About GEN in Philippines

Manila

The Global Entrepreneurship Network (GEN) began operating in the Philippines in 2013 when it partnered with the Young Entrepreneur Society (YES Philippines) to conduct the country’s first Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW) campaign. The campaign was an immediate success with 60 local partners holding about 150 events for more than 15,000 participants.

Under the leadership of Henry Ong, the GEW campaign grew into one of the region's largest celebrations of entrepreneurship. By 2015 it had expanded to some 300 events and more than 23,000 participants, and within a few years it counted 144 partner organizations, 529 events, and more than 264,000 attendees. Universities have been central to that growth, Miriam College participated with large scale events, and the campaign has drawn support from the highest levels of government. President Rodrigo Roa Duterte backed the campaign as did President Benigno Aquino III and Vice President Jejomar Binay. Recent editions have continued the trajectory, with the November 2024 campaign running nationwide and student-led groups such as the CSPC Young Entrepreneurs Society mounting week-long programs.

The momentum led GEN to convene ecosystem leaders and provide support on a year round basis. In recognition of its impact and accomplishments, GEN’s work in the Philippines was nominated for the GEN Country of the Year award. GEN's engagement in the Philippines has extended into policy. GEN advocated for the Innovative Startup Act that President Duterte signed into law in April 2019. This created a Philippine Startup Development Program of benefits and incentives administered by the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), the Department of Science and Technology (DOST), and the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT). Filipino policymakers have been visible in GEN's Startup Nations community, including Senen Perlada of the DTI's Export Marketing Bureau and Antonilo Mauricio, General Manager of the National Development Company, and GEN's Startup Nations Policy Hack — a collaborative method for beta-testing regulatory ideas — was implemented in the country.

Filipino startups have made repeated use of GEN's programs to accelerate their growth. GEN Philippines has also hosted the national finals of the Entrepreneurship World Cup (EWC), with one edition held at the Philippine Stock Exchange, where bamboo social enterprise Bambuhay emerged as national champion. Since GEN launched the competition in 2019, the EWC has offered founders in roughly 200 countries free training, mentorship, and exposure to investors while competing for a share of $1 million in prizes. Four Philippine startups have reached the EWC Top 100: Bambuhay (2019), EveGrocer Zero Waste Online Shop Corp (2020), AuREUS Energetics (2021), and Farmtri (2024) — ventures spanning sustainability, zero-waste retail, clean energy, and agriculture.

Manila is also home to a chapter of Startup Huddle, GEN's monthly peer-mentoring meetup, organized locally by YES Philippines. Beyond these, GEN Philippines runs an incubation program, entrepreneurship bootcamps, weekly business-management workshops, a mentor-and-investor matching program, and an international exchange for Filipino founders, and several ventures — including Sustainable Alternative Lighting (SALt), whose salt-powered lamp earned international attention — have engaged with the GEN Starters Club and other global programs.

GEN maintains extensive relationships with key Philippine ecosystem stakeholders, including the Department of Trade and Industry, the Department of Science and Technology, the Department of Information and Communications Technology, the National Development Company, Impact Hub Manila, Miriam College and other universities, and the Young Entrepreneur Society.

Guided by Henry Ong's vision for unleashing the potential of Filipino entrepreneurs, GEN is working to position the Philippines as a central hub for a fast-growing, entrepreneurial economy fueled by innovation and enterprise. GEN’s global team has supported that work by connecting the country's founders and policymakers to GEN's worldwide network, linking the ecosystem to leading-edge research, proven programs, and communities of experts so that Filipino entrepreneurs can scale at home and abroad.