Keeping pace with demands, CEDF-IT evolves into CIB.0

Francis Monera, CIB.0 chairman (center), discusses their new organization, Cebu IT/BPM.Organization (CIB.0) during a press briefing after its launching at the Marco Polo Plaza hotel. With him during Monday’s CIB.0 launching are (from left) Gregg Gabison, CIB.0 president, and Jun Sa-a, CIB.0 managing director.
CDN PHOTO/LITO TECSON

The Cebu Educational Development Foundation for Information Technology (CEDF-IT) will now be known as Cebu IT/BPM.Organization or CIB.O.
With the Information Technology/Business Process Management (IT/BPM) industry projected to continue its exponential growth, a foundation created 16 years ago has evolved into a full-time industry organization that will provide not only manpower development services but also marketing and promotion to cement Cebu’s image as a preferred destination for companies offering higher-end outsourcing services.

The organization launched its new name at the 2017 Transformation Summit yesterday, May 22, 2017 at the Marco Polo Plaza Cebu.

CEDF-IT and CIB.O

CEDF-IT was founded in 2001 after an IT Summit to address the gap issue between available talent produced by educational institutions in Cebu and the industry requirement.

Since then, the industry has seen robust growth with more companies setting up offices in Cebu.

Members of the CEDF-IT board, however, saw a new need in the industry, which includes not only manpower development but also to push Cebu more at the forefront of the fast-changing demands in the industry, hence the need to relaunch and evolve into CIB.O.

CIB.O is a consortium of 128 member companies and organization including IT/BPM companies, academe, support groups, government agencies and civil organizations who work together to create solutions and programs for the industry.

According to Francis O. Monera, CIB.O chairman, CIB.O’s vision is to make Cebu the preferred IT/BPM location for higher value IT and IT-enabled services.

These are the same elements that CEDF-IT had been following for the last 16 years.

“The organization will retain these elements but with an expanded coverage,” he said.

CIB.O complements the industry players by providing services not only on human resource development but also marketing and infrastructure that will help further promote Cebu as a preferred IT destination for higher-value services.

Collaboration

“In Cebu, it’s all about collaboration,” said Monera.

Collaboration, innovation and excellence are said to be the characteristics to observe as they move forward.

“The city of Cebu is very supportive,” adding that Cebu City is one of the major sponsors of yesterday’s event.

CIB.O’s Board of Trustees is comprised of representatives of different IT/BPM companies including their chief executive officers and deans from different universities and colleges.

The 2017 Transformation Summit covered various topics for the informational talks by different speakers.

Services sector

In a recent news conference, Philippine Statistics Authority in Central Visayas (PSA-7) Regional Director Ronaldo C. Taghap said the combined income from the different subsectors grouped under the services sector had the biggest contribution to the region’s GRDP growth with 55.5 percent share in 2016.

The services sector, which includes the IT/BPM industry, registered a product of P291.6 billion.

National Economic Development Authority Regional Director Efren Carreon said they expect the services sector to continue to bring in the bulk of the region’s GRDP fueled by the continued expansion in the IT/BPM industry.

Sophisticated services

“The growth momentum of the IT/BPM industry is expected to be sustained in 2017. Although the growth of investments in the industry may no longer be as high as earlier years, the expansion of the industry will be more on the sophisticated services offered,” said Carreon.

He added that the region expects the entry of more BPM companies that require higher-skilled tasks as the Philippine outsourcing industry in general shifts to higher-level services.

This is where CIB.O wants to touch base — to make Cebu ready for the more sophisticated services and be known globally as a preferred destination for companies looking for the higher-skilled talents, said Monera.

These include computer developers and talents for cloud computing and analytics.

Roadmap

“Based on the 2022 Roadmap of the IT-Business Process Association of the Philippines, revenues of the BPO sector would reach US$40 billion by the end of 2022. The industry is expected to generate 7.6 million direct and indirect jobs by then,” said Carreon.

In Cebu, Carreon estimated the number of people hired in the IT/BPM sector to have already reached the 100,000 level.