IBM opens R & D innovation center in the Philippines

Seeking to better enable Philippine programmers to develop software to penetrate world markets, IBM Corp. formally opened recently its IBM Innovation Center at the UP-Ayala Technopark in Diliman, Quezon City; it is Big Blue’s 40th globally and third in Southeast Asia.

At the press briefing inside the UP-Ayala Technopark compound, top IBM Corp. officials led by its General Manager for independent Software Vendors and Developer Relations James Corgel told reporters that the site would primarily be a testing center for Philippine-based developers to test their programs to determine if they were world class enough technically and could therefore be marketed abroad.

The tests would be done with the aid of IBM technical experts and computers and other IT equipment that ran the programs under various operating conditions expected if used worldwide. The developers would be registered as IBM business partners with varied terms for partnership agreements even as the testing would be free.

Corgel told reporters that opening of the center was the natural consequence of the Philippines having achieved a solid reputation globally as a provider of BPO services. IBM would now help the country achieve one-step higher the value chain by offering customers abroad quality software.

“The timing is now right for us to enter the Philippines,” the New York-based Corgel said.

Corgel added that the IBM Innovation Center would open its doors to all kinds of developers in the Philippines, including technically savvy teenagers with innovative ideas for new computer programs. As such, they would first have to be accredited as IBM business partners, but this could be done even online.

In a brief interview with The Manila Times shortly before the briefing, IBM Philippines country leader for ISV and developer relations, Iris Hester Tan Chiu, said many small information technology enterprises in the Philippines had complained about the lack of sufficient testing facilities in the country to assure the quality of their computer programs. Thus, the need for facilities such as the IBM Innovation Center.

Meanwhile, information contained in press kits furnished to reporters said the center would enable development of world-class software in several sectors such as banking, energy, telecommunications, transportation, retail and government.

At the briefing, Corgel explained that there would be different degrees of arrangements of terms with IBM Corp. A check by The Times of the innovation center’s Website showed the highest level would involve joint marketing strategies.

The intermediate level would involve enhanced marketing and training support while the basic level would mean information and enablement tools for the partner.

Corgel said the IBM Innovation Center in the Philippines formed part of the US $2.5 billion IBM Corp. had invested worldwide since 1989 in the formation of such centers.

Some of its other centers are in Chicago, Dallas, Barcelona, Shanghai, Sao Paulo and Moscow.

In Southeast Asia, it also has centers in Ho Chi Minh City and Kuala Lumpur.

At the briefing, Corgel said that Big Blue had signed up 250 business partners for its innovation center at a recent event at the Asian Institute of Management and said they were young as well as innovative. –IKE SUAREZ CORRESPONDENT, Manila Times