Maniolas

MANILA, Philippines – Real estate developers and telecommunications companies have pledged their support for the development of the country’s information technology and business process management (IT-BPM) sector which will soon embark on a new six-year growth path. The Information Technology and Business Process Association of the Philippines (IBPAP) said the country’s biggest property and telecommunications players  vowed to put up better quality buildings and infrastructure in their bid to create an ecosystem that will sustain more inclusive growth for the IT-BPM sector. These firms include Ayala Land, Double Dragon Properties, Federal Land, Filinvest, Globe Telecom, Leechiu Property Consultants, Megaworld, PLDT, Profriends, Robinsons Land, and SM Prime Holdings, the IBPAP said. “All these years, our roadmap partners have been our strong allies in building the industry through connectivity and building robust, world class 24/7 communities that IT-BPM companies need. They continue to play a crucial role as the 1.2 million strong industry charts its course over the next six years,” said Benedict Hernandez, IBPAP’s executive committee chairman. Hernandez said the property and telecommunications giants maintained their commitment to further support the growth of the sector by continuously aligning with IT-BPM companies’ needs and ICT demands as they continue to expand into areas outside Metro Manila, transforming previously untapped and undeveloped localities into bustling IT-BPM hubs. “Our collaboration and partnership will remain key to realizing the new roadmap ambitions, especially as we focus even more on countryside development,” he said. Business ( Article MRec ), pagematch: 1, sectionmatch: 1 IBPAP and research Read More …

SOME mining firms in the country passed the Environment department’s completed audit,its chief said on Friday, even as the agency is still processing the results of its probe.

Many of you may have noticed that, alongside the many new restaurants and bars that have opened in the last few years not only here but in many progressive cities across the archipelago, there are as many new coffee shops that have also cropped up. There are Starbucks outlets in all malls and shopping districts, but alongside the foreign brands, our home grown brands like Bo’s Coffee of Cebu and Figaro cannot be far behind. Coffee has come of age in the Philippines, a mark of sophistication for many to be sure, but more importantly a shot in the arm for our neglected coffee farmers from Benguet to the far corners of Mindanao. Our local cafes now boast of being proud members of the third wave of coffee, and though this age has been around for some 10 years in the US and in Europe, it is still a big step forward for our local coffee industry.  And we have to thank our very active Philippine Coffee Board for this. We have come across two relatively new cafes in the metro that are among this “third wavers.” Cow & Chicken Before this restaurant/café opened, one of its owners, Junco Flores, was a barista extremely passionate about coffee.  From this passion stemmed his personal advocacy to support the Filipino coffee farmer.  All the coffee they serve at Cow & Chicken are locally sourced, primarily from Benguet farmers.  Very soon, they plan to tap the Batangas coffee farms and those from Mt. Read More …

MANILA, Philippines – Mitsubishi Hitachi Power Systems (MHPS) has chosen the Philippines as a jump-off point for its expansion in Southeast Asia and the Middle East in providing operation and maintenance (O&M) services for thermal power plants. MHPS launched yesterday its third Global Service Center (GSC) for thermal power plant operators in Alabang, Muntinlupa City—the first in Southeast Asia—following its remote monitoring centers in Japan’s Takasago, Hyogo Prefecture in 1999 and Orlando, Florida in 2001. The company decided to open shop in the Philippines mainly because it is an English-speaking country and has been doing engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) business with local companies for over 40 years, MHPS president and CEO Takato Nishizawa said during the launch. “We need a good place and then expand, not only in Southeast Asia but also including the Middle East from here,” he said. Centered in Southeast Asia, the new GSC offers comprehensive services to a wide range of thermal power plant operators including remote monitoring, control, O&M and single-point centralized management optimized for each power plant. Masao Ishikawa, MHPS managing director for Asia Pacific, said the GSC aims to optimize the operations of power plants through the Remote Monitoring Center, which will help in lessening the downtime of plants. Business ( Article MRec ), pagematch: 1, sectionmatch: 1 “We are expecting what is happening in the machines. Predictions are based on data. From there we can easily locate parts needed to repair or replaced,” he said. With the new Philippine facility, Nishizawa Read More …

Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez said the country renewed its petition to the US during his meeting with Deputy US Trade Representative (USTR) Robert Holleyman II at the recently concluded 13th ASEAN Business and Investment Summit in Laos. STAR/File photo MANILA, Philippines – The Philippines has urged the US anew to include travel goods on the list of duty-free products under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program. Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez said the country renewed its petition to the US during his meeting with Deputy US Trade Representative (USTR) Robert Holleyman II at the recently concluded 13th ASEAN Business and Investment Summit in Laos. “On our end, we’ve re-presented the request and the justifications on the travel goods. We requested for the inclusion of travel goods on the US GSP and we have a request to reconsider. It is moving already. It’s in the process, up for consideration,” Lopez said. The Philippines was unable to secure the US government’s nod to include locally manufactured travel goods in the GSP program – a preferential tariff system given by the US to its trade partners – on its annual review released last June. The country’s earlier petition which the USTR deferred seeks to include travel goods such as luggage, handbags, pocket goods, backpacks, sports and travel bags. “The only concern why it was excluded is that they are saying that the Philippines is not a least developed economy. But for us, we’re saying we are still developing and we need support and Read More …