START UP WEEKEND DAVAO 3

That time of the year is here again when budding entrepreneurs both young and mature alike brew up a dizzying brainstorm of ideas to pitch and work on as their own startups in all of 54 hours. Organized here in Davao by Dulce Lada, Gay Viray, Angel Abella, and our very own CEO John Naranjo, this is the 3rd Startup Weekend here in the city.

This year, Ingenuity is again one of the sponsors and Pat, Andrea, Nap, and myself went to volunteer our services to the event. It was a busy busy day since there were a lot of attendees this year.

Of the 74 total participants, 41 pitched their ideas. The Finster Bldg. conference hall at the Ateneo de Davao  University where the event was held this year, was a flurry of activities as idea pitchers began selling their ideas to their peers. Of the 41 ideas, 12 were chosen to be this year's potential startups.

As usual, mentors were at hand to provide their respective expertise, industry and business know-how to the budding entrepreneurs. They were:

• Marx Consuegra - Designer, Lightning Web Apps, PageSnapp, DGDC
• Pia Bernal - Social Enterprise Investments Manager, Kickstart Ventures
• Yosuke Fukada - CEO, YOYO Singapore
• Rey Rubio - CEO, CubePixels
• Ted Padova - Dean, Phil. College of Technology
• Wesley Chiongbian - CEO, mynimo.com
• Gil Padua - CEO, InfinityHub.com
• Eric Su - CEO, Lifebit/Twidl Inc.
• Jason Torres - CTO, ProudCloud
• Jay Basañes - CTO, Twidl Inc.
• Christian Foster - Technical Director, Bywave
• Ferdie Macatangay - Country Channels Manager, IBM Phils.
• Simplicio Jison Jr. - CEO, Accelerate Desk

some of the organizers and mentors + judge Ravi

The judges this year were composed of the best and the brightest in the IT community. The group, CEOs and Founders and bigwigs in the industry, was very forthcoming with their critiques on the presentations and gave good advice to the would-be businessmen, as well as offered in-depth and very constructive ideas for the betterment of the Startup Weekend event here in the city.

• Joey Gurango - CEO & Founder, Gurango Software
• Ravi Agarwal - CEO & Founder, EngageSPARK; Angel Investor
• Wit Holganza - CEO, NanoScript; ZipIT Solutions
• Rhett Jones - CEO, Synacy
• JP Bisson - CEO, ClickingLabs
• Harm Rietjens - CEO, Caresharing
• Fred Amores - Program Manager, DOST-ICTO ICT Industry Devt. Group

The event winners were CITIHUB an app for places & events at a certain locality (1st), INSTARENT a web/mobile platform for searching and matching rentals (2nd), and HEALTHLINK an app that connects patients and doctors whenever, wherever (3rd). 

We at Ingenuity are very proud of the CITIHUB group since one of their members is our past OJT Trainee JV Dagaang. He was also mentioned specifically by the judges as having a very clean, very streamlined design for their winning app! Congratulations!

CitiHub winners (JV in Earth Day shirt) and the organizers

After the event, participants, kibitzers, judges, mentors, and everyone proceeded to Primo Grill for a nightcap (beers & rousing intelligent conversation). Everyone got to meet and had a chance to converse with the mentors and judges, especially those who jetted to Davao just for the occasion.

the judges with the Ingenuity boys + Angel

All in all, it was another year of success! Hopefully, by the next Startup Weekend, we can have more hands-on organizers, volunteers, and support group so that our beloved event would get elevated to the next level. Go, we can do it!

Special thanks are also in order for Dom Cimafranca, Asst. Dean of Computer Studies at the Ateneo de Davao University for his full support to SWDavao3. And of course, to all the volunteers who devoted their time and efforts for a whole weekend just to see this event to the end, you are priceless! To our very own NAP CALUB, reprezheeent!

Dom Cimafranca

Nap Calub - MVP Volunteer :)