Venture capitalist a must to boost IT sector growth

Cebu needs to form a "venture capitalists community" to fully realize its bid to become the Silicon Valley in the Philippines, and take advantage of the ample Information Technology (IT) talents here.

This according to Filipino technologist and IT expert Dennis Ramon Posadas during his talk in the recently culminated three-day 2nd Cebu ICT Strategy Summit.

"I see extraordinary talents here. Why are they not competing with the rest of the world? A venture capital concept must be organized to nurture and make your talents' invention profitable in the world," Posadas said.

Venture capitalists are businessmen who will take advantage of a good concept or IT development product and would offer to fund the idea, as well as market the product.

While Cebu is strongly positioning to become the Silicon Valley in the Philippines, a Venture Capital concept must be fully developed here. Otherwise, the talents will be pirated by other countries, or multinational companies.

Likewise, outgoing commissioner of Commission of Information Communication Technology (CICT) Dondi Mapa echoed Posadas' suggestion, saying "Cebu has to find a way to put together geeks or technology talented persons, and entrepreneurs," to develop a vibrant IT sector here.

With the financial limitations of the government to support the growth of the IT sector, Posadas said a Venture Capital concept must take the lead in boosting the industry, to fund the bright technology-based inventions of Cebuano talents.

He reiterated that what is important for a location to be successful as an IT hub, is the ample stories of innovation, wherein a number of success stories will be highlighted.

Without the help from the wealthy capitalists, brilliant ideas for innovation may be in vain, as IT professionals mostly do not have financial backbone to further develop their programs and concepts and promote it to the market.

Posadas added that the IT industry, such as in Cebu, would need a strong partnership with the capitalists, as well as the academe, to forge trust and confidence of every undertaking to be pursued by techno-preneur.

Techno-preneurs in Cebu, or the startup companies are operating within their own financial capacity, while trying to market their products to the domestic market. Some in fact have already closed shop, and programmers or good IT innovators decided to find greener pastures abroad.

Few years back, Ayala Group attempted to create the "idea farm" facility in Cebu, wherein it encouraged techno-preneurs to present their concepts involving innovation and the Ayala Group supposedly served as the Venture Capitalist once the company sees a huge business potential from a concept. However, the project was later called off.

Without a venture capitalist, a potential idea may be wasted, while only those few techno-preneurs who have good monetary back up will be able to make it through.

"Cebu has an advantage, you have to work hand in hand, from there you can develop a lot of world competitive technology-based inventions," Posadas said.