CAREER

I was born and grew up in the Philippines. After graduating university, I worked in IT for large multinational companies like Accenture, P&G and AWS. I love technology and I have been fortunate to not only work with a lot of cutting edge tech in cybersecurity, cloud computing and AI, but have also had a chance to travel to other countries and work with a lot of other nationalities as part of my job.

While I worked mainly in enterprise IT, I actually had a passion for the creative side of tech which was web design, computer graphics, video editing, and photography. I was practicing this on the side as hobbies. I learned about 360 Virtual Tour technology and started to experiment with it. My parents had a condominium in the Philippines that they listed for rent and I took the chance to create a virtual tour to help promote it online. My sister who was a real estate agent was able to help find a tenant from abroad using the tour. It makes me happy when technology can be used to help improve everyday lives.

While I had a good stable career, I have always wanted to start my own business. However, I couldn’t think of what business I would be passionate in doing but my experience doing the virtual tour made me think, “Hey, I actually like doing this if this was my business.”

Working in IT security, I was naturally risk averse and thought of all the things that could go wrong. However, there’s a saying “There is no right time, just time and what you do with it” so I decided to just do it.

While researching about the virtual tour business, I determined that amongst the use cases, real estate was the natural customer and had the highest adoption mostly in western countries like the US and Canada. This was when I came across Shibuya Startup Support and Japan as a market because Japan had a healthy real estate industry where there was a lot of foreign investment activity and growth potential. Shibuya City was also supportive of entrepreneurs with the Shibuya Startup Support program so I thought I would start my business here.

BUSINESS

We produce immersive virtual tours for various industries and use cases that help improve people’s daily lives and inspire action. These can be accessed using personal computers, mobile devices or VR headsets using the web browser without requiring the installation of an app.

1. Real Estate / Expat Relocation / Domestic Relocation – Our 360 virtual tours help people and companies save time and money while also helping them make better decisions by leveraging technology to make home searches more efficient.

2. Safety Training and Education – Using a combination of 360 environments, photo, and video that the audience can explore and interact with creates a more engaging training experience especially when the environment is dangerous or non-permissive (e.g. restricted construction area, manufacturing floor, etc.) On top of traditional quizzes, training can involve scavenger hunt and escape room type of activities for more interactivity.

3. Hospitality and Tourism – cultural protected environments, heritage sites, and nature conservations where in-person exploration is not allowed can be experienced using a 360 virtual tour reproduction. This helps people virtually experience and be educated without harming fragile artifacts or biodiversity of the preserved site.

4. Experiential Marketing – Use 360 virtual technology to create memorable interactive experiences with your products and brand. For example, experience the interior of a car while being able to look around as if you were inside. Use 3D models generated using photogrammetry to inspect and engage with a product with more interactivity than traditional catalogs using photos.

VISION

I hope to be able to collaborate with other companies and organizations to hopefully find solutions to the growing abandoned houses (Akiya) problem happening in Japan’s countryside. I want to contribute in the revitalization of Japan’s rural areas by promoting local businesses in renovation and reuse of abandoned houses through the use of our virtual tours service.

I would like to connect with real estate companies, hospitality and tourism companies, universities, and most of all, small business owners like minpaku, ryokan, and minshuku operators that are looking to promote their spaces using 360 Virtual Tours. I want to help their businesses stand out, save time for both them and their customers, as well as showcase their spaces in an engaging way.

PROFILE

As an IT professional, I worked mainly in cybersecurity, enterprise architecture and cloud helping large multinational companies build secure systems and processes for over 20 years. I am now working on my startup SHIBUYA360° which I hope to use technology creatively to help people's everyday lives more directly. My personal interests are football (soccer) and riding motorcycles.

Filipino – Metro Manila, Philippines
Ateneo De Manila University

▼ SHIBUYA360° website
https://shibuya360.com

▼ LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/company/shibuya360/

▼ Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/shibuya360

▼ YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/@shibuya360