A farmer's son

In the year 1984, an electrical engineer named Diosdado Banatao also known as ‘Dado”, is a Filipino engineer who designed the first ever Personal Computer chipset. Because of his amazing technology, Dado is now considered as Bill Gates’s counterpart here in the Philippines. Diosdado “Dado” Banatao graduated at the Mapua Institute of Technology with a degree in Electrical Engineering. His story illustrates a perfect example of ‘Rags to Riches”. He showed and proved that poverty is never a hindrance in fulfilling one’s dreams. He worked very hard to achieve what he already achieved. Diosdado “Dado” Banatao grew up in the rural part of the country in a small barrio called Malabbac in the town of Iguig, Cagayan Valley, Philippines. Way back when he was young, Dado dreamed of becoming an engineer someday because he wanted to build new things that will make people live life more comfortable

Dado grew up with a simple life, with no electricity and no telephones. He used to walk barefooted along with the dirt road of his hometown just to reach his primary school. When he was in elementary, his teacher taught him math by using bamboo sticks. As the years went by, Dado observed and realized that almost all of his classmates stopped going to school after sixth grade to help their families. Most of his classmates sacrificed their dreams to help bring food to their tables. Diosdado “Dado” Banatao’s father was a farmer; his father worked very hard to sustain his education. His father never asked dado to help him work in the fields because they have an agreement that dado must focus on his studies. When he graduated elementary, Dado went to a High School which is a bit far from his home. This scenario made Dado feel very sad and made him feel so isolated from his other classmates. He knew that most of his classmates have a different type of living compare to him, but this doesn’t stop him from pursuing his study. Every time his friends go out and play basketball outside, he chooses to stay and study his lectures. This shows how Dado gave up his leisure time to make time for studying because he doesn’t want to waste and throw his parent’s effort and support.

When Dado graduated from college, he is very excited to apply his knowledge and skills that he acquired at school and earn money for his family, but unfortunately things didn’t go out according to his plan. He found out that there are no “true design jobs” for him here in the Philippines, where he could apply the knowledge he has in his chosen engineering field which is Electrical Engineering. After many months Dado finally had the chance to train as a commercial airline pilot with Philippine Airlines, but again he felt that the salary he is getting from his job is quite small, so he decided to move to United States of America (U S A). This decision led him to his dream job. When he arrived in America, Dado was pirated by a Company called Boeing. He was trained and assigned as a design engineer for Boeing 747, which is the company’s newest commercial airliner and cargo transport aircraft in the United States at that time. When Dado was in the U.S, he grabbed the opportunity and chance to take his engineering studies further. He took up his Master’s in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at Stanford University in 1972. Dado felt excited, but at the same time, he felt intimidated because everyone in his class seemed smarter than him. But instead of letting his insecurity drag him down, he took this as a challenge, and it made him more determined to study twice as hard as he usually does. 

After he graduated from college, he acquired many working experience and knowledge from different technology companies that he worked with such as the Intersil and the National Semiconductor. Dado developed the first single chip, which is a 16-bit microprocessor-based calculator under Commodore International. He was able to reduce 300 components into three with that computer chip. As he jumped to different companies, Dado never stops innovating, and he kept on inventing new technology. 

In 1981, he designed his second invention, which is the first 10-Mbit Ethernet CMOS with silicon coupler data-link control and trans-receiver chip under the company SEEQ Technology. As he kept on experimenting with a computer, He went on to create the first system logic chipset for IBM’s PC-XT and the PC-AT; which is the local bus concept and the first Windows Graphics accelerator chip for personal computers. 

Diosdado “Dado” Banatao along with his business partner Francis Siu put up a high-technology company called Mostron. Dado and his business partner started with a half a million US dollars as capital to launch a manufacturer of motherboards. Then a group of Filipino Electronics Engineering Students created a device that generates electricity out of wastewater a year later; the company made a five-chip set which marked the formation of a new company Dado cofounded that is called the Chips and Technologies. In this company, a system logic chipset for IBM’s PC-XT and the PC-AT was developed which got them a profit of 12 million US dollars in just four months. The Chips and Technologies Company went into public after a little less than two years. With Dado’s expertise with computers, he didn’t stop with two companies (“Mostron” and the “Chips & Technologies”) and launched S3 Graphics. This startup focused on enhancing the graphics capabilities in personal computers by using a graphics accelerator chip. Dado’s secret to this is his invention of a local bus. By 1996, Dado’s startups are forces to be reckoned with in the technology industry.  Dado’s S3 Graphics was in the front line of the graphics-chips market at that time and defeated its strong competitor which is the Cirrus Logic Inc., while the company Chips & Technologies was sold to Intel for about 300 million U.S dollars. Dado’s place in the business sector doesn’t end there. In 2000, he established a venture capital firm named Tallwood Venture Capital with a capital of 300 million U.S dollars. Then ten years later, Dado was named as Ikanos Communications’ CEO.

Despite the success he has, he never forgets to give back and share the blessings he has for both here in the Philippines and abroad. Dado provided annual funds for five aspiring engineer scholars under the Dado Banatao’s Educational Foundation. Another foundation that he founded is the Philippine Development Foundation that offers free education for deserving young Filipinos and to help these brilliant young Filipinos to reach their full potential. Dado also put up a computer center in the grade school where he went in his childhood town of Iguig. It is the only public school with the most modern computer network in the Philippines. Aside from his local foundations, he also has an international foundation in Northern California called the Banatao Filipino American Fund, where he financially assists high school students of Filipino descent who want to become engineers. 

In 2016 Dado shared his formula for success in the Anvil Business Summit 2016. In this summit, he says that the Filipino entrepreneurs should understand their target market if they really want to compete globally. He said that Filipino entrepreneurs must understand the dynamics of their target market, the size of that market, the velocity of revenue, the volume of that market and the dynamics of whether it is growing or not. He keeps on reiterating that the common cause of startups failures are the skip of the market requirements and people come up with products only to realize that no one will buy it. “Profitability” is largely about good design, Dado says. He said that “if you have good design, you will instantly sell your product.” That is a good lesson for an engineer when they were trained to design and to create products. And it must be associated with an application that is very important for productivity. In his speech in the Anvil Business Summit 2016, Dado Banatao points out a big flaw in the Philippines that prevents the flourish of technology companies which is the lack of venture capitalists. Dado Banatao cited that entrepreneurs and investors must build a Silicon Valley. He also called out the attention of the Philippine elite and challenged them to live up to an obligation of helping the society called The corporate social responsibility. He said that they must do it as a gift and not for charity because “Charity destroys societies,” Dado says.

Dado Banatao’s life story and his life’s experiences and struggles are truly an inspiration to everyone most especially for millennials. Despite all the Odds and failures he experienced, Dado remained strong and positive. He is never afraid of trying and taking risks and chances which are the attitude that made him what he is now. Dado showed four elements to succeed in life, and these elements are dream, determination, passion and Good heart.

Dream:

When Dado was just a young boy, he has his vision and dreams in life. People, who don’t have so much money and have a wealthy lifestyle like him, seem to have an impossible dream of becoming an engineer. But he showed that no one should be afraid of dreaming bigger things because it’s free and no one will judge you. Having a vision in everything that you do is the essential thing because your vision is the one that will propel you to the success that you really dream of. But vision alone is not enough to fulfill your dreams; we must also put in our minds that we must give our hearts and souls into this vision.

Determination:

From scratch, Dado Banatao’s father is the person who showed him how to be determined despite all the odds and struggles they experienced. Dado’s father showed how much he loves his family and showed how determine he is to get his family out of poverty. His Father never stops working in the fields just to give them and provide them a better life. Dado’s father’s determination inspired him to be determined as well.

Passion: 

            Dado as a student, showed how much passion he has for his studies, he even sacrifices most of his leisure time just to have extra time to study his lessons. And as a Boss of his company, he never failed to give passion to his work. Dado never failed to put his 100 percent passion towards his innovations and inventions which gained success.

Good Heart:

            Dado gained a lot of blessings from his genius mind and talent. And to repay the blessings he received; never forget to give back his blessings to those who needed it. Dado knows how hard it is to go to school without money and without anything that will aid students in their studies because he been to that situation, that’s why he helped unfortunate people by providing them free education through his foundations and giving them study aids such as computers to enhance and to broaden student’s knowledge. He also never forgets the people who gave him wisdom and experience when he was young. Dado has the heart to give that’s why he is blessed.  

            To sum up my reflection for Dado Banatao’s life story (“A Farmer’s son”), his story gave me a chance to have time to self-reflect. I realized that I am very lucky, since I never experienced some of his struggles in life because I live a with a comfortable life compared to him,and I feel that students like me who lives today in this digital world are very fortunate to experience these new technologies that we have today compared to them who don’t even experience any technology way back then. And if given a chance to meet this guy, I would definitely ask some great advice from him, and I would also love to share those advice to other people to give inspiration.

Technopreneurship (4th Meeting)

Before we had our 4^th meeting discussion in our subject Technopreneurship, our facilitator recapped some essential topics with regards to our previous discussion to refresh our minds, so that we will be able to relate it to our next lesson which is just a continuation of our last lesson which is all about Internal and External Analysis (SWOT).

            In my previous reflection, I explained about the SWOT Analysis. It is a structured process and a useful technique that is commonly used by an organization in making a strategic plan for goal and mission accomplishment. SWOT analysis consists of examining an organization's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats that an organization might face. The purpose of a SWOT analysis is to create a synthesized and captures and frames up what your current state is. A SWOT analysis is divided into two environments: the internal environment, which focuses on the strengths and weaknesses of an organization, and the external environment, which focuses on opportunities and threats. 

           After taking some self-assessment test like Emotional Quotient Test (EQ test), Personality Trait test, etc. and have a thorough assessment of myself; we have come to the point in our class where we have to discuss the importance of generating a business idea and how a business works. Many people or should I say all people wants to become rich right? But being rich is not as simple as picking leaves from a tree. It takes a long and thorough process to achieve it, particularly in technopreneurship. In this blog, I will share to you my reflection on our fourth meeting in our class technopreneurship that will cover the importance of generating a business idea and the opportunities it offers us as an aspiring technopreneur.

           In our fourth discussion, our facilitator discussed how to generate great business ideas. He also gave us an insight on how to be on top of the game, how to defeat your competitors in getting more customers, and how to develop the idea you have. Our facilitator also emphasized that nothing is constant in the world of business and technology since people's taste and needs changes. To cope up with this change and keep yourself on top, you need to be more creative and innovative in terms of generating new ideas that will suit people's needs.

           Successful entrepreneurs used their everyday imaginations to make new ideas and decisions to make the world a better place. A good example of a great entrepreneur is Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs doesn't limit himself in creating and generating new technologies. And one factor that makes him very successful is his genius ideas and that only shows how generating great business ideas important is. As an entrepreneur who is planning to make the world a better place, you must have to gain knowledge even from the smallest detail first before starting generating a business idea.  You as an entrepreneur must know to outplay your opponents since the world of business is a nasty environment to be. You have to always watch your back and prepare yourself from a potential attacks from your competitors.

Define what is Business first

            Before entering the world of business, you must have a basic knowledge of what business is. When we hear the word business, the first thing that would possibly come in our minds is money, profits, products, and the workforce. But business does not start with all the four things that I listed above. I always start with the idea. Starting with a business idea will give us a goal to achieve.

Generating a Business Idea

How to generate a business idea?

A lot of people think that some idea will just fall from the sky just like rain drops, but that is not the way it works. Generating Idea must come from you. You can generate ideas through brainstorming and testing new things. Another way to generate idea is by asking yourself some questions like What skills do I have?, What is the problem that needs a solution? And How do I solve this certain problem? Through these questions, you can formulate strategies and ideas that might help you achieve success.

          In my previous blogs, I was able to assess myself in terms of my strengths and weaknesses. We are encouraged by our facilitator in our class to venture new ideas that will create a good company. By making good business ideas, we will be able to compete in the industry knowing that you have generated a unique business. Generating a business idea should be unique and first.

          Way back in the first week of our meeting, our facilitator gave us a task to go out of the school building and identify some of the common problems that we are facing today and give an innovative solution for it. Our facilitator gave us three categories of places, and these are the Hospitals, Department Stores and Fast food chain / Restaurants. We must go at least three different companies in each category. And in this reflection, I will give some problem solution that I proposed for each category. 

Fast food chains

            The first place that we visited is Fast food chains since there's a lot of fast food chains near our school. 

 Jollibee

 One of the problems that some customers experience while dining in Jollibee is when they need something like water, extra tissue, etc. they need to go to the counter to ask for it or sometimes they have to exert an effort to find and call the attention of the service crews to get what they need, which may interrupt the customer's munch time and may also affect their moods while taking their meal. To solve this existing problem I came up with the idea of making a device called the “Jollibee Help Buttons.” It is a device that alerts the Service Crews when a customer needs something. This device is embedded in the restaurant’s tables so that the customers can easily call the attentions of the service crews when they need something. The device has three buttons. (a) Button for water, when the customer press this button it automatically alerts the counter that a particular table number needs water. (b) Button for tissue just like in Button (a) once pressed it alerts the service crews that a customer needs extra tissue and lastly (c) Button for cleaning when the customer press this button it means that the customer’s table needs cleaning.

Goldilocks

A birthday is a special day that comes once a year that should be celebrated for several reasons. A birthday is a time when a person acknowledges the anniversary of his or her birth. In most cultures, birthdays are celebrated in some ways. Often, birthdays are celebrated with a gift, party and most especially it is celebrated with a birthday cake.

 Every year, birthday makes someone feels special that’s why the cake that we serve to them must be personalized according to the celebrant’s personality and hobbies. But one thing that I observed in the Pastry/Bakeshop Chains like Goldilocks is that their cake designs are stuck with the same common designs. Why not create a system that allows its customers to design their cakes for their loved ones. The system that I proposed is called the“Goldilocks’s Cake Creator.”The “Goldilocks’s Cake Creator” is a system that allows its users to create or design their cakes. The user can specify and choose what type of ingredient he/she wants, and the user can design his/her cakes. The amount of the cake made by the customer is based on the cake’s size, the cake’s ingredients and toppings chose by the user. 

Department Store

              The second place that I visited is the department's stores since there are also a lot of malls surrounding our school.

Victoria Plaza Mall

Victoria Plaza is considered as the oldest mall in Davao City way back in the early 1900s. Victoria Plaza opened its doors to Davaeños along J.P Laurel Avenue which was formerly known as Bajada. The place occupies a gross land area of 81,000 square meters. Today, only a few establishments stick with the mall through the years that passed.

The problem that I observed at the Victoria Plaza Mall is the old baggage system they have. We are now living in a digital world where almost everything is digitalized. So why not change that old baggage system into a modern one. The main reason for changing the old system is for the security of the customer’s things. Let’s say the customer forgot or dropped his/her card number somewhere which may lead him/her undergo some process that will take a lot of time to get his/her things.

Another problem is what if someone steals your card number from you or picked your card number somewhere; they can easily claim or should I say steal your things just by presenting your card number which will not be an ideal scenario for all of the shoppers of Victoria Plaza. My proposed solution for this problem is making a "Baggage Counter Numbering System.” This “Baggage Counter Numbering System” is a system that lets its users use their finger prints as a key in storing their things at the baggage counter instead of using the traditional number cards. The primary purpose of this system is to make sure that the only authorized owners are the one who can claim their things. And in case the customer lost his/her card number they don’t have to worry because they have to use their finger prints as a key which is safe and more efficient.

Toy Kingdom

The problem that I saw at the Toy Kingdom Toy Store is that when people try to buy a certain toy they want but didn’t know where is that toy located. This will lead to minutes of searching at the store that will consume a great amount of time and also consumes energy in finding that toy. To solve this problem why not create a system that will help you find that special toy that you want. The proposed solution for this problem is called the “Toy Kingdom Toy Finder System.” The “Toy Kingdom Toy Finder” is a system wherein you just need to key in your desired toy’s name and the toy’s type and the system will automatically find a match and will automatically display the item’s information like the toy’s price, it’s discounted price and the location of that item in the store. This system aims to lessen the time and the energy consumed by the customers in searching a certain item.

Hospitals

Southern Philippines Medical Center 

       The problem that I observed in roaming around the Southern Philippines Medical Center (SPMC ) is the medical charts that they are using to monitor their patient’s records. Southern Philippines Medical Center (SPMC ) is still using the old paper medical charts that are prone to damage that might lead to losing of patient’s records. To solve this problem, I proposed a digitalized version of their medical charts, and it is called “SPMC’s Digitalized Medical Charts.” “SPMC’s Digitalized Medical Charts” is a digital version of a patient’s paper medical chart. This system will ensure that the medical charts of the patients are complete and accurate. “SPMC’s Digitalized Medical Charts” is a real-time record that makes health information available instantly and securely to authorized users. It also reduces the incidence of medical error by improving the accuracy and clarity of medical records and coordination of diagnosis and treatment among health providers.

            To summarize everything, generating good ideas is not as easy as 123. It requires a lot of knowledge and dedication most especially if you want to become a pioneer of a particular product. Being the first one to develop a certain business idea is surely good, but it does not necessary that you will overlook the existing ones. All you need to do is to keep your confidence and guts in sharing your ideas to people to attract possible clients. Through this reflection, I was able to show the importance of generating new and fresh ideas that will greatly affect me as an aspiring technopreneur.