disruptive innovations

Last October 26, 2007, Forbes.com had this article on "A Decade of Disruption" and it's really interesting because of the the impact of these innovations in our lives in the last 10 years.

The latest post can now be found in our social media, by clicking on the gallery above.

Also, as part of our "disruption", we will transition our blog into a social media for the Filipino innovation community.

This is also in response to (UP Vice Chancellor for Research and Development) Dr. Luis Sison's advice to open our initiative to more technology groups, competitions and projects that will cater not just one sector, but for us to encourage more who are into the fields of research, inventions, collaborations, technology and innovations.

In turn, we believe that this niche will be able to reach out to more Filipinos worldwide with the convergence of new ideas and collaborations of various initiatives with the participation of more sectors in our social media.

It's also very encouraging to note that more are responding to our invitation for interviews from the different sectors such as the government agencies, academe, etc.

More on this "disruptive development" in the coming weeks...

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The Next Stage

After having the popularity of blogging and social networks, there are new things happening in the Web 2.0. A lot more experience, more visual and making us more connected to our colleagues, friends and families.

Some of these are now what we are testing which we can eventually build upon and integrate in our blog. We believe that these will help us provide more exciting functionalities and features for our readers and eventually, as our community members.

Recently, we have added newsreel, slide.com and twitter.com to add spice in the blog. Another major improvement was changing the layout to a 3-column format.

As for our feature stories and profile of tech personalities, I know that more of our technopreneurs, researchers, inventors, innovators, etc. will have an impact to all Filipinos through the blog.

More features and integration will be soon announced. So hopefully, you too will be interested to be part of our community and portal.

Indeed, this is an exciting year for Convergex Asia!

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"The Road Ahead"

When we launched this initiative in November, 2007, it was our dream to slowly make it mainstream within the year 2008.

Now, in less than 5 months of the blog's existence, we're happy to share our progress in terms of (as of March 13):

• Ads Impressions has 834 in March while February has 764
• Visitors Per Day in March is 6.58 while February has 1.24
• Pageviews in March is 207 while February has 81
• Pages/Visit in March is 2.62 while February has 2.25
• Bounce Rate in March is 60% while February has 53%
• Ave Time on Site (mins) in March is 7:32 while February has 6:09
• Absolute Unique Visitors in March is 13 while February has 4
• Loyalty of Visitors in March is 10.13% while February has 2.78%
• Visitors from different countries is 6 in March while 3 in February

And out of the hundreds of millions of websites globally, Alexa.com now ranks us at 9.3M in March, compared to 12.4M when we started. That's an increase of almost 25% in just within a month.

These very encouraging developments will give us more motivation to feature more topics for our readers and partners this year.

Especially the big leap that we have experienced with Alexa.com is an indication that the road ahead for an Innovative Collaboration Ecosystem in the Philippines is still wide and open for all of us.

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Innovation in the Philippines

"Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower." Steve Jobs, Apple Inc.

When we decided to focus on promoting our local innovations through the web last year, we believed that this will allow us to reach more people and share that there are so many things that our researchers, inventors and innovators have already created or developed.

Personally, in the many technology-focused events that we have initiated since 2000, I have observed that many of our partners such as research institutions and universities can do compete internationally, despite their limited funds.

Institutions and organizations have the following:

• DOST - Advanced Science and Technology Institute has Bayanihan Linux
• Philippine Carabao Center has started cloning researches on our buffalos
• CLIERDEC has research collaborations among its member-institutions
• DLSU - College of Computing Studies has some advanced researches like robotics
• Technological University of the Philippines has outputs ready for patents

Other developments that can push innovation to a new level:

• The national government, along with some partners, have launched the fist National Innovation Summit last November, 2007
• Cebu, for one, will stage the Cebu Business Month ICT Conference this June and will include the first Cebu International Open Source Summit with the objective of catapulting Cebu as an “Innovation Island”

In the coming months, we will feature our local innovators from different sectors such as academe, ICT, agriculture, government research, energy, telecommunications, etc.

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A New Direction in 2008

This year, we have prepared to renew and change the name of our startup, from being Convergex Asia Expositions Management to Convergex Asia Web Services, to reflect the new direction and vision which we intend to achieve for the startup for the long-term.

A new perspective of being purely an events management startup for the last 6 years to becoming an information technology services startup.

Unexpectedly, what the Department of Trade and Industry (Nueva Ecija) did approve recently was the business name Daph and Dale Web Services.

With this new development, we will be officially using the name Daph and Dale Web Services in all of our transactions and communications. (The names Daph and Dale pertains to our children, Daphnee Gail and Dale Samuel.)

We will, on the other hand, prepares to apply the names as trademarks or brand names of the Daph and Dale Web Services with the Intellectual Property Office. Moving forward, this will be our identity:

• Daph and Dale Web Services will be our legal name
• Convergex Asia will be our venture into the web services such as video blogging
• Daph and Dale will be our venture into internet cafe and related services
• Central Plains will be our venture into technology events and educational shows

With this new direction, we are optimistic that we'll be able to achieve more starting this year.

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a little about our past

Convergex Asia was established in Cabanatuan City by Melvin Ferrer and Ma. Elisa Soco in January 2000. Formerly as Maelisoft Technology, the initial objective of the events management startup was to promote the latest technologies in the province of Nueva Ecija, particularly in the field of Information Technology.

It's first-ever event was the 1st Nueva Ecija IT Expo 2000, which was supported by the following sponsors and partners: Cisco Systems, HatchAsia.com, Microdata Systems, Piltel, Villman Computers, Blas Edwards, Globe Telecoms, Wordtext Systems, MediaG8way, National Panasonic, Philippine National Police, TESDA Nueva Ecija, DTI Nueva Ecija and NE Pacific Mall.

This was participated by 1,300 college students in different colleges and universities within Nueva Ecija.

Highlight of the said event was having the support of Sen. Ramon Magsaysay, Jr. as Guest of Honor and Speaker. Another distinguished Guest of Honor was then NTC Comm. and now Nueva Ecija Gov. Aurelio Umali.

Also in that year, it was another accomplishment where the 1st Nueva Ecija Technology Congress 2000 was held. This was supported by the following: Net25 TV, De La Salle University, HatchAsia.com, John Clements IT Consulting Group, and DLSU - College of Saint Benilde.

Highlight of the event was the support of Sen. Loren Legarda as Guest of Honor and Speaker.

In 2002, more than 11,000 students participated in the 1st Nueva Ecija Interactive Science Exhibit. Some of the partners and sponsors who supported the exhibit: Philippine Science Centrum, Microsoft, Cisco Systems, Department of Science and Technology, DepEd - Nueva Ecija, DA - Phil. Carabao Center, Solar Electric Co., Pizza Hut, A&W Restaurant, Greenwich and Megacenter Mall.

Highlight of the said event was the support of DOST Sec. Estrella Alabastro as Guest of Honor and Speaker.

2004 was another milestone for Convergex. For this was the start of the Innovations Expo which became the foundation of bringing the latest local technologies and innovations to more places in the countryside.

Almost 12,000 participated in the 3-day event and was supported by the following: Filipino Inventors Society, Department of Science and Technology, Department of Energy, DepEd - Nueva Ecija, Digitel, Level-Up!, ACSAT, DigitalFilipino.com, Pizza Hut, Greenwich, Mr. Donut, DWNE Radio, Net-25 TV and Nueva Ecija National High School.

One of the highlights of the event was the support of then DOE Sec. Vincent Perez as one of our Guests of Honor.

And for the very first time, DOST Sec. Estrella Alabastro supported us again and had a greater impact on all of us with her very presence as our Guest of Honor and Speaker.

The next 2 years was another feat for our startup: bringing the Innovations Expo to 4 cities in Central Luzon with a total of almost 20,000 participants:

• Zambales National High School, Iba, Zambales
• Cabanatuan East Central School, Cabanatuan City
• Tarlac Convention Center, Tarlac City
• Liwag National High School, Gapan City

This technology roadshow featured the latest technologies, researches, inventions, innovations and collaborations from the following institutional partners and corporate sponsors:

• Central Luzon Industry and Energy Research and Development Consortium
• DA - Phil-Sino Center for Agricultural Technology
• DOST - Advanced Science and Technology Institute
• DOST - Philippine Council for Advanced Science and Technology Research and Development
• DOST - Philippine Industry and Energy Research and Development
• DOST - Philippine Nuclear Research Institute
• De La Salle University
• Digitel Philippines
• Filipino Inventors Society
• Globe Telecoms
• MediaG8way
• Polytechnic University of the Philippines
• Smart Communications
• Technological University of the Philippines
• University of the Philippines

In terms of the topics and technologies presented: agricultural innovations from DA-PhilScat, educational software from DOST-ASTI, internet access from Digitel, inventions from FIS and TUP, researches from DOST-PCIERD, DOST-PNRI, CLIERDEC, robotics from DLSU-CCS and UP-COE and mobile service from Globe and Smart.

Now with the unlimited technopreneurial opportunities being opened by the Internet for the global village, our startup will leverage its initial success to reach more people without geographical limitations.

"Knowledge is growing so fast that 90% of what we will know in 50 years time, will be discovered in those 50 years." - thetech.org

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an evolving journey

Since 2000, we have initiated various technology-focused and entrepreneurial events and projects in the Philippine countryside, from having around 1,300 participants in Cabanatuan City to almost 20,000 in various cities in Central Luzon. It was indeed a worthwhile journey!

That in the last 6 years, we have been involved in the promotion, presentation and demonstration of our local researches, world-class inventions, creative technologies and leading-edge institutions. Yes, it was indeed a fruitful endeavor!

That it was our utmost privilege to have been supported by the following:

• Sen. Loren Legarda
• former Sen. Ramon Magsaysay Jr.
• Sec. Estrella Alabastro, Department of Science and Technology
• former Sec. Butch Abad, Department of Education
• former Sec. Vincent Perez, Department of Energy
• Gov. Aurelio Umali, Province of Nueva Ecija
• former Comm. Dondi Mapa, Commission on ICT

Now moving further beyond our geographical limitations, we will always be there in the ever dynamic fields of innovation, entrepreneurship, leadership, learning and technology.

And it will be our foremost commitment to continually collaborate with our technology partners and corporate sponsors in creating an environment for our future technopreneurs, innovators and national leaders.

This is our new journey... to reach out to more people, to more places where the latest and appropriate technologies can have more impact in their lives.

So join us as we'll strengthen our foundation for an innovative collaboration ecosystem for the Philippines!

"Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower." - Steve Jobs, Apple

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