IdeaSpace earmarks P100 M for startups

MANILA, Philippines - IdeaSpace Foundation, the technology incubator backed by the First Pacific Group, has allotted P100 million for this year to support startups.

IdeaSpace executive director Diane Eustaquio told reporters the P100 million allotment is from the donors who have committed to provide funding to the organization until next year.

“That’s the promise of our donors, so it continues up to 2017,” she said.

After 2017, she said IdeaSpace should have enough money on the endowment fund to support its operations.

The technology accelerator which holds an annual startup competition, has opened applications for this year’s edition.

Through the IdeaSpace competition, individuals with early-stage startups can get funding and support to pursue their ideas.

Interested groups and individuals  from the Philippines and the Southeast Asian region can apply to participate in the competition by logging on ideaspacefoundation.org and submitting their startup ideas.

Based on the applications, 20 early-stage startups would be chosen and announced by July 5.

From the 20 early-stage startups, 10 would be entering the acceleration phase by August 1, and have access to up to P1 million funding which will include up to P500,000 in cash and non-cash benefits such as housing, transportation, incorporation, office space, communication, software support, trainings and classes, as well as mentoring from executives of companies under First Pacific until March 18.

Unlike the previous years, IdeaSpace will no longer have a 20 percent equity in each of the startups.

Eustaquio said the move is intended to enable startup founders to focus fully on bringing their ideas to reality and ensure the sustainability of the foundation.

“It means that if you hold on to 20 percent, you have to provide 20 percent value every year…From an operations point of view, we would always have to keep on adding members to IdeaSpace to attend to these startups and so, we would end up being like an investment firm. We were not intended to be that in the beginning. It is challenging on the resources,” she said.

For startups that have already received support in previous years, IdeaSpace would also start divesting its equity by selling shares to the founders.

“It is really up to the startup to decide if they want us to sell the shares to let’s say a bigger fund. That would be more beneficial to them because they would have access to more funding. It’s really up to them. We can only endorse to the certain companies in the MVP (Manuel V. Pangilinan) group. But it is up to entity and startup to negotiate,” Eustaquio said.