2nd Annual Filipino
Business Alliance Conference

November 08, 2004
12:30 -- 8 pm
Westin San Francisco Airport Hotel
1 Old Bayshore Highway, Millbrae
California

FILIPINO-AMERICAN entrepreneurs will look to Filipino American business leaders to show the way to successful entrepreneurship in the 2nd Annual Filipino Business Alliance (FBA) Conference to be held on Nov. 8 at the Westin San Francisco Airport Hotel in Burlingame, California at 12:30 pm. Participants will listen to industry moguls talk and discuss this year's theme "Excellence in Entrepreneurship."

The conference is being put together by the FBA -- the alliance of Filipino entrepreneurs. Denny Roja, founding president of FBA and managing partner for Acuity Ventures, is confident that the FBA will help bring increased equity to the Bay Area Filipino community. The FBA has been carrying out its mission in various ways as it seeks to empower Filipino-American entrepreneurs and businesses to build global businesses by supporting their management, business development, technology, financial, and legal needs.

Keynote speakers Cora Tellez, CEO of Sterling HSA and Raymond L. Ocampo Jr., former senior vice president and general counsel of Oracle Corp. and co-founder of the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology, will share the leadership and entrepreneurial skills that made their visions and dreams become a reality, and guided their businesses far beyond their expectations.

Prior to founding Sterling HAS, Ms Tellez spent 25 years as a successful executive in the health care industry, including president of Health Net health plans division, president of Prudential's Western health care operations, and CEO of Blue Shield of California.

"An entrepreneur is an incurable optimist. Problems and barriers that would defeat people in corporate structures are dealt with quickly because -- without exaggeration -- it's a life-or-death issue for the entrepreneur's business. I love the speed with which issues and problems are dealt with. And I am awed by the sense of confidence entrepreneurs have in the outcome of their effort," says Ms Tellez.

Attendees will be able to participate in a rare Fireside Chat with one of the Bay Area's leading venture capitalists, Dado Banatao, managing partner of Tallwood Venture Capital. Banatao is regarded as a Silicon Valley visionary able to spot upcoming trends and opportunities in technology solutions from computing and communications. Arguably the most successful Filipino entrepreneur in contemporary times, he is credited with developing several key semiconductor technologies as well as co-founding three successful technology start-ups. The latest of this is S3 Corp. (now Sonic Blue Inc.) which went public in the 90s.

More than a dozen panelists will share their expertise in identifying entrepreneurial opportunities in technology and non-technology industries, skills and talents necessary for success, hot business areas to investigate, strategies for breaking through glass ceilings, and the importance of business ethics.

When asked about possible barriers to success, conference panelist John Ocampo, CEO of Sirenza Microdevices, a Silicon Valley public company, replies, "There are significantly more opportunities for Filipinos to be a successful entrepreneur today. In other words, we are at the right place at the right time. The door of opportunity for Filipino-Americans is wide open."

Alelie Funcell, formerly vice president of engineering and manufacturing at Xilinx Corp., a leading semiconductor company in Silicon Valley, views FBA as "a hub where independent business people can get a clearer perspective of the bigger picture and share experiences, failures and best practices on how to survive the technical and emotional challenges of running a business. It is also an incubator that provides a learning environment that encourages Filipinos to translate bright ideas into successful products and viable businesses."

According to Andrew Cuyugan McCullough, senior vice president and general counsel of Century Theatres, "FBA is a constant reminder that Filipino businessmen are not alone, and that resources exist to guide both entrepreneurs and corporate managers."

Twenty-two percent of the Bay Area population is of Filipino descent, the second largest Asian ethnic group in the country. Filipinos tend to have a much higher than average median household income, yet in 1997 only 85,000 of the 21 million sole proprietor businesses in the U.S. were Filipino-owned.

Founded in 2002, the 501(c)6 non-profit Filipino Business Alliance is the premier San Francisco Bay Area organization dedicated to empowering Filipino-American entrepreneurs and businesses while fostering innovation by supporting their management, business development, technology, financial, and legal needs.

To register or receive additional information, e-mail info@filipinobusinessalliance.org, visit www.filipinobusinessalliance.org or call +408 8354926.

RELATED SITE:
Filipino Business Alliance
www.filipinobusinessalliance.org