By Tom S. Noda
Published in the CWP February 2010 issue

Having already amassed fortune but still working harder like a beginner, Winston Damarillo may appear to want more wealth. But a closer look would reveal that what keeps this serial entrepreneur going is simply technology advancement.

“I don’t really have to work anymore. I’m generally satisfied with my personal financial achievement. My motivation now is to discover new technologies that would change the way people do things,” says Damarillo.

As chairman and CEO of Global Gateway Innovation Exchange (G2iX), Damarillo confesses that the other layer that stands meaningful to him is the discovery of what the local IT industry can become.

“The Philippines can be the best in high value outsourcing. And that drives me. To be an individual contributing to that is so rewarding.”

Only 39 years old, Damarillo has a proven track record of building successful technology start-ups. For instance, he founded multiple disruptive companies that include Exist, a multi-awarded Open Source software engineering team; Morph Labs, a cloud computing provider; and MaestroDev, an innovative tooling-automation company. G2iX serves as his latest venture that unifies the portfolio to deliver a complete innovation platform.

Despite the financial crisis in 2009, all three companies founded by Damarillo are reportedly doing well and he and his team are all looking to be “hyper growing” as they expect double or triple growth in 2010.

Damarillo describes his job to be basically ensuring that his employees will have good, exciting and sustainable jobs and that his shareholders will make the most money as possible. Yet there is a mission in what Damarillo and his team do today.

“Our mission is to be the best in the world and whatever it takes to do that, responsibility falls on me,” Damarillo notes. “The company I build becomes a showcase of the capabilities of Filipinos as IT practitioners and companies.”

Among Damarillo’s past entrepreneurial endeavours include Gluecode Software, an open source application infrastructure company that Damarillo grew to profitability before securing Series A funding and subsequently sold to IBM in 2005; Logicblaze, acquired by Iona Technologies; and DevZuz, which was bought by Exist in 2007.

Prior to his entrepreneurial endeavors, Damarillo was among the highest performing venture capital professionals at Intel, having led the majority of his investments to either a successful IPO or a profitable corporate acquisition. He served under various leadership roles such as managing strategic software relationships, channel development, product engineering, and new business development.

Damarillo believes he is the kind of leader who lives by example and an active entrepreneur. “I like the idea that a leader should understand the business itself. From my perspective, I always try to relate with my team, my developers by staying technical. I can write code like anybody else. But then I always try to acquire what it requires to be a CEO, like how to run a business, how to raise money, among others,” he says.

Damarillo shares that among the lessons he learned as a professional is that pitch, positioning, and marketing—if lacking in content—is not a real business. And that no matter how excellent a person’s background is, or how deep one’s business partners are, if that person doesn’t build a fundamentally sound business, nothing will happen.

“One of my latest findings is you can never hire managers to replace a leader. You can always outsource management but you can never outsource leadership. Innovative people want to work with an innovative leader, so I have to keep my edge,” Damarillo says.

Damarillo currently serves as international marketing director for the Philippine Software Industry Association (PSIA), a non-profit organization that aims to promote the growth and global competitiveness of the Philippine software industry. He also serves as board member of the Ayala Foundation USA.

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