

The Philippine startup scene: Asia’s best kept secret? - wyclif
http://sgentrepreneurs.com/commentary/2012/07/11/the-philippine-startup-scene-asias-best-kept-secret/

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sivers
Yes! Love it. I'm actually producing a book about the Entrepreneur's Guide to
the Philippines : <http://woodegg.com/ph>

If anyone's interested, or wants to contribute, or has a business they want
profiled in the book, please contact me at derek@sivers.org

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Hates_
Site needs a mailing list so I can be informed when it's released! :)

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ra
Agreed. And please add me to the list!

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jister
"One cause of this problem is an outdated curriculum that doesn’t correspond
to the needs of the industry. The academic sector has not been agile enough to
meet the human resource needs of tech startups"

...or the top developers were already pirated by big corporations in Singapore
and other countries. For example, there's a shortage of senior .Net developers
in the Philippines because most of them are working abroad.

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wyclif
It's very true that you can't expect to build a startup in the Philippines
solving first world problems.

The Filipino entrepreneurs I respect tell me that if you want to target the
largest group of consumers today, your best bet is SMS. That's where the
action is. AFAICT the RP is the texting capital of the world.

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antonioevans
Mobile is the main web connection for a lot of people in Philippines. Makes
sense they will try and tackle that first.

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john2x
"Free" texts, to be exact. 3G/4G networks in the Philippines aren't very good
or reliable. And they are expensive, so only a very small minority use them.

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chewxy
Betteridge's Law of Headlines:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridges_Law_of_Headlines>

So, I'm guessing: No.

As an aside, in this podcast [1], Johnny Arbitrage is mentioned as a model of
entrepreneur. Essentially someone who takes advantage of the difference
between the money in their own country and a cheaper country, and moves there
to try to make things happen.

Could work for many people with the Phillipines I guess.

[1] - [http://www.lifestylebusinesspodcast.com/seven-types-of-
entre...](http://www.lifestylebusinesspodcast.com/seven-types-of-
entrepreneur/)

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rubyrescue
I've tried to hire in the Philippines for 24/7 operations and have had a hard
time... there just doesn't seem to be a big community, or as the article says,
everyone leaves.

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pajop
LobangClub from Singapore has relocated to the Philippines. When I asked them
why, it's because they're convinced they could hire Python talent cheaper than
if they did it in their own country.

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echoz
That is not the only reason. There is also the issue of quantity. 1% of
Singapore is very very different from 1% of the Philippines.

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chaostheory
I think the Philippines has a lot of good entrepreneurs (both expats and
native) and for a country as a whole I can't think of anywhere else in Asia
where English is a near universal language where even the poor can speak well
enough (Singapore doesn't really count since it's more of a city state or
micro country).

Unfortunately (someone can correct me but) there a few problems with PI's
startup scene (which the article mostly mentions):

1) Most PI entrepreneurs concentrate on traditional industries (mostly in the
food sector). I rarely see companies in riskier and more innovative sectors.

2) A lot of entrepreneurs inherit their businesses.

3) Historically PI's greatest export is its English speaking workforce. To my
knowledge, it hasn't changed much. Good engineers leave for western countries
or elsewhere in Asia where both the pay and conditions are better. The
engineers that stay on a whole are sub-par. From experience, PI has a great
(manual - not automated inclined) QA workforce; programmers not so much.

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wyclif
Are there any reliable numbers on how many Filipinos are using Android?

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likarish
Neal Stephenson? Is that you?

