Recently held in Makati, the event gathered almost 200 CIOs and IT decision makers from top corporations from various industries including Offshoring & Outsourcing, Banking and Finance, Retail, and Manufacturing.

“Together with International Data Corporation, we are envisioning this to be an annual milestone, which will gather top executives and ICT experts across the country and in Asia.  Our common goal is to drive Philippine enterprises into the next wave of Innovation and allow them to harness the full power of ICT in their businesses,” said PLDT President and CEO Napoleon L. Nazareno

The event featured a roster of distinguished speakers from the IDC and a panel of experts from key industry verticals and global partners.

Opening the session was an informative talk on Journey to the 3rd Platform by IDC Asia-Pacific Managing Director Eva Au, while IDC Asia-Pacific Lead for Services and Cloud Research Mayur Sahni gave an overview peek of the growing role of IT for business come 2020.

Panel discussions opened the floor to raise dialogues and collaboration for attendees on the changing roles of CIOs in companies and going up the next level of ICT transformation and Innovation. The initial talk was by IDC Malaysia Associate Research Director Roger Ling, while the industry panel experts were composed of PLDT FVP Jovy Hernandez, BPAP President Jomari Mercado, American Chamber Chairman Don Felbaum, SEIPI President Dan Lachica, BSP Deputy Director and Head for IT Raymond Estioko, Bancnet VP Rene Natividad, and EDC CIO Ferdinand Poblete.

Data Center services and technologies were also highlighted in the one-day summit with IDC Indonesia Associate Research Director Sudev Bangah giving insight on the evolving data center and the emerging trends and strategies in the Asia Pacific.

Leading the talks on Data Centers in the local landscape were ePLDT COO Nerisse Ramos, NTT Communications EVP Taylor Man, Sun Life of Canada CTO Teodoro Pineda Jr., Maynilad SVP and CIO Francisco Castillo, and Accenture Country Manager Lito Tayag.

Cloud technology was also in the summit’s agenda that opened up discussions on the gains and enlightened on the risks for businesses integrating Cloud into their operations. IDC’s Sahni presented a Cloud case study on the Asia Pacific and the viability of the technology in companies in the region while the Cloud panel included PLDT VP Joseph Ian Gendrano, NTT Communications Director for Cloud Ryutaro Hosono, CCAC CIO Sean Byrne, IBM Director for Cloud Business Justin Gatlin, Oracle APAC Sr. Director for Cloud Caroline Chan, VMWare PH Country Manager Manny Portugal, and Microsoft PH Country Manager Karrie Ilagan.

PLDT Group has since supported and enabled the growth of ICT in the country investing heavily on infrastructure and new technologies to support the growing need of leading industries. It has since build out almost 100,000kms of its fiber optic network to link the country’s archipelago with fixed and wireless connectivity.

“PLDT has shifted its focus to becoming an end-to-end ICT provider ranging from connectivity, data centers, unified communications, applications, cloud, and analytics, as well as other ICT areas through expertise we have nurtured and developed over the years,” said PLDT EVP and ePLDT President and CEO Eric Alberto.

“We are in a continuing journey into new technology spaces that are not clearly defined, but our commitment to the economic and commercial development of this country is such that PLDT has gone from being this nation’s leading Telco to becoming its principal digital enabler.”