RCG Global Services President & CEO Robert Simplot, RCD-ODC President and Managing Director Richard McGonegal, executives and staff of RCG Information Technology Philippines, ladies and gentlemen, a pleasant evening to you all.
First of all, I would like to congratulate RCG Information Technology Philippines on the occasion of your 25th anniversary. I didn’t realized there are two celebrations this evening, of course the 25th anniversary of your company RCG Information Technology Philippines and the farewell party for Rick, he spent more than 20 years in the Philippines. Thank you for inviting me to share this celebration Your presence here for the past 2-1/2 decades confirms that this country’s attraction is a top-tier destination for various IT-BPM services. This is the first time that I’m attending a dinner meeting that starts 7:00 PM and ends at 11:00 PM, it shows your attuned to the working hours with the country which is located in the other side of the world. Your presence here also demonstrates our shared history in the growth of the Philippine IT-BPM sector. We at DTI have supported the IT-BPM industry through appropriate policies and services, and we are glad that you have taken advantage of the opportunities that we have offered to companies like yours.
Over the years, the IT-BPM sector has evolved to high-value services such as global shared services, IT and software, health care, data analytics, and artificial intelligence (AI). Of course, your company has always been in a higher type of outsource service. The IT-BPM boom was evident last year in its 10.6% revenue increase to over USD 29 billion, about 9% of our country’s gross domestic products and its 9.1% total headcount price to 1.44 million Filipino workers.
As you navigate your next 25 years in the country, may I share with you the following developments for the Philippine-based IT-BPM and digital companies?
We have been developing a robust digital infrastructure. We have international and domestic connectivity with 14 sub-sea cable systems, connecting us with the countries beyond our shore, 12 cable landing stations, 2 million kilometers of fiber optic network within the country, 9 major internet exchanges, 35 cloud service providers, and 4 network backbones. We host 12 major commercial data center providers operating 25 major commercial data centers, and these data centers possess an estimated total rack capacity of 19,000 units.
The thriving Philippine business process outsourcing industry has laid the groundwork for hyperscalers, data centers, and telecommunications infrastructure and services companies. Our prosperous BPO industry is undergoing rapid migration to the cloud as Future of Work programs are bridging the urban-rural divide. The pandemic has expedited the adoption of cloud-based services. Philippine enterprise spending is expected to grow from USD1.8 billion in 2020 to USD2.6 billion in 2024, as cited by GlobalData, a leading data analytics company.
A favorable regulatory environment, including relevant laws ensuring data protection and well-defined data ownership, is part of our government’s effort to support the industry. Foreign investors can enjoy a variety of tax incentives and are now abled up to 100% ownership of public service companies.
We have a growing digital and economic profile among our 112 million population. We have the second highest number of mobile phone connections in Southeast Asia and we Filipinos, are the heaviest internet users in the world, spending an average of 10.5 hours online daily.
Furthermore, we are implementing our Artificial Intelligence Roadmap that provides for the establishment of the Center for Artificial Intelligence Research. We launched this AI research center in Laguna last month with the innovation hub of UnionBank. AI Adaption can enable the country to tap vast opportunities to help maintain the regional and global competitiveness of industries, prepare the future workforce for future jobs, and attract the AI R&D of multinational and big tech companies to locate in the Philippines. The Center is structured as a public-private partnership. It will serve as a hub for data scientists and researchers to perform collaborative AI research, provide consultancy services, create AI tech products, and conduct data literacy programs. The intention of this AI research center is really to support smaller companies because the large ones are now accessing AI through contract work with established centers in many parts of the world.
We are also building another innovation center, the Industry 4.0 Pilot Factory, which will serve as a platform for a collaborative learning environment for manufacturing enterprises. The Pilot Factory will teach and demonstrate Industry 4.0 management and production technology (robots, automation, Internet of Things, smart factory), especially to MSMEs, researchers, and universities. It will serve as a co-maker and co-working space for R&D and prototyping activities, so we have a sandbox-type of operation there. We also innovated in south of Manila where most of the ecozones are located. Our technical partner for the Pilot Factory is Siemens of Germany.
The current Administration puts digitalization front and center in our development efforts to realize the vision of a digitally transformed Philippine economy. Our strength in the IT-BPM sector will help us traverse the path toward a modern, sustainable, and technologically adaptive economy.
We will stay the course by adopting a Science, Technology and Innovation (STI)-based industrial strategy. The strategy is to align and integrate industry development, trade, and investment policies. Such an approach is crucial in addressing gapsin supply and value chains and will promote inclusive and sustainable industrial transformation and growth in the country. One of the three priority clusters in this industrial strategy is Technology, Media, and Telecommunications, which covers IT-BPM and hyperscale data centers; creative economy and digital economy; and products using AI, robotics, Augmented Reality, 5G, and Internet of Things.
As you can see, the future of the Philippine Digitalization Agenda is bright. Together, let us make things happen in the Philippines.
Again, congratulations on your silver anniversary, achieving business at the speed of now. Thank you, and have a pleasant evening. ♦
Date of Release: 04 October 2022