IBM urges government to invest on information technology

One of the world’s largest computer firms has urged the government to invest on Filipinos in the field of information technology (IT) to boost the economy.

"Economies that want to win this environment need to focus on the skills that underpin their workforce and economic transformation in a global environment," said Stephen Braim, International Business Machines (IBM) Asia-Pacific vice president for governmental affairs.

"They need to know what these skills are and how to invest in them, how to foster the skills that will attract new industries and prepare their economies to ensure they remain internationally competitive and relevant."

Braim said China, Brazil and India have turned into IT giants and continuously improving their competitiveness on IT services, innovation, new technology development and global delivery.

The Philippines has also taken advantage of IT as business process outsourcing (BPO) industry has been flourishing in the country in the past years, he added.

Braim said in sustaining the momentum, the government must build stronger partnership with industry players, especially academe.

"Success requires open collaboration among academe, government and industry to transform how the pipeline of future skills is built," he said.

"These would entail integrating cross-disciplinary programs and degrees and fusing technical competency with industry-specific knowledge and business-process expertise," he said.

The country has been a top exporter of semiconductor devices, portable, digital automatic data processing machines and storage units, among others.

IBM is a partner of the Science Education Institute of the Department of Science and Technology (SEI-DOST) in a bid to improve competitiveness through science and technology human resource development.