FOLLOWING the success of the first Geeks on a Beach (GOAB) held in August last year in Boracay, the organizers thought of bringing the second run in one of the country’s fastest growing business hub also known for its pristine blue water beaches—Cebu.
The event is slated on August 21 to 22 at the Movenpick Hotel Mactan Island Cebu, said Tina Amper, TechTalks.ph founder and co-organizer of GOAB2 during last Monday’s briefing.
For the second run, Amper said they are targeting to gather again 300 “geeks” from around the world to meet and possibly find partners just like what happend last year when startup companies meet investors and established partnerships.
“Events like GOAB that help provide a venue to gather the right people together and help kickstart our startup community. Filipinos are good in development and not only in call centers and we need to show this to the world,” Amper said.
GOAB is an event they have conceptualized which focuses on startups, technology and design. It was held in Boracay last September where it brought together startup founders, investors, technologists, developers, designers, journalists and
writers.
Amper said that being the second biggest business process outsource center in the Philippines, Cebu will make a great venue for their international conference.
“We want to be holistic -we want to meet your business requirements and also make you happy at the same time and build network connections,” she added.
She also said they wanted to shed light on the natural disasters that hit Cebu last year, and promise to give a portion of their proceeds to help victims of the earthquake and supertyphoon Yolanda.
“We picked the location right after the big earthquake and the typhoon and we wanted to showcase Cebu and Bohol and shed light to what’s happening,” she said.
Just like last year, Amper said they are expecting participants from all over the world to join their unique startup conference.
“We make it easy for everyone to connect during the conference,” she said.
Speakers for this GOAB 2 include Bowei Gai of World Startup Report, Maria Ressa of Rappler, Jason Torres of Proudcloud, Khailee Ng of 500 Startups, and Stephen Jagger of PayrollHero.com.
Dave Overton, the founder of Sym.ph and also an organizer of GOAB 2, said that participants can expect the same tracks from last year’s GOAB, which includes design and gaming, developers and technology, and businesses and management.
GOAB 2 is organized by TechTalks.ph and the Department of Science and Technology-Information and Communications Office (DOST-ICTO), Sym.ph, HappyGaraje and PRWorks Vis-Min.
DOST-ICTO has allocated P450,000 funding for the event this year./Reporter Aileen Garcia-Yap and UP Intern Angeli Sarmiento