HOW COULD WE HAVE MORE TECHNOLOGY BUSINESS INCUBATORS?

HOW COULD WE HAVE MORE TECHNOLOGY BUSINESS INCUBATORS?

Let us begin with a simple question: Should we stop at 80?

As of 2026, the Philippines has approximately 65 to 80 active Technology Business Incubators (TBIs) and accelerators. That already makes us one of the leaders in ASEAN, second only to Singapore, which reportedly has more than 220 incubation and acceleration entities under its Startup SG umbrella.

But should being “second” be our ambition? Or should we aim higher?

We often treat TBIs as if they were simply real estate projects—another building, another ribbon-cutting ceremony. That mindset is wrong. TBIs are not buildings. They are ecosystems. If we want more of them, we must move from infrastructure thinking to ecosystem thinking.

The good news is that we already know how to do it.

Through the Innovative Startup Act and the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), more than 50 university-based TBIs have been established, especially within State Universities and Colleges (SUCs). The Philippines actually has over 2,300 Higher Education Institutions recognized by CHED, including 113 SUCs and more than 150 Local Universities and Colleges.

Now here is the math.

Even if only half of the 400 or so recognized universities in the country were to establish their own TBIs, we could easily reach 200 to 225 incubators. That would already surpass Singapore in sheer numbers. Since we already have about 80, we would need to establish roughly 145 more. If we were truly ambitious, we could even triple our current number to 240.

The question is not “Can we?” The real question is “Why not?”

Universities are natural habitats for innovation. They already have the land, the laboratories, the faculty researchers, and most importantly, the students. What they often lack is three things: capital, commercialization expertise, and market access.

This is where the “triple helix” model becomes crucial—government, academia, and private industry working together.

The government can shift from one-time grants to performance-based funding. Instead of merely funding buildings, why not release additional support when an incubator achieves measurable outcomes—startup survival rates, follow-on investments, or export revenues?

Universities must also reform their intellectual property policies. Many researchers hesitate to commercialize their inventions because ownership rules are complicated. If a professor cannot easily spin off a company from a lab discovery, innovation remains stuck in a filing cabinet.

The private sector, meanwhile, must see TBIs not as charity but as strategic pipelines. Corporate venture capital programs can treat incubators as early scouting grounds. Why wait for foreign startups when we can grow our own?

Another important shift is specialization. General incubators are helpful, but high-impact growth often comes from vertical focus—agri-tech, biotech, AI, green technology. DOST has already begun clustering AI in certain regions. Why not designate some provinces as national centers for specific technologies?

We should also embrace hybrid and virtual incubation. Not every TBI needs a large physical space. Digital platforms can provide mentorship, legal assistance, investor matching, and training. This lowers the cost of expansion, especially in the Visayas and Mindanao.

Of course, numbers alone do not guarantee success. An incubator without quality mentors or access to seed funding is merely a co-working space. The real indicators are startup survival rates, innovation outputs, and global competitiveness.

Singapore’s strength is not just quantity but density—investors, founders, and corporations interacting constantly. If we want to scale beyond 80, we must build that density.

We already have the campuses. We already have the brain power. We already have policy foundations. The private sector has the capital.

So I return to my original question: Should we be content with being second in ASEAN? Or should we dare to become the region’s academic innovation powerhouse?

If we truly believe in Filipino talent, the answer should be obvious.

RAMON IKE V. SENERES

www.facebook.com/ike.seneres iseneres@yahoo.com senseneres.blogspot.com 09088877282/04-05-2027

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