Silicon Gulf

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Silicon Gulf seal

Silicon Gulf is a nickname for Davao City and extends to the Davao Region, at Southern Mindanao, Philippines. The nickname refers to the growing number of Information Technology and IT Enabled Services (or ITES) companies sprouting in the area. The name was adapted from Silicon Valley, referring to the high tech cluster located in the San Francisco Bay Area in northern California.

Davao Region is one of the regions of the Philippines, located on the southeastern portion of Mindanao. Davao Region consists of four provinces, namely: Compostela Valley, Davao, Davao del Sur, and Davao Oriental. The region encloses the Davao Gulf and its regional center is Davao City.

Silicon Gulf is part of the Philippine Cyberservices Corridor.

1 Origin
2 Davao City
3 Associations / Organizations
4 Companies
5 Universities
6 Technology centers internationally
7 External links

[edit] Origin

The Silicon Gulf Initiative was officially announced in October 6, 2006, during the ICT Davao, Inc. launch at the Royal Mandaya Hotel in Davao City. The initiative emphasized radical collaboration between government, academe and industry in harnessing technical talent and information-oriented manpower as the key driving force in transforming the city from an agricultural / industrial economy to a knowledge-based one.

[edit] Davao City

Given its potentials to become a “center of excellence” in Information Communications and Technology (ICT), Davao City is declared as an IT HUB area in the Philippines by the National Telecommunications Office per memorandum # 05-05-200.

As a modern metropolis bustling with life, verve and color, situated in a typhoon-free zone with a land area of 244,000 hectares touted as one of the world’s largest, recent study made by the Asian Institute of Management through a project called “Philippine Cities Competitiveness Program” revealed that the City is the Most Competitive City in the Philippines (Urban Category) with the lowest cost of Doing Business.

Moreover, using a scorecard developed by the Commission on Informationa and Communications Technology (CICT), Davao City ranks high as an attractive ICT investment location in the country.

In the area of Workforce Potential, the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) XI reported that as of January 2005 out of 76 colleges and universities in the region, Davao City has a total of 42, three (3) of which belonging to the Top 20 in the country namely: Ateneo de Davao University, University of the Philippines in Mindanao and San Pedro College.

About 14 colleges and universities in the region were also granted the PAASCU, PACUCOA, and AACUP accreditations, hence, assuring that quality graduates are produced each year in many higher education.

Moreover, a total of 15,731 graduates were recorded for the schoolyear 2004-2005 with the following top courses: Education (with 2,715 graduates), Commerce, (with 2,707 graduates) and Nursing (with 2,241 graduates).

In the area of telecommunications infrastructure, Davao City has an available high-speed Digital Subscribers Lines (DSL) that can support 24x7 operations. The presence of major telecommunications companies i.e., Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company, BayanTel, Globe, Digitel, Meridian Telekoms, Inc. and PT&T can provide such services from fiber-optic links, wireless broadband, to simple and triple redundancy.

In the area of real estate, Davao City has huge open spaces that can be developed into an IT Park or IT Building. There are five (5) major hotels and more than 10 business inns.

In the area of vendor support, large vendors in Manila and Cebu are now in Davao City to cater the requirements of local companies in terms of hardware and software namely: GlobalChips Technologies, Co; Trinet Multimedia Systems Corporation; Micro-D International, etc.

In the area of power infrastructure, Davao City has the most stable power supply and one the cheapest rates in the country. Its power utility company, the Davao Light and Power Company has a backup power supply of 44 MW at its Bajada Power Plant. In the last 5 years, there was no recorded incidence of massive power shortage and blackouts.

In the area of transportation, a total of 189,621 motor vehicles in the region were registered in the Land Transportation Office (LTO) XI in 2005 distributed as follows: motorcycles & tricycles - 109,142; Utility vehicles - 44,118; Taxi/Cars - 18,983; Trucks – 11,310; Sports Utility Vehicles – 4,045; Trailers – 1,265 and Buses – 758. Davao City and nearby provinces have more than 2,000 aircon/non-aircon taxi units equipped with 2-way radio system running 24 hours a day.

In terms of local incentives, Davao City is the first local government unit in Mindanao to provide incentives to investors in the city.

For Quality of Life, Davao City was adjudged as the most liveable city in the Philippines and included in the Top 20 in Asia.

[edit] Associations / Organizations

Association of Computer Businesses in Mindanao (ACBM)
Association of Solution Integrators in Davao, Inc (ASID)
Business Process Outsourcing Davao (BPO-Davao)
Council of Deans in I.T. Education (CDITE-Region XI)
DabaweGNU
Davao Inventors Association
Davao IT Organization (DITO)
Davao Technical Expert for Computer Hardware & Software Support, Inc (TechSupport)
ICT Real Estate Association of Davao (ICTREAD)
Internet Cafe Association of Davao, Inc. (ICAD)
MIS-Corporate Davao
Philippine Society of I.T Educators (PSITE-Region XI)