Supply chain issues that rendered flat the growth rates of many global and local industries in 2021 and 2022 are expected to vastly improve and make for a promising economic outlook for 2023, SARTiNE chief executive officer Renesar A. Deunida told Manila Standard in an exclusive interview over the weekend.
“It’s apt that we’ll be ushering in the Year of the Rabbit because the world is now ready to race anew at full speed,” a voluble Deunida said in his Makati City office. “We took tentative steps to adapt to the new normal in the year about to end, but bold, full strides are what’s required for 2023.”
For his fearless forecast, Deunida said manufacturing and agriculture, as well as travel, tourism, and digital advertising are sectors that need to take advantage of the country’s momentum in a year that saw it elect a new chief executive in President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
Deunida said that SARTiNE, as a leading digital ad marketing player with a number of allied firms under its wings, fully intends to continue going from strength to strength with its media, brand and public service clients in a post-COVID pandemic world.
In 2022, SARTiNE powered several political personalities to poll victories, including two top vote-getting senators, a congressman from Mindanao who won big despite being given just a yeoman’s chance, and the mayor of the most progressive city in the country.
Through snazzy short-form videos that are the most desired digital ad medium today, SARTiNE fanned massive public interest for the opening and full operation of the Metro Pacific Tollways Corporation’s (MPTC) Cebu Cordova Link Expressway (CCLEX) during the holding of a star-studded ironman competition there in August.
SARTiNE also teased a heart-tugging clip on how the Bench clothing company, a valued long-standing partner, has harkened back to the good old days by practically adopting its workers as family members—from earning their first peso, getting married, having children, working up the career ladder, growing old and retiring with Bench.
Deunida told MST that a full-length documentary for Bench’s 35th founding anniversary is in the works and would be out soon.
There’s a lot to be thankful about for the past three years despite COVID-19, said Deunida, who logged in decades abroad as an information technology specialist for the United Nations, World Health Organization and also banking behemoth HSBC.
And there’s a lot to be hopeful for insofar as 2023 is concerned, he added, chuckling as he enthused that “only the harebrained would be caught with a slow foot in the Year of the Rabbit.”
“Just days back, the Asian Development Bank revised its September growth forecast of 6.5 percent to 7.4 percent for the Philippines in 2022,” he said.
“Notwithstanding growth seen to slow down to 6.0 percent in 2023 from 6.3 percent year-on-year, that’s something to toast the dawning New Year for,” Deunida added.
Coming off a whirlwind tour of tech conferences in the United States, Deunida pointed out that quicker inflation in Q4 and a sharp slowdown in the GDP growth of European and North American countries should not serve as a damper to a bright outlook.
He explained that even at its low end hovering around 6.5 percent, the Philippines’ GDP, as noted by the ADB, would remain within the high range compared to the 5.5 percent growth forecast for the whole of Southeast Asia.
“What does this mean for digital advertising? Forbes, citing Magna’s forecast for 2023, says global ad spending revenue for media owners would total $833 billion, up five percent year-on-year,” he said.
“Traditional media like MST has certainly positioned itself to get a slice of the pie with your foray into digital. There are a lot of potential revenues to spread out and partnerships, as we speak, are being formed,” he said.
Among digital advertisers and media outfits, there’s a move, aided by governments, to force the tech giants manning the social media platforms to share ad revenues, the SARTiNE chief said.
While there’s a natural resistance from social media platforms to share income as even they are hit by financial constraints leading to mass lay-offs, Deunida said it’s not always sound, sane, or prudent to be picking up fights.
“As Bugs Bunny famously said to Yosemite Sam, ‘if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em,’” Deunida said, laughing. “Now that’s a giveaway as to my generation. Seriously, we dash or sprint—pardon the repetitiveness—but 2023 is a time to go on a full gallop. No one needs to be left behind.”