InnovationForce and AboitizPower Announce Three-Year Partnership to Accelerate Resiliency through Innovation in the Philippines

Companies announce partnership at Innovate Cebu!, a regional innovation challenge designed to strengthen economic resilience through local ingenuity

RALEIGH, N.C. and CEBU, Philippines — October 16, 2025 — InnovationForce, the leader in affordably democratizing innovation with AI, today announced a landmark three-year agreement with AboitizPower, the nation’s largest renewable energy producer. The partnership will scale the use of the InnovationWorks platform across AboitizPower’s innovation teams to accelerate new projects.

Through this strategic collaboration, AboitizPower will also be expanding the use of the InnovationWorks platform internally, across all power divisions to:

• Democratize access to innovation across all units and departments

• Rapidly match internal challenges to a global marketplace of solutions

• Accelerate decision-making and reduce pilot cycle time

• Track the performance and outcomes of innovation programs with real-time data

• Increase resiliency through community collaboration.

The announcement comes in tandem with Innovate Cebu!, a first-of-its-kind regional innovation competition aimed at co-creating solutions to address Cebu’s most urgent resiliency challenges: energy reliability, flood management, sustainable waste management, and water access. With the theme "Innovations in Reliability, Resilience, and Regeneration," the competition empowers university students, professionals, and startups to bring forward breakthrough ideas that can be piloted and scaled across the region.

Empowering Innovation at Every Level to Address Real Resiliency Needs

The Philippines ranks among the world’s most disaster-prone countries, and Cebu City, home to over 1 million people is especially vulnerable. Rising sea levels, increasingly intense typhoons, flooding, and aging infrastructure put lives, livelihoods, and future economic development at risk. For Cebu to thrive, it must not only rebuild but reimagine itself to withstand future shocks. That requires local ingenuity, faster innovation cycles, and scalable solutions grounded in the region’s unique needs.

“Resilient infrastructure is the bedrock of economic growth,” said Kim Getgen, CEO and Founder of InnovationForce. “Together with AboitizPower, we’re harnessing the power of innovation ecosystems to ensure that local ideas to solve these pressing challenges are surfaced, evaluated and piloted.”

Innovate Cebu! is a multi-phase innovation competition open to two tracks:

• Student Creators: University students currently enrolled in any Cebu-based college or university

• Professional Builders: Early-stage startup founders, engineers, business professionals, and aspiring entrepreneurs with a strong connection to Cebu

  
  

The top ideas will be selected based on three key criteria: Simplification, Breakthrough Thinking, and Automation. Teams that make it to the final phase will develop a business case or minimum viable product (MVP) and present it in front of a live audience in December.

“This is more than a competition, we hope it surfaces the hidden human ingenuity capable and ready to solve these critical challenges,” said Jokin Aboitiz, Chairman of AboitizPower. “We’re calling on the next generation of innovators in Cebu to help us build a more reliable and resilient infrastructure and ensure the livelihood of the community’s future. No one knows how to solve these issues better than the local students, entrepreneurs and startups.”

“My research shows the most successful innovation is inclusive, scalable, and measurable,” said Dr. Linda Hill, co-founder of InnovationForce and Professor at Harvard Business School. “Cebu’s future depends on unleashing the collective genius of its people. We hope every student, entrepreneur, and frontline worker who has ever said, ‘There’s got to be a better way’ participates. We are so proud they have chosen InnovationWorks, as the platform to support this competition and create the conditions for that genius to thrive and where learnings can be shared.”

Innovate Cebu! kicks off on Oct 16, 2025 and InnovationForce CEO Kim Getgen will deliver opening remarks at 9:55 am.

About InnovationForce

InnovationForce democratizes innovation with an AI-powered platform that fosters collaboration and accelerates time-to-decision. Everyone innovates faster — from solo innovators and teams to global enterprises — anyone can collaborate to turn ideas into impactful, production-ready solutions that transform industries and drive growth. In 2024, we were named a Top 10 "Most Innovative Workplace” solution by Fast Company and “Best in Business” by Inc. Learn more at www.innovationforce.io.