Young entrepreneurs and business leaders gathered at Green Sun Hotel in Makati City on Oct. 22 for Bootstrap Manila 2016, a startup and innovation conference.
Organized by two of the country’s leading co-working spaces and incubator/accelerator hubs—Impact Hub Manila and Launchgarage—the one-day conference presented bright ideas from the ecosystems of Berlin, Bangalore, Jakarta and Manila.
Bootstrap Manila is a part of the StartHubs AsiaBerlin Roadshow that ran from Oct. 18 to 27, with Bangalore as the first stop, followed by Manila and Jakarta.
StartHubs AsiaBerlin is a project initiated by the Berlin Ministry of Economic Affairs in collaboration with the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH.
It seeks to shed light on the four important startup hubs and build an open platform for interconnectivity, networking, direct communication and cooperation and collaboration among the partner cities. It is funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Delegates kicked off the Manila leg of the roadshow with a tour of the world-class Manila Fame, Design and Lifestyle Event, at the World Trade Center, and an al fresco dinner at Nayong Pilipino’s Orchidarium at Rizal Park, Manila on Oct. 21. Both activities were hosted by the Department of Trade and Industry’s Slingshot Philippines, a program that aims to nurture and grow the local ecosystem through capacity building, funding and policy support for startups.
Senen Perlada, DTI’s Export Marketing Bureau director, recognized the importance of startups. “Creativity and innovation are the currency of today,” he said.
Impact Hub Manila’s co-founder LizAn Kuster and Launchgarage’s Jay Fajardo opened the whole day conference on Oct. 22. Kuster delivered an insightful introduction on what it means to bootstrap as an entrepreneur.
“Bootstrapping is more than just building your solutions without external fundings. It means growing your enterprise with people and connections. Thus StartHubs AsiaBerlin is extremely valuable for our ecosystem,” Kuster said.
Rainer Seider, head of the International Unit for Cooperation of the Berlin Ministry for Economic Affairs, described Berlin’s diverse and vibrant ecosystem and outlined the goals and plans of StartHubs AsiaBerlin to create a “single intercontinental startup ecosystem through structured channels, such as a online platform which will launch soon and everyone can join” despite each city’s different intricacies.
Seider was joined by other members of the keynote panel – Deepash Agarwal of MoveInSync from Bangalore; Fajar Anujerah from Bali Recycling; Ces Rondario, Impact Hub Manila co-founder; and Jay Fajardo.
Moderated by Kuster, the panelists shared the characteristics, strengths, challenges and opportunities of their respective ecosystems.
Following the keynote panel was Geraldine de Bastion, founder of Global Innovation Gathering, a network of grassroots innovators, social entrepreneurs, founders, makers and hackers. Speaking about Innovation in the Global South, she showed examples of innovative and creative ideas and solutions from GIG’s network.
Yathan Blumenthal, founder and accelerator chief of Hardware Co., talked about accelerating business, methodologies and co-working, based on first-hand credible experience and the successful Berlin-based co-working hub, Betahaus.
Luis Buenaventura of Bloom Solutions and a cryptocurrency and fintech expert spoke about blockchains and how the Philippines was starting to use it in remittances.
Paula Schwarz, founder of Startupboat, gave a personal account of how her growing up years in a Greek island contributed to her work with migrant refugees landing in their shores. Startupboat leads a program for workplace and community integration for refugees.
Ibba Rasul-Bernardo showed the audience how DSCVR, an app that creates 360 VR stories, works while Manny Ayala, managing director of Endeavor Philippines, a global non-profit, gave an inspiring talk about high-impact entrepreneurship.
Bootstrap Manila 2016 was sponsored by Slingshot Philippines, Proudcloud, Nayong Pilipino, UHop, and Signature Ads.