish they would see us as a rich reservoir of human resource, and higher than the rest in terms of class when you talk of call center materials," Leonardia said.*CGS

ergit222

August 8th, 2006, 08:37 AM

CEBU CITY, Aug. 6 - Six buildings will soon rise on an aggregate area of about 8.5 hectares at the Cebu Business Park (CBP), according to an official of Ayala Land Inc. affiliate Cebu Holdings Inc. (CHI). CHI chief operating officer Francis Monera said the six projects are the result of the growing information technology (IT) industry in Cebu and bolster the province's efforts to become the IT hub in the region. "Expect more businesses and more traffic in the area," said Monera, also president of the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCCI). The six projects are: the 14-story Cebu Towers that will house IT offices; two expansion buildings of Lexmark Research and Development; Tower Palace, a 20-story residential condominium; Pioneer Insurance, an eight-story office; and Security Bank.

Taz08

August 8th, 2006, 08:39 AM

Another call center
to open in Bacolod
BY CHRYSEE SAMILLANO
Bacolod Mayor Evelio Leonardia yesterday welcomed another US-based call center that has chosen Bacolod City as its first site in the country.

Leonardia said site manager and project director James Martin of Focus Communications Inc. called on him yesterday and informed him that they have started training 38 agents, and that their target is to hire 200 call center agents this year.

From India, the group came direct to Bacolod instead of considering Manila. Leonardia said, "I believe that, with this, we could strengthen our image as the new rising capital of the call center industry in Western Visayas," he said.

Leonardia also said, "I believe we are much ahead of Iloilo now and that is an advantage that we have to sustain."

Martin said Focus Communications is a full service contact center which offers both inbound and outbound services. He said they hope to be fully-operational by the end of August.

Martin said they chose to open in Bacolod because Manila is already saturated and besides, there are many graduates in the city who need jobs.

He said Focus was brought to Bacolod by Joey Marcaida, a member of the Mormon Church, who happened to be a good friend of the owners.

Focus, founded by the Mormon Church, started in 1994 with only five call center agents, now they have a total workforce of 13,000 in their 10 centers in other countries including the Philippines, with head office in Roy City, Utah, Martin said.

He said they plan to provide their regular employees with privileges like housing loans, savings matching, night differentials, rice allowance and compensation ranging from P8,000 to P12,000 a month.

They also plan to grant student's assistance loans to deserving regular employees, he added.

Martin said Focus aims to improve people's lives in communities wherever they operate by giving them better jobs and alternative that will allow them to progress. He said there is no discrimination in Focus in terms of religion, academic attainment and experiences.

Julie Gretchen Dizon, who is in charge of Public Relations for Focus, said that in Bacolod, they have adopted the Sto. Niño Orphanage at Puentevella Subdivision, where they plan to donate volunteer support services, among others.

Focus Communications Inc. is situated at the former AMA Computer School at 24th-Lacson streets, Bacolod City.*CGS

Taz08

August 8th, 2006, 08:41 AM

There are four major call centers in Bacolod today, namely, i-Solutions Outsource Asia or I/O Asia, Teleperformance, Focus Communications Inc. and Teletech.

wornout

August 8th, 2006, 08:45 AM

If I were made to rank,
..Cebu
..Bacolod
..Iloilo
..CDO
..Davao

cebu should not be included on this list....hehehehh...

I think I.T. is too advanced in Cebu compared to these cities...I mean cebu is already competing with other cities in the asian region in terms of infotech investments...

talk about big names being present in this city, like LEXMARK RESEARCH AND DEV'T CORP., NCR CORPORATION, EPSON, NEC and all the other call center companies.........well, i think cebu should leave the call center and bpo jobs to the mid-tier cities and have the higher end of the market instead...like knowledge-based bpo, research and development, software engineering and all of the good stuff...but well for the meantime a mix of all of these is working for this city...but it's good to know that good-paying jobs are getting available in the provincial cities and in big numbers...

BYAHILO

August 8th, 2006, 08:57 AM

bacolod
iloilo
dumaguete

jaz read the business section of their local dailies. and u know what i mean. development here and there, expansion left and right. busines opening here and there.

GlamChiqAA

August 8th, 2006, 09:00 AM

cebu should not be included on this list....hehehehh...

I think I.T. is too advanced in Cebu compared to these cities...I mean cebu is already competing with other cities in the asian region in terms of infotech investments...

talk about big names being present in this city, like LEXMARK RESEARCH AND DEV'T CORP., NCR CORPORATION, EPSON, NEC and all the other call center companies.........well, i think cebu should leave the call center and bpo jobs to the mid-tier cities and have the higher end of the market instead...like knowledge-based bpo, research and development, software engineering and all of the good stuff...but well for the meantime a mix of all of these is working for this city...but it's good to know that good-paying jobs are getting available in the provincial cities and in big numbers...

Well you have a point

Christendom

August 8th, 2006, 09:09 AM

im happy for this that, CEBU, BACOLOD, DUMAGUETE, and ILOILO are all in the visayas regions.

www.metrobacolod.cq.bz

ritche

August 8th, 2006, 09:24 AM

http://imageserver4.textamerica.com/user.images.x/40/IMG_519040/_0317/TZ200317000601142.jpg

Fiber-rich City
http://www.philippinebusiness.com.ph/images/pbmimgs6/CCtrain_NewClass.jpg
Dumaguete's telco infrastructure qualifies it to ride on the growth of global outsourcing industry

By Dominique Cimafranca

One secret that will serve Dumaguete well in its ambitions is the telecommunications infrastructure in the city. Unknown to many, Dumaguete actually has a robust high-capacity network already in place. This network consists of microwave links and a fiber-optic backbone which connect the city not only to Manila and Cebu City, but to Mindanao and other islands, as well.

The fiber optic links going into Dumaguete are among the best for a city outside of Metro Manila. The total capacity of these fiber links is a whopping 320 Gbps* which translates to 4.5 million high quality data and voice lines – a capacity which can accommodate five million call center agents. Bandwidth-hungry outsourcing businesses such as call centers, transcription services, and digital post-production will find ample room for growth for their telecommunication needs.

Redundancy is another key feature of Dumaguete’s telco infrastructure. Dumaguete is a landing site for the fiber optic backbone networks of Globe Telecommunications, as well as Telecphil – the national consortium of telco providers. In addition, microwave communications supplement the links, assuring that service businesses need not fear outages caused by a downed cable.

Investment promotion is going full-speed ahead for Dumaguete with the coordinated efforts of local government, national agencies, and non-government organizations. Already boasting of topnotch graduates, the city is well positioned for growth in the booming international services outsourcing industry.

*320 gbps and growing...
_________________________________________________________________
IT/ITES Firms

"In the past few years, several software development companies have emerged in the Philippines, as well as many other IT-related enterprises, like Medical Transcription Services and Call Centres, most of them however clustered in big cities like Manila and Cebu. Little did the world know that Dumaguete City, apart from its human resources, has access to the country’s most advanced telecom infrastructure right outside its doorstep, comprising a high speed fibre optic backbone network with a 320Gbps capacity!

This rarely promoted advantage this little city has over the rest of the country, combined with four well reputed universities and several other learning institutions, and added to that a considerably lower cost of operating businesses compared to the metro cities, makes Dumaguete City probably the most attractive place in the Philippines for ICT growth today. " - Nestwood Software Development Corporation (http://www.nestwood.com/default.aspx?tabid=47)

An investment location is known by the corporation/companies it keeps. These are the current ITES firms in Dumaguete:

http://static.flickr.com/53/114105612_6d24543eed.jpg?v=0 Teletech Holdings Corp. (http://www.teletech.com/global.asia.count.phil.html)

http://static.flickr.com/50/131723394_e6f0553357.jpg?v=0 SPI Technologies (http://www.spitech.com)

http://www.tri-edge.net/images/Logo.gif
Tri-Edge Resources GLP (http://www.tri-edge.net/)

http://static.flickr.com/39/114105609_f18e6534b2.jpg?v=0 Entheos IT Corp. (http://www.entheosit.com/)

http://static.flickr.com/56/114105610_7848021456.jpg?v=0 Nestwood Development Corporation (http://www.nestwood.com)

http://static.flickr.com/42/115574335_272b601583_m.jpg
IT Outlook (http://it-outlook.com)

Bayantel Communications (http://www.bayantel.com.ph/news/presscenter14.shtml)

Innove Communications (http://www.innove.com.ph/)

More vital facts about Dumaguete here (http://www.philippinebusiness.com.ph/archives/magazine/vol11-2004/11-6/geographics.htm).
_________________________________________________________________
Philippine fiber optics network - "The fiber optic telecommunications backbone of the Philippines is located in Oriental Negros. As a result, the province boasts of state of the art telecommunications facilities. Its geothermal powerplants ensure stable supply of electricity." - OneIPC website (http://www.investoriental.com/tourism.html)

http://static.flickr.com/39/113644001_d7180c36a2.jpg?v=0

Visayas fiber optics network
http://static.flickr.com/53/113644003_4953a5a7e7.jpg?v=0

Negros fiber optics network
http://static.flickr.com/45/113644002_8ce0bb86b6.jpg?v=0

Christendom

August 8th, 2006, 09:30 AM

'Bacolod eyed as next IT hub of Visayas'

Bacolod City is being eyed as the next Information Technology frontier in the Visayas, Bacolod Councilor Jocelle Batapa Sigue yesterday said.

Sigue said she was informed by the Philippine Economic Zone Authority that there are IT investors who want to put up their business in Bacolod and there are three requirements which the city is preparing for - the people, infrastructure and environment. She said that when an IT enterprise locates, it wants a steady source of workers. In Bacolod there are the representatives of Negros Occidental Private Schools Sports, Cultural and Educational Association and all the universities in the city, Iloilo and other parts of the Visayas, she said.

Sigue said that, as far as the infrastructure is concerned, the Bacolod IT Team, during a meeting last week with the Philippine Long Distance Company-Smart and Globe were informed that the city is very much ready for IT. She said they were also told that as early as 1998 Bacolod was already part of the "fiber optic ring," and has direct link to Cebu.

Sigue said the city is also stepping up its efforts in the environment aspect because of the concern of many IT enterprises that came here, that the city does not yet have an IT building or IT park accredited by PEZA, which is a requirement for incentives. An IT building or park owner can enjoy income tax holidays, she said, and that in the Asia town IT park they had visited, the lots there were being sold at P25,000 per square meter.

PEZA assistant deputy director for operation Wilhelm Ortaliz will be in Bacolod on August 5 to meet with the Bacolod IT Team created by Mayor Evelio Leonardia, and the real property owners, Sigue said. She also said that by August 5 they will be able to launch the IT web page which will be contained inside the Bacolod City website. She said the name of the city's IT web page is "Make IT Bacolod" with a byword - "you are a click away to a wise business decision. Make that wise business decision now. Make it Bacolod."

Sigue said that in terms of high speed fiber optic and the academe, Bacolod is very much ready. The city has two of the best universities in the Philippines, she said, which are the Universities of St. La Salle and Negros Occidental-Recoletos, while West Negros is gearing up. She added that they are also planning to tap schools in Iloilo.*CGS

SOURCE:
http://www.visayandailystar.com/2005/July/28/businessnews1.htm

www.metrobacolod.cq.bz

chymera00

August 8th, 2006, 09:32 AM

Christendom

August 8th, 2006, 09:40 AM

chymera00

August 8th, 2006, 09:44 AM

Thursday, July 06, 2006
W. Visayas soon an IT hub
By Roberto L. Bacasong

THE cities of Bacolod and Iloilo may soon become the next Information Technology center in Western Visayas with eight call centers already operating in the two cities.

Arroyo Watch: Sun.Star blog on President Arroyo

Carlos Boteros, regional director of the Department of Labor and Employment (Dole), said that many US-based contact centers have expressed interest on expanding their companies in Bacolod and Iloilo.

Iloilo and Bacolod have four call centers each. Those in Bacolod include the I/O Asia, Teleperformance, Focus Communication and TeleTech.

"Young professionals as well as newly graduated students will benefit from these as more jobs will be opened. The English proficiency in Western Visayas are very good," he said.

Boteros added that they already have the data of the total number of jobs generated in the opening of IT companies and will soon be releasing this report.

Meanwhile, City Councilor Jocelle Batapa-Sigue, who headed the Bacolod IT Focus Team, disclosed that Bacolod City now has two sites declared by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo as information technology (IT) zones under the Philippine Economic Zone Authority (Peza).

Malacañang has officially informed Bacolod Mayor Evelio Leonardia this week of Presidential Proclamation No. 1078 dated May 29, 2006 creating and designating certain parcels of land located in Barangay Villamonte, Bacolod City, as an IT park under Republic Act No. 7916 or the Special Economic Zone Act of 1995 as amended by Republic Act No. 8748.

Presidential Proclamation No. 963 declaring Robinson's Metro Bacolod as an IT building was approved by President Arroyo on December 27, 2005. Teletech will soon start call center operations in the said area.
Boteros, in related interview, said that from January up to the present, Western Visayas has 2.9 million labor force.

He added that the region has 2.37 employed persons and 258,000 unemployed. The region's employment rate is 91 percent while its underemployed rate is nine percent.
http://www.sunstar.com.ph/static/bac/2006/07/06/bus/w..visayas.soon.an.it.hub.html

Iloilo seen as new technology hub

By Nestor P. Burgos Jr.
INQ7.net, Inquirer
Last updated 00:27am (Mla time) 06/19/2006

ILOILO CITY--Iloilo has the makings of a potential information and communications technology (ICT) hub, similar to Manila and Cebu, an government official has said.

Dondi Mapa, an outgoing commissioner of the Commission on Information and Communications Technology (CICT), said the boom in ICT services was "crowding" the leading centers Manila and Cebu, opening opportunities for other areas like the cities of Iloilo, Bacolod, Dumaguete, Baguio and Sta. Rosa town in Laguna.

The five areas are considered the next ICT hubs.

Mapa said Iloilo has built-in advantages like the presence of many schools and universities, which could readily supply an English-proficient workforce for call centers.

Investments in ICT will provide employment opportunities in these areas, said Mapa.

He projected that there would be 28,000 workers employed in cyber services in Iloilo by 2010, which should nearly double to 50,000 by 2012.

This would follow the nationwide trend of around a million workers employed in ICT services by 2010 from the current 160,000. The number would double to two million by 2012.

"The workplace of the new Filipino is in cyberspace," Mapa said in speech at the launching of the Iloilo Foundation for Information Technology (I FIT) last week.

But Mapa said these areas should boost the training of their workforce by "revitalizing" the teaching profession to upgrade the standards of education.

He also urged the academe to spearhead programs on English proficiency.

He said students here should be better at English than many of those in Manila who tend to mix Tagalog and English words in their sentences.

"English (proficiency) is the key to cyberspace," he said.

Mapa said educational institutions and programs should also produce more graduates on human resource management because their services would be more in demand in the coming years.

He said the demand for human resource management students would reach 45,000 in 2010 from the present 18,000.

http://technology.inq7.net/infotech/infotech/view_article.php?article_id=5366

Iloilo City is the university belt of Iloilo having 54 higher education institutions comprising of 2 state universities, 4 private universities, 4 state colleges, 25 private colleges and 19 satellite & integrated campuses; and 35 technical/vocational schools.

ritche

August 8th, 2006, 09:47 AM

http://static.flickr.com/37/113644555_a35f6f3202.jpg?v=0

Oriental Negros, Pioneer in Quality Education (http://www.investoriental.com/ICT-pioneer.html)

"Dumaguete is the Only City of its size (100,000) with 4 Universities. There are around 2,000 faculty and staff, and one in every four people is a college student. College students number more than 25,000. The service and retail sectors get a third of their sales from education related spending. Education contributes P2B to the economy annually."

Silliman University (1901)
The first American investment when they arrived in Dumaguete City was a private school called Silliman Institute (now Silliman University).

Centers of Excellence/Development in Biodiversity Conservation, Nursing, Education, Coastal Resources Management, Physics, Mechanical Engineering, Marine Sciences, Business & Management Education and Biology.

National Artist for Literature Dr. Edith Tiempo - a graduate of Silliman, started the oldest Creative Writing Program in Asia, producing a majority of PEN and Palanca Awardees.

It is the only university that owns its fiber optic system; it is one of only two academic institutions in the Philippines that have extensive fiber optic backbones.Costing US $2.5 million in 1997, the fiber optic backbone connects all colleges and buildings in the University.

First school in the Philippines to deploy wireless Wi-Fi B2B LAN technology on its campus; WIFI and Fiber Optics are the main media used for data communication within the University

St. Paul University (1904)
First St. Paul school in the Philippines was established in Dumaguete City (At present, there are 42 schools and 23 hospitals managed by the St. Paul of Chartres sisters all over the country)

St. Paul University Dumaguete is the first ISO 9000 certified school in the Philippines.

Negros Oriental State University (1907)
The Beginnings of what is now the Negros Oriental State University (NORSU) date back to 1907, from a single woodworking class at what was then the Negros Oriental Provincial School, the forerunner of the present Negros Oriental High School. As more industrial arts subjects were added, a separate arts and trade school on the secondary level called the Negros Oriental Trade School was established 1927.

This was the provincial trade school which became East Visayan School of Arts and Trade in 1956 and the Central Visayas Polytechnic College in 1983. In June 25, 2004, became Negros Oriental State University.

The newest State University in the country and a pioneer internet service provider in Oriental Negros. NORSU is the gateway for province-wide One Government Network and has the biggest student population in Oriental Negros

Foundation University (1947)
First non-profit, non-stock college in the Philippines was established in Dumaguete City named Foundation College (now Foundation University).

Operates a CISCO Networking Academy consistently having 100% certification rate.IT Center open 24/7 so students can work, do research, browse, chat, have lessons, or even play online games

Its Computer Science program focuses on working with open source programming.IT is applied to all disciplines. It also hosts several student-designed and built websites for local NGOs, including the website for the Oriental Negros Innovation Awards, a pioneering business plan competition aimed at generating more new businesses in the province.

ritche

August 8th, 2006, 10:00 AM

Aside from that, here is the excerpt of President Arroyo's SONA: "We will lengthen the Dumaguete runway for tourism as well as electronics. Valencia, Oriental Negros could attract semiconductor firms with power rates subsidized by the geothermal field of Palimpinon. Negros will also advance energy independence with ethanol projects in San Carlos City and Tamlang Valley, once the biofuel law is passed. (You have done your part, Migs) "

With power rates subsidized, the export processing zone in Valencia with Intel, Texas Instruments, and other semiconductors and IT firms, as well as electronics firms, as possible locators would be very much competitive, if not superior in terms of cost, to other export processing zones...

3stan_yu

August 8th, 2006, 10:03 AM

cebu is already a hub.

Arcenas Estate IT Building
Convergys Philippines Services Corporation
IT enabled services.
99.99% American
00.01% Filipino

Asiatown I.T. Park
Dash Engineering Philippines, Inc.
To engage in computer-aided engineering and design for petrochemical, gas, refinery and chemical plants in the field of process, equipment, electrical, instrumentation, piping, civil, project coordination and services for construction and procurement.
99.99% Japanese
00.01% Filipino

Asiatown I.T. Park
E-Telecare International, Inc.
Development and operation of a call center business that serves overseas clients, by providing customer relationship management services through various media, and any and all allied or related businesses.
75.72% Filipino
21.12% American
03.16% Hongkong

Asiatown I.T. Park
Epson Precision (Philippines), Inc.
To engage in software development and application, including programming and adaptation of system softwares and middlewares for Epson products.
100% Japanese

Asiatown I.T. Park
NCR-Cebu Development Center, Inc.
To provide software, mechanical and electrical engineering services.
99.99% Dutch
00.01% Filipino, American, British

Asiatown I.T. Park
NEC Telecom Software Philippines, Inc. (Cebu)
Development and export of operation management software for telecommunication equipment and transmission systems and system engineering such as, but not limited to, fiber optic transmission system (multiplexer), high performance internet routers.
100% Japanese

Asiatown I.T. Park
PeopleSupport (Philippines), Inc.
Contact Center (outsourced customer care services).
99.99% American
00.01% Filipino

Asiatown I.T. Park
SPI Healthcare Documentation, Inc.
To engage in the design and implementation of healthcare documentation solutions for the healthcare business process outsourcing market, and non-medical transcription activity.
100% Filipino

Asiatown I.T. Park
SPI Litigation Direct, Inc.
Provide IT-enabled services with emphasis on the creation of electronic data discovery (EDD), legal automation activities, and the presentation of data in formats for distribution via intranet, internet and optical media
100% Filipino

Asiatown I.T. Park
SPI Publisher Services, Inc.
Provide specialized services of an IT and Communication (ITC) -enabled nature with emphasis on technical editing, graphic formatting and content databasing of peer-reviewed research information to be distributed to the global research community.
100% Filipino

Asiatown I.T. Park
Tsuneishi Technical Services (Philippines), Inc.
Engage in ship design, Computer Aided Ship Design (CASD), Computer Aided Engineering Design (CAED) and Electronic Data Archival (EDA).
100% Japanese

Asiatown I.T. Park
Versagrafx Designs Philippines, Inc.
To engage in the conceptualization and computer-aided design of motion picture promotional collaterals, i.e., cinema standees, DVD tower casing, and web pages.
99.9% American
00.1% Filipino

Innove IT Plaza
Lexmark Research and Development Corporation
Provide engineering design and software development services.
99.996% Swiss
00.002% American
00.001% Filipino
00.001% French

JY Square IT Center
Calltek Center International, Inc.
To operate a customer contact center.
99.968% American
00.032% Filipino

Mactan Ecozone II
Saturn Electronics Philippines, Inc
Electronic hardware / software design of automotive control modules as well as precision circuit board (PCB) layouting of these modules; mechanical design and flexible circuit assembly (FCA) of all other automotive mechanical components; and web design and development of the company's intranet and internet.
100% American

Mactan Ecozone II
Western Wats Philippines, Inc.
To operate a call center.
100% American

Mango Square I.T. Center
Vidichi I.T. Facility u/c
Cebu Towers I.T. bulding u/c

to quote the article from bacolod

Bacolod targeting $2-B IT investments

Ms. Sigue said they hope to duplicate the success of Cebu in attracting call centers, other business process outsourcing (BPO) companies, and other information technology (IT) investments.

"Cebu is so immense. In 2000, the mayor of Cebu held an IT summit. Now, they have more than 20 call center companies. Even the Philippine Economic Zone Authority realized that there is a big thing happening in Cebu," she said.

and the article from iloilo

Iloilo seen as new technology hub

ILOILO CITY--Iloilo has the makings of a potential information and communications technology (ICT) hub, similar to Manila and Cebu, an government official has said.

with finality... cebu should not be included in the list, Cebu is ALREADY a HUB. competing internationally and not locally.

in relation to the topic, il say its dumaguete and CDO.

Taz08

August 8th, 2006, 10:04 AM

City dashes for solution to power problem
By Lory Ann B. Bilbao

AFTER three investors have backed out from opening their businesses in Iloilo City due to allegations of power problems here, the City Government is on its feet working on selling the city and ironing out problems that cause this.

City Council's Committee on Trade, Commerce and Industry and City Councilor Jed Patrick Mabilog, revealed that after what happened, Mayor Jerry P. Treñas has doubled his efforts in working out for the problems in electric power source -one of the major reasons that the investors backed out.

"The Mayor is actively talking with representatives from the National Power Corporation (Napocor), Transco and the Panay Electric Company (Peco) for the latter's interconnection to the former.

He revealed that the Peco was hesitant to connect with Transco, the distributor of Napocor's power because there was reportedly a P3-million fund that they should produce to be able to do this.

"The P3-million was required for the connection equipment guarantee of Peco to Transco," Mabilog said.

Mabilog said Mayor Trenas was trying to persuade Peco to come up with the fund, saying "this is very little amount compared to the cost of the needs of the consumers in the city."

Coal-fired power plant

Further, Mabilog said a business group is in talk with oppositors of coal-fired plants to resolve the latter's concerns with regards to coal, "the cheapest available alternative power source."

The business groups will benefit the most, since they are the ones who need most of electricity.

On one hand, the councilor cited, "Almost double in cost of power and its insufficiency in the city" was just one of the two major reasons of the scenario.

Initially, the call center companies transferred their investment to Bacolod because of the absence of a building here that could accommodate the space they need.

Mabilog said these companies were able to negotiate a good price with the management of the Bacolod Convention Plaza, thus the transfer. This is contrary to what was reporter earlier that they got scared of the power shortage in the city.

As per his committee, Mabilog said they have already came up with various economic legislations to promote for the city's investors friendly face.

The recent one was the expanded investment incentives code, which provides attractive incentives packages to new and existing businesses in the city.

This was aimed to enhance the economic competitiveness of the city "towards the vision of becoming a premier city by 2015."

Christendom

August 8th, 2006, 10:05 AM

proud of NEGROS island bcoz of the two cities fast growing IT- BACOLOD & DUMAGUETE cities.

www.metrobacolod.cq.bz

ritche

August 8th, 2006, 10:14 AM

And here's our soon-tor-rise business park. Seven hectares of this is an IT Park.
http://img47.imageshack.us/img47/6665/dgtebizparksd0.jpg
(This is just an approximation of the original logo. The original logo is way better than this one.)

Aside from that, Dumaguete already has the SPi Technology Park, the first IT Park outside of Manila and Cebu...

LordCarnal

August 8th, 2006, 11:06 AM

It's better if we make the entire region an I.T. hub instead of just a single city.. Imagine the possibilities if the friendship bridges would be built (Iloilo-Guimaras-Negros-Cebu-Bohol).....

ergit222

August 8th, 2006, 12:13 PM

^^totally agree

amras

August 8th, 2006, 01:22 PM

that's exactly the cyber-corridor concept that the government wants to implement. synergy is the way to go nowadays.

valium

August 8th, 2006, 01:43 PM

I'm still skeptical whether the manpower is big enough in Dumaguete to be a major IT hub.

talking about manpower, davao city, as most davaoeños say, has the biggest number of "capable" manpower, but we didnt see it among the list. it just didnt fit into the picture. among the number of viewers of this thread nobody saw their so called "potential"? where is it?

WawaY[625]

August 8th, 2006, 01:57 PM

^^ first cebu tinira mo tapos iloilo..ngayon davao na naman...may monthly calnedar ka ba?

Taz08

August 8th, 2006, 01:59 PM

Another Call Center......
Convergys will start operating in Bacolod by next year............

valium

August 8th, 2006, 03:19 PM

^^ first cebu tinira mo tapos iloilo..ngayon davao na naman...may monthly calnedar ka ba?

was i hitting on davao? i only stated a fact why theres nobody here who see davao's potential, and you accuse me of hitting on davao? and please, stick to the topic, this thread is about the next it hub, this is not about valium, this is not about me so dont talk about me here as what you like to do in your local thread.

anyway, its surprising why convergy's picked bacolod over iloilo, could be because of iloilo's erratic and unstable power supply?

next it hub? i say its cagayan de oro and bacolod.

WawaY[625]

August 8th, 2006, 03:31 PM

was i hitting on davao? i only stated a fact why theres nobody here who see davao's potential, and you accuse me of hitting on davao? and please, stick to the topic, this thread is about the next it hub, this is not about valium, this is not about me so dont talk about me here as what you like to do in your local thread.

anyway, its surprising why convergy's picked bacolod over iloilo, could be because of iloilo's erratic and unstable power supply?

next it hub? i say its cagayan de oro and bacolod.

I know this isnt the "valium" thread..a valium thread would be a thread of hatred and strife..(or a thread where TROLLS thrive..and bitter people are at home)

On topic, with the exception of Cebu, id say Bacolod and CDO too, but then ill give Davao semi credit since i think PGMA mentioned it in her Super Regions SONa when she mentioned IT for CEbu, Baguio and Davao.of course the IT industry is still young so plenty of times for other cities to catch up..for now though CDO has the lead in Mindanao..

Imnot familiar with Davao's efforts in the IT industry..actually im a total IT noob..lols..so far heres what i got for Davaos IT industry

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v446/jbanico/Silicon%20Gulf/davaogulf.png

http://www.silicongulf.net/

A long write up..i dont understand this actually but please allow me to post

CT INDUSTRY CLUSTER PLAN*
Region XI

I.Introduction

Competitiveness of the industry is a national concern where economic players from both the private and public sectors have to collaborate in an interdisciplinary and multi-stakeholders approach. Most developed countries have adopted the industry clustering approach as a way of enhancing their regional economic comparative advantage. Industry clustering is a geographic concentration of interdependent companies and institutions in a particular field. The network interplay of large and small companies in the manufacturing and services sectors combined with a strong economic foundation create a competitive advantage and propel regional economic growth.

Thus, the Davao Regional Development Plan (DRDP) 2005-2010 adopted the industry clustering approach as the main vehicle for development, particularly in the development of exports, generation of investments and jobs. One of the priority clusters for development identified for DRDP is the Information and Communications Technology (ICT). The ICT cluster is primarily driven by the growth in sub-sectors namely: e-services, outsourcing and IT-enabled services which include software development, animation, business process outsourcing, call centers and medical transcription.

II.Situationer

Asia is a source of significant outsource service operations from the US and Europe. The Philippines is becoming an acknowledged center for cyberservices due to the following competitive advantages: higher quality personnel, lower costs in business and proximity to markets. In fact, the country is considered an emerging Information and Communications Technology (ICT) destination offering value for money to investors along with India, Malaysia, and China.

Citing the potentials of ICT in the economic growth of the country, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo said that the sector generated a total of about 132,000 jobs, very close to the target of 135,000 for the whole year of 2005 and many of these jobs were being generated outside Metro Manila.

She added that over the past 12 months call centers have opened in the cities of Davao, Iloilo, Cagayan de Oro, and Baguio. BPO operations have sprung up in Legaspi and Tacloban. Medical transcription centers have been established in Dumaguete, Davao, and Naga.

The concept of the cyberservices corridor is gaining ground, added the President.

Moreover, in her speech during the Philippine Investment Conference held on March 09, 2005 in Lapu-Lapu City in Cebu, the President mentioned the Cyberservices Corridor Project which actually stretches 600 miles from Baguio in Northern Luzon to Zamboanga in Mindanao.

Said corridor shall be served by a $10B high-bandwidth fiber backbone and digital network and envisioned to be home to 75,000 call center and BPO agents who all speak English and many of whom speak Spanish, Japanese, Chinese or Arabic, all of whom provide cyberservices at par with global standards.

Defined as services delivered in cyberspace, cyberservices cover the following areas: E-services such as Customer Care & Contact center, Software Publishing and E-learning; Outsourcing such as Customer Care and Contact Center, Back Office Processing, IT Outsourcing, Software Development, eLearning, Medical Transcription and Engineering and Design and IT-enabled services such as Customer Care and Contact Center, Back Office Processing, Elearning, Digital Animation and Visualization, Multi-media and Gaming, Medical Transcription and Engineering and Design.

The opportunities are but enormous that cyberservices sector is expected to generate a total of 981,000 jobs and contribute total revenue of US$11.7 Billion in the economy by 2010.

On the other hand, priming up as one of the country’s top destinations for cyberservices is Davao City. Given its potentials to become a "center of excellence" in Information Communications and Technology (ICT), the city is declared as an IT HUB area in the Philippines by the National Telecommunications Office per memorandum # 05-05-200.

As a modern metropolis bustling with life, verve and color, situated in a typhoon-free zone with a land area of 244,000 hectares touted as one of the world’s largest, recent study made by the Asian Institute of Management through a project called “Philippine Cities Competitiveness Program” revealed that the City is the Most Competitive City in the Philippines (Urban Category) with the lowest cost of Doing Business.

Moreover, using a scorecard developed by the Commission on Informationa and Communications Technology (CICT), Davao City ranks high as an attractive ICT investment location in the country.

Other considerations:

In the area of Workforce Potential, the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) XI reported that as of January 2005 out of 76 colleges and universities in the region, Davao City has a total of 42, three (3) of which belonging to the Top 20 in the country namely: Ateneo de Davao University, University of the Philippines in Mindanao and San Pedro College.

About 14 colleges and universities in the region were also granted the PAASCU, PACUCOA, and AACUP accreditations, hence, assuring that quality graduates are produced each year in many higher education.

Moreover, a total of 15,731 graduates were recorded for the schoolyear 2004-2005 with the following top courses: Education (with 2,715 graduates), Commerce, (with 2,707 graduates) and Nursing (with 2,241 graduates).

In the area of telecommunications infrastructure, Davao City has an available high-speed Digital Subscribers Lines (DSL) that can support 24x7 operations. The presence of major telecommunications companies i.e., Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company, BayanTel, Globe, Digitel, Meridian Telekoms, Inc. and PT&T can provide such services from fiber-optic links, wireless broadband, to simple and triple redundancy.

In the area of real estate, Davao City has huge open spaces that can be developed into an IT Park or IT Building. There are five (5) major hotels and more than 10 business inns.

In the area of vendor support, large vendors in Manila and Cebu are now in Davao City to cater the requirements of local companies in terms of hardware and software namely: GlobalChips Technologies, Co; Trinet Multimedia Systems Corporation; Micro-D International, etc.

In the area of power infrastructure, Davao City has the most stable power supply and one the cheapest rates in the country. Its power utility company, the Davao Light and Power Company has a backup power supply of 44 MW at its Bajada Power Plant. In the last 5 years, there was no recorded incidence of massive power shortage and blackouts.

In the area of transportation, a total of 189,621 motor vehicles in the region were registered in the Land Transportation Office (LTO) XI in 2005 distributed as follows: motorcycles & tricycles - 109,142; Utility vehicles - 44,118; Taxi/Cars - 18,983; Trucks – 11,310; Sports Utility Vehicles – 4,045; Trailers – 1,265 and Buses – 758.

Moreover, Davao City and nearby provinces boast of more than 2,000 aircon/non-aircon taxi units equipped with 2-way radio system running 24 hours a day.

In terms of local incentives, Davao City is the first local government unit in Mindanao to provide incentives to investors in the city. However, based on the success of Davao City Government, other LGUs in the region have also crafted their own incentive code noteworthy to mention are Sta Cruz LGU,

For Quality of Life, Davao City was adjudged as the most liveable city in the Philippines and included in the Top 20 in Asia.

And lastly, the organized industry players are important factors in moving the sector to grow fast coupled with the support of the local government units and national government agencies.

There are about 10 organized industry players in the city, namely: Association of Solution Integrators in Davao (ASID), Association of Computer Businesses in Mindanao (ACBM), Philippine Society of IT Educators (PSITE) and Davao City Technical Vocational Schools Administrators Association (DCTVSAA), Internet Café Association of Davao (ICAD), Council of the Deans for Information Technology Education (CDITE), Dabawegnu Linux Group, and others.

In 20032, the ICT cluster, specifically the e-service companies were found to be thinly spread in Davao City. Surprisingly some of these companies have been offering outsourcing services since 1995 serving the needs of foreign countries in America, Europe and Asia. For the past three (3) years, the average total sales revenue per year is estimated at P50 million. These companies were bonded together to form the Association of Solution Integrators in Davao (ASID) to actively promote e-services not only locally but also internationally.

Through DTI, ASID grabbed the opportunity to market itself internationally by participating in the e-Services Philippines (ESP) 20033 in February 2003. The first attempt of ASID to participate in the ESP 2003 in Manila generated an estimated sales revenue of P11 million. Most of its clients are from US and Europe and some large exporting companies in Region XI and nearby provinces and cities. The group has been privileged to be sponsored by the Davao City Government for its participation to the ESP 2003.

As an offshoot of ESP 2003, the ASID Solutions Expo 2003 was organized by ASID in coordination with DTI to promote e-services to SMEs, IT students and IT organizations in Davao City. ASID also adheres to excellence in software development. In partnership with the Virtual Center for Technology Innovation in Information Technology (VCTI – IT) of the Department of Science and Technology and in coordination with DTI, ASID promoted the Capability Maturity Model (CMM)4 in 2003.

Inspired by its success from the ESP 2003, ASID participated again in the ESP 2004 in Manila increasing the number of its participants from five (5) to 10 and its sales to P13.265 million. This time the following foreign markets were tapped: Japan, Singapore, Netherlands, Australia. During the business matching session with the Japanese businessmen, the Davao City participants had difficulty in their negotiations. Thus, the Japanese Business Language Course for SMEs was organized by DTI in coordination with ASID in April 2004.

As part of the strategy to promote ICT locally, the IT Innovations and Solutions for the Entreprising Pinoy was organized by DTI in coordination with ASID and the Davao City Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Inc in 17 July 2004.

Efforts to promote Davao City as an ICT investment area have slowly paved the way for large IT companies looking for expansion areas in 2004. In response to the exploratory visit organized by DTI to Cyber City Teleservices, Ltd. (CCTL) in Clarkfield, Pampanga, top officials of CCTL flew in to Davao City in January 2004 to look into the possibility of establishing a call center in Davao City. On 16 September 2004, the first call center in Mindanao was established as GCom5 launched its call center facility with H. E. President Gloria Macapagal – Arroyo as the Guest of Honor. This call center facility has 450 seats and is expected to generate 1,200 jobs. The visit of CCTL was followed by visits of other prospective IT investors such as: People Support, Convergis, IBM, Sykes, eTelecare and others. Davao City became busy welcoming business meetings for these companies with the following concerned sectors: telephone companies, academe, government, real estate and others.

III. SWOT Analysis

A.Strengths

1. Presence of organized ICT sub-sectors:

Association of Solution Integrators in Davao (ASID) – composed of at least 15 registered e-service companies: animation and graphics design, software development, wireless applications, and medical transcriptions

Association of ACBM – composed of at least 15 established companies-vendors/dealers of computer hardware in Davao City and nearby provinces

PSITE XI

Davao City Technical Vocational School Administrators Association (DCTVSAA)

Council of IT Deans in Davao

Internet Café Association of Davao (ICAD)

2. Expanding Infrastructure6

2.1 Telecommunications

Identified Davao City as one of the IT Hub areas of the country for purposes of providing high speed networks and connectivity (NTC Memo Circular No. 05-05-2002)

Available broadband carriers offering: wireless broadband routers nad wireless non-adapter; bandwidth installed up to Multiple E1; and local loops in copper, fibre optic and microwave

Wide choice of Internet Service Providers: 10 companies

3. Affordable Quality Human Resource

English speaking city

Increasing number of college graduates

Note: Davao City has been supplying excellent human resources to IT companies in Cebu, Manila, Singapore, Europe, and North America)

Easily trainable

Lower costs (approximately one-fifth the cost of the US and Europe)

4. Strategic Location

Davao City is the trade and tourism hub of Southern Philippines and the biggest urban mariket in the Brunei-Indonesia-Malaysia-the Philippines East ASEAN Growth Area (BIMP-EAGA)

Available of large shopping malls and tourism facilities

5. Presence of IT professional proficient in Japanese language

6. Emergence of relevant business support organizations (BSOs)

Mindanao Information and Communications Technology - Task Force (MICT-TF)

Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Council of Davao

Regional Information Technology and E-Commerce Council (RITEC)

7. Local Government Support

B.Weaknesses

1. Lack of IT business zone/park;

2. An unaccounted population of ICT companies are characterized by small and informal set-ups/practices;

3. Inability of regional ICT companies to purchase “cutting edge technology”

4. Poor marketing and promotion of e-services;

5. High cost of training of personnel (due to job description unmatched with IT curricula); and

6. Inadequate database on ICT cluster

C. Opportunities

1. The Philippines emerging as a specific alternative to India, due to historical and cultural factors

2. Davao City was identified by the National Telecommunicaitons Commission (NTC) as one of the IT hub areas in the country for purposes of providing high speed networks and connectivity;

3. Growing interest of IT investors in Davao City;

4. Improved appreciation of the business community on IT- enhanced business operations;

5. Strong Government support to the development of ICT sector

Current study to include ICT in the Local Investment Code for business incentives by the Davao City Investment Promotions Office (DCIPC)

Support during Davao’s first participation to the ESP 2003
Formation of the ICT Committee in the City Council

City Council’s issuance of a resolution to grant funding assistance for IT companies participating in the ESP 2005
Personal Computers for Public Schools (PCPS) Project by DTI

6. Active participation of the private sectors (including the academe) in DTI - initiated activities

7. Declining cost of telecommunication services

8. Presence of American Chamber of Commerce and American Investments: Dole Philippines; Marsman-Drysdale; Del Monte, Gcom, Ford Philippines

9. Presence of USAID Funded Organizations and Projects: Growth with Equity in Mindanao (GEM), Management Science for Health Services; Mindanao Business Council, Mindanao Fruit Council

10. Presence of International Development Agencies

11. Crime rate: 0.64/10,000 persons per month (last kidnapping incident: 1994)

D. Threats

1. Recruitment of staff by ICT companies in other cities and provinces;

2. Absence of CMM accrediting body in Davao for software development;

3. Need for local incentives for ICT investors

4. No access to affordable business solutions

5. Lack of micro-lending programs for ICT

6. Negative impression on the peace and order condition of Davao City/Region XI

IV. Industry Framework Plan (2006-2010)

A. Goal

The ICT sector shall contribute to the achievement of the goals stated in the Davao Regional Development Plan (DRDP)

B. Objective/Purpose

To enhance the global competitiveness of the ICT sector in Region XI

C.Target Outcomes (2006-2010)

16,000 employment generated
P1 Billion worth of investments generated
1,000 new SMEs developed

D.Strategies

D.1 Investment Promotion

Conduct of marketing assistance to ICT companies

Massive promotion and image building of the region as an ideal promotion

Conduct of regular ICT events in Region XI in 2005 (exhibits, expos, seminars, and others)

Showcase of local talents, activities, developments and others through local ICT channel

Conduct of free demonstrations in the region’s ICT services to strategic areas

Organization of trade & investment missions to ICT hubs in the world such as China, India, US, Canada, Australia, etc.

Organization of national road shows focusing on Region XI

D.2 Advocacy

Designation of “ICT aware” persons in key positions;

Provision of tax incentives for ICT firms; and

Consolidation of all government agencies and organizations dealing with ICT development

Conduct of series of dialogue between private sector and government

Lobby with the congressmen in the region for government policy support to ICT sector

D.3 Human Resource Development

Proposal for a shift to a competency-based education to CHED

Organization of trainors’ training on ICT

Promotion of a regular conduct of ICT Manpower Accreditation Exams (TESDA, vendor associations, and others)

Participation in the activities updating knowledge on ICT or training on new ICT trends on a regular basis

Advocacy for provision of special loan funds to educational institutions and ICT businesses for the purpose of upgrading of ICT tools

Lobby for the provision of scholarships for faculty training to ICT training institutions

Organization of orientation seminars on ICT industry standards (e.g. CMMI, Philnits, and others)

Business Management Trainings for SMEs

D.4 ICT Database & Information Build-up

Establishment of information centers in the key areas in the region

Creation of a database for sourcing of local IT talents and vendors by the government.

D.5 Strengthening of ICT Companies & Industry Associations

Conduct of Capability Building Seminars

Conduct of Organizational Building and Strengthening Seminars

LordCarnal

August 8th, 2006, 04:11 PM

papable

August 8th, 2006, 04:49 PM

^^

The Cyber Corridor is a nice idea for anything related to I.T. (software and hardware development, call centers, etc..etc..)

Dumaguete City can become the "research center" sort of like Harvard or MIT. The existing corporate offices in Cebu can then outsource the manufacture of the hardwares to other places like Bacolod (since Bacolod is planning to have an export processing zone). The final product can then be sent to Cagayan de Oro City where it can be shipped to the world and beyond -- it being the site of the largest international container port in Mindanao. CDO can also maximize its potential if it be declared a freeport. It has a very lucrative position being near (and practically facing) the gold coasts of the South China Sea..

Methinks it's impractical. And expensive. It requires big investments in transport infrastructure, one that is truly efficient and low-cost. Sadly, it is one of our weak links (there are many others).

At any rate, (this is another topic) can I suggest that we just quote or cite salient points in articles already published (in say, newspapers) or worse, already posted, rather than post the whole thing again. I would like to think that forumers are keen current events followers anyway. :righton: Peace!

nicko

August 8th, 2006, 04:49 PM

Philippine fiber optics network - "The fiber optic telecommunications backbone of the Philippines is located in Oriental Negros. As a result, the province boasts of state of the art telecommunications facilities. Its geothermal powerplants ensure stable supply of electricity." - OneIPC website

bitoy

August 8th, 2006, 05:08 PM

Errrrr... ano ba definition niyo ng IT HUB?

Paramihan ng IT companies and services?

philwily

August 8th, 2006, 05:18 PM

Cebu, Davao, Bacolod, Iloilo, Dumaguete, and Cagayan de Oro... in no particular order.

Cebu already has a lot of IT and IT-related companies. Several reputable IT companies are already here, and who knows which IT companies will open their doors here in the next few years... example, Azeus and Accenture have expressed their interest to open in Cebu.

Bacolod, Iloilo, and Dumaguete... I think these three cities are definitely improving in terms of IT. Give it a few more years, and we'll see a very much IT Visayas.

For Mindanao, Cagayan de Oro and Davao have the potential, with Cagayan de Oro scoring big with its LGU and Davao with manpower (for example, in our company, 50% of the engineers who didn't graduate from Cebu graduated from Davao). It will be good for Mindanao (and for the Philippines) if the two cities actually become IT Hubs. :okay:

LordCarnal

August 8th, 2006, 06:15 PM

^^

yeah, Cyber Corridor phil..

tj_brewed

August 8th, 2006, 09:04 PM

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/dvoreport.jpg

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/dvoreport2.jpg

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/dvoreport3.jpg

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/dvoreport4.jpg

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/dvoreport5.jpg

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/dvoreport6.jpg

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/dvoreport7.jpg

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/dvoreport8.jpg

WawaY[625]

August 8th, 2006, 09:17 PM

^^ nuff said!

boju

August 9th, 2006, 03:18 AM

The next IT Hub in the Philippines is:

http://i59.photobucket.com/albums/g283/boju4289/itgoldmine-1.jpg

Cagayan de Oro city!

www.cdoitgoldmine.com

ergit222

August 9th, 2006, 03:32 AM

@tj_brewed. :applause: nice post. It said it all. My only comment is that Clark is a part of Angeles City Pampanga and Clark is not a city. :)

boju

August 9th, 2006, 03:59 AM

-edit-

nicko

August 9th, 2006, 09:29 AM

hmm.. very interesting report.. although that was just last october 2005..

boju

August 9th, 2006, 09:33 AM

Mindanao Marks ICT Month as Call Center Capital of Mindanao
Mike Banos

The Regional Information Technology and E-Commerce Committee (RITECC) of Region 10 (Northern Mindanao) kicked off its month-long celebration of June as ICT (Information and Communications Technology) Month with a press conference yesterday trumpeting its major accomplishment so far: making Cagayan de Oro the No. 1 ICT Hub in Mindanao.

"We are proud that Region 10 is performing better than expected," said Engr. Elpidio M. Paras, RITECC-X Co-Chair and Director of the 2nd Mindanao ICT Congress scheduled to be held here this coming September. "Cagayan de Oro has three of the 10 call centers in Mindanao with over 800 call center representatives compared to more than 100 for Davao, and we expect this to double by next year."

Although Davao became the first city to attract a contact center (Cyber City) to Mindanao in late 2004, Paras said Cagayan de Oro got a leg up on the competition when President Gloria Arroyo signed Proclamation No. 770 declaring Pueblo de Oro IT park as an ICT ecozone last January 26, 2005.

PEZA Director General Lilia De Lima recently said that the information technology industry, spurred by the booming call center industry, has been the country's fastest growing industry since 1999 and now constitutes around five percent of PEZA-registered investments, with 41 firms as of this month, compared to only 17 in May 2005.

The 10-hectare Pueblo IT Park is the first and only PEZA-registered and proclaimed IT park in Mindanao. It is part of the Pueblo de Oro Township, a self-sustaining 360-hectare mixed use development which includes commercial, residential, and educational institutions built around an 18 hole par 72 championship golf course, 74-room international standard hotel and SM Cagayan de Oro.

Paras expects Link2Support, Inc., the city's first and biggest call center locator in Pueblo de Oro IT Park with 650 call center agents (as of May 31, 2006) to double that complement within the next two months. Arriba Telecontact, Inc., which Paras owns and operates at the Rosario Arcade in Limketkai Center, has 60 call center agents at present and expects to double this number by year end. The third call center, Tradetel Corp., is owned and operated by Philcom Corp. with 20 seats at its local exchange building in Bgy. Carmen.

And the city has plenty of room for more.

"SM has a 1,700 sq.m. space in its Car Park Bldg. which is now under negotiation for a term lease with a call center," said Paul Ferrer, SM Cagayan de Oro Mall Manager, in his welcome remarks to media in the presscon.

"SM is a major stakeholder in the ICT industry and it is part of our overall strategy to attract commerce and tourism," Ferrer said, citing the E-1 e-commerce building in SM's recently opened Mall of Asia in Bay City, Pasig.

Rodolfo L, Meñes, who heads RITECC-X's e-Business cluster, said the owner of a 2,700 sq.m. lot adjoining SM in the Pueblo de Oro IT Park is willing to immediately construct to house a call center locator.

DTI Misamis Oriental listed other areas immediately available for call center operations include the Alwana Business Park, Trinidad Building, A. Lim Bldg., and Fontanosas Bldg.

Meñes, who is vice president and general manager of Pueblo de Oro Development Corporation which operates the Pueblo de Oro IT park, told media attending the presscon the IT park area will soon be doubled to 20-hectares.

"We have taken the first step in the journey of a thousand miles," Meñes said. "We are well on our way to attaining our objective to create employment by recruiting people from Cagayan de Oro and dispersing regional centers away from traditional urban metros like Manila and Cebu."

"The only constraint to our rate of growth is the availability of qualified manpower," Paras said. "With the industry expected to double year after year, this will be a major constraint unless we find ways to increase the present 10% passing rate of applicants for call center representatives in the region."

Juanito Demetrio, CHED-X Education Supervisor II, who represented E-Learning Cluster Head Dir. Paderanga in the presscon, disclosed that CHED and TESDA are working closely together to address this concern. Already, he cited local schools such as Informatics Inc. and the Asian College of Science and Technology (Acsat) are offering call center preparatory courses.

In a similar initiative, Capitol University and the Cagayan de Oro Chamber of Commerce & Industry Foundation Inc. jointly hosted the first Cagayan de Oro Academe-Industry Forum earlier this week to discuss the major issues between the academe and the industry, including a stronger internship process for students in partner industries.

"Industries within Cagayan de Oro City and Northern Mindanao area are experiencing growth and this means an increasing demand for graduates," said chamber president Ruben Vegafria. "This is especially true for ICT and ICT-related products and services. That is why we need to work with the academe."

However, his colleagues in RITECC-X share Paras' concerns the country has to shape up to maintain its competitive edge over similar up-and-coming competitors like China, Malaysia and Indonesia by implementing upgrades and improvements now in infrastructure and labor quality to attract more call center investments to the country.

The ICT Profile provided by the DTI-Misamis Oriental office describes the ICT infrastructure in Cagayan de Oro as being traversed by two major backbones: PLDT's 10 gbps Digital Fiber Optic Backbone (DFOB) which is directly connected to five (5) international submarine cable systems in the Asia Pacific and Southeast Asian region with onward connections to North America, the Middle East and Western Europe, supported by an extensive Digital Microwave Backbone; and Telicphil's 10 gbps National Digital Transmission Network, a 2,762 kms. fiber optic backbone facility that originates from Cuyapo, Isabela in the north and terminates in Cagayan de Oro in the south.

"Connectivity is important in the call center industry," said Engr. Teodoro Buenavista, NTC-X regional director and member of the RITECC-X e-cluster group.

Bautista stressed it is not only connectivity in hardware but between the local players that the local call center industry needs to maintain an edge over the competition. He cited the 1st TPG Friendship Games scheduled later this year to increase fellowship and interaction between local players as one such initiative.

"RITECC-X will continue to push public-private partnership in three areas of development : policy, implementation and advocacy," Bautista said.

The Department of Trade and Industry says the Philippines is fast catching up with India as the "Call Center Capital of Asia" due to the increasing costs of doing business in G-7 countries.

A study conducted last year by research firm Frost and Sullivan, reveals that the Philippine call center industry now ranks ninth in the Asian region with $9.8-million invested in hardware and software last year, trailing its English-speaking rivals: India ($21 million) and Singapore ($20.3 million). From only a handful of call centers at the start of 2000, there is now an estimated 105 call center companies in the country, or double the figure from 2003. The Philippines is expected to be spending more in the next few years.

Besides manpower, another concern for the burgeoning local industry is the rising salary scale as the volume of business increases and the entry of big players resulting to consolidations through mergers and acquisitions. Call centers have been prime targets for consolidation as they buy or merge with other ICT-related firms.

"Our starting salaries for call center representatives are 30 percent lower than those in Manila and Cebu," Paras said. However, he said experienced CSRs from the metropolitan areas have been coming back to Cagayan de Oro due to its lower cost of living and to be with their families.

"There is no social displacement inherent with people working far from their families so our CSRs have higher morale," Paras said. Besides, he said the lower costs of living here means the workers net even more than their counterparts in the metros.

"No other industry can match that right now," Paras said.

Just last week, Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT) said its wholly owned subsidiary, ePLDT, Inc., was acquiring BPO firm SPI Technologies, Inc. and all its subsidiaries for an undisclosed amount.

SPI is the world's ninth biggest in the transcription company with 6,500-employees operating in 23 locations worldwide serving 150 company clients with a variety of services including content editorial and production, litigation support coding and electronic data discovery, medical transcription, database structuring and management and transaction processing.

Earlier January, PeopleSupport completed the acquisition of California- based Rapid Rapidtext, Inc. and its subsidiary, The Transcription Co., with most operations to be moved to the Philippines.

source: http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=10655

boju

August 9th, 2006, 09:46 AM

http://i59.photobucket.com/albums/g283/boju4289/mict.jpg

http://www.mictcongress2006.com/

habagatcentral1

August 9th, 2006, 09:48 AM

^^BAi Boju, asa di'ay dampi ang IT park sa dakbayan sa CDO? :)

boju

August 9th, 2006, 09:54 AM

Naa sa Pueblo de Oro Township, where the SM city is located.

Sera

August 9th, 2006, 06:24 PM

among the baby boomers in I.T. I see a lot of potential for cities like Dumaguete, Dagupan or San Fernando, La Union

Sera

August 9th, 2006, 06:25 PM

Outside Metro Manila I think the Main IT Hubs would be Cebu in the Visayas & Cagayan de Oro in Mindanao

tj_brewed

August 9th, 2006, 06:31 PM

For me....Cebu in Visayas. Davao in Mindanao.

Information and Communications Technology Industry is not limited to CallCenters alone.

Please take note that Davao has the most Technepreneurs and IT firms (local and foreign) in Mindanao.

WawaY[625]

August 9th, 2006, 06:52 PM

Sera

August 9th, 2006, 07:15 PM

I agree in the Visayas Cebu definitely is the established IT Hub but in Mindanao - where IT is at its infancy, CDO, Davao & Zamboanga are still establishing themselves as potential IT Hubs

davaoeagle

August 10th, 2006, 05:06 AM

I agree in the Visayas Cebu definitely is the established IT Hub but in Mindanao - where IT is at its infancy, CDO, Davao & Zamboanga are still establishing themselves as potential IT Hubs

When you talk of IT, it does not limit to call centres alone just like TJ said. There are incubating labs, software development, call centres, medical transcription, IT training centres etc. To date, only Davao has all these things going in the whole of Mindanao.

davaoeagle

August 10th, 2006, 05:14 AM

^^ sabagay the IT industry is still in its infancy so even if Davao has yet to have an IT park,Davao still has the biggest potential (next to Cebu) as the next IT hub (accdg to the studies TJ has posted)

but in order for this to happen, Davao must act fast before its too late..

It's even no longer in the infancy stage Gravy. Davao has these things going since early 90s. Lack of support from the LGU stunted the dev't of this industry in Davao but of late a lot of noise has been heard if only to drum up more support to this burgeoning industry in Davao.

IT park does not constitute the entirety of the IT industry though it makes for a smooth sailing IT operations.

boju

August 10th, 2006, 05:48 AM

When you talk of IT, it does not limit to call centres alone just like TJ said. There are incubating labs, software development, call centres, medical transcription, IT training centres etc. To date, only Davao has all these things going in the whole of Mindanao.

As of now, CDO has 3 call centers, 2 Medical Transcriptions, and one Software Development and many more to come. In regards of IT training centers, there are now academes handling this with the support of government agencies.

amigo32

August 10th, 2006, 06:07 AM

how is the agent's pay? Is it comparable to Manila?

WawaY[625]

August 10th, 2006, 06:13 AM

should be lower..otherwise whats the use?

amigo32

August 10th, 2006, 06:27 AM

lower but decent enough for a provincial worker?

WawaY[625]

August 10th, 2006, 06:35 AM

yeah..maybe..lols wala naman akong kilala sa IT industry eh.hehe

amigo32

August 10th, 2006, 06:38 AM

gusto ko kasing lumipat sa probinsiya. makapag apply nga.

habagatcentral1

August 10th, 2006, 06:47 AM

gusto ko kasing lumipat sa probinsiya. makapag apply nga.

^^ Try Cebu or other places in the country. For Cebu, decent ang rates kasi mura naman ang pagkain dito (P25, decent meal), pamaseahe anywhere in MetroCebu starts from P6 to P10 for one ride na jeepney. Marami namang amenities and entertainment.

Laki ng pinagbago ng mga syudad sa labas ng Maynila kung tutuusin.

junax

August 10th, 2006, 08:08 AM

As of now, CDO has 3 call centers, 2 Medical Transcriptions, and one Software Development and many more to come. In regards of IT training centers, there are now academes handling this with the support of government agencies.

yes, i agree cdo/local government is very supportive in (IT business). it's good that the city, inch by inch, is slowly getting recognized in this area. but talking about infancy stages (cdo and davao), i think cdo, although new in this field, could get a fair share in the market in the long run because of government support and that is good news for mindanao. davao city on the other hand only lacks IT zoning but has everything to be called an ICT industry haven. without that zone, ICT investors pay more with less perks but still davao managed to produce hardcore programmers and software companies serving U.S. and Japan, which i think is the goal of silicongulf, turning davao into a programmer city. this year we saw some support from the government and if we get our IT zone, then it's full throttle for davao. the brokenshire 3g/ICT incubation center, UP-Ayala Incubation Facility, joji-ilagan-john f. kennedy call center academy, about 5 call centers, medical transcriptions in some colleges/universities, graphics and animation studios and numerous big time software companies served davao for decades without an IT zone and the fad.

cdo in the north and davao in the south, will be a good tandem for mindanao.

Jimbu

August 10th, 2006, 08:25 AM

Five Japanese IT firms plan to invest in Cebu
Cebu Daily News
Last updated 11:20am (Mla time) 08/10/2006

FIVE Japanese information-technology companies have expressed interest in expanding their operations to Cebu, according to Cebu Investment Promotion Center (CIPC) managing director Joel Mari S. Yu.

The Tokyo-based companies were identified as Bell Net Co. Ltd., ISFnet Co. Ltd., Sahara Systems Japan, Data Application Co. Ltd. and CyberTech Corp.

While these companies plan to set up only small operations here, Yu said this is ideal for Cebu since it has yet to build its capability to serve their skills requirement.

"We don't really have the capability to provide 2,000 programmers, for example," he said.

Attracting these companies will help Cebu show that it can handle IT investments, other than call centers and business process outsourcing, Yu said.

Bell Net, a software engineering company, is engaged in such IT services as computer system operational support, helpdesk and desktop service, IT consulting and educational service, streaming site production and digital broadcast content production.

It has already set up a temporary office in Cebu, with a P10 million capitalization, 10 full time staff and 160 contract IT engineers and designers, Yu said.

Bell Net chief executive officer Toshio Osada, sales director Masaru Ajito and project division manager Nino Perol (a Filipino IT engineer) met with Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña during the latter's visit to Tokyo last June.

The company is looking for IT engineers with Java and C++ language skills and technical support and maintenance engineers for desktop with Japanese language level 2 skills, he said.

The ISFnet, with a capitalization of $1.6 million and 1,600 employees, offers consulting, system design, software development, hardware, computer system management and other IT-related services.

The company plans to hire and train engineers for three years and set up a training school here later, he said.

The Sahara Systems is engaged in software consulting, IT recruiting and software products.

Yu said the company has asked for CIPC's assistance in setting up partnerships with different universities in Cebu to develop Unix (or Uniplexed Information and Computing Service, a computer operating system) and Japanese language courses. The company plans to come up with four-year Unix course and hire qualified graduates of this course.

The company is offering its Unix box for free to different Cebu universities in return for acknowledgement of their contribution, he said.

Yu said CIPC is getting in touch with different schools and universities in Cebu and arranging meetings with different government and nongovernment agencies involved in IT development. Sahara Systems executives will be coming in September or October this year, he added.

The Data Application Co. is a provider of various products including communication middleware and other IT support services. Its core business is network systems development. It has 50 employees and has a capitalization of 200 million yen.

Data Application president and chief executive officer Keita Hashimoto, corporate strategic planning and administration director Sadakazu Nagai and manager Shigeru Yoshida met with Osmeña and the Cebu City delegation in Tokyo last June 26.

Yu said the company plans to start its project here by October this year.

The CyberTech Corp., which has an 80-million yen capitalization, is involved in the development of the world's first commercial XML native database Cyber Luxeon and the development of XML database using middleware.

XML stands for extensible markup language, a simple and flexible text format designed for use in large-scale electronic publishing. It is also used in the exchange of data on the Web.

LordCarnal

August 10th, 2006, 08:38 AM

^^ Try Cebu or other places in the country. For Cebu, decent ang rates kasi mura naman ang pagkain dito (P25, decent meal), pamaseahe anywhere in MetroCebu starts from P6 to P10 for one ride na jeepney. Marami namang amenities and entertainment.

Laki ng pinagbago ng mga syudad sa labas ng Maynila kung tutuusin.

are there call centers in cebu province? :colgate: joke!

P25 is not a decent meal Bernie.. Even in cheap "carinderias" you will have to spend around P30-40... Hehehe.. Anyway, as for my experience, I usually spend around P70-80 just for lunch, thus I guess it should be a factor as to how much these IT companies will pay you.

WawaY[625]

August 10th, 2006, 08:39 AM

^^ joker man ka oi..hehe a

philwily

August 10th, 2006, 10:04 AM

how is the agent's pay? Is it comparable to Manila?
lower but decent enough for a provincial worker?

Well, what do you mean by agent? call center agent? sales agent? :?

In my field, well it still depends on the company. After graduating, the highest offer I got in Manila was higher than the highest offer I got from Cebu and Davao. But the Cebu offer was still bigger than some of what my batchmates got in Manila. So yun nga, depende rin sa company. But I think on most matters, Manila will still offer the highest salary... but I think you also have to look at other factors like living expenses, traffic and transportation, way of life, etc.. I guess those are reason enough to go to the cities outside Manila. :cool:

As for meals... well, here in Cebu I spend around 70-100 pesos/meal when i eat out, but when we just cook some stuff at home, the groceries would amount to around 50 pesos/day. Okay na diba? :okay: As for Davao, I would say it's cheaper than Cebu. I almost never cooked at home there, and the 70 pesos/meal i spend in Cebu, I spent that in a day in Davao... may sobra pa hehe.. So yeah, the pay I have to say is decent enough... and if you just know where to look, you can even spend less than the estimates I have above. m))

Hope that helps in anyway. :hi:

davaoeagle

August 10th, 2006, 10:05 AM

yes, i agree cdo/local government is very supportive in (IT business). it's good that the city, inch by inch, is slowly getting recognized in this area. but talking about infancy stages (cdo and davao), i think cdo, although new in this field, could get a fair share in the market in the long run because of government support and that is good news for mindanao. davao city on the other hand only lacks IT zoning but has everything to be called an ICT industry haven. without that zone, ICT investors pay more with less perks but still davao managed to produce hardcore programmers and software companies serving U.S. and Japan, which i think is the goal of silicongulf, turning davao into a programmer city. this year we saw some support from the government and if we get our IT zone, then it's full throttle for davao. the brokenshire 3g/ICT incubation center, UP-Ayala Incubation Facility, joji-ilagan-john f. kennedy call center academy, about 5 call centers, medical transcriptions in some colleges/universities, graphics and animation studios and numerous big time software companies served davao for decades without an IT zone and the fad.

cdo in the north and davao in the south, will be a good tandem for mindanao.

Well said bro!

chixbebe

August 10th, 2006, 10:25 AM

By all means, the Philippines is ready for a broadband revolution. Even the most cynical observer admits that the fundamentals appear sound to catapult the country to the ranks of Asian nations that have embraced the broadband technology. We may not exactly feel it but the process has started and thebroadband revolution (http://www.manilastandardtoday.com/?page=business06_aug10_2006)is already with us. Before we know it, a critical mass has been reached to sweep the nation to become a broadband power in Asia.

gimikguysmile

August 10th, 2006, 10:39 AM

Why does Davao looked left behind? I thought its as grown as Cebu? Just askin... Baguio i agree should be in the list of possible bets.

MtApoStandard

August 10th, 2006, 11:04 AM

Why does Davao looked left behind? I thought its as grown as Cebu? Just askin... Baguio i agree should be in the list of possible bets.
cebu is the oldest city in the philippines. older than manila. davao became chartered city in the 1930's, how old was cebu then as a city. she would have been the premier city of the philippines by now. davao is in mindanao and it is not easy to be part of the place prejudiced by bigots. politically davao is playing in the lopsided playing field. if you're referring to IT advancement, davao was a silent dominant player in mindanao and still is. he was disadvantaged for not being hyped. he is just silent whenevr a locator comes in compared to competitors. because he knows he is still short of the very important infrastructure in the industry. but this does not matter anymore, davao is now in the agenda of government's major regionalisation as a southern component of IT corridor of philippines.

.

habagatcentral1

August 10th, 2006, 11:39 AM

are there call centers in cebu province? :colgate: joke!

P25 is not a decent meal Bernie.. Even in cheap "carinderias" you will have to spend around P30-40... Hehehe.. Anyway, as for my experience, I usually spend around P70-80 just for lunch, thus I guess it should be a factor as to how much these IT companies will pay you.

^^ Basta sa pantry sa PS P25 lang. Sa carinderia sa amua P30 ra. Sa Orange Brutus, P40-P70. Basi grabe man ka kaon,hehe! Joke! :lol: Just doin my way para makatipid. Hay life! Pero at least no, barato man lang diri sa Cebu unlike sa kabisera na you'll have to spend more than P200 per day sa pagkaon ug plete.

LordCarnal

August 10th, 2006, 11:47 AM

As for meals... well, here in Cebu I spend around 70-100 pesos/meal when i eat out, but when we just cook some stuff at home, the groceries would amount to around 50 pesos/day. Okay na diba? As for Davao, I would say it's cheaper than Cebu. I almost never cooked at home there, and the 70 pesos/meal i spend in Cebu, I spent that in a day in Davao... may sobra pa hehe.. So yeah, the pay I have to say is decent enough... and if you just know where to look, you can even spend less than the estimates I have above.

Hehe.. Yeah I think this is the reason why I minimize eating outside... But sometimes, I can't just resist given the fact that I keep on eating the same menu in the house. Aside from that, I also don't know how to cook.

But I think the end point of this is that our money is really losing its value. P40 during highschool was already big for me, now even P200/day is not enough..

So like what I said, let's make the entire region an IT hub and not just a single city or what. At least we can uplift this sick nation of ours; otherwise, I'll keep on studying for the stateboard until I leave this country.

ritche

August 10th, 2006, 12:04 PM

ritche

August 10th, 2006, 12:10 PM

ritche

August 10th, 2006, 12:23 PM

And the backbone of the fiber optics network in the Philippines (http://www.investoriental.com/tourism.html) is in Dumaguete, meaning the heaviest investment of telecommunications companies is located here...we were among the first to put up wireless services in the vicinities of Dumaguete.

With ready and excellent infrastructure for power and telecommunications, there is no reason Dumaguete can't make it to the big league...

habagatcentral1

August 10th, 2006, 12:34 PM

Some people thought that there was PS in Uyanguren. Since PeopleSupport is an American-based company, travel advisories and stuff was one of the reasons why PS didn't push through their plans for Mindanao operations YET.

Why YET? I've heard sa workplace that PS may have the potential to invest in Davao. In other words, habang may buhay may pag-asa. Malaki kasing pool of human resource ang Mindanao.

Ako sana sa Davao ako magatatrabaho.

MtApoStandard

August 10th, 2006, 12:50 PM

It is interesting to note that when the IT sector in the Philippines started to boom in 2003, the government identified only four (4) places (http://www.newsflash.org/2003/05/si/si001661.htm) as the country's IT hubs. These are Clark and Subic in Luzon, and Cebu and Dumaguete in the Visayas. There were none identified in Mindanao because of insurgency problem and the far distance between cities that have potentials to become IT centers. Industries operate in the principle of clustering, meaning businesses of the same industry, i.e. BPO can interact with each other easily. Hence, Clark and Subic which are just around 100 kilometers away, and Cebu and Dumaguete which is about 3-4 hours away by bus. In Mindanao, Cagayan de Oro and Davao are the potential IT Centers, but they are very far from each other. Add to that, the separatist movements there are a pain in the neck. Sadly, IT companies take cue from travel advisories made by embassies. So people from Mindanao, you have a harder time convincing the IT companies to locate in your area. The main reason PeopleSupport hasn't operated a site in Davao until now....
may be ot here, but let me opine my view why mindanao could not recover from this sad reality of publicity game. travel advisories do come every now and then and is not pinned to philippines alone. security problem is all over southeast asia, and prime targets around the world. australia had even handed down the tightest advirsory to indonesia among countries in the region. but why is it still a destination in the travel list of tourists. indonesia is ahomebase of jimaa islamiya(forget the spelling but sounds like that anyway) but why is mindanao percieved as incredebly gross of terrorisism? bali succumbed to the worst terroristic disasters that killed foriegners(a lot of them astralaians)in asia but why it was able to recover its name as top holiday destination and mindanao is still percieved as a "gruesome" place until now. isolated incidents in mindanao is nothing compared to bali's. is it because of philippines press attitudes of irresponsible reporting? its a pity why there maybe a lot of people were disoriented of true facts about mindanao. imo, if china and vietnam have philippines press running their media, they will still be like philippines today. corruption is not an excuse, because the 2 countries have high index of corruption. larger than philippines. just a thought.

.

cyrusal

August 10th, 2006, 02:26 PM

July 4, 2006
Cagayan de Oro truly an ICT hub, says ICT Commissioner

Cagayan de Oro City (4 July) — No less than a commissioner of the Commission on Information and Communications Technology (ICT) has affirmed Cagayan de Oro City’s position as an ICT goldmine in the country.

Commissioner Emmanuel Ilallana of the Commission on Information and Communications Technology (ICT) disclosed during the log-off ceremony of the month-long celebration of the ICT Month over the weekend at the Kiosko Kagawasan in Divisoria, that Cagayan de Oro can effectively serve the ICT needs of prospective local and foreign investors because of the well placed ICT facilities in the city at present.

He said that Cagayan de Oro is completely equipped with state-of-the-art facilities boosted by the establishment of the Pueblo de Oro ICT Park, the first ICT park in Mindanao.

Being an ICT hub, Ilallana revealed that Cagayan de Oro is chosen to be one of the pilot sites of the I-Eskwela that they will be launching this year.

Despite its being a neophyte in the ICT industry, the city government together with the private sector has already drawn the attention of many ICT investors who have already started pouring in their investments here.

The culminating activity of the ICT Month celebration was highlighted with City Mayor Vicente Y. Emano’s launch of Cagayan de Oro’s official website and the switching on of the Telepono sa Barangay project.

The Telepono sa Barangay is a P49-million project which aims to provide telecommunications access to the city’s remotest barangays and consequently open the floodgates of economic development and technological advancement even in the city’s hinterland areas

MtApoStandard

August 10th, 2006, 02:37 PM

.

Medical transcription school opens in Davao
Thursday, August 10, 2006

The medical transcription industry in Davao City got a boost with the opening here over the weekend of the MTC Academy (MTCA), the country’s first and largest TESDA-registered medical transcription school.
“The best time to pursue medical transcription career and business prospect is now,” MTCA Davao president Lizabel Holganza said during the opening of MTCA Davao – the company’s 30th branch – along Quirino Avenue last August 5.

“The USA has a federal law that requires all health management organizations to convert their records into digitized format,” she said.

Holganza said the medical transcription industry is estimated to be worth $20 billion and grows at an annual rate of 20 percent.

“That is why MTCA is offering a medical transcription course: in order for Davao to get a sizeable chunk of that opportunity,” Holganza said.

In an email to the Mirror, MTCA said the reason India gets most of the medical transcription jobs is it has a large number of qualified transcriptionists and it has a law that supports the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) of the US.

“Although we have lots of qualified graduates from the allied health degree courses, we lack training as medical transcriptionists. MTC Academy offers the longest MT Training because we believe there are no shortcuts to medical transcription. It involves time and effort to be called a medical transcriptionist. If we do not train medical transcriptionists, we won’t have the contract, we won’t get the doctors to trust us and give us the voice file,” the MTCA email said.

Medical transcription is a very lucrative field, with a junior medical transcriptionist earning P9000 to P12,000 per month plus incentives. The rates can go as high as P50,000 a month.

The course, however, is a little pricey. High school graduates who have to take the course for 18 months will have to shell out P59,075. Non-medical course graduates will have to pay P35,875 for the six-month certificate program.

Graduates of allied health course like nursing pay P24,875 while doctors who need to complete three months of training have to spend P21,275.

Source: DIANA LHYD SUELTO
http://bond.lanesystems.com/sitegen/article.asp?wid=125&cid=452&aid=37096

.

WawaY[625]

August 10th, 2006, 03:35 PM

may be ot here, but let me opine my view why mindanao could not recover from this sad reality of publicity game. travel advisories do come every now and then and is not pinned to philippines alone. security problem is all over southeast asia, and prime targets around the world. australia had even handed down the tightest advirsory to indonesia among countries in the region. but why is it still a destination in the travel list of tourists. indonesia is ahomebase of jimaa islamiya(forget the spelling but sounds like that anyway) but why is mindanao percieved as incredebly gross of terrorisism? bali succumbed to the worst terroristic disasters that killed foriegners(a lot of them astralaians)in asia but why it was able to recover its name as top holiday destination and mindanao is still percieved as a "gruesome" place until now. isolated incidents in mindanao is nothing compared to bali's. is it because of philippines press attitudes of irresponsible reporting? its a pity why there maybe a lot of people were disoriented of true facts about mindanao. imo, if china and vietnam have philippines press running their media, they will still be like philippines today. corruption is not an excuse, because the 2 countries have high index of corruption. larger than philippines. just a thought.

.

i relly think the media tends to get abusive when it comes to reporting (and thats MOST IF THE TIME) there should be a way that their reports are regulated or at least checked if its the truth or exaggerated (we need a media regulatory board as the KBP is inutile) aaah but then again those mofos will cry coz the fredom of the press is repressed damn

MtApoStandard

August 10th, 2006, 03:47 PM

i relly think the media tends to get abusive when it comes to reporting (and thats MOST IF THE TIME) there should be a way that their reports are regulated or at least checked if its the truth or exaggerated (we need a media regulatory board as the KBP is inutile) aaah but then again those mofos will cry coz the fredom of the press is repressed damn
pardon my opinion but freedom of the press for a fragile philippines economy is real threat against its interest. philippines economy is not well grounded as that of USA that if their press is feasting on their political mudslinging, the economy even if shaken, will not be greatly affected. investors will not runaway because they are investors themselves.

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LordCarnal

August 10th, 2006, 04:46 PM

we were among the first to put up wireless services in the vicinities of Dumaguete.

Like wiFi? that's interesting to note.. :)

LordCarnal

August 10th, 2006, 04:52 PM

With lots of places in the country wanting to be IT Hubs, there's no reason why the Philippines can't, at least in the future, be an IT leader in Southeast Asia.

It's time for the Philippines to regain its glory. We've been looked down by our neighbors simply because we're a third world country that can't get its acts together. (should it be time for us to do the same to them? :colgate:)

Jimbu

August 10th, 2006, 05:05 PM

cebu is the oldest city in the philippines. older than manila. davao became chartered city in the 1930's, how old was cebu then as a city. she would have been the premier city of the philippines by now. davao is in mindanao and it is not easy to be part of the place prejudiced by bigots. politically davao is playing in the lopsided playing field. if you're referring to IT advancement, davao was a silent dominant player in mindanao and still is. he was disadvantaged for not being hyped. he is just silent whenevr a locator comes in compared to competitors. because he knows he is still short of the very important infrastructure in the industry. but this does not matter anymore, davao is now in the agenda of government's major regionalisation as a southern component of IT corridor of philippines..

I often read this opinion in other forums. Maybe it's yours in PEX. Anyway, the premise that Cebu should have been the premier city because it is the oldest city is wrong on this subject. Because it would construe that Cebu is ahead because of this reason. Also, it would be unfair to Cebu's leaders and businessmen who had responded and invested much effort on this industry.

And why compare with Manila. You have to consider that Manila is the capital city and you know very well the politics under a unitary system. Declaring Cebu the oldest city did not provide her economic advantage. It is a title like giving Magellan the first to discover the Philippines and not to Malayans, Indonesians or the Chinese. Remember Davao and Cebu have been around since the 18th century and when did IT industry came into every city's vision to become a hub. Think about it.

Davao and Cebu became chartered cities on the same month and on the same year in 1936. From this year until 1990's, both cities are all equal in terms of IT development. Both cities have nothing to be proud of. Lately, Cebu have attracted some companies to invest in the city and that’s because of its leaders. Cebu leaders and businessmen have organized and responded because they see future in this industry. They have sent people in States and in Banglore, India because they want to duplicate their success. That's the reason and not because of being the oldest city. I would not be surprised if Bacolod may do well against Iloilo in Visayas or Cagayan de Oro against Davao in Mindanao in the coming years.

LordCarnal

August 10th, 2006, 05:19 PM

^^

It's nice though that lots of cities in the Philippines are shining. At least this means that we're on our path to recovery?

Ey, by the way, regarding that Bangalore, India thingy, US presidential hopeful John Kerry, during a campaign speech, mentioned something like most U.S. jobs (intended for Americans) were going to Bangalore (India) and Cebu (Philippine Islands) thus one of the reasons why he was running against Bush. I read this sometime a few years back.

3stan_yu

August 10th, 2006, 06:32 PM

^^ that was on reader's digest!

tj_brewed

August 10th, 2006, 06:49 PM

It is interesting to note that when the IT sector in the Philippines started to boom in 2003, the government identified only four (4) places (http://www.newsflash.org/2003/05/si/si001661.htm) as the country's IT hubs. These are Clark and Subic in Luzon, and Cebu and Dumaguete in the Visayas. There were none identified in Mindanao because of insurgency problem and the far distance between cities that have potentials to become IT centers. Industries operate in the principle of clustering, meaning businesses of the same industry, i.e. BPO can interact with each other easily. Hence, Clark and Subic which are just around 100 kilometers away, and Cebu and Dumaguete which is about 3-4 hours away by bus. In Mindanao, Cagayan de Oro and Davao are the potential IT Centers, but they are very far from each other. Add to that, the separatist movements there are a pain in the neck. Sadly, IT companies take cue from travel advisories made by embassies. So people from Mindanao, you have a harder time convincing the IT companies to locate in your area. The main reason PeopleSupport hasn't operated a site in Davao until now....

I beg to disagree. I am from PeopleSupport.

Currently, there is a PeopleSupport Recruitment and Training Center in Davao. It's our third office in the Phils. (Makati and Cebu - operations, Davao - recruitment) and the fifth in the world (LA - management and Costa Rica - operations).

Though PeopleSupport has not transferred its operations yet in Davao, a fourth center to be established in Davao is already in the drawing board. Have you attended the "Breakfast with the President (of PS) lately'" ? If you have, then you should have heard of the plan.

The temporary office is located at A-301 Plaza de Luisa Bldg, Ramon Magsaysay Avenue, Davao City.

This is PeopleSupport's permanent office in Davao (underconstruction)

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/DAVAO/ps2.jpg

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/psps.jpg

Updates

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/DAVAO/psdvo.jpg

tj_brewed

August 10th, 2006, 10:59 PM

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/cctl.jpg

This is CyberCity Teleservices / GCom - another callcenter in Davao and Mindanao. The first callcenter to be established in Mindanao.

tj_brewed

August 10th, 2006, 11:04 PM

Here are some of the IT players in Davao.

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/DAVAO/ict.jpg

Pls note; when we talk about IT industry, pls don't refer to the IT-enabled industries such as call center only. Most of the IT players in Davao are into software development, web, and network solutions.

tj_brewed

August 10th, 2006, 11:08 PM

Davao - Technology Hub
ITmatters.com
Source (http://itmatters.com.ph/news.php?id=051506c)

DAVAO CITY -- Davao Gulf could be converted into Mindanao’s Silicon Valley, an overseas-based research fellow told local media. "The plan is to harness Davao’s human resource skills and talent base to move towards building a strong information industry," said Jason Banico, a Davao City native who is a fellow of the Reuters digital vision fellowship at Stanford University in the United States. Mr. Banico said the plan is to make the city a center for software development and business process outsourcing. He coined the plan Silicon Gulf as it was inspired by Silicon Valley and since the city is part of the Davao Gulf. A supporter of Mr. Banico’s plan is Councilor Peter Laviña, city council committee on trade and commerce and among the few local government unit officials who have tapped technology in promoting issues through web blogs.

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/DAVAO/SATDAVAO/dmond.jpg
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/DAVAO/SATDAVAO/addusite.jpg

tj_brewed

August 10th, 2006, 11:11 PM

http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a340/tj_brewed/DAVAO/SATDAVAO/PRYCE.jpg

This is not an IT Park. This is Pryce Business Park which is home to a number of IT firms such as Lane Systems, Mozcom, 3G Com, Digital Interface, etc.

tj_brewed

August 10th, 2006, 11:23 PM

In addition, CDO is also fast becoming as another IT hub outside Cebu and Manila as well.

As a whole, the island of Mindanao is more integrated when it comes to IT considering that it is the only region outside of Cebu and Manila to have a consolidated effort to promote itself as an IT Hub through Mindanao Business Council. As a matter of fact, Mindanao ICT Congress, which will be held in CDO this year, has been around for five years now even before other cities such as Dumaguete realized its IT potentials.

1st Mindanao ICT Congress held in Davao City
2nd Mindanao ICT Congress held in Davao City
3rd Mindanao ICT Congress held in Zamboanga City
4th Mindanao ICT Congress held in Genral Santos City
5th Mindanao ICT Congress held in Cagayan de Oro City (this year)

Mindanao may not have attracted more BPO locators but the island's business chambers managed to develop ICT Investments from within.

There are a number of local IT Players in Davao, CDO, Gensan, and other cities in Mindanao with markets from Japan to US.

junax

August 11th, 2006, 02:45 AM

^^ nice presentation TJ... and this "when we talk about IT industry, pls don't refer to the IT-enabled industries such as call center only. Most of the IT players in Davao are into software development, web, and network solutions." call centers, graphics and animations, software development, hardware sales, mobile and network solutions are just examples of what an ICT company can play with.

speaking of ICT company... here's one davao is proud of:

Lane Systems: Making it big in IT industry

HERE's a success story of a Dabawenyo who is gaining popularity in the field of information technology (IT) in the United States.

Davao City-based Lane Systems, Inc. is one big name in the IT industry, not just in the local scene, but as well as abroad.
One of the persons behind the lofty success of this IT firm is Rodney Jao.

Lane Systems, which has its business office in San Francisco, is comprised of a team of highly competent IT experts, offering software development and consulting with wide range of software and hardware solutions.

Jao is a graduate of Bachelor of Science major in Computer Science (BS Computer Science) at the Ateneo de Davao University (ADDU) in 1995.

During the early part of that year, Jao met Marlyn Couchman, a Dabawenya who is married to an American, at Digital Interface, where Jao was a faculty member.

"Actually, Marlyn and I are not friends. We just met there, nagkakuwentuhan. At I don't know what happened kung bakit napunta sa pagtatayo ng ganitong business ang usapan. Year 1995 was the start of Internet era in Davao," he said.

In September, 1995, they established the company, both in the US and Davao City, which they first called Lane Systems Analysts.

"Ginawang Lane kasi it is the middle name of Donald, Marlyn's husband. Analysts kasi everybody was a partner during that time. Wala pa kaming employees kasi noon," Jao said.

When they put up Lane Systems, Jao was no longer connected with the Digital Interface. He was already a Computer Science instructor at ADDU.

"Since I was teaching at the Ateneo at that time, we had to look for an office na malapit lang doon. Maalala ko pa super pangit ng aming office noon kasi nga hindi pa naman kami successful. I was the one who was doing everything here because Marlyn and Don were in the States attending to our office there," he said.

Even if the company was only in its first year, it managed to get clients from the US. One of Lane Systems biggest clients in 1995 was Sesame Street Retail Store, the distribution arm of Sesame Street products such as stuffed toys of the famous characters (e.g. Ernie, Bert, Cookie Monster, Big Bird, and Elmo) in the said children's show.
With clients like Sesame Street, the company started to grow slowly, prompting Rodney to quit from teaching.

In 1999, the company changed its name to Lane Systems, Inc. since it already had a number of employees who were helping them address the needs of its clients.

In January of 2000, Lane Systems transferred its office to Landco building in Bajada.

"Actually, fourth office na namin 'to. Galing kasi doon sa may Ateneo, lumipat kami sa may harapan ng Gaisano Mall. From there, nag-Landco na kami pero hindi dito sa unit na 'to. Mas maliit 'yong dati," he said.

The transfer of Lane Systems to a bigger and better office unit only signifies its growth.

To date, the company is actively promoting IT development in the city and is closely working with government agencies in building solutions for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and encouraging them to automate their business processes.

Lane Systems exists to provide an ever-increasing level of quality software, consultation, service, and responsiveness, to its customers.

Lane Systems is unique in several aspects. One of them is the unparalleled ability to examine a business challenge, apply appropriate technology solutions, and effectively articulate the solution to its own teams.

"We guarantee customer satisfaction as we go the extra mile to see that our customers know we mean business when we say we are committed to them," Jao said.

Among the major services of the company are telephony (e.g. call center telephony solutions); business systems for accounting, point of sale, inventory management, etc.; auto-ID such as barcode and biometrics wherein the iris or thumb is being used as an identification for a person to have an access over entering a certain vicinity; and IT consulting and services such as planning, implementation, and maintenance of servers and hosting and server co-location.

The company is presently addressing the needs of local industries such as the NCCC Supermarket, Del Monte, Dole, Emcor, and even the Department of Education (DepEd). This is just a small chunk of the company's huge market.

Lane Systems' superior service has already been recognized worldwide as Jao was chosen as the Most Valuable Professional of Microsoft from 2002 until 2005. The MVP award is a recognition of somebody's exemplary achievements in the field of IT.

For more details about lane Systems, Inc. please call 221-3344 and 221-6923. You can also visit them at 14F Landco Corporate Center, Pryce Business Park, J.P. Laurel Ave., Bajada, Davao City. (JMM)

junax

August 11th, 2006, 03:02 AM

ICT companies in Davao are the ones doing the "dirty work", hardcore programmers, not just call center agents.

Davao is on the I.T map

Annually, a high-octane event called the e-Services Philippines exposition, brings together IT companies from all over the country to showcase their products and services. It is organized by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) through the Center for International Trade Expositions and Missions. The more than 300 companies and institutions that took part in "e-Services Philippines 2005: The 5th IT Outsourcing Conference and Exhibition" are involved in the delivery and acquisition of electronic business solutions, from software applications to animation to medical transcription and contact center services.

From 17 to 18 February 2005 at the EDSA Shangri-La Manila Hotel, big-name corporations such as Microsoft Philippines and Trend Micro, plus a sizable number of mid-range solutions providers, were in attendance. Small- and medium-sized IT enterprises were in full force as well. For the third straight year, Davao City's e-services outfits, under the banner of the Association of Solution Integrators in Davao (ASID), have participated in the Expo. This commitment has proven beneficial not only for these companies, but also for Davao's entire IT industry.

The ASID is a non-profit organization of IT services companies based in Davao City. It was registered with the S.E.C. in July of 2002. Currently comprised of fifteen companies, the Association represents the e-services sector, which is recognized by the DTI as one of the country's priority investment areas.

In its commitment to the DTI, the Association endeavors to formalize the sector it represents by encouraging independent providers to become formal companies that contribute to the local business community. Furthermore, membership development is one of the thrusts of the Association. Membership in the ASID entails the following requirements: applicants must be a duly-registered corporation, partnership or single proprietorship; must be based in Davao; more than 50% of the business must be in IT services. IT services are categorized into the following broad areas: software development; animation and graphics design; wireless applications development; medical transcription services; and, call/contact center services.

This year, the Davao companies that participated in the Expo are: Cubepixels Design Studio, Hubport Interactive Inc., ids-media, and Lane Systems Inc. The services that these companies were able to showcase included, among others, automated telephony systems, web applications, animation, corporate image design, and custom software applications development. The other member-companies of the ASID that were not able to go to Manila for the event were represented by the Association's executive director.

The Davao Pavilion in the e-Services Philippines 2005 was made possible by the Davao City Mayor's Office, through the Davao City Investment Promotions Center, headed by Engr. Bobby Teo; and, the Davao City Information Technology Center, headed by Engr. Ricarte Franco Jr. Instrumental in the financial assistance extended by the city was a resolution to allocate funding, passed by the Sangguniang Panlungsod, sponsored by Hon. Pilar Braga. The Davao City Tourism Office, through Mr. Ian Garcia, provided promotional materials such as brochures and maps, as well as useful information for tourists and businessmen alike. The Association is proud of its local government unit because it now recognizes the importance of the IT industry in the city's economy.

Innove Communications (formerly GlobeQuest) likewise provided valuable cash sponsorship towards the fulfillment of the Association's bid to participate in this year's Expo. This firm has been supportive of developments in Davao's IT industry ever since 2001 when the Association's members--then part of the IT Society of Davao--organized the most successful One Internet Day celebration in the country, through the full support of GlobeQuest.

After three years of being part of the e-Services Expo, Davao IT companies have proven that their product offerings are as excellent as those delivered by Manila- or Cebu-based companies. This can be seen from the total number of contracts now under negotiation between ASID member-companies and corporate buyers, a number of which are foreign-based. These potential contracts amount to P15.6 million, as estimated by the DTI-Davao City Field Office. In last year's Expo, the ASID brought home P13 million worth of potential contracts. These figures do not take into account the projects that these companies have garnered from ripple effects of their unwavering involvement in the Expo.

Rodney Jao of Lane Systems, current president of the Association, believes that, due to its continuing presence in the Expo, their Luzon- and Visayas-based counterparts have come to respect the position that Mindanao-based IT companies now hold. Foreign buyers, especially Japanese companies, are also now taking a more serious look at the capabilities of ASID members. This is evidenced by the huge potential that Davao companies now have in tapping the Japanese market. During the Expo, ASID members met with Japanese corporate representatives in several business-matching sessions. This resulted in at least two negotiations that are expected to come to positive conclusions within the year.

The Japanese delegation have expressed their interest in Davao IT providers due to the ASID's thrust in the promotion of the Japanese language as a tool for business. The Association in fact conducts professional Nihongo courses for the benefit of its members' employees, as well as all other interested parties. And since Davao has a sizable population of Japanese speakers and students of the language, these Japanese companies appear confident that their requirements will be met, not only technologically but also linguistically.

The ASID, with the dedicated support of DTI-Region XI and DTI-Davao City Field Office, is now finally realizing the achievement of one of the goals it set at its inception: that of putting Davao City firmly on the country's IT map

junax

August 11th, 2006, 03:06 AM

Even before the advent of Call Centers and IT parks...

Davao’s best-kept secret

DAVAO has always been known to be the land of waling-waling, the exotic durian, the majestic Mt. Apo or the Philippine Eagle. What many don’t know is that when it comes to technology, the city is also home to several companies responsible for developing world-class applications. This used to be Davao’s best-kept secret but now I think we’re ready to let everyone in on that secret.

For the first time, Davao City, represented by five companies from the Association of Solution Integrators in Davao (ASID) joined CITEM’s eServices Expo held last February 13-15 at the World Trade Center in Manila. The expo focused on promoting the country’s capabilities in IT and eServices and featured top IT companies all over the country. A lot of people who attended the event were surprised to find out that the IT industry is growing in Davao and that these Davao companies have been servicing US and European clients as early as 1995. They were even more surprised to see the range and quality of software developed and the software tools used from Microsoft Technologies such as .NET, Java and GIS. The five companies which took part in the expo were Automata Interactive, CDR Software Studio, Ids-Media, Nth and Lane Systems.

The participation of ASID was made possible through the efforts of Councilors Frances Mabel Acosta-Laman and Myrna Dalodo-Ortiz and the funding assistance form Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte. And the group’s participation in the eServices Expo was a success. It not only generated more contacts and projects for the five participants but it also put the spotlight on the growing IT Industry in the city.

When it comes to outsourcing, Davao not only has agricultural products to boast of but also software development. And because of the lower overhead expenses, these Davao-based solution integrators are able to offer lower rates without sacrificing the quality of the software. And technology and infrastructure support in Davao have made these companies accessible to their clients everywhere.

junax

August 11th, 2006, 03:16 AM

here are some of the BIG time ICT players in davao city, doing the "dirty works, hardcore programming and IT services", serving the U.S., Japan and Europe silently without hype and less government support (until 2006), no perks whatsoever.

1. Blinque - http://www.blinque-tech.com
2. Cerveo - http://www.cerveo.com
3. Cube Pixels - http://www.cubepixels.com
4. Filmindsoft
5. Hubport Interactive - http://www.hubportinteractive.com
6. IDS-Media - http://www.ids-media.com
7. Kwik Release - http://www.kwikrelease.com
8. Lane Systems Inc - http://www.lanesystems.com
9. MTTO Transcriptions
10. PhilAmerican - http://www.philamerican.com
11. Silvercup
12. SSP Transcript
13. Pisolutions
14. Digital Interface - http://www.digitalinterface.com.ph/

as TJ said "Mindanao may not have attracted more BPO locators but the island's business chambers managed to develop ICT Investments from within.

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 03:34 AM

The IT hubs being identified by the government have the potential to attract the IT resources, e.g. the heavy investments for the fiber optics will be there, and there are also potentials for the location of export processing zones where IT products and services such as semiconductors, electronics, computers, peripheral products, and services such as callcenters and BPOs, etc. will be located. If you look closely at the fiber optics network of the Philippines, they are heavily concentrated in the Cebu-Negros area, expecially the cities of cebu and Dumaguete....

Do you have any write-ups to support this claim? re: fiber optics network heavily concentrated in the Cebu-Negros..... Davao's fiber optics have been ready since the early 90's and PLDT and some other big players in this sector saw the vast potential of Davao early on. Davao's position as the center of trade in the BIMP-EAGA polygon was a logical reason why this kind of infrastructure was mulled and implemented.

I don't refute Cebu's claim for dominance in this industry and I believe without any iota of a doubt they have this infra installed even earlier than Davao's as Cebu is easily the second biggest market in the country next only to Manila but to say Negros or Dumaguete (specifically) claiming the same attribute would rather be regarded with a pinch of salt.

Common sense would tell you to go for the much hackneyed high yield city/ies to pour in your money otherwise your investment is doomed to fail right from the start. Needless to say, Davao is a default third top in the minds of the investors (after Manila and Cebu) at least in the time being, what with Davao City's 1.6 (2006 estimate) million people with 98.7% lireracy rate, 5 big universities, 39 colleges and 244,000 hectares of land area, making it so ripe and mature to handle the busiess, to say the least.

In regards to the separatist movement in Mindanao, this phenomenon has been present for 20 decades or so and has really hampered the growth of Davao and Mindanao as a whole. Boon or bane, Davao has transscended this obstacle and in fact claimed top plums in national and international assesment for livability and performance. I should say Davao won all these with crippled legs with all the surrounding debacles hounding it.

And who would say only Mindanao has this monster to fight, let's not forget that the NPAs also abound in the Visayas and Negros figures to be one of the hotspots. They carry the same magnitude of threat just like the MILF and they have made their presence felt everywhere in the country. No city is immune to terror threats anymore and terrorists know no time and place when they want to wreak havoc, not even the first world city like New York which has the most sophisticated intelligence and terror detection capabilities, is immune to this threat.

And lastly, the latest SONA of the prexy declared Baguio, Cebu and DAVAO to form part of the IT corridor so what's all the hype about Dumaguete now? How do you fare vis-a-vis Davao now in terms of IT inroads? If you can provide stats on the aforementioned claims then better for the forumers. Numbers don't lie. Unless it's written, it's never been said, remember.

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 03:50 AM

ICT companies in Davao are the ones doing the "dirty work", hardcore programmers, not just call center agents.

Davao is on the I.T map

The Japanese delegation have expressed their interest in Davao IT providers due to the ASID's thrust in the promotion of the Japanese language as a tool for business. The Association in fact conducts professional Nihongo courses for the benefit of its members' employees, as well as all other interested parties. And since Davao has a sizable population of Japanese speakers and students of the language, these Japanese companies appear confident that their requirements will be met, not only technologically but also linguistically.

The ASID, with the dedicated support of DTI-Region XI and DTI-Davao City Field Office, is now finally realizing the achievement of one of the goals it set at its inception: that of putting Davao City firmly on the country's IT map

This explains why an acquaintance of mine who used to head the IT sector in Davao went back to school specifically at the Kakusai Daigaku (Mindanao International College) in Davao to learn Japanese. All the while I thought he got bitten by the "go abroad" bug.

ritche

August 11th, 2006, 04:17 AM

Do you have any write-ups to support this claim? re: fiber optics network heavily concentrated in the Cebu-Negros..... Davao's fiber optics have been ready since the early 90's and PLDT and some other big players in this sector saw the vast potential of Davao early on. Davao's position as the center of trade in the BIMP-EAGA polygon was a logical reason why this kind of infrastructure was mulled and implemented.

You have not read much about it. I suggest you go to the Dumaguete thread. We were able to have that robust fiber optics link because the former CEO of Islacom is from Dumaguete, and he had the foresight to put to where it is supposed to be: to the country's only City that can lay claim to being a University Town. I put it here already before, for your benefit, here's the link (http://www.philippinebusiness.com.ph/archives/magazine/vol11-2004/11-6/geo_p2.htm) .

And again, to support the claim that the backbone of the fiber optics network of the Philipines is in Dumaguete, here's the link (http://www.investoriental.com/tourism.html).

And again, Dumaguete is part of the original four IT hubs identified by the Board of Investments (BOI). That Bacolod is getting a lot of investments in IT it's because its nearer to the Cebu-Dumaguete cluster, also with Cagayan de Oro which is nearer to Cebu.

Well Davao and Iloilo are on the brim, it's how these two places will play it up that could spell success in attracting IT players. For Iloilo, the big factor against it is the power situation. For Davao, it is the bombings and the insurgency problem that still lingers in the minds of investors despite the fact that it has been relatively peaceful in the recent months.

tj_brewed

August 11th, 2006, 04:38 AM

And again, Dumaguete is part of the original four IT hubs identified by the Board of Investments (BOI).

Don't based your claim on a dinosaur age plan. The NEO IT stats is the latest survey there is. And even GMAs SONA is the most up to date - an IT Corridor from Baguio, Cebu to Davao. Why put all your hopes to the past? It's time to move on......

I dont dispute your claim re Dumaguete's IT plans.(in fact, I have high hopes for it)......but im disputing your claim regarding Mindanao's status in the IT industry. Bout how CDO and Davao may have a hard time playing (inviting investors) along with small cities such as yours because it is located in Mindanao.

ritche

August 11th, 2006, 04:54 AM

I dont dispute your claim re Dumaguete's IT plans.(in fact, I have high hopes for it)......but im disputing your claim regarding Mindanao's status in the IT industry. Bout how CDO and Davao may have a hard time playing (inviting investors) along with small cities such as yours because it is located in Mindanao.

I don't really want to dispute here. I just want to debate based on facts and nothing else. I have nothing against Davao...in fact I love the place as I have worked there for almost a year.

Well, Dumaguete is a small city limited by the number of its human resources after all. As such, you could not expect it to have a large number of IT players right away. But for its small size, it has already attracted at least seven (7) IT players, all of whom are dealing with the international market. Two are multinationals (SPi and Teletech), which are among the biggest in their particular fields. SPi (http://www.spitech.com) is not a callcenter but many mistake it to be one. It is the first of its kind in the visayas-Mindanao area, and is actually in the higher category than callcenter as it deals with knowledge processing such as publishing and editing. Which speaks very much of the quality of human resources Dumaguete has. Recently some operations in its Manila office were transferred here due to lower cost. It is aiming to grow to 1,000 workers by the end of this year or early next year.

Teletech is also aiming to grow to 1,000 workers in a year or two. Starting next year until 2008, we should be able to attract more IT companies.

And an export processing zone (I don't know if this really the appropriate term) is in the drawing board for Valencia (a town next to Dumaguete) which would have semiconductors, electronics and other related items for its products, and which would be geared to the export market.

Aside from these, there are startup IT companies around that are maybe too small or not really active in making themselves visible, yet.

I myself is involved in a startup company which hopes to train future callcenter and BPO agents, aside from training foreigners to speak conversational English.

tj_brewed

August 11th, 2006, 05:04 AM

In Mindanao, Cagayan de Oro and Davao are the potential IT Centers, but they are very far from each other. Add to that, the separatist movements there are a pain in the neck. Sadly, IT companies take cue from travel advisories made by embassies. So people from Mindanao, you have a harder time convincing the IT companies to locate in your area.
The main reason PeopleSupport hasn't operated a site in Davao until now....

I am not disputing your claim. I never did! All I am saying is that I beg to disagree with the post you made above. I have laid down the facts as well.

I am very much aware what SPI or Teletech is. I am with the contact center industry for more than 2 years now.

In addition, your last statement made me raise my eyebrows. I have also posted some info that can be found on the prior page.

tj_brewed

August 11th, 2006, 05:14 AM

URL=http://www.spitech.com]SPi[/URL] is not a callcenter but many mistake it to be one. It is the first of its kind in the visayas-Mindanao area, and is actually in the higher category than callcenter as it deals with knowledge processing such as publishing and editing.

Ever heard of INNODATA in Cebu? It started in Cebu last 2000 pa! So to say that SPI is the first of its kind in Visayas - Mindanao is once again a misleading claim!

http://www.innodata-isogen.com/ < for more info

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 05:17 AM

You have not read much about it. I suggest you go to the Dumaguete thread. We were able to have that robust fiber optics link because the former CEO of Islacom is from Dumaguete, and he had the foresight to put to where it is supposed to be: to the country's only City that can lay claim to being a University Town. I put it here already before, for your benefit, here's the link (http://www.philippinebusiness.com.ph/archives/magazine/vol11-2004/11-6/geo_p2.htm) .

And again, to support the claim that the backbone of the fiber optics network of the Philipines is in Dumaguete, here's the link (http://www.investoriental.com/tourism.html).

And again, Dumaguete is part of the original four IT hubs identified by the Board of Investments (BOI). That Bacolod is getting a lot of investments in IT it's because its nearer to the Cebu-Dumaguete cluster, also with Cagayan de Oro which is nearer to Cebu.

Well Davao and Iloilo are on the brim, it's how these two places will play it up that could spell success in attracting IT players. For Iloilo, the big factor against it is the power situation. For Davao, it is the bombings and the insurgency problem that still lingers in the minds of investors despite the fact that it has been relatively peaceful in the recent months.

I have read the article thru the link you provided but it never said that fiber optic lines are only concentrated in Cebu and Dumaguete and that is what I'm refuting here. You may have your own vibrance in the IT sector but to claim you are way ahead in Davao or CDO is way too much of a shadow punching.

Yes you are a university town as what you can see in your Silliman is pretty much what your Dumaguete is all about. With 3 universities, how can you compete with Davao's 5 big universities and 39 big colleges. After your 3 universities, what comes next? Davao has a very deep line up of future universities.

You blantly mentioned about Davao's bombings and insurgency as if to brandish to all and sundry that Davao is indeed a place to fear treading on. Is that your way of promoting your city? How safe and immune is your city to any untoward terroristic attacks? Well, you maybe safe because sowing terror is a matter of sending signals and this would always involve big and popular cities to send the message loud and strong and Dumaguete is nowhere near in this category. Small man's ego, isn't it?

You keep harping on 2003 article and that is now downright passe. That article in the link you provided bore no date in it and so I suspect it's one of those archived write-ups. Whereas, the latest declaration in fact a huge part of the SONA by the president, is that the 5th Super Mega Region which will form part of the 5 Mega Regions is the IT corridor which unfortunately does not include Dumaguete.

With this development, Davao's IT industry will have much to gain by way of the humongous monetary appropriations the city will benefit from. By then, Davao's already vibrant IT industry will even more teem with all the hustle and bustle to the maximum degree.

With a small city like Dumaguete and I'm not about to burst your bubble here, it's the one which has to surmount a lot of obstacles and what's more troubling is that you don't have the resources big cities are blessed with.

If I were you, stop stepping on other city's foot if your desire is to hoist your city. This I could say with all the verbal tussles you have been involved with in any forum you went to. But that is another story. Why can't you just say you are doing well too in the IT sector other than give a sweeping statement that only makes a caricature out of you.

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 05:30 AM

MtApoStandard

August 11th, 2006, 05:36 AM

I often read this opinion in other forums. Maybe it's yours in PEX. Anyway, the premise that Cebu should have been the premier city because it is the oldest city is wrong on this subject. Because it would construe that Cebu is ahead because of this reason. Also, it would be unfair to Cebu's leaders and businessmen who had responded and invested much effort on this industry.

And why compare with Manila. You have to consider that Manila is the capital city and you know very well the politics under a unitary system. Declaring Cebu the oldest city did not provide her economic advantage. It is a title like giving Magellan the first to discover the Philippines and not to Malayans, Indonesians or the Chinese. Remember Davao and Cebu have been around since the 18th century and when did IT industry came into every city's vision to become a hub. Think about it.

Davao and Cebu became chartered cities on the same month and on the same year in 1936. From this year until 1990's, both cities are all equal in terms of IT development. Both cities have nothing to be proud of. Lately, Cebu have attracted some companies to invest in the city and that’s because of its leaders. Cebu leaders and businessmen have organized and responded because they see future in this industry. They have sent people in States and in Banglore, India because they want to duplicate their success. That's the reason and not because of being the oldest city. I would not be surprised if Bacolod may do well against Iloilo in Visayas or Cagayan de Oro against Davao in Mindanao in the coming years.
i knew what the thread was when i wrote something objectionable to you. it was an empirical response to key lines of the post that i think vague in its meaning. if it was an inaccurate account of cebu, blame it to some columnists of philippines dailies who were distorting the facts. but story would still be same minus cityhood. that cebu had already been there as center of trade at time of magellan when davao was still a settlement of ethnic tribes in the middle of thickly forested riverbanks. so before davao became a trading center, cebu had already bustled as an established center of trade and commerce. and infrastructurewise, to me, it has more roads, communication technology was better, schools, seaport, etc was advanced. it's why this could be the reason why davao look up cebu as mature olden city. geographically at the crossroad of maritime trading with manila up north, the seat of government and davao at the tail end, so the playing field was lopsided to compete against cebu and that’s an accepted fact. but the point of my post did not limit to where you ended the highlight. davao is in mindanao, and attractiveness wise, it could not compete with cebu. geopolitically, cebu is closer to the seat and heart of government to me, because government is openly supportive of what cebu want. when it was starting to receive IT investors, davao was fixing up the mess that lingered since twin terror attacks that crushed its star performing tourism industry. but inspite of all the disadvantages, inspite of lack of sufficient IT support infrastructure, it has a thriving IT industry that it can tell everyone. By the numbers of entrepreneurs in the industry, it has the most in mindanao if you compare it to cagayan de oro which get more attention because it was hyped. if cagayan de oro is attractive enough to you, why did it fail this early to attract convergys considering it has an IT zone. if davao missed out PS call centre investment, why did it overlooked cagayan.

btw what’s pex? obviously, a forum like scc i guess. but what,s the arconym stands for? have not ventured to any other forum and not into forum shopping too. this forum is enough pastime for me:)

.

slerz

August 11th, 2006, 06:59 AM

^^yeah right, I got your point there... Cebu is older than Davao that's why today Cebu is ahead of Davao and is still developing faster...

junax

August 11th, 2006, 08:20 AM

^^yeah right, I got your point there... Cebu is older than Davao that's why today Cebu is ahead of Davao and is still developing faster...

yes, must be the trend coz if davao overtakes cebu (not just in IT but overall performance) despite the head start advantage, then we can say there's something wrong with cebu. we are happy that cebu is catching up with the capital and in full throttle, but i still feel visayas and mindanao area is still neglected by the kingdom of luzon. we are having sleepless nights waiting for the first 45++ storey buildings to erect in cebu but in manila nobody cares for another 50 storey building down the block. even in infrastractures, we are decades behind them, and to think we (visayas and mindanao) feed them. thinking federal now?

back to the topic...
nice to see many philippine cities gearing up to be the next IT hub in the phil. but next or whatever, please don't get succumbed to the idea that call centers/contact centers are the heart and soul of IT. if there is a heart, it will be composed of computer, electrical and communication engineers, computer programmers, technicians and system analysts. the soul will be composed of hardware peripherals (computers, fiber optics, mobile equipments, software, comm lines, etc.), who got the heart and soul? the ICT companies of course.

meanwhile, a call center "is operated by a company to administer incoming product support or information inquiries from consumers, outgoing calls for telemarketing, clientele, and debt collection". that's their forte. ICT companies on the other hand offer BPO, call center/contact services, graphics and animation, software development, hardware services, mobile and network solutions to name a few. so in an IT map, call centers are under the ICT companies.

those cities outside mindanao are fortunate, they are not under the scope of bad publicity. but thanks to davao, cdo or mindanao IT professionals and entrepreneurs for thriving despite the woes. far flung, neglected, adding insult to injury... bad publicity injected for years. sometimes, most often, we call malaysia, indonesia, palau as neighbors close to our heart when in fact we have brother cities just hours away from home. i hope this divided philippines will change or else, federalism is the best option.

slerz

August 11th, 2006, 09:31 AM

But there's no sign yet that Davao can overtake Cebu,hehe. but if Davao can, it's ok basta all our cities will become prosperous :)

junax

August 11th, 2006, 09:46 AM

^^ lol, i think that's not the mind set of davao too (overtaking cebu). is cebu going to overtake manila too? davao is going to overtake the old davao. don't worry cebu is cebu. and davao will always be that gentle gulf city down south.

slerz

August 11th, 2006, 09:50 AM

oist, Cebu love Davao...:) :okay:
Rodrigo Duterte, idol ni Tomas og idol sa mga Sugbuanon ;)

junax

August 11th, 2006, 10:03 AM

:) cebu should love davao coz rodrigo duterte is a proud cebuano. he piloted davao DC 9 from the ground and turn it into an airbus 380 at landing. i just hope he can still managed another term.

tj_brewed

August 11th, 2006, 10:11 AM

let's go back to the topic at hand!

philwily

August 11th, 2006, 10:47 AM

I think it's great that we have several cities gearing up for IT... and that we have people who are proud of their own city's accomplishments. I'm happy that people here see a lot of potential in IT (hehe i'm biased towards my own field! :lol:). I think it's better if we welcome more cities that embrace IT with or without the blessing of the SONA or the BOI. I don't think anyone can really prevent a city/province if the people (Business Chamber, LGU, population) want to go through the path of IT. If the city/province wants to go IT, then well, the more, the merrier. Maybe i'm a little biased, but I really think that IT is the way to go for the Philippines. :okay:

As for contact centers.. well I think, the definition of IT has really expanded through the years. Maybe originally, programmers, software engineers, system analysts, etc. defined IT, but now, I think we can consider many fields/jobs IT. That's why I think IT has so much power because it reaches out to so many. So contact centers, software development, research and development are just some types of IT companies. I don't necessarily think that there is such a thing as "heart and soul," but rather, I just see the companies as different flavors of IT, each with their own flavor. So I say we welcome all these kinds of companies - they bring investment and employment to the cities the come to. :okay:

I have met some ACID members before, and I have to say that they are very much dedicated to improving IT awareness in Davao. I remember two years ago when the industry (ACID), the academe (the CDITE and PSITE for educators and the PSITS for the students), and CHED worked hand-in-hand to court the Davao City Council to declare one week in December as an IT week (and the IT Week pushed through that year and (I think) has become an annual event). It just goes to show the dedication of these different sectors to IT. If people are as passionate as these groups, then I don't see why IT dreams can't be realized in the long run.

Basta, ok gyud ang IT hehe. :okay:

junax

August 11th, 2006, 11:01 AM

^^ hastang ok ha gyud sa IT bai. dili sa panghinambog, i'm earning an average of 400T a year on my sideline alone as a system/software programmer specializing in networked communication software and business apps (like accounting,inventory,payroll, etc), and i do it independently at my own place and time without attaching to any company pa. maybe its a meager amount compared to other hardcore programmers but i spent my easy earned money sa davao man, barato kaayo so my income is way high na rin. the advent of call centers and ICT companies will hurt my sideline but i don't mine basta moasenso lang pod ang uban. there is gold in IT, diamond pa gani.

chixbebe

August 11th, 2006, 11:23 AM

http://www.philstar.com/philstar/NEWS200608110713.htm

China is hoping to further correct its trade imbalance with the Philippines by promoting and selling more of its goods to Philippine buyers.

A delegation of the Chinese Export Commodities Fair, led by Chen Barong, is in the country specifically to drum up interest and invite Philippine buyers to the forthcoming CECF in October this year to be held in Guanzhou, China.

According to Chen, bilateral trade between China and the Philippines in the first half of this year reached $10.32 billion, 33 percent higher than the first half of 2005.

Trade between the Philippines and China, Chen said, had increased 31.7 percent to $17.56 billion in 2005 from 2004, although still in favor of the Philippines.

Chinese exports to the Philippines in 2005, Chen disclosed, amounted to only $4.7 billion as compared to imports from the Philippines which amounted to $12.7 billion.

Most of China’s exports to the Philippines, Chen said, are consumables.

However, Chen noted that bilateral trade between the two countries has been increasing, with a "healthy" correction of the imbalance.

For the first time in 2004, Chen said, bilateral trade between China and the Philippines exceeded $10 billion.

China, however, Chen admitted, is seeing a favorable development in trade with the Philippines as Chinese exports increase and imports from the Philippines have slowed down.

In fact, Chen said, while the number of Philippine buyers in the annual CECF has not exceeded 2,500 participants, the amount of goods they have purchased have increased 24 percent to $170 million in the most recent CECF held in April this year.

Most of the goods bought by Philippine buyers are electrical and mechanicals products and consumables.

The CECF, Chen explained, is the second biggest trade fair in terms of exhibit space, second only to the Hannover trade fair in Germany.

The CECF is held twice yearly and has been held annually since 1957.

Jimbu

August 11th, 2006, 12:08 PM

i knew what the thread was when i wrote something objectionable to you. it was an empirical response to key lines of the post that i think vague in its meaning. if it was an inaccurate account of cebu, blame it to some columnists of philippines dailies who were distorting the facts. but story would still be same minus cityhood. that cebu had already been there as center of trade at time of magellan when davao was still a settlement of ethnic tribes in the middle of thickly forested riverbanks. so before davao became a trading center, cebu had already bustled as an established center of trade and commerce. and infrastructurewise, to me, it has more roads, communication technology was better, schools, seaport, etc was advanced. it's why this could be the reason why davao look up cebu as mature olden city. geographically at the crossroad of maritime trading with manila up north, the seat of government and davao at the tail end, so the playing field was lopsided to compete against cebu and that’s an accepted fact. but the point of my post did not limit to where you ended the highlight. davao is in mindanao, and attractiveness wise, it could not compete with cebu. geopolitically, cebu is closer to the seat and heart of government to me, because government is openly supportive of what cebu want. when it was starting to receive IT investors, davao was fixing up the mess that lingered since twin terror attacks that crushed its star performing tourism industry. but inspite of all the disadvantages, inspite of lack of sufficient IT support infrastructure, it has a thriving IT industry that it can tell everyone. By the numbers of entrepreneurs in the industry, it has the most in mindanao if you compare it to cagayan de oro which get more attention because it was hyped. if cagayan de oro is attractive enough to you, why did it fail this early to attract convergys considering it has an IT zone. if davao missed out PS call centre investment, why did it overlooked cagayan.

btw what’s pex? obviously, a forum like scc i guess. but what,s the arconym stands for? have not ventured to any other forum and not into forum shopping too. this forum is enough pastime for me:)
.

Yes we can blame the columnists for presenting distorted facts or inaccurate accounts about Cebu but who they are, I dont care.

Bai, this is not Cebu vs Davao. I just don't agree Cebu being an old city can relate or help with it's vision to become an IT hub. If I am Bill Gates I can transform any town in Minadano become an IT hub by hiring people from anywhere in the Philippines, give them salary 10 times the minimum they want. You can put infrastructure quickly if you have the money. I's not about old cities. We are in the 21st century. If Cebu is ahead with other cities outside Metro Manila then that's because of its people, it's vision:

Cedf-it Vision
Our vision is to help transform Cebu into a major ICT Software and E-Services Hub in Southeast Asia through proactive intervention in the ICT Human Resource sector; and by serving as a catalyst to responsive academe-industry-government-NGO linkage

And of course with private infra support. We have Cedf-it here supporting the IT industry and I’m sure you have its counterpart also there in Davao.

San Jose, California is not the US oldest city but it’s the world’s IT hub. Bangalore the Silicon Valley of India accounts for 35 percent of India's software exports. It beats Varanasi an old city, Mumbai the hub of commerce or New Delhi it’s capital. I’m just pointing out here that being and old city is not an advantage to become an IT hub. We are not talking here of old churches, old monuments and other heritage sites for tourism. Clark is not even a city yet but it’s on the same level with Davao and Cebu as far as current and future potential attractiveness in outsourcing.

More on Cedf-it:

History
The establishment of the Cebu Educational Development Foundation for Information Technology (CEDF-IT) is an important result of the 1st Cebu IT Summit held last March 29-30, 2001.

The Cebu IT Summit had identified the need to enhance the quality and quantity of human resources in the IT industry. CEDF-IT is the response to this challenge by the major players in the industry, the academe, and government and NGOs.

Vision -Mission
Our vision is to help transform Cebu into a major ICT Software and E-Services Hub in Southeast Asia through proactive intervention in the ICT Human Resource sector; and by serving as a catalyst to responsive academe-industry-government-NGO linkage.

Mandate
1. To promote and support the development of IT Education in the tertiary level and, therefore, the quality and quantity of graduates of IT courses, through -

A faculty Development and Incentives Program that will upgrade the quality of IT instructors among its consortium member-schools.
A Student Scholarship Program that will give incentives to deserving students who may wish to ursue IT courses.

2. To enhance IT education in the tertiary level by assisting consortium member-schools in curriculum development, improvement of equipment, facilitis and technology, and other related concerns;

3. To promote the early acquisition of relevant IT knowledge and skills in the primary and secondary school levels by assisting these schools integrate IT education within their curriculum;

4. To assists in the promotion and provision of non-formal IT skills training through short-term certificate courses;

5. To guarantee the efficient absorption of qualified IT graduates by industry through an employment mechanism set-up solely for this purpose; and,

6. To serve as an advocay group for the formulation of pertinent IT policies, beneficial national and local laws, and appropriate incentives program by the national and local governments. http://www.cedfit.org/about.php

Jimbu

August 11th, 2006, 12:22 PM

Cebu Educational Development Foundation
for Information Technology (Cedf-it)

Flagship Programs

IT Teachers Academy

The CEDF-IT IT Teachers Academy is envisioned to serve as the venue, means, and catalyst for promoting and sustaining the culture of excellence in IT teaching learning, from within and through CEDF-IT consortium members.

Professional Certification & Training Center

The CEDF-IT Professional Certification and Training Center is a credible body that ensures quality and competence in the practice of ICT, responsive to the needs of local and global industry.

HR Survey & Monitoring

The objective of the project is to generate and make available set of credible baseline data on the supply side on the market chain, i.e., Cebu as a "supplier" of IT skills for the local, national, and international ICT industry for use in the HR planning, development, and implementation of CEDF-IT programs directly affecting the marketing of IT skills, curriculum development, and teacher training.

R & D Institutionalization Unit

The long-term goal of the project is to help ensure that the universities serving Cebu employers have ICT R & D capabilities commensurate with the size and potential of Cebu's ICT industry. The medium terms objectives are to trasin an R & D team that will spearhead the creation of an R & D Center initialli in one of CEDF-IT member schools, and to establish an R & D Institutionalization Unit within CEDF-IT that would "mentor", facilitate, oversee, and monitor the establishment of aforesaid university-based R & D Center.

Quality Assurance in IT Education

There is a need for an "objective set of criteria by which to judge that indeed quality IT education takes place, is sustained and can be assured" in an educaitonal insitution. This project aims to provide such criteria and provide the means to assess an educational institution's quality of education.

Innovation & Entrepreneurship Hub

The long-term goal of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Hub is for the local Cebuano ICT entrepreneur to have a venue for developing, testing, and in some cases, commercializing their ideas and kinnovations. It is envisioned as an impetus for creativity, encourage R&D, and attract venture capitalists to invest in Cebuano innovations.

Cebu as a Global IT Education Hub

To be a focused ICT Hub, it is vital for Cebu to sustain the quality and quantity of its human resources. Cebu shall hus advance itself as a Global IT Education Hub - with CEDF-IT providing the strategic and logistical support for the marketing of IT schools abroad and the provision of relevant services (visa facilitation, application and enrollment, housing and leisure needs,tc.) to facilitate the studies of foreign students in Cebu.

dive-cebu

August 11th, 2006, 01:13 PM

cebu's competing globally...

jimbu, you're the best... :nocrook: :nocrook: :nocrook: :nocrook: :nocrook:

ritche

August 11th, 2006, 02:39 PM

And lastly, the latest SONA of the prexy declared Baguio, Cebu and DAVAO to form part of the IT corridor so what's all the hype about Dumaguete now? How do you fare vis-a-vis Davao now in terms of IT inroads? If you can provide stats on the aforementioned claims then better for the forumers. Numbers don't lie. Unless it's written, it's never been said, remember.

I read it somewhere that Negros Island is among only two or three islands in the Philippines encircled with fiber optics. Unfortunately I could not locate that article by this time.

As I said before, I really have nothing against Davao.

Am quite familiar with how IT stakeholders here operate...it's possible Dumaguete is not promoting itself so well these days as its capacity to handle companies is almost reached....But then again, Dumaguete has two multinationals, and their operations are not really small. In fact, their capacities are comparable to their counterparts in Manila. And these are good enough for a small city like Dumaguete. Davao has big potentials, but until now it has remain potentials. It has, I think, two or three multinationals, and the other one is not even operating fully, only recruiting. So in my own opinion, at least at this time, Dumaguete is doing better than Davao in this area.

I hate to repeat this, but for your benefit it was mentioned in President Arroyo's SONA that an export processing zone producing semiconductors and electronics products will soon rise here near Dumaguete, in addition to lengthening its airport runway which would, hopefully, qualify it to be an international airport.

Dumaguete never hoped to be a big city, only a very livable city with amenities and quality of living comparable, if not superior, to those of the big cities. If you want to know more about our vision, maybe you need to go to the Dumaguete thread and read about where we want to go five years from now (http://villageidiotsavant.blogspot.com/2006/06/dumaguete-in-2011.html). Which we are accomplishing very fast.

I was in Davao and I could say that you are really blessed with much natural resources, at least agriculturally. But then again, where do Cebu and the other side of Negros, as well as Panay get their power from? Don't you know that we could actually paralyze these provinces if we want to by cutting off their power? And again, our fiber optics network. Aside from our universities which are comparable to the ones in Manila. In other words, we are a small city with resources, facilities and amenities comparable to the big cities. To say it bluntly: Small but terrible. I think it is now time that we get the best use of our geothermal power plant and our fiber optics system that have been laid in our soils for years now.

WawaY[625]

August 11th, 2006, 04:56 PM

wala akong maintindihan sa IT IT na yan!!! lols

WawaY[625]

August 11th, 2006, 05:00 PM

Aside from our universities which are comparable to the ones in Manila.

lols..after silliman..what university?

cough *Ateneo de Davao..cough* UP Mindanao cough* University of Southeastern Philippines cough * University of Mindanao

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 05:44 PM

cebu's competing globally...

jimbu, you're the best... :nocrook: :nocrook: :nocrook: :nocrook: :nocrook:

this one is a bit brow-raising. it's even uncalled for here.

MtApoStandard

August 11th, 2006, 05:54 PM

.

look, we’re not getting anywhere. let's not complicate things it made me confuse. theres no big deal in my posts. hope i can best explain what i have been trying to explain in this way:

here is the line I was reacting to a poster

why does davao looked left behind? I thought its as grown as cebu? Just askin...

1. because it could mean urban development, i had to justify my reason in my own terms in my own context of understanding. first thing that came up was age difference of both cities. and then i had to rationalize my reason in my own context of understanding why one is edging the other , what makes it different.

2. because i knew what the thread is about, i had to address the poster’s wondering mind. in the race of IT dominance, i did not push davao aginst cebu. instead, i made him feel that davao is not dead in activities.

here was my empirical reply to the post:

cebu is the oldest city in the philippines. older than manila. davao became chartered city in the 1930's, how old was cebu then as a city. she would have been the premier city of the philippines by now. davao is in mindanao and it is not easy to be part of the place prejudiced by bigots. politically davao is playing in the lopsided playing field. if you're referring to IT advancement, davao was a silent dominant player in mindanao and still is. he was disadvantaged for not being hyped. he is just silent whenevr a locator comes in compared to competitors. because he knows he is still short of the very important infrastructure in the industry. but this does not matter anymore, davao is now in the agenda of government's major regionalisation as a southern component of IT corridor of philippines.

i hope this will now be understood. i was not pushing to connect the age of cebu and its lead in IT industry.

Yes we can blame the columnists for presenting distorted facts or inaccurate accounts about Cebu but who they are, I dont care.

Bai, this is not Cebu vs Davao. I just don't agree Cebu being an old city can relate or help with it's vision to become an IT hub. If I am Bill Gates I can transform any town in Minadano become an IT hub by hiring people from anywhere in the Philippines, give them salary 10 times the minimum they want. You can put infrastructure quickly if you have the money. I's not about old cities. We are in the 21st century. If Cebu is ahead with other cities outside Metro Manila then that's because of its people, it's vision:

Cedf-it Vision

And of course with private infra support. We have Cedf-it here supporting the IT industry and I’m sure you have its counterpart also there in Davao.

San Jose, California is not the US oldest city but it’s the world’s IT hub. Bangalore the Silicon Valley of India accounts for 35 percent of India's software exports. It beats Varanasi an old city, Mumbai the hub of commerce or New Delhi it’s capital. I’m just pointing out here that being and old city is not an advantage to become an IT hub. We are not talking here of old churches, old monuments and other heritage sites for tourism. Clark is not even a city yet but it’s on the same level with Davao and Cebu as far as current and future potential attractiveness in outsourcing.

More on Cedf-it:

History
The establishment of the Cebu Educational Development Foundation for Information Technology (CEDF-IT) is an important result of the 1st Cebu IT Summit held last March 29-30, 2001.

The Cebu IT Summit had identified the need to enhance the quality and quantity of human resources in the IT industry. CEDF-IT is the response to this challenge by the major players in the industry, the academe, and government and NGOs.

Vision -Mission
Our vision is to help transform Cebu into a major ICT Software and E-Services Hub in Southeast Asia through proactive intervention in the ICT Human Resource sector; and by serving as a catalyst to responsive academe-industry-government-NGO linkage.

Mandate
1. To promote and support the development of IT Education in the tertiary level and, therefore, the quality and quantity of graduates of IT courses, through -

A faculty Development and Incentives Program that will upgrade the quality of IT instructors among its consortium member-schools.
A Student Scholarship Program that will give incentives to deserving students who may wish to ursue IT courses.

2. To enhance IT education in the tertiary level by assisting consortium member-schools in curriculum development, improvement of equipment, facilitis and technology, and other related concerns;

3. To promote the early acquisition of relevant IT knowledge and skills in the primary and secondary school levels by assisting these schools integrate IT education within their curriculum;

4. To assists in the promotion and provision of non-formal IT skills training through short-term certificate courses;

5. To guarantee the efficient absorption of qualified IT graduates by industry through an employment mechanism set-up solely for this purpose; and,

6. To serve as an advocay group for the formulation of pertinent IT policies, beneficial national and local laws, and appropriate incentives program by the national and local governments. http://www.cedfit.org/about.php

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 06:19 PM

I read it somewhere that Negros Island is among only two or three islands in the Philippines encircled with fiber optics. Unfortunately I could not locate that article by this time.

As I said before, I really have nothing against Davao.

Am quite familiar with how IT stakeholders here operate...it's possible Dumaguete is not promoting itself so well these days as its capacity to handle companies is almost reached....But then again, Dumaguete has two multinationals, and their operations are not really small. In fact, their capacities are comparable to their counterparts in Manila. And these are good enough for a small city like Dumaguete. Davao has big potentials, but until now it has remain potentials. It has, I think, two or three multinationals, and the other one is not even operating fully, only recruiting. So in my own opinion, at least at this time, Dumaguete is doing better than Davao in this area.

The burden of proof rests on your shoulder now. Unfounded claims litter everywhere in this forum.

Potentials in Davao have been harnessed long ago and if there's any stall in it it's because the LGU's hands have been full with other problems at hand. But whatever the LGU was handicapped about was compensated by the dynamism of the private sector. This symbiosis between the LGU and the private sector is what's keeping Davao City economically powerful. We are the centre of trade in the BIMP EAGA and we attribute this to the exemplary working relationship between the city hall and the private sector.

If Dumaguete is better than Davao in the IT industry, what's the proof? 2 multinationals with Davao's 3? 5 IT companies with Davao's close to 20? How could you claim as such?

I hate to repeat this, but for your benefit it was mentioned in President Arroyo's SONA that an export processing zone producing semiconductors and electronics products will soon rise here near Dumaguete, in addition to lengthening its airport runway which would, hopefully, qualify it to be an international airport.

Dumaguete never hoped to be a big city, only a very livable city with amenities and quality of living comparable, if not superior, to those of the big cities. If you want to know more about our vision, maybe you need to go to the Dumaguete thread and read about where we want to go five years from now (http://villageidiotsavant.blogspot.com/2006/06/dumaguete-in-2011.html). Which we are accomplishing very fast.

Does this one show Dumaguete never hoped to grow big as a city? You must be a unique Filipino tribe if your words are to be dignified. Is this the general sentiment of the Dumaguetenos? While the rest of the world scramble to get a piece of development, Dumaguete wants to remain parochial. This is funny.

Yes the president promised to improve your infrastructure and what's the big deal? Every city/province gets it's own share of promise from the politicians and wether they make good of the promise or not that is the one million peso question. Davao's economic dominance was borne mostly out of the local initiative. We don't wait for the mannah to drop in our laps, we create them ourselves.

You mentioned about vision, mission of Dumaguete, well and good. Good governance should follow a certain framework. Every organization, every city has this as a bible and what's the big fuss?

I was in Davao and I could say that you are really blessed with much natural resources, at least agriculturally. But then again, where do Cebu and the other side of Negros, as well as Panay get their power from? Don't you know that we could actually paralyze these provinces if we want to by cutting off their power? And again, our fiber optics network. Aside from our universities which are comparable to the ones in Manila. In other words, we are a small city with resources, facilities and amenities comparable to the big cities. To say it bluntly: Small but terrible. I think it is now time that we get the best use of our geothermal power plant and our fiber optics system that have been laid in our soils for years now.

Again, you are making a big claim, "pulling off the power supply plug and Cebu and Negros will all grope in the dark". This is even uncalled for. I should say this is plain cockiness. Indeed, small man's ego is having a grand time here.

Universities comparable to Manila? Yes for Silliman but after that, what? Davao has 2 and they are very young universities at that; ADDU (top5) and USEP (top 20).

I was only disputing your claims about IT and now you wandered around governance. What's next? Are you sure you have enough ammunition to survive in this debate? I'd rather you stuck to IT and we can at least dole out a good dialectic here.

MarkiiBoi

August 11th, 2006, 06:23 PM

'Better English' of Cebuanos seen as edge in outsourcing

The Freeman 08/12/2006

Ambassador Roberto Romulo said the Cebuanos' ability to speak "better English" than others from other provinces serves as their competitiveness edge in developing Cebu as a Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) hub.

This as one of the thrusts of the APEC Business Advisory Council is the continued development of BPO sector, and which was discussed during the opening of the three-day ABAC meeting held at Shangri-La Mactan yesterday.

Romulo, who is also the chairman of ABAC and the presidential adviser on competitiveness, said that development of BPO sector in the country is really impressive considering that there are now more than 100 call centers employing around 200,000 employees as against the meager four call centers and approximately 1,000 or 2,000 employees when the country first engaged in the BPO sector in 2004.

Although India is taking the lead in the BPO sector, Philippines can also offer a good competition by developing BPO not only in the call center industry but also in party logistics, supply chain management and knowledge management, such as in medical tourism.

In line with this, Cebu is going to be developed as the BPO hub in the country.

"There's one key here which I'm scared to say because Manila will get mad at me. You speak English here. And you speak better English here than any other provinces in the country. So I think that's a big plus as far as BPO is concerned," Romulo said in a press briefing yesterday morning.

In relation to this, Romulo said the private sector task force has been tapped by President Gloria Arroyo to formulate a master plan on how we can be internationally competitive in the BPO sector.

The president delivered her opening and keynote address during the 3rd ABAC meeting and 10th ABAC anniversary conference yesterday morning.

"The private sector will take the lead and the government will enable," he said.

sugbuanon

August 11th, 2006, 06:27 PM

na unsa naman ni oi..

magsige nalang ta ug palabwanay ani..

WawaY[625]

August 11th, 2006, 06:29 PM

http://www.davaolight.com/imgLinkHandler2.asp?LinkID2=11 > http://www.su.edu.ph/suakcrem/images/su-logo-small.gif

IMHO

WawaY[625]

August 11th, 2006, 06:33 PM

na unsa naman ni oi..

magsige nalang ta ug palabwanay ani..

lols siaw-siaw ra ni oi..were not taking it seriously naman...:)

all in the spirit of asaran..hehe

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 06:35 PM

sugbuanon

August 11th, 2006, 06:35 PM

^^ hehe siguro pero ang uban dire mura naninuod naman.. aw ila pud na :D

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 06:37 PM

http://www.davaolight.com/imgLinkHandler2.asp?LinkID2=11 > http://www.su.edu.ph/suakcrem/images/su-logo-small.gif

IMHO

LOL ( in a good, Davaoeno way) bigger LOL

sugbuanon

August 11th, 2006, 06:41 PM

di man na palabwanay bai. kung naay naga claim nga better sila unya layo ra sab, unsa imong ma feel? Kung naay moingon ana sa Cebu, di kaha mo mo ulbo sa kasuko diha? palabwanay ni kung wa ko gapresent ug numbers as facts. kining si riche nga bisan asa lang ni gakakikta ug kadebate mao ni gapalabawlabaw unya wala pa gyud proof.

aw iya pud na bai.. aw sige lang padayon lng mo gud ky nalingaw mn sd mi basa sa inyo mga posts.. hehe

wana ko ana lalis-lalis maski pa atakihon ang cebu ky mao lng ghapon ang atong panaglalis walay mapadulngan.. luv lng jud cguro niya ang dumaguete.. :D

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 06:41 PM

^^ hehe siguro pero ang uban dire mura naninuod naman.. aw ila pud na :D

hayy, kining uban kay naay GIANT SYNDROME unya perteng gamaya. Pataka lang ug claim ba unya off tangent perme si mo stick sa topic. Ok man ang Dumaguete kung sa OK pero parochial pa gyud intawon, layo ra sa among Tagum, ug Digos minus the universities nila.

tj_brewed

August 11th, 2006, 06:43 PM

@ ritche

You have wandered from one topic to another trying to avoid the first issue which you have raised! And all our disputes (those coming from Davao) are reactions to the claim you have posted above!

I have posted all my facts. Have you? No you havent. Instead you have walked us through limbos trying to post claims with no basis.

Now I dare you.... Prove me wrong!

By the way...you claimed that SPI is the first of its kind in Visayas and Mindanao! Knock knock! Sorry to burst your bubble but INNODATA Cebu has already been established before the dawn of this new millenium.

Another claim - "PS decided not to establish an office / site in Davao"? Haller.......ur from PS or something? COZ I AM! and I definitely know the plans of our company as I am one of those who actively participates in any Q/D (discussions with the pres.) or Breakfast with the Pres. As a matter of fact, I wont claim anything. Just take a peek at the under construction building of PeopleSupport in Davao. Yes, we have no operations yet, since what we have in Davao is into training and recruitment. But to claim that we do not have any site there is another false claim.

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 06:44 PM

aw iya pud na bai.. aw sige lang padayon lng mo gud ky nalingaw mn sd mi basa sa inyo mga posts.. hehe

wana ko ana lalis-lalis maski pa atakihon ang cebu ky mao lng ghapon ang atong panaglalis walay mapadulngan.. luv lng jud cguro niya ang dumaguete.. :D

Wala man seguroy di mag love sa iyang city unless na lang ingrato siya pero kung mangatake ka ug laing city para ituboy ang imong city lain na nang istorya.

slerz

August 11th, 2006, 06:45 PM

WawaY[625]

August 11th, 2006, 06:48 PM

ugma napud..natulog na si ritchie..lols

tj_brewed

August 11th, 2006, 06:49 PM

i agree @ slerz. cge lunch sa ko ha! brb

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 06:56 PM

^^daghan naman niingon nga mas better ilang city sa Cebu pero wala man nuon mi mo ulbo sa kasuko, amo rang sturya sturyaan sa among meets, kasagaran reaction kay siguro kay wapa man ta kaadto didto and if better sila, maayo nuon. Pangutan a gudna si tj, we are wishing for all cities to prosper. Lain man gud kaayo paminawn nga masuko kay nalabwan, ngano man gud diay, buhi bitaw gihapon ta :D

kanya kanya pud nang opinion bai, depende sa kung unsa ang priority sa tao. Pero kung naay moingon nga better ilang city sa tanang aspects, exag ra pud na labi na kung wa pa katamak sa ubang city.

davaoeagle

August 11th, 2006, 06:59 PM

sige manarbajo sa ko diri.

3stan_yu

August 12th, 2006, 03:54 AM

cebu is the oldest city in the philippines. older than manila. davao became chartered city in the 1930's, how old was cebu then as a city. she would have been the premier city of the philippines by now.

this line raises eyebrows, a bit uncalled for. what does age have to do with being a premier city, and what does it have to do with being an ICT hub? and yes, cebu is not competing locally, heck, theyre not even using manila as a benchmark.

from a website of DTI

There are internationally accredited Software Learning Centers in Cebu. These include the CISCO Networking Academy, Microsoft Certified Training Centers and an Oracle Programming Academy. Negotiations are currently underway to transfer an IT curriculum being offered by the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT) to an appropriate learning institution in Cebu.Broadband services through Digital Subcriber Lines (DSL) are provided by PLDT and Globe. Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) Services are available in Cebu through dual-band GSM Facilities provided by Globe and Smart.

In year 2001, the Cebu Educational Foundation for Information Technology (CEDF-IT) was created to improve the quality of Cebu's IT manpower. The founding members were NEC Telecom Software, Lexmark, Cebu Property Ventures (the developer of Cebu Asiatown IT Park) and Ng Khai Development Corp. from the business side. From the Academe were eight of the largest universities and colleges all represented by their presidents. From the business associations were the Aboitiz Group Foundation, TriTech (another private initiative active to bridge government, industry and academe to insure the proper training of engineering skills that is sought after from industry), and the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry. From the government sector were DTI-7, DTI-Cebu, NEDA, CHED, TESDA, DOST, DECS and the Cebu City Government. The government officers of the various agencies in Cebu pride themselves on working closely with the business and academe sector.

outside the established IT hubs of manila and cebu, i have to say, DUMAGUETE AND CAGAYAN DE ORO looks very promising!

dive-cebu

August 12th, 2006, 04:57 AM

this one is a bit brow-raising. it's even uncalled for here.
dude, i'm just stating my opinion and i believe nobody owns this thread, ayt? if my post is uncalled for or inappropriate or whatever, i think the mods are the only ones who are given that privilege/right to tell me that.

dive-cebu

August 12th, 2006, 05:03 AM

amigo32

August 12th, 2006, 07:50 AM

na unsa naman ni oi..

magsige nalang ta ug palabwanay ani..

:) mag contest na lamang ta sa hambog.

sa hinambogay magdaog ta... :)

hehehehe

Christendom

August 12th, 2006, 07:55 AM

:) mag contest na lamang ta sa hambog.

sa hinambogay magdaog ta... :)

hehehehe

ayos ah... :runaway:

www.metrobacolod.cq.bz
(U/C)

amigo32

August 12th, 2006, 08:00 AM

It's getting hot in here. Masyadong seryoso ang mga threaders. Commercial muna.

WawaY[625]

August 12th, 2006, 08:16 AM

ok ok..ako lolo ginoo sa IT! oh ha..laban mo ana? lols

Christendom

August 12th, 2006, 08:20 AM

ok ok..ako lolo ginoo sa IT! oh ha..laban mo ana? lols

huwag ka namang ganon masyado bro.

www.metrobacolod.cq.bz
(U/C)

amigo32

August 12th, 2006, 08:20 AM

hacker ang akong lolo.

WawaY[625]

August 12th, 2006, 08:34 AM

huwag ka namang ganon masyado bro.

www.metrobacolod.cq.bz
(U/C)

well someone asked for payabangan..at least it gives us a break from all the tension here...

add to this my Lola is Bill gates' mentor..without my lola there'd be no windows..

MtApoStandard

August 12th, 2006, 08:43 AM

akong iro likes to net:D

.

Christendom

August 12th, 2006, 08:44 AM

well someone asked for payabangan..at least it gives us a break from all the tension here...

add to this my Lola is Bill gates' mentor..without my lola there'd be no windows..

haha...parang my tama ka..

www.metrobacolod.cq.bz
(U/C)

WawaY[625]

August 12th, 2006, 08:47 AM

akong iro likes to net:D

.

and kini way tikal ha..i think my dog was a pc user sa iyang past like..3x na nako sya naskapan na nagtungtong sa chair ug ginatap ang akong keyboards

amigo32

August 12th, 2006, 08:48 AM

akong iro likes to net:D

.

dili na man na katingalahan. duha kabook iro diri sa SSC akong ilhan: ASKAL UG DOGGMAN. basig ka chat na nila imong iro? hehehe.

puede nang back to topic. asa na sila? :scouserd:

Christendom

August 12th, 2006, 08:54 AM

puede nang back to topic. asa na sila? :scouserd:

ikaw mag-una pabalik bro kasi ikaw naman ang nagpa depart for a while.

www.metrobacolod.cq.bz
(U/C)

davaoeagle

August 12th, 2006, 08:56 AM

this line raises eyebrows, a bit uncalled for. what does age have to do with being a premier city, and what does it have to do with being an ICT hub? and yes, cebu is not competing locally, heck, theyre not even using manila as a benchmark.

from a website of DTI

There are internationally accredited Software Learning Centers in Cebu. These include the CISCO Networking Academy, Microsoft Certified Training Centers and an Oracle Programming Academy. Negotiations are currently underway to transfer an IT curriculum being offered by the British Columbia Institute of Technology (BCIT) to an appropriate learning institution in Cebu.Broadband services through Digital Subcriber Lines (DSL) are provided by PLDT and Globe. Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) Services are available in Cebu through dual-band GSM Facilities provided by Globe and Smart.

In year 2001, the Cebu Educational Foundation for Information Technology (CEDF-IT) was created to improve the quality of Cebu's IT manpower. The founding members were NEC Telecom Software, Lexmark, Cebu Property Ventures (the developer of Cebu Asiatown IT Park) and Ng Khai Development Corp. from the business side. From the Academe were eight of the largest universities and colleges all represented by their presidents. From the business associations were the Aboitiz Group Foundation, TriTech (another private initiative active to bridge government, industry and academe to insure the proper training of engineering skills that is sought after from industry), and the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry. From the government sector were DTI-7, DTI-Cebu, NEDA, CHED, TESDA, DOST, DECS and the Cebu City Government. The government officers of the various agencies in Cebu pride themselves on working closely with the business and academe sector.

outside the established IT hubs of manila and cebu, i have to say, DUMAGUETE AND CAGAYAN DE ORO looks very promising!

Well, any city for that matter can always claim it's not competing with the locals. Advertizing is such a wide avenue often abused and misused by any entity wether local or overseas. It's even worse in the Philippines where democracy has a price of a centavo.

I have no qualms with your saying that Cebu is not competing with its local counterparts, gee, they have every right to do that. Manila needless to say, can very much ignore the rumblings down below them and they are a natural magnet for investors- they have every reason to compete in the global arena as far as IT.

As for Davao, well who would say we don't have what it takes to be a giant in this field. We have all the necessary ingredients to be at par with the local greats and we have proven that in a lot of surveys and mentioning them wont be necessary.

Davao has been through a lot of down moments but with the dynamism of both the local government and the private sector it always picked up the pieces and forged on. That makes us Davaoenos resilient and ready to rise up to the situation. IT is still in the birthing stage in the Philippines in general and it might be too early to pass on judgement as to which city can breathe life to its high falutin tag lines. Let's see what happens then.

Sera

August 12th, 2006, 08:58 AM

About the statement made previously about the Baguio-Cebu-Davao IT Corridor in the Philippines I want to make a clarifications.

1. Thou the 5th corridor spans Baguio (Northernmost IT area), Cebu (Central IT Area) & Davao (Southernmost IT area) these specified areas are only geographic markers. To say that a city like Dumaguete isn't part of the priority IT areas because it wasn't mentioned in the SONA is false. Just because GMA made special mention to Baguio, Cebu & Davao doesn't necessarily mean that these places are ahead of others. For example with regards to IT in Luzon, Subic & Clark are ahead of Baguio likewise in Mindanao CDO is curently at par with Davao.

2. People shouldn't make the SONA a parameter for dictating the potential of a city to be a IT Hub. It is the LGU's & the people who can make a city an IT hub. For example in China cities like Shanghai & Beijing were always hyped & were much older cities. Naturally the gov't trumpeted these cities. But now China has faster growing cities than these two namely Chonquing & Shenzen. In the Philippines newcomers like Cagayan de Oro, General Santos and Bacolod may have just been established in the mid 90's (unlike Davao, Cebu or Iloilo) but are quickly catching economically.

davaoeagle

August 12th, 2006, 08:59 AM

dude, i'm just stating my opinion and i believe nobody owns this thread, ayt? if my post is uncalled for or inappropriate or whatever, i think the mods are the only ones who are given that privilege/right to tell me that.

Yes you are stating your own opinion and I just did the same. Say what you can say and I won't gag your mouth for doing so. This is an open thread I suppose.

davaoeagle

August 12th, 2006, 09:18 AM

About the statement made previously about the Baguio-Cebu-Davao IT Corridor in the Philippines I want to make a clarification.

1. Thou the 5th corridor spans Baguio (Northernmost IT area), Cebu (Central IT Area) & Davao (Southernmost IT area) these specified areas are only geographic markers. To say that a city like Dumaguete isn't part of the priority IT areas because it wasn't mentioned in the SONA is false. Just because GMA made special mention to Baguio, Cebu & Davao doesn't necessarily mean that these places are ahead of others.

2. People shouldn't make the SONA a parameter for dictating the potential of a city to be a IT Hub. It is the LGU's & the people who can make a city an IT hub.

I thought you were now part of PGMA's cabinet re:" I want to make a clarification."

Seriusly, you could be right when you said Davao, Cebu, and Baguio serve as demarcation figures for the IT corridor but in a country where every city scrambles for meager allocations and stuff, it means a lot to have a special mention specially if it comes straight from the horses mouth.

I don't even agree if someone disputes the fact that this declaration will not spur IT development for the mentioned cities. They are there to be prototypes and by that I mean they shall have the vital infrastructures suited to the industry. If there are appropriations to this end, these cities will surely siphon the biggest share and that will spell the difference then.

Sera

August 12th, 2006, 09:38 AM

I thought you were now part of PGMA'a cabinet re:" I want to make a clarification."

Seriusly, you could be right when you said Davao, Cebu, and Baguio serve as demarcation figures for the IT corridor but in a country where every city scrambles for meager allocations and stuff, it means a lot to have a special mention specially if it comes straight from the horses mouth.

I don't even agree if someone disputes the fact that this declaration will not spur IT development for the mentioned cities. They are there to be prototypes and by that I mean they shall have the vital infrastructures suited to the industry. If there are appropriations to this end, these cities will surely siphon the biggest share and that will spell the difference then.

lol...I didn't want to sound authoritative...anyway the Special Mentions to Baguio, Cebu & Davao will undoublty boost them as IT centers but only briefly & if so in a limited scale.

BTW Cebu is the only established IT hub from the list. Baguio & Davao have to establish itself.

1. In Northern Luzon Dagupan, San Fernando & Laoag are also
gearing up as IT Hubs. Laoag has an International Airport while San Fernando La Union is also constructing an International Airport in Poro-point. Both also have a very capable & efficient labor force.

2. While in Mindanao CDO+Iligan & Zamboanga are also establishing themselves. CDO-Iligan corridor may follow the prototype of the twin IT cities of Cebu-Dumaguete. Laguindingan Int'l Airport will also serve CDO & Iligan. Zamboanga is also in the verge of a boom as its GRDP has grown 7% (the country's fastest!). 3 Huge Malls will also open this year in Zambo as it gears up for more investments.

davaoeagle

August 12th, 2006, 09:40 AM

So Mindanaoans will all have to rejoice then.

Sera

August 12th, 2006, 09:44 AM

So Mindanaoans will all have to rejoice then.

Its nice to see a sleeping giant like Mindanao wake up from its slumber.

amigo32

August 12th, 2006, 09:44 AM

So Mindanaoans will all have to rejoice then.

No.

The Philippines. :) :) :)