Pilosopong Rodec is the founding Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Pilosopong Tasyo Technopreneurs Multipurpose Cooperative. It was initiated by students and alumni of the Master of Technology Management program of the Technology Management Center(TMC) of UP Diliman. Technology Management is a graduate business degree similar to an MBA (Master of Business Administration); however, it focuses on using technology as leverage for corporate growth and competitiveness. We take inspiration from "Pilosopong Tasyo", a fictional character in "Noli Me Tangere" by Dr. Jose P. Rizal, our National Hero. He is potrayed as an old man with revolutionary ideas ahead of his time. Because of fear of the Spaniards, he writes backwards so that few could read his writings. This is because he doesn't write for his current generation, he writes for the future. Like him, we see that what we want is difficult to attain and we may or may not be able to attain our goals within the current generation. But we will strive on. Because we are not fighting just for the current generation, we are fighting for the future.Physicist. Engineer. Entrepreneur.
As an Applied Physics student of the National Institute of Physics, UP Diliman, Rodec has seen the scientific and technological capability of Filipinos. Because of scientists like Dr. Caesar Saloma, Dr. Vincent Daria and his other lab-mates at the Instrumentation Physics Laboratory, he is convinced that in terms of brain matter, Filipinos can compete with the best in the world. Unfortunately, few people know them and their scientific contributions. He thinks that it is because their work is too high tech to be understood and be beneficial to ordinary Filipinos. He was struck by the question poised by one of the thesis evaluators after the thesis defense of a batchmate regarding cosmic gravitation, "OK naman 'yan thesis mo. Pero paano 'yan makakatulong sa Pilipinas?" [ You're thesis is good but how could it help the Philippines?] Because of this, he became an engineer instead of pursuing higher studies in Physics.
He took up MS Electrical Engineering Major in Computers and Networking at the College of Engineering, UP Diliman. He also worked as an Electronics Engineer for Micrologic Systems and the Advanced Science and Technology Institute of the Department of Science and Technology. As an engineer, he is able to develop products and systems that improve people's lives. But besides his industrial automation project with the Metro Cebu Water District that remotely control and monitor their pumping stations that supply water to Southern Cebu City, his and his co-worker's other projects failed to leave the laboratory, failed to change people lives.
He realizes that to commercialize technology, there are numerous 'non-technical' stuff he has to learn. Ideally, there must be a support structure that commercializes technology developed in the university. It is part of the innovation process of many countries but it is not present here in the Philippines. After spending several years as part of the academe and several years more as a government researcher, he realizes that the government and the academe are not able to commercialize technology not because they don't want to, but because they can't. Their primary concern is the development of science and technology and that is what they do best and the systems and policies that guides their operation is geared towards that goal. Unfortunately, that focus on research also set up barriers against commercialization of the technology because the academe and government research agencies are not meant to commercialize the researches. Commercialization is the role of the industrial sector with the academe and the government as support. Wishing to developed an Innovation System that is applicable in the Philippine setting, Rodec, an engineer, decided that he must commercialize technologies himself by becoming an entrepreneur.
He took up a Master in Technology Management at the Technology Management Center of UP Diliman and started his own company, i-ARC System Integrators (http://i-arcsys.blogspot.com). He tried answering the question of how a Filipino scientist or an engineer could become a technopreneur. He read a lot of books but most of them are about the experiences in the US, Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, etc but none in the Philippine setting. There are local books in entrepreneurship but they deal with traditional businesses rather that technology-based enterprises.
He learned the concept of the National Innovation System and how and why it is almost non-existent in the Philippines. He studied the Innovation System of other countries but he thinks that we can't adopt their policies. Each country is unique and just as they have developed their own innovation system, we should, too. The main weakness of the Philippine Innovation System is the linkage between technology developers and technology users. Ideally, there should be systems and policies that links the two and he hope that there would be one.. someday. In the meantime, he would like to share ideas and suggestions how the lone entrepreneur -- the smallest possible unit of collaboration -- could bridge the gap. Using the availability of knowledge on the Internet, advances in Information and Communication Technology, and the Rapid Product Development and Rapid Enterprise Development Methodology he developed, Filipino technopreneurs can complete the Innovation Chain. In lieu of nationwide policy changes which he can do nothing about, he calls for a 'mindset' change or a philosophical change in Filipino entrepreneurs. If we couldn't do anything about the problem, let us change how we view and react to the problem.
He was suppose to write a book but, instead, he wrote this blog. He would like to form a globally competitive company and he believes that there shouldn't just be one company, there should be hundreds and thousands. In the face of global competition, one Filipino company couldn't do it alone. It must be supported by numerous other local companies. Through this blog, he hopes to guide and inspire other Filipino entrepreneurs to envision a future where global Filipino companies is the norm rather than the exception.
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