Ms. Shaynnah Maie Quilang (BS in Tourism Management) and Mr. John Paulus Serafin Gazzingan (BS in Information Technology), won the first ever Pathway Hackathon in Cagayan Valley Region, Philippines, held at SPUP last July 11, 2023, with their project Lakbayan.org. This was their ticket to Spain to attend the two-day Valencia Digital Summit 2023 (VDS 2023). With them are the two Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU) students who also won in the PATHWAY-Hackathon at ADMU.
In a remarkable gathering of tech visionaries, SPUP and ADMU students got the chance to engage with the aspiring CEOs, business leaders, investors, and promising startups during the 2023 Valencia Digital Summit (VDS2023) which was opened last October 26, 2023, Thursday, at the famous, City of Arts and Sciences (Ciutat de les Arts I les Ciencies) in the City of Valencia, Spain.
The annual summit gathered 12,000 professionals from 91 countries for its sixth edition this year, beating its attendance record for the second consecutive year. Indeed, SPUP students were one of the luckiest who were chosen by Pathway to be part of the VDS2023.
The notable participants were startups, aspiring business tycoons and investors. The venue was filled with festive and exciting aura for the event. It has an investors’ corner, gaming corner, lounge area and different pitching corners. It brought so much amazement, excitement and the best impressions among diverse faces.
The event was star-studded with the big names and impressive lineup of speakers: Alejandro Mullor, digital Strategist at Microsoft; Vala Afshar, Chief Digital Evangelist at Salesforce; Angel Saenz from Linkedln, and Angel Rivera, CEO of Santander Spain.
Ms. Quilang and Mr. Gazzingan were able to meet the President of Startup Valencia, Juan Luis Hortelano during the Opening Remarks Session, and the Mayor of Valencia, Maria Jose Catala during the Official Institutional Welcome at the Summit Stage.
Talks were delivered in both English and Spanish to allow the international participants understand its content and views. A few of the topics were on The Future of Tourism, Artificial Intelligence in the Core of Business and Innovation Programs that Transform the World Into a More Sustainable Place. All topics were insightful that they absorbed and gained beneficial knowledge for the development of their application, Lakbayan.org.
