The technology start-ups in the Philippines are set to a bright future as three national government departments have committed to work together to support and push for their development and growth.
The heads of the Departments of Science and Technology (DOST), Information, Communications and Technology (DICT), and Trade and Industry (DTI) signed a memorandum of understanding on December 19 at the Second National Technology Business Incubation (TBI) Summit held at a hotel in Manila for a five-year road map that will forge strategies and provide assistance to 1,000 start-ups.
The five-year road map is geared to create an inclusive and sustainable Philippine start-up ecosystem starting from 2013 to 2019.
The action plan includes implementing activities either jointly or separately but cohesively.
Russell M. Pili, chief science research specialist of the DOST Philippine Council for Industry, Energy and Emerging Technology Research and Development, told the BusinessMirror that the road map will involve tackling issues and challenges, such as addressing skillset, access to funds and policy gaps, to name a few.
“We want a solid framework,” Pili said. “We will help them [start-ups] get more customers through various support systems whether it is a grant, loan or a training program.” These start-ups must have a P5 million revenue or funding—a benchmark for a stable and sustainable start-up venture.
According to Science Secretary Fortunato T. de la Peña, the collaboration among the three government departments is “very important.”
He added that the departments have already been working together before. “It’s good that there is now a formal agreement.”
The DOST, according to Pili, is “interested in improving the technologies of the start-ups so that the innovation level will also increase.”
Moreover, the DOST secretary told the BusinessMirror that the science department will continue to support the TBI operations.
A TBI is a facility designed to help and accelerate the creation and growth of technology-based start-ups through various supports, including mentorship and provision of business. De la Peña disclosed he was once a manager of a TBI in its University of the Philippines-Diliman branch in the 1990s.
Trade Secretary Ramon M. Lopez, on the other hand, expressed that his agency has been supporting the efforts of the TBI program. “We’re here for the promotion, development of inclusive innovation, innovativeness and industrialization,” Lopez said in his speech.
He added that in everything done in the start-up community, “we would like to see more market-driven solution, driven technologies, disruptive technologies and, ideally, I will go for those that would attack social problems.”
Lopez said the kind of technology and solution the department needs is a proposed unified portal system in a smartphone where Filipinos can start registering their businesses, upload documents and fill-up forms, pay and print business permit “all in 30 minutes.”
De la Peña noted that the DTI can help a lot in promoting Filipino start-ups to investors.
“They can help promote our innovative Philippine products, particularly in the bigger market and, of course, provide the various linkages that are important for terms that are operating,” he added.
Pili also said that start-ups are “a different breed” because they are technology-centered, hence, the DTI wants these to succeed because these businesses can scale up immediately.
“They can service from one to 1000 customers and if you can service a lot of customers then they can bring more income and more contribution to the country’s GDP, and we have a million of them so that’s a great contribution.”
Lopez committed that the DTI will be part of this technology start-up ecosystem “until we develop more unicorns. If you want to change that definition, at least more start-up technologies that will be sustainable,” and push for entrepreneurship mindset increasing “entrepreneurshiptensity.”
The DICT, through the tripartite partnership, pledged a better connectivity for the start-up ecosystem. “We will provide good ICT services, such as seamless Internet connectivity,” Information and Communications Acting Secretary Eliseo M. Rio Jr. told the BusinessMirror.
Rio added that as a young department created about two years ago, the DICT will be the institution that will hold together the DOST and DTI programs.
“More or less, we can say we are the ‘gel’ in what the DOST is doing—innovation, coming up with new system of things, and [the] DTI—offering quality Filipino commercial products, and put them together as information in the Internet and make business out of the virtual world,” Rio said.
De la Peña said the DICT is “important because nowadays you cannot do business without good ICT. Their main role is to provide good ICT services so that businesses in the country can work well. And there are many opportunities in ICT for start-ups. In government operations alone, the design to improve services requires a lot of ICT support and there would be opportunities for our start-ups here.”
Rio said that besides good connectivity is data security to ensure every information being put on the Web is safe and secure.
The target after the five-year road map is to have a total of 1,500 start-ups ready. Science Undersecretary Rowena L. Guevara told the BusinessMirror that from 2009 to 2018, there are already 500 start-ups supported by the science department.
“I can confidently project that we can have an additional 200 start-ups by 2019, in 2020 another 300, and in 2023, we will have an additional of 500 start-ups.”
Guevara explained that 98 percent of the country’s businesses are with the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs.)
“They [start-ups] will be part of the MSME’s, which we hope, started with TBI as a micro industry, by the time they are released they become a small enterprise then medium until they fully transform into large companies,” she added.
The undersecretary believes that by 2023, at the end of the five-year road map, the country should and could accommodate 1,000 start-ups and the support from private financial institutions should be there by then.
Image credits: Stephanie Tumampos