Succeeding in times of crisis: Corporate Venture Building and Investing with the Embiggen Group

MANILA, Philippines — The Embiggen Group formally launched its venture capital-as-a-service and corporate venture building services in an online event last September 8, 2022.

Formerly known as Embiggen Consulting, the company grew exponentially since its establishment in 2020, amid a global pandemic, by co-founders Rolan Marco Garcia, Paul Pajo, and Earl Valencia. 

Garcia and Pajo are concurrently serving as heads of the innovation arms of Far Eastern University and De La Salle – College of Saint Benilde respectively, while Valencia is also the co-founder of fintech startup Plentina.

Despite being an early-stage startup, Embiggen was trusted by well-known corporations and organizations to provide solutions for their challenges. 

“We partner with ambitious, progressive, and forward-thinking organizations to build, launch, and invest in new digital ventures at startup speed. Essentially, we help organizations achieve innovation-led growth through venture building and venture investing,” said Embiggen CEO Rolan Marco Garcia.

Furthermore, in 2021, Embiggen established partnerships with one of the top Asian business schools, the Asian Institute of Management (AIM), and the worldwide innovation standard certification body,  Global Innovation Management Institute (GIMI).  As the exclusive certified training partner of GIMI in the Philippines, Embiggen offers globally-recognized innovation certification programs. Over 10,000 innovators from corporations worldwide like Pfizer, HSBC, and the Ayala Corporation have trained with and gained certifications from GIMI and GIMI’s certified training partners.

The company’s growth and the trust it has earned from established corporations are significant achievements, especially since it hasn’t begun seeking external investments.

Screenshot from the Embiggen Group Launch last September 8, 2022

Challenge to survive and thrive

Companies worldwide have realized the importance of innovation as many corporations have gone out of business over the past few decades due to their failure to innovate.

“Innovation is the key to surviving times of crisis,” said Garcia.

Contrary to popular belief, corporate innovation is not just inventing new products and services. It is also the incorporation of the process of ideating and implementing new innovation initiatives into a corporation’s business model to contribute to its growth and success. 

“The one thing that most people think about innovation is that it’s unstructured, black magic or it’s random. But the most innovative people, corporations, and countries approach innovation in a very disciplined, organized, and structured process,” said Valencia.

Embiggen’s unique approach to innovation utilizes corporate innovation and corporate foresight to take on an organization’s challenges. Corporate foresight allows it to anticipate and prepare for the future thereby ensuring that the innovations Embiggen co-builds with clients will last through the next few decades.

Embiggen’s suite of solutions allows them to help organizations from day one of their innovation journeys. Even if an organization is proficient at innovating, Embiggen can still accelerate its growth and achieve its objectives.

Embiggen’s team of innovation strategists, technology entrepreneurs, digital transformation executives, venture capitalists, and innovation thought leaders are bringing the practice of innovation and foresight into the Philippines.

Their work empowers the development of the innovation and foresight capacity of organizations and allows the co-creation of ingenious and exciting ventures worldwide. 

“This is a call to action for conglomerates who want to go into innovation because maybe the pandemic gave them an existential crisis that ‘we need to have other options than what we are currently doing in our business,’” said Pajo.

Despite the numerous health and economic crises plaguing the world today, Embiggen tirelessly works to make the world a better place through innovation.

“And the reason why we do this is that Embiggen was founded on the belief that through venture building and investing, established businesses and organizations can help accelerate the creation of solutions to the world’s most pressing problems, including mental health, climate change, water scarcity, and education gaps,” said Garcia

Learn more about the work Embiggen does at http://embiggengroup.com.