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Azkals start preparations for top-class tournaments

THE Philippine national men’s football team’s preparations for the AFF Suzuki Cup 2018 and the AFC Asian Cup UAE 2019 get under way today as it plays Bahrain in a friendly at the latter’s home turf.
To take place at the Bahrain National Stadium in Riffa, the Philippine Azkals come together anew for a series of matches as part of their training in the lead-up to their campaigns in the Suzuki Cup and Asian Cup.
The Bahrain friendly marks the first time that the Azkals will be playing under new head coach Scott Cooper of England, who was thrust to the position after compatriot Terry Butcher resigned from his post as coach last month even before he got to meet the team.
Mr. Butcher was named a replacement for longtime Azkals coach Thomas Dooley of the United States, who helped the Philippine team qualify for the Asian Cup.
In connection with the Bahrain friendly, the Philippine Football Federation called up the services of national team players, most of whom coming from the Philippines Football League.
Said players started to leave for the friendly earlier this week.
Making up the pool of players are goalkeeper Neil Etheridge, Amani Aguinaldo, Carlos De Murga, Junior Munoz, Daisuke Sato, Hikaru Minegishi, Paul Mulders, Manny Ott, Mike Ott, Patrick Reichelt, Adam Tull and Dylan De Bruycker.
Also part of the team are Stephan Schrock, Luke Woodland, Curt Dizon, Angel Guirado, Phil Younghusband, Patrick Deyto, Louie Casas, Ace Villanueva, Stephen Palla, Fitch Arboleda and Jovin Bedic.
The AFF Suzuki Cup happens in November while the AFC Asian Cup takes place in January. — Michael Angelo S. Murillo

Magnus grind

 

6th Sinquefield Cup 2018
Saint Louis, USA
August 16-29, 2018

Final Standings
1-3. Levon Aronian ARM 2767, Magnus Carlsen NOR 2842, Fabiano Caruana USA 2822, 5.5/9
4. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov AZE 2801, 5.0/9
5-7. Maxime Vachier-Lagrave FRA 2779, Viswanathan Anand IND 2768, Alexander Grischuk RUS 2766, 4.5/9
8. Wesley So USA 2780, 4.0/9
9-10. Hikaru Nakamura USA 2777, Sergey Karjakin RUS 2773, 3.0/9
Average ELO 2788 Category 22
Time Control: 100 minutes for the first 40 moves, then 670 minutes for the rest of the game with 30 seconds time delay before clock starts on every move.
This tournament saw the last encounter between Magnus Carlsen and Fabiano Caruana before their world championship match this November. It was no surprise therefore that the question of whether Caruana has a chance against the reigning world champion dominated the chess twitter-sphere when it ended.
Magnus Carlsen is obviously the favorite to retain his title as he is after all the higher-rated player, the “king of all formats.” In classical chess he is no. 1 (2839), 12 points ahead of his challenger, who is at no. 2. In rapid the gap is even bigger between: Magnus is no. 1 at 2880 while Caruana is no. 9 at 2789. In blitz chess Carlsen has an unheard-of rating of 2939 while Fabi is way down at no. 18 with a decent 2767. As the American Champion’s compatriot Nakamura says, if they reach the tie-breaks (which is played at faster time controls) Caruana will have no chance.
Having said that, it is also apparent to all that the Norwegian GM sees Caruana as his biggest threat, and prepares especially hard against him every game. “Fabulous Fabi” is the real deal.
Caruana himself when asked about his chances replied that “I think I have shown that I can fight pretty much on equal terms with him, and in tournaments to sometimes outperform him, or even this year, to outperform him often…”
No doubt Fabi was referring to the four recent super-tournaments (not counting the recently-concluded 2018 Sinquefield Cup) where the two of them both competed:
London Classic Dec 2017. Caruana tied for first with Nepomniachtchi (both with three wins and six draws) and then won the play-off. Carlsen had two wins one loss and six draws and tied for 3rd place with Wesley So and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave.
Tata Steel 2018, Jan 2018. Magnus and Holland’s Anish Giri both finished on top with nine points out of 13 rounds. Carlsen then went on to defeat Giri 1.5-0.5 in a blitz tie-break. Fabiano Caruana had a terrible tournament, his worst in many years. He won only one game (against cellar-dweller Hou Yifan), lost four games (against Kramnik, Mamedyarov, Anand and Karjakin) and drew the rest to finish 11th out of 14.
Grenke Chess Classic 2018 March 2018. Caruana was a convincing winner and he finished with four wins and five draws to distance himself from Carlsen by a full point. Magnus was also undefeated but only had two wins.
6th Norway Chess May 2018. Once again Caruana won half a point ahead of Magnus Carlsen, Hikaru Nakamura and Anand, although he lost in the individual game against Carlsen.
Fabiano finished ahead of Magnus in three out of the four tournaments above, but we should also note that in head-to-head encounters Magnus won one and drew three in those tournaments, and in the three draws the Italian-American GM was usually struggling to hold it.
Anyway, Caruana’s record against Carlsen (as of the Sinquefield Cup 2018) is +5-10=18 (42%). Very few players have a better record than that (the names of Ding Liren, Vladimir Kramnik and Levon Aronian are mentioned) but it stands to reason that if Caruana is not a worthy foe, then no one is.
I don’t think anyone should write-off Caruana’s chances — he has a knack of rising to the occasion. When a game absolutely has to be won, he will not choke and will grab whatever opportunities come his way with both hands.
If Magnus Carlsen shows up in London in the same form as he showed against Karjakin two years ago then he will lose. From what I saw in the Sinquefield Cup though it looks like he is on his way to regaining the ability to just grind away in any position and force through the win.

Carlsen, Magnus (2842) –
Karjakin, Sergey (2773) [A17]
6th Sinquefield Cup Saint Louis
(2.3), 19.08.2018

1.c4 e6 2.Nc3 Bb4 3.g3 Nf6 4.Bg2 0–0 5.Nf3 d5 6.a3 Be7 7.d4 dxc4 8.Ne5 Nc6 9.Bxc6
Less good is 9.Nxc6 bxc6 10.Bxc6 Rb8 11.0–0 Bb7.
9…bxc6 10.Nxc6 Qe8 11.Nxe7+ Qxe7 12.Qa4 c5
Black has to get his pieces developed fast. For example 12…a5?! 13.Bg5! Ba6 14.0–0 c5 15.Bxf6! gxf6 16.Rad1 cxd4 (16…Rfd8 17.d5 is clearly better for White) 17.Rxd4 Qc5 18.Rfd1 White has a small but persistent edge. Exactly the type of position that a Kramnik or a Carlsen would love to have. Kramnik, V (2685)-Salov,V (2660) Madrid 1993 1–0 40.
13.dxc5 Qxc5 14.Be3 Qc7 15.Rd1 Nd5!
Forcing the knights off the board and, with bishops of opposite colors left, the chances for a draw are high.
16.Bd4
White cannot win the pawn on d5. If 16.Nxd5 exd5 17.Rxd5? Qb7! (stronger than 17…Bb7 18.Rc5 Qe7 19.Rg1 (19.0–0?? Qe4 wins) 19…Rad8) 18.Qb5 a6! White will lose one of his rooks.
16…Rd8 17.Nxd5 exd5 18.Qc2 Qe7 19.0–0 Bh3 20.Rfe1 Rd7 21.Bc3 Re8 22.Rd4
The threat is 23.Rh4 with a double attack on h3 and h7.
22…Qg5
So that if 23.Rh4 Bf5 everything is covered.
23.Qd2
Structurally White is better and Black needs to counter that by creating some chances in the kingside. It is therefore completely logical to take the queens off the board.
23…Qxd2 24.Rxd2
Black is not yet off the hook The pawn weakness on d5 forces him to defend it with …Be6, after which White’s e2–e4 advance can become dangerous.
24…Be6 25.Red1 Rde7 26.f3 h5 27.Kf2 f6 28.Rd4 Kh7 29.R1d2 Bf7 30.h3 a6 31.Rf4 Kg8 32.Bd4 Kh7 33.Bc3 Kg8
Karjakin is just shuffling his king back and forth, but hereabouts has already decided to sacrifice the exchange and is trying to time it at the best opportunity.
34.g4 hxg4 35.hxg4 Kh7 36.Rf5 Rb7
37.Rfxd5!
Carlsen: I thought it was just a little bit better and I was kind of hoping to be able to sac the exchange at some point. Then I feel like he played inaccurately because I got basically the perfect conditions to sac the exchange, since I either get one pawn back immediately or the g5–break.
37…Bxd5 38.Rxd5 Kg6?!
A controversial decision, giving up his c4–pawn. However, Karjakin as you know is nicknamed the “Minister of Defense” for his ability to defend inferior positions and of course knew the rule that in rook endings piece activity is more important than keeping your pawns intact. If Black had switched to passive play with 38…Rc7 39.Rd6 Rce7 40.e4 Re6 41.Rd5 Rc6 White is pushing hard.
39.Rc5 Rh8 40.Kg3 Rb6 41.Rxc4 Rh1 42.Rc7 Rc1 43.Rd7 Rc6 44.a4!
Putting his pawn on a5 so as to fix the position of Black’s a6 pawn.
44…Rg1+ 45.Kf2 Ra1 46.a5 Ra4 47.Kg3 Rac4 48.Ra7 Re6 49.e4 Rc8 50.Rd7 Rec6 51.f4! R8c7 52.f5+ Kh7 53.Rd8 Rc8 54.Rd3 Re8 55.Rd4 Rc7 56.Kf4 Rce7 57.Rc4 Kh6 58.Kf3 Rd7 59.Bd4 Kh7 60.b4 Rd6 61.Ke3 Kh6 62.Rc1 Kh7 63.Bb6 Rd7 64.Bc5 Red8 65.Rh1+
IM Saravanan from the Chessbase website points out here that 65.e5! would have been strong. After 65…fxe5 66.Ke4 Re8 67.g5 White’s position is looking threatening.
65…Kg8 66.Kf4 Re8 67.Re1 g5+!
Again choosing not to leave his pieces in defensive positions although it gives White a passed pawn. Later in the game we see that Karjakin’s judgement is correct, but one mistake wiped out all his gains.
68.fxg6 Kg7 69.g5! Kxg6 70.gxf6 Kxf6 71.Rh1 Rf7!
Giving his king a direct route to the queenside. Hereabouts Karjakin used up almost all his time already and was subsisting on the 30 second time delay, the so-called “Bronstein clock” which was in use in the Grand Chess Tour. You are just given 30 seconds before the clock starts running, the additional seconds is not added to your clock. In other words you will be in perpetual time trouble. “As soon as he got down to the delay, I felt it would be very, very hard not to blunder,” Carlsen predicted. And he was right.
72.Ke3
[72.e5+ Rxe5 73.Rh6+ Kg7+ 74.Kxe5 Kxh6 is a book draw.]
72…Ke6 73.Rh4 Rf6 74.Rh7 Rf7 75.Rh5 Kd7 76.e5 Rf1 77.Ke4 Kc6?
The losing move. The way to the draw is 77…Re1+ 78.Kd5 Rd1+ 79.Kc4 Rc1+ 80.Kb3 Re6 Keeping his rook on the 6th rank should hold the position.
78.Rh6+ Kb5 79.Rb6+ Kc4 80.e6!
The catch. Karjakin probably counted only on 80.Rxa6 after which 80…Re1+! draws, for example after 81.Be3 Kxb4 82.Ra7 Rxe3+ 83.Kxe3 Rxe5+ 84.Kd4 Rxa5 no comment necessary.
80…Re1+ 81.Kf5 Rf1+ 82.Ke5 Re1+ 83.Kf6 Rf1+ 84.Kg7
Surprisingly in the open board there are no checks for Black.
84…Ra8 85.e7 Re1 86.Kf7 Re4
[86…Rf1+ 87.Rf6 Re1 88.Rd6 Rf1+ 89.Ke6 Re1+ 90.Kd7]
87.Rd6 Rh8 88.Rxa6 1–0
Not a brilliancy at all, but a good indication of how difficult it is to hold against Magnus Carlsen as he always manages to find a way to put pressure on you, even if objectively the position is equal.
 
Bobby Ang is a founding member of the National Chess Federation of the Philippines (NCFP) and its first Executive Director. A Certified Public Accountant, he taught accounting in University of Santo Tomas for 25 years and is currently the Chief Audit Executive of the Equicom Group of Companies.
bobby@cpamd.net

Apple walked to $1 trillion; Amazon.com got there in a sprint

America went 242 years without a trillion-dollar company. Thirty-three days after getting the first, it now has two.
And while Apple Inc. lumbered through the final stretch, needing 15 months to traverse the last $200 billion, Amazon.com Inc. covered it in a three-month sprint. The $440 billion in market value it has created in 2018 alone exceeds the value of all but five S&P 500 companies.
Jeff Bezos’ online superstore rose as much as 1.9 percent to $2,050.50 in New York, sending its capitalization above $1 trillion for the first time. Apple passed the 13-digit boundary on Aug. 2. Two other companies, Microsoft corp. and Google parent Alphabet Inc., are within $170 billion of the goal.
“I never would have thought at $200 that this would be a $2,000 stock,” said Jason Cooper, a money manager who helps oversee $4 billion including Apple and Amazon shares at 1st Source Investment Advisors in South Bend, Indiana. “At $300, I thought we missed the boat. Boy, was that wrong.”
Through trade wars, unprecedented market volatility, rising interest rates and stock market stress in China, Amazon’s share performance has been as close to straight-up as could be in 2018. It’s had one down month — March — all year, with the average gain in the other seven standing at 9 percent.
It’s another display of might for technology companies grown on America’s West Coast, a cohort of megacaps whose relentless appreciation has come to be known as the Faang rally. Along with Facebook Inc., Netflix Inc. and Google, the quintet have created $2 trillion in equity value in three years.
From a valuation perspective, Amazon and Apple reflect distinct judgments about what constitutes value in the stock market. Apple may earn more than $58 billion in its 2018 fiscal year, the fruit of maturing franchises in everything from mobile phones to personal computers. At about 19 times projected profit, the company is huge and also relatively cheap. Back out the $244 billion in cash and cash equivalents Apple had at the end of its fiscal third quarter and it’s even cheaper.
Amazon’s a different animal, a retail behemoth that maniacally held down profit margins for all of its 24-year existence and is expected to earn a relatively paltry $8.5 billion in 2018. That’s good for a price-earnings ratio of 120 — a sign of the huge faith Wall Street puts in Bezos to execute over time.
“This is a company that has pioneered e-commerce, and has visionary leadership — they’ve done an amazing job of dominating their niche and successfully expanding,” said James Angel, professor at Georgetown’s McDonough School of Business. “It could be irrational. It could the market getting carried away. But the market usually knows more than I know.”
For now, the rapid ascent is a validation of the growth-at-all-costs ethos that has defined Bezos’ vision. While the conversation around Apple has shifted from iPhones to sales of apps and music streaming subscriptions, Amazon has relentlessly expanded into new markets, from groceries to data centers. The Seattle-based company’s revenue is growing at a better than 30 percent clip, more than twice that expected from Apple this year.
Of course, Amazon.com is the younger of the two, having been founded in 1994, a good 18 years after Apple. In addition to slower growth, the maturity of Cupertino, California-based Apple shows in its governance, which is bent on returning profits to shareholders. Apple has doled out more than $275 billion as dividends and buybacks since 2012.
In contrast, Amazon, which has never paid out a cent through either route, generates relatively little in the way of profits and continues to invest heavily in its businesses. Capital expenditures, or spending on physical assets such as warehouses and equipment, jumped to nearly $12 billion in 2017, up from $7.8 billion the year before.
That spending has helped fuel growth in business like Amazon Web Services, which is much more profitable than Amazon’s core retail operations. The company’s cloud-computing operations and other high margin businesses such as advertising will account for about 22 percent of total revenue in 2018 and could generate as much as $45 billion in operating profit by 2020, Morgan Stanley said in a research note on Aug. 29.
Perhaps because of that, the retailer gets a slight edge in analyst adoration. While its number of followers is roughly in line with Apple, the proportion of analysts saying buy Amazon is the highest among tech megacaps. On a scale from 1 to 5 where higher is better, Amazon has a consensus recommendation of 4.8. This compares with 4.5 for Facebook, 4.1 for Apple, 4.7 for Google, 4.1 for Netflix and 4.7 for Microsoft.
Other metrics paint a less divergent picture. Both companies are trading in the neighborhood of 4 times sales, and using a valuation lens that adjusts the price-earnings ratio for the rate of earnings growth, the two are traded at about the same multiple. — Bloomberg

From the Front Page: Business picks up for factories in August

The Philippine manufacturing industry saw “a modest improvement” in August with new business inflows and new jobs generated in the sector.
According to a survey conducted by IHS Markit for Nikkei, Inc., this came even as production growth slowed and input costs and prices rose “at marked rates.”
The Nikkei Philippines Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) records the performance of the country’s manufacturing sector. A PMI reading above 50 means the business condition is healthy, while a reading clocking in at 49 and below indicates some deterioration.
How is that number calculated? The PMI has five sub-indices:

  • New orders – 30%
  • Output – 25%
  • Employment- 20%
  • Supplier delivery time – 15%
  • Stocks of purchases – 10%

Despite poor weather, heavy traffic, and lack of supply in the second quarter impeding production, last August’s performance recorded a “modest improvement” at 51.9 from the 50.9 reported in July.
According to the report, this was due to higher sales and increased operating capacity.

“Business conditions in the Philippines’ manufacturing sector improved further midway through the third quarter,” the report read. “While output growth softened, new business inflows picked up pace, and optimism improved. Job creation was also reported for the first time in three months.”

“Firms continued to scale up purchasing activity, which contributed to further accumulation in input inventories. Meanwhile, inflationary pressures remained strong, with both input costs and output prices rising at marked rates.”

Industry outlooks

According to Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. economist Michael L. Ricafort, the strong growth in real estate and construction factored into the uptick. He pointed to the FDIs that had become operational that helped in improving the August reading.
“The faster reading in Philippine manufacturing as of August 2018, compared to a month ago and versus a year ago, may partly reflect the continued growth in real estate and construction — and the positive impact on industries allied to/related to real estate and construction,” Mr. Ricafort said via email.
“[This], as well as the new record highs in foreign direct investments (FDIs) that have led to increased manufacturing activities as they become operational, as the Philippines is still among the fastest-growing economies in Asia,” he said.
Domestic consumption also drove last month’s demand as exports slowed due to the recent passage of the TRABAHO bill, the second package of the TRAIN Law which seeks to cut corporate taxes while also scrapping fiscal incentives the government considers redundant.

“This may have caused some upcoming/new investments in export-oriented industries that are currently entitled to fiscal/tax incentives [to take] on a wait-and-see attitude or make investments adjustments accordingly,” said Mr. Ricafort.
Bernard Aw, IHS Markit principal economist, said the Nikkei survey indicated that the Philippine manufacturing sector has regained some growth momentum in August, raising hopes that the demand slowdown in July was just a blip.
“With the indicators of price gauges remaining elevated, the August survey sends a hawkish message to policy makers,” said Mr. Aw.

Sought for an outlook, Mr. Aw said that the “Philippines’ manufacturing sector continues to expand on a steady pace, with forward-looking indicators pointing towards similar growth rates in coming months.”

With reporting by Anna Gabriela A. Mogato, Online Reporter

CBS, MCBL to offer public school teachers salary loans that come with life insurance

China Bank Savings Corp. (CBS) and Manulife China Bank Life Assurance Corp. (MCBL) are set to provide automatic payroll deduction salary loan that comes with free life insurance.
In a statement sent to reporters on Wednesday, CBS and MCBL said they partnered with the Department of Education (DepEd) to offer Easi-Automatic Payroll Deduction Salary Loans (Easi-APDS Loan), allowing the employees of the agency to avail of loans that come with free life insurance.
Public school teachers and other staff from DepEd can borrow a minimum of P5,000 and maximum of P1 million through the Easi-APDS Loan.
The loans are payable either in one, two or three years and insurance coverage will be equivalent to the outstanding loan balance during the first three months.
The coverage will increase to 1.5 times of the outstanding loan balance from the fourth month onwards. — Karl Angelo N. Vidal

Berjaya Philippines invests P124.47 million in Malaysian 7-Eleven operator

Berjaya Philippines, Inc is shelling out P124.47 million to increase its stake in the Malaysian operator of 7-Eleven convenience stores.
In a disclosure to the stock exchange on Wednesday, Sept. 5, Berjaya Philippines said it has acquired 6.5 million shares in 7-Eleven Malaysia Holdings Berhad (SEM) at 1.48 Malaysian Ringgit (RM) each. One RM is equivalent to around P19.14 at the time of the transaction.
The company said it acquired the shares from the Malaysian open market from March 1 to Sept. 3.
SEM is the parent of 7-Eleven Malaysia Sdn. Bhd., which operates more than 2,100 7-Eleven convenience stores in Malaysia.
This brought Berjaya Philippines’ equity interest in SEM to 1.59%, or a total of 18 million shares. The company noted that the acquisition is for investment purposes. — Arra B. Francia

Property firm Pueblo de Oro to develop more residential projects

Pueblo de Oro Development Corp. (PDO) targets to develop more residential projects in the future as it looks to contribute to the housing sector in addressing the housing backlog in the country.
In a statement issued Wednesday, Sept. 5, the property unit of Investment & Capital Corporation of the Philippines (ICCP) said among the projects it has in the pipeline is a 40-hectare residential subdivision in Malvar, Batangas.
To be launched in the fourth quarter of 2019, the project forms part of the 250-hectare “live-work” community being developed by its sister firm, Science Park of the Philippines, Inc.
PDO said it chose to expand in Malvar due to the projected influx of locators in the area from Southeast Asian countries in the following years.
“With ASEAN integration and the pick-up in the economy, we expect more multinationals and industrial locators to come in and setup in areas outside Metro Manila such as Batangas,” PDO President Rhoel Alberto B. Nolido said in a statement. — Arra B. Francia

2008 Celtics

As has invariably been the case whenever Doc Rivers finds himself in New England, talk shifts to the Celtics’ triumphant march to the National Basketball Association championship in 2008. It was a particularly memorable time for him, and not simply because he got marquee names with humongous egos and disparate personalities to subscribe to a common objective. And, to his credit, he has acknowledged all these years that “ubuntu” worked because he preached it to a choir; everybody associated with the campaign sacrificed for the collective.
Yesterday, Rivers was in Boston for the ABCD Hoop Dreams’ annual event, and, naturally, he got around to speaking about his experience a decade ago. “That team, the 2008 group, was as close of a group as you could ever coach,” he noted. “On the floor, I’d take that group every night to go to war. If I had one game to win for my life, I’m taking that 2008 group … because you know they were going to show up and do it together.” As all and sundry know, however, that closeness failed to stand the test of time. Ray Allen’s transfer to the rival Heat in 2012 was deemed a defection by the rest of the Core Four, creating a chasm that remains to this day.
Which, in a nutshell, is why Rivers can no longer recall his crowning achievement without a tinge of wistfulness. Yesterday, he lamented how he could, and should, have done a better job of patching things up between Allen and Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, and Rajon Rondo. Instead, he will see the greatest three-point shooter in league history enshrined in the Basketball Hall of Fame without the other three on hand.
To be sure, the reverse was true when the Celtics retired Pierce’s jersey early this year. Even as Rivers, Garnett, and Rondo were at the TD Garden marking the occasion, Allen chose to play golf with comedian George Lopez in Los Angeles. Clearly, a lot of patching up needs to be done first before they all agree to be in one place at a given time. To be sure, the rift and its cause didn’t prevent Rondo from latching on to the Lakers in July; evidently, it didn’t bother him that he would be sharing the locker room with LeBron James, who so happened to head the very Heat he, Pierce, and Garnett hated.
It’s just too bad, because Allen deserves to be feted by his former teammates, just as he deserved to be at the recent reunion of the 2008 titleholders. And while it may be no skin off his back, Rivers is right. “Ray won us a title. He really did,” he argued. “He should be celebrated in Boston. He’s responsible for that banner.”
 
Anthony L. Cuaycong has been writing Courtside since BusinessWorld introduced a Sports section in 1994.

Brand-building at scale: The value of thought leadership

In the Philippines, every business relationship, every transaction, begins with trust.
A consumer will choose your product because they trust it will work for them. A business will choose your service because they trust it will bring them value.
But despite the importance of trust in Filipino business dealings, we’re still operating in the dark ages when it comes to trust-building.
Most Filipino professionals that deal with their customers — whether in marketing, sales, accounts management, or senior leadership — dedicate a significant portion of their work life to this abstract process of trust-building. They spend face-to-face time with their potential clients, sometimes in formal meetings, often in casual settings. Over lunch, dinner, or even drinks, they mix business and pleasure like the cocktails they bond over.
In my experience, the problem with this rubbing elbows-approach is that it’s simply not scalable. There are only so many interactions you can have with potential clients in a given week.
To ilustrate: Let’s say you skip the EDSA gridlock by optimizing all your meetings down to a single location in Metro Manila. How many meetings would you be able to squeeze in? Four or five a day? 16 or 20 a week? Even then, these meetings are essentially a lot of speculative work for a few possible deals that may or may not pull through.
So what’s a business leader to do?
We believe that the much more scalable approach to trust-building is thought leadership.
First things first, thought leadership and public relations are not the same thing. Public relations boils down to getting exposure for your company through various channels — be it print, digital, radio, or television.
The goal of thought leadership is not necessarily to make your company more visible — though that inevitably occurs — but to showcase how you are the most trusted authority in addressing the problem at hand.
I’ll share some insights from my experiences with Micab, the taxi-hailing platform I founded. Given that the transportation space is one of national importance, Micab has gotten a lot of exposure through traditional public relations channels.
For example, our new ads platform, MiAds, was featured heavily by media networks — as well as our recent hardware partnerships with Huawei and Smart Communications.
Our thought leadership, on the other hand, focuses much less on our own business experiences and challenges.
Instead, we try to highlight our advocacy of creating “Taxi 2.0” — a revitalization of the industry with drivers that are polite, kind, generous, and cars that are clean, comfortable, and modern.
The focus of our thought leadership efforts is to communicate our goal to create inclusive innovation for the tens of thousands of taxi drivers across the country. So many platforms take pride in wanting to “disrupt” their livelihood, but we believe they deserve a chance at proper customer service training and support in optimizing their connections with riders.
We promote this goal and present Micab as the group best-equipped to tackle it. In so doing, our partners grow to trust us, not because we claim we are experts, but because they understand how we are experts.
And the best part is that by spreading this type of messaging through various platforms like digital, print, radio, television, and even in person at events, I’ve found that I’m able to build trust at scale.
The inbound contacts that result from thought leadership make establishing partnerships much easier. Oftentimes, potential partners are already familiar with us, even before we meet them. In many cases, they even reach out to us for a partnership, rather than the other way around. Since your reputation precedes you, the only thing left to do is finalize the particulars.
Thought leadership, in short, gets your foot in the door — hundreds of potential clients and organizations at a time. How many one-on-one lunches would it take to do that?
Think about how you can position yourself as a leader in your industry, so that people will come to you. This may not be the natural inclination of many Filipinos, predisposed as we are to be low key, but it’s a must. By becoming thought leaders, we can lead our industry in the right direction.

Eddie Ybanez is the founder and CEO of Micab. Based in Cebu, he is a “hacker” by training and by heart.

Customs destroys misdeclared goods worth P3.5 million

The Bureau of Customs (BOC) has destroyed four containers worth around P3.5-million worth of goods on Wednesday, Sept.  at Angat, Bulacan.
In a statement, BOC said that two 40-footer containers from China held expired jelly candies was worth P2 million. The cargo, which was composted, was found to be consigned to Richco Marketing.
Another two 40-footer containers, which carried helmets was estimated to cost around P1.5 million and was consigned to Mild Red Trading.
“Upon further investigation, it was also found that the shipment was misdeclared as housewares and lacks the required Department of Trade and Industry – Bureau of Philippine Standards permits and clearances,” BOC in the same statement said.

Helmets are being destroyed in Angat, Bulacan in this handout photo taken on Sept. 5. The Bureau of Customs seized two 40-footer containers carrying helmets, which were misdeclared as housewares. The helmets were estimated to cost around P1.5 million and was consigned to Mild Red Trading.

The Auction and Cargo Disposal Division-Port of Manila said that goods which cannot be consumed and products that have no more commercial value will have to be destroyed as these cannot be auctioned anymore.
Prior to this, Customs Commissioner Isidro S. Lapeña had ordered district collectors to examine abandoned containers amid their transparency drive in destroying forfeited goods.
The destruction or condemnation of harmful and prohibited goods is in line with Republic Act No. 10863 otherwise known as the Customs Modernization and Tariff Act. — Anna Gabriela A. Mogato

European med-tech firms eye the Philippine market — BoI

A delegation of mostly healthcare and medical technology companies from the European Union (EU) is seeking to bring in new technologies in the country through a business mission, the Board of Investments (BoI) said.
In a statement on Wednesday, Sept. 5, the Department of Trade and Industry’s investment promotions arm said that around 50 companies from 15 EU states participated in the EU Business Avenues in South East Asia program this week.
The program, which seeks to develop partnerships between Philippine and EU firms, showcased new technologies in medical equipment such as in medical waste management, dental products and supplies, cosmetic equipment, IT solutions, assistive technologies, and rehabilitation equipment.
BoI Managing Head Ceferino S. Rodolfo said that the business mission “complements the effort of the local health services industry to develop and promote the country as a medical travel, wellness tourism, and as a retirement destination in Asia”.
“The government supports the manufacturing medical devices and supplies as the country presents great opportunities in the field with the presence of over 2,000 government and private hospitals and over 23,000 health units and stations all over the country,” he added.
Citing data from Med Tech Europe, BoI said that the bloc is one of the largest sources of medical devices with almost 25,000 medical device manufacturers and distributors of various fields under medicine.
EU Ambassador Franz Jessen said that “[t]he EU remains committed in supporting the Philippines in its healthcare agenda through various programmes, trade and investment”.
BoI said that total healthcare trade in 2017 reached more than €1.1 billion. With the country’s population of elderly aboe 65 years old expected to reach 4.9% by 2020, trade between the Philippines and EU is expected to grow further, Med Tech Europe noted. — Anna Gabriela A. Mogato

Peso weakens to fresh record low against dolllar

The peso weakened against the dollar to its fresh 12-year low on Wednesday, Sept. 5, following the faster-than-expected August inflation print.
The local currency ended Wednesday’s session at P53.55 versus the greenback, a centavo and a half weaker than the P53.535-per-dollar finish on Tuesday.
This was the peso’s fresh low in more than 12 years since it closed at P53.575 against the dollar on June 28, 2006.
The peso traded sideways the whole day, opening the session at P53.535. It slid to as low as P53.56, while its best showing for the day stood at P53.51.
Dollars traded soared to $1.38 billion from just $440.75 million that exchanged hands the previous day.
A foreign exchange trader said the peso weakened slightly as it continued to move within a very tight range.
“There’s a lot of trading today, but still the exchange rate continued to be pegged at around P53.55,” the trader said in a phone interview Wednesday.
He added that the August inflation print “was a big surprise,” boosting investors’ speculation of another rate hike from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas.
Inflation accelerated to a fresh nine-year high of 6.4% in August, the Philippine Statistics Authority reported Wednesday, coming from July’s 5.7% and from 2.6% in August 2017.
The pickup in inflation last month was mainly attributed to the prices of food as well as alcoholic beverages and tobacco.
In a statement, the central bank said it will be “looking more closely” at the latest data to reassess the medium-term inflation path. — Karl Angelo N. Vidal

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