Venture capitalists may cushion US bill impact

CEBU, Philippines -  Now that the voice Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) is threatened by the pending US bill on outsourcing, it is all the more important for Cebu to develop the Venture Capital (VC) market to maturity as a BPO-IT destination.

Jerry Rapes, chairman of the Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry BPO-IT committee said that what’s missing in Cebu right now, amid its dynamic environment for BPO and ICT, is the serious development for VC community.

“We need more people, capitalists in Cebu to start investing in technology. Although, it’s not that simple, but we can learn from successful VC companies in Manila, and even in other countries,” said Rapes, who is also the president of Filipino-owned large outsourcing firm Global eXist.

Rapes suggested that there should be more interaction between potential Cebu technology capitalists, and that of the Manila-based venture capitalists.

In order to develop a mature eco-system as a BPO-IT destination, Rapes said VC should be there to encourage the potential talents to make their creations make it into the commercial sphere.

Cebu cannot take off as a BPO and IT hub, there is no strong support from the Venture Capitalists.

Although, creating a VC market is not easy, and simple, businessmen in Cebu should also see the potential putting off funding to support the local talents especially in software development, engineering, among others.

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

However, the formation of a group of Venture Capitalists here would entail a taskful study on how to go about it, including the establishment of good mechanism that would give an effective venture capital market in Cebu.

Ideas for start-up businesses that could be funded through Venture Capital would not only limit to Information Technology (IT) related start-ups, but it would fund feasible ideas from the grassroots, or those business concepts that are produced by students.

Although, this idea has been floated in Cebu in the last couple of years, this opportunity has not been seriously taken into consideration by businessmen here.

In 2007, Cebuano entrepreneur-advocates started to consider the VC idea, however up to this time the formation of venture capitalism Cebu still remains floating.

Venture Capitalism, is only known most especially in the IT sector, of which in other countries, successful businessmen grouped together to fund good projects in relation to IT products and services.

Aside from lack of technical awareness in creating a good VC community in Cebu, CCCI past president Francis O. Monera said the government still has to settle some regulatory rules, specifically in protecting the Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), before VC culture could take off.

Monera said there are a lot of IT entrepreneurs in Cebu that have good concepts, ideas, however, both IT geeks, and capitalists still has to meet half-way on how to come up with good strategy for IPR, as current process is too complicated.

 “We need to improve the IPR side,” said Monera, who is also the chairman of the board of the Cebu Educational Development for Information Technology Inc., or Cedfit.

Last year, industry leaders in Cebu expressed interest to pursue the VC culture here, to push Cebu’s bid into becoming the next “Silicon Valley.”

Businessmen are encouraged to embrace the VC concept, as this is one of the measures that indicate the maturity of an ICT industry, said Rapes.—(FREEMAN)