Packworks, a retailtech startup offering a B2B platform for community based micro-retailers or sari-sari stores, won top honors at the Philippine regional Wildfire pitch competition during the final day of IGNITE 2022 FUSION’S weeklong hybrid conference held at the Fairmont/Raffles Hotel in Makati City.
Founded in 2018, Packworks bested nine other finalists to gain the right to represent the Philippines in the 2023 Startup World Cup (SWC) Grand Finale in Silicon Valley organized by Pegasus Tech Ventures and vie for the $1,000,000 grand prize.
Packworks CEO Bing Tan shared, “I’m very thankful for this opportunity. What I’m fighting for is beyond me, beyond Packworks. It’s really helping our “nanays” (mothers) grow better businesses. I also think that for budding entrepreneurs and startups, I want you to build companies with a cause. Just because you’re doing good doesn’t mean you can’t make money, and that’s the single philosophy that Packworks lives by.
Two other Philippine start-ups shared the podium with Packworks at the regional SWC pitch competition. Smile API, a digital platform that fast tracks the loan or financing application process for workers suffering from a lot of red tape, and ALLCARE.io, a platform that provides worker benefits like healthcare, insurance, training, and other perks accessible to freelancers, self-employed individuals, solopreneurs and MSMEs, rounded out the top three. ALLCARE.io was also recognized for being the QBO Innovation Hub Prize Winner!
“I was blown away by the Startup World Cup Philippines Regional event” said Cole Carouba, Investment Manager at Pegasus Tech Ventures, a global venture capital firm behind Startup World Cup.
“It’s always a pleasure getting to expand my worldview and see first-hand the innovation taking place across the world. The event was filled with promising startups that ranged from a cryptographic identity protection platform to an eco-friendly nanomaterial’s producer. I want to thank Ignite Fusion for making this event possible and look forward to seeing the future of innovation in the Philippines,” added Carouba.
In the preceding Wildfire Pitch Competition featuring international and late-stage startups, the top three winners were Optimays, a human resources platform for online recruitment and personal development, Metain.io, a co-investment platform for NFTs and stablecoin holders, and PH-based startup Instalimb, the world’s first 3D printing technology company for prosthetics. The top three startups received generous prizes from 917Ventures, Xendit, and Microsoft.
On his impressions of the Philippine regional pitch , SWC jury member and Orbit SOSV SEA Director Navin Danapal said, “It’s great to see the evolution of the Philippine startup ecosystem. After seeing the pitches, it shows how the maturity has set in, and it tells a good story for investment potential in the Philippines. It’s also great that Ignite has maintained their status as the largest conference for startups in the country.”
SWC juror and angel investor and venture partner of Mandalay Venture Partners Amarit Charoenphan added, “I knew Ignite was going to be a good show but I didn’t realize that it has grown and matured over the past ten years I’ve been coming back to the Philippines. People are saying that this is supposed to be the Philippine decade, that there’s going to be amazing companies coming out of this ecosystem. I’m really excited by the energy.”
Prior to the culminating pitch events on October 14, Ignite 2022 Fusion held online activities from October 10 to 13 made up of panel discussions, breakout sessions, workshops and sessions featuring speakers from around the world. The conference was organized by TechShake, dentsu X, and Brainsparks.
“Ignite 2022 was a big challenge for us since we had to restart from two years of online events to an online and face-to-face hybrid, so our biggest success was that we were able to expand our audience and start up entries to the APAC region,” according to Kazuhiro Ohki, dentsu X Executive Director.
“Going forward, we still feel the need to further expand both online and F2F audiences, but this is possible once there are more startup entries from markets other than the Philippines as the audience will follow the startup’s country origin,” he concluded.