Villars, U.P. launch innovation hub

Former Senate President Manny Villar’s Vista Land and Lifescapes and the University of the Philippines has launched the first phase of development of the UP School of Technology Entrepreneurship to be built in the state university’s new Alabang campus.

“The opening of a UP-run innovation hub in Evia is the beginning of the realization of the UP Alabang vision,” said Villar. “Creating a community that is designed to become the heart of all start-up activities in the Philippines requires that bridges be built early on between brilliant minds from the academe and industry. This is what the future UP Alabang will stand for.”

“UP @Lab is a dream brought to life by the Villars for UP’s student-locators because it brings us closer to accessing industry funding that makes our inventions and ideas a reality,” said Luis Sison, project leader of Diliman-based DOST-UP Enterprise and Innovation Hub.

The initial phase of development is the creation of an Innovation Zone and Incubator Hub at Vista Land’s Evia Lifestyle Center. The hub, nicknamed UP @Lab by the student start-up locators and university staff, is positioned as the first spark that will initiate the academe and industry partnerships that UP aims to create by putting up a campus in Alabang.

“Having such a facility as the first building block of UP Alabang allows us to solve issues that plague fledgling start-ups such as limited access to industry and business expertise, which have hindered the progress of technology innovation and development in the country,” said Aura Matias, former dean of the UP College of Engineering.

UP @Lab, located on Level B1 of the Vista Land’s Evia Lifestyle Center, is a fully equipped innovation hub complete with four start-up offices, two meeting rooms and an open workspace area for visiting locators. The hub will be run by the same team behind UP Diliman’s DOST-UP Enterprise Center as a starting point for eventual operations in UP Alabang.

The UP Alabang campus will be home to two new tech-driven centers for innovation for the county’s premier university—the UP School of Technology Entrepreneurship and the UP Alabang Enterprise Center.