Vietnamese software company to invest on local music app

PARTNERS. FPT Software Philippines inks a partnership with Cebu Music stalwarts. (L-R) Do Tuan Anh, FPT Software Philippines managing director; Hoang Viet Anh, FPT Software CEO; Cattski Espina, 22 Tango Records founder; Jude Gitamondoc, Kadasig co-founder; and Giogines Teves, FPT Software Philippines chief of sales and business development. (CDN PHOTO/CHRISTIAN MANINGO)

A Vietnamese software development company based in Cebu plans to spend at least P1 million to create an online streaming app for homegrown music.

FPT Software Philippines has partnered with local music stalwarts to develop IslaTunes, which is expected to be available for download by February 2017, as a way to support the music industry here.

“Almost all the time, a lot of our guys in the office listen to local music. So we thought of putting up a ‘home’ for homegrown music,” Gio Teves, chief of sales and business development, said during the partnership signing in FPT’s office at Cebu IT Park on Wednesday.

Teves said the app is probably worth around P1 million to develop, but the total investment for the project, which includes marketing and promotions, is not fixed.

This comes three months after the company made its services available to the local market, following more than one year of operations in Cebu serving international clients.

Among the services offered by the firm are cloud professional services, application services, business application, product engineering services, mobility, legacy migration, QA testing and BPO solutions.

Passion for music

Teves said he hopes the app will not only be a platform for Cebuano musicians alone to showcase their craft but also for other local artists across the country.

Hoang Viet Anh, FPT Software chief executive officer, said he fully supports the idea of developing an app for homegrown music.

“I really like it. I support it because it is a really sustainable business model. Filipinos like music a lot and so there is much passion in developing this app,” he said.

FPT Software Philippines managing director Do Tuan Anh, meanwhile, assured their new partners of the company’s commitment to the investment.

The software company, which is the local branch of Vietnam’s biggest information technology (IT) conglomerate, sought the help of Kadasig and 22 Tango Records.

Cebuano counterparts

Kadasig, represented by Cebu-based songwriter, record producer and musical director Jude Gitamondoc, is a crowd-funding project aimed at producing more Bisaya songs in 2017.

22 Tango Records, meanwhile, is a nontraditional independent record label based in Cebu and owned by singer-songwriter Cattski Espina.

Gitamondoc and Espina are in charge of curating content to ensure that only the best homegrown music and videos go into the app for fans around the world to enjoy.

Espina, who has been in the music industry for over a decade, said she hoped the app will bring out more artists who are “hiding” because they don’t have a platform.

She added that this would also become a tool to provide the local music scene structure.

Gitamondoc, on the other hand, said having the app will definitely level up Bisaya music.

“Another place to be heard is not a bad thing,” he said.

FPT Software, with its headquarters in Hanoi, Vietnam, was established on Jan. 13, 1999, and has more than 9,000 workers worldwide.

The company branched out to Cebu City last March 27, 2015, with 100 staff members assigned locally and internationally.

At present, the company has 20 clients here and overseas in various industries such as IT applications, product engineering, commerce, communication, media and entertainment and nongovernment organizations.