The Philippine Trade Training Center – Global MSME Academy (PTTC-GMEA), the training arm of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), launched last Sept. 14 the Push Start Business Incubation Program, a three-month program aimed at boosting local tech startups.
“We are witnessing the rapid growth of the economy, improvements in infrastructure, along with a young tech-savvy population which has been driving the demand for digital products and services. All these factors are contributing to the emergence and growth of tech startups,” DTI competitiveness and innovation group head undersecretary Rafaelita Aldaba emphasized in her speech during the launch.
Aldaba also highlighted the importance of tying up government policies and programs in order to create an enabling environment for startups and scaleups.
“The government has a role in building a robust startup ecosystem. The presence of an enabling environment is an important determinant of the development of a healthy startup system. Government policies and programs are one of the critical factors that would encourage and stimulate the growth and development of innovative startups,” she said.
PTTC-GMEA executive director Nelly Nita Dillera welcomed the inaugural batch of the Push Start Business Incubation Program, and committed to bringing in solutions-oriented program for the startups and scale ups.
“We in PTTC are committed to giving you a three-month long program that would help your tech solutions thrive and attract more venture capitalists. We will be bringing in topnotch, internationally-renowned resource persons to help you grow and be world-class, but we also hope that you help our MSMEs in their business needs — as your solutions see fit,” she said.
The following startups and scaleups will be part of the pioneering batch of the program:
For Product Management solutions:
- BENTA TV is an e-commerce solutions platform aimed at making online selling easier by equipping sellers with efficient tools such as product management, order management, payment gateways, third-party logistics, and sales tracking.
- Geopik Technologies aims to establish micro-fulfillment hubs or parcel pickup points through sari-sari stores located in Cagayan de Oro City and Davao City. Aside from reducing operational costs of logistics companies, it will also give them additional revenues to the sari-sari stores that will qualify as a micro-fulfillment hub.
For Human Resources solutions:
- Technovation LMS is a startup that aims to bring trainings to the virtual world. They envision providing course trainings with progress assessments per module per course.
For Business Management solutions:
- Empitech Startup creates technologies that enable active involvement of people to bridge the gaps in the society, assuring equity and inclusiveness.
- Rapid Signal Electronics is a startup that specializes in digitizing daily business processes such as invoicing, inventory, shipment, budgeting, and accounting.
- TOCA is an alternative delivery service and more. It aims to have an online platform for pickup requests, scheduled/on-demand delivery, parcel delivery, and personal shopper functions.
- LAMI App by Niuwa Tech aims to empower “homemaker nanays” to have their own food business and sell their homecooked meals online.
- Trippr is a travel tech startup that aims to provide tools for the tourism industry using data-driven market insights in creating trip plans.
- Zayls is a tech scaleup that empowers MSMEs to digitize their end-to-end operations by eliminating complexity.
- Panay360 is a search engine optimized website that showcases 360-degree virtual tours of establishments, landmarks, and properties in Panay Island. With its immersive experience, Panay360 envisions attracting prospective investors for the city.
- Food Ranger PH offers fast food and Halal food delivery and virtual online groceries delivery in every city. It also offers delivery of fresh seafood and fresh fruits.
- 188 Express Butuan is a startup that monitors business operations by utilizing digital platforms. It also does marketing services using any digital platform available.
For Accounting solutions:
- Taxumo is a tech scaleup focused on providing an online tax compliance tool in the Philippines – helping freelancers, self-employed professionals, small business owners and corporations file and pay for their taxes wherever they may be.
For Sales and Marketing Solutions
- The Avigate App helps merchants sell on social media by creating no-code, instant chatbots that sell for them 24/7. It is an online selling assistant to help MSMEs navigate the post-pandemic digital commerce growth.
- Citybee.ph is a community-based e-commerce marketplace for Filipino MSMEs. Anyone can sign up and start selling.
- Rafflexchange aims to provide an instant and affordable loyalty system to businesses of any size, and promote products without significantly eroding profitability compared to deals and discounts.
- The Dream Team is a startup that brings businesses to the next level by helping them operate on digital platforms. The Dream Team is committed to helping businesses experience growth by applying recent sales and marketing trends.
- Tangere is a tech scaleup that provides affordable market research to SMEs in the FMCG industries to help them know their millennial market better using big data analytics.
- Delivery Boy PH is a tech scaleup that enables MSMEs to display their products in the app for their customers. Delivery Boy PH also provides free graphic design, and creates business pages on Facebook to boost MSMEs’ online presence.
- ChatHero helps MSMEs accelerate their digital transformation by providing an affordable, easy-to-use, all-in-one sales and marketing tool kit consisting of chatbot, e-commerce site, Messenger e-commerce app, SMS and email and social media marketing, automation, and Customer Relationship Management platform essential towards driving more sales, improving brand awareness and loyalty, and increasing profit while reducing costs.
- Quick buy digitizes sari-sari stores into an e-commerce mobile application that aims to provide the community the basic needs from commodities to necessities without the need to go to the nearby supermarket or bigger grocery stores for the consumers.
- Sureplus is a tech startup that resells, repurposes, and reallocates surplus food to minimize food wastage and hunger.
For Agritech solutions:
- Ba-eng Hydroponics from Baguio City is focused on developing alternative and agricultural technologies to help urban households in creating small-scale hydroponics setups.
- Alipugpug Tech Solutions connects small scale farmers to increase their income through an automated vertical farming system made out of bamboo, which also offers a healthy market ecosystem for farmers through a digital platform that is easy to use.
- TABO App aims to directly link farmers to agricultural goods users. The app aims to do the marketing for the farmers and help them reach a wider market, eliminating the middlemen who earn more than them.
