SM SUPERMALLS employee programs, ABOITIZ Group award, NINJA VAN innovation, GLOBE BUSINESSGFiber Biz Plus, SEEDIN TECHNOLOGYfor accessible financing, CSMC certified platinum, FEU in Cabanatuan City, UNIONBANK innovation festival, ABS-CBN leads in SG

 SM Supermalls employee programs win international accolades

SM Supermalls recently received three awards from global awarding institutions. These include a Gold Award for Excellence in Learning and Development and a Silver Award for Excellence in Employee Engagement from the HR Excellence Awards 2022 (HREA) Philippines. At the recently concluded Stevie Awards, they also received a Bronze Stevie Award for Employer of the Year (Retail) from the 2022 Stevie Awards for Great Employers (SAGE).

The company stated that the awards are a validation of the company’s employee-centric efforts as it considers its people to be at the core of the achievement of business goals. For this, employees’ learning, growth, and overall wellbeing are prioritized and invested in by SM Supermallsthrough programs that are anchored on purpose, passion, and performance — the pillars that embody life in SM.

Through groundbreaking programs such as the strengthening of employee communication, learning, and engagement; leaders’ town halls, coaching and mentoring sessions; SM Masterclass; online mental health counselling; and wellness learning series’, among others, SM Supermalls has been able to achieve business targets, retain 90% of high potential talents, deliver 94% in training coverage, and achieve 100% in employee engagement reach.

Winners of the 2022 Stevie Awards for Great Employers were announced on September 17 at the Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, while the winners of the first ever HR Excellence Awards 2022 (HREA) Philippines were announced on September 23, at a gala dinner at Hilton Manila.

 BOI honors Aboitiz Group

Aboitiz Foundation received the Pandemic Heroes Award from the Board of Investment (BOI) during the appreciation ceremony held at the Aboitiz Corporate office in Bonifacio Global City last September 29.

The Pandemic Heroes Award is given to BOI’s partner stakeholders in various industries that responded to pressing needs during the COVID-19 pandemic and provided genuine support and assistance in ensuring the health and safety of our countrymen and bringing opportunities through investments.

At the onset of the pandemic, BOI tapped the  private sector  to help provide critical PPEs for important government hospitals. Aboitiz Foundation was BOI’s early partner and readily donated medical-grade N95 masks as a form of assistance.

The Aboitiz Group has contributed over P2.2 billion to the national Covid-19 response effort.

Ninja Van  ramps up innovation

Ninja Van is accelerating automation and other operational improvements as it marks its sixth anniversary in the Philippines.

Earlier this year, Ninja Van Philippines (NVPH) opened its 21,000-square-meter fully automated hub in Cabuyao, Laguna.  The Group’s largest automated hub in the region boosts receiving and outbound capacities by 300 percent and 400 percent, respectively.

The Group recently announced a $50-million investment in automation technology and systems in key regional parcel sorting hubs, which include the Cabuyao hub.

Seen to be completed by the second half of 2024, these region-wide parcel handling improvements are expected to increase the Group’s overall operational productivity by 50 percent.

Ahead of its sixth anniversary, Ninja Van Philippines also opened a 5,000-square-meter hub in Novaliches, Quezon City.

Globe Business launches new GFiber Biz Plus

Globe Business launched its latest made-for-business broadband plan called GFiber Biz Plus.

With GFiber Biz Plus, businesses can enjoy robust connectivity without the high cost. All plans are now fully “symmetric” across speeds of 35Mbps up to 1Gbps. Plus, they can now enjoy 4x the speed from 50 Mbps to 200Mbps for Plan 2499.

GFiber Biz Plus Plans also come with additional tools important for businesses. For Plans 2499 and up, Globe Business extends help to business owners by giving them the option to choose among these additional support based on their needs: a free one-year license of Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 to improve business productivity; two units of WiFi Mesh for a more enhanced WiFi coverage; P5,000 subsidy that can be used for in-house wiring or  on barangay permit. All plans also include unlimited calls to all mobile and landline networks for 24 months, making calls to customers and suppliers worry free about extra charges.

SeedIn Technology makes financing accessible for everybody

SeedIn Technology–a mobile-app, web-based investment platform–matches Small Medium Enterprises (SMEs) with potential investors from around the world.  As the only SEC-licensed P2B SME crowdlending platform in the country, this easy-to-use app has taken the finance world by storm, making financing and investment accessible for everybody.  The model has been widely successful asSeedIn Technology is now one of the biggest P2B (person to business) crowdfunding platforms in the region, having put over US $200 million into SMEs across Southeast Asia in 4 countries (Philippines, Taiwan, Singapore and Cambodia).

SeedIn was brought to the Philippines by Edison Tsai, Anson Uy and Dexter Tiu, successful entrepreneurs in the information technology, finance and energy.

SeedIn Technology’s crowdfunding model has found a decentralized solution to financing by pulling together the resources of tens of thousands of investors who use their app.  Tsai calls SeedIn “The People’s Bank,” as many struggling businesses are now able to gain access to credit and continue to thrive and be part of the comeback economy.

SeedIn makes financing more inclusive by allowing anybody to be an investor.  With a minimum per investment amount of only Php 1,000 and an average of 10% per annum returns, investments now become accessible to anyone 18 and above with a Philippine bank account or e-wallet.

Operating in the Philippines for five years, SeedInhas served hundreds of businesses and over 80,000 investors across 80 countries around the world.  It is one of the largest P2B SME crowdfunding platforms in Asia is eyeing to expand to other regions soon.

CSMC certified platinum

Cardinal Santos Medical Center (CSMC) is the first hospital in the country to receive platinum accreditation from Investors in People (IiP).

This also makes Cardinal Santos the fifth institution to receive the highest possible accolade from the international accrediting body. CSMC now ranks fourth among 69 organizations in the Human Health & Medical Activities Category and 83 of 1074 organizations globally that have taken part in the accreditation process.

The certification is valid from 2022 to 2025 and is the culmination of a re-accreditation process that has seen the hospital receive the highest-possible approval that IiP hands out. Platinum accreditation means that there is a high level of trust, empowerment, and collaboration between the organization’s leaders and its people.

FEU partners with Good Samaritan Colleges

Far Eastern University (FEU) announced its partnership with Good Samaritan Colleges in Cabanatuan City, offering two top-tier business degree programs to students in Nueva Ecija.

Under this partnership, students can choose to take up either a Bachelor of Science in Accountancy (BSA), or Business Administration (BSBA). Both programs will be offering the same curriculum and extracurricular activities as its main campus, in an aim to not only improve quality education access to those outside of Metro Manila, but also to provide the unique university life that FEU Manila has for its students.

The BSA program provides a balanced mix of general education and business courses for its students. The BSBA program offers specialized tracks in Economics Law, Entrepreneurial Management, Financial Management, Leadership and Human Capital Management, or Marketing Management.

Tech industry players under one roof

Many of the biggest technology players in the industry recently banded together in the name of innovation at the first annual Innovation Festival 2022 organized by Union Bank of the Philippines (UnionBank).

The event took place on September 7 to 9 at the newly inaugurated UnionBank Innovation Campus (UBIC) in San Pedro City, Laguna.

The companies which supported the Bank as Platinum Sponsors were Huawei, Cloudera, Globe Business, TIM Corp., eCloudvalley, VMware, Questronix Corp., BlueVoyant, Palo Alto Networks, Integrated Computer Systems Inc., Via Appia PH, Twilio, and METACO.

Salesforce joined as a Gold Sponsor, while Pointwest, Converge ICT, PDAX, and Blancco participated as Silver Sponsors.

No. 1 in Singapore

The global flagship channel of ABS-CBN Corp. has maintained its lead among Filipino TV stations in Singapore for the second quarter this year and heading into the third quarter, according to television audience measurement SG-TAM.

The Filipino Channel (TFC) showed its advantage throughout April, May and June based on its average daily reach and average time spent for PayTV audience, peaking at 4,300 daily audience and 88 minutes, respectively.

This is followed by TFC’s lead with average daily reach at 3,400 and average time spent at 1 hour and 20 minutes for PayTV audience among the Filipino channels tracked by SG-TAM in July.

TFC said it also dominated both weekday and weekend household viewing across this period, with weekday cumulative net reach peaking at 7,800 in the second quarter and at 6,800 in July.

TV Patrol is the most watched weekday program in July which peaked at 3.9, while FPJ’s Ang Probinsyano concludes its seven-year run on a high note coming in second at 2.3, TFC said.