ABREEZA: Ayala Center and Business Park - Coming soon in 2011

Contractor's Perspective of Ayala Center Davao

DDT Konstract, Inc.

Workplace Modernity in the Next Wave Cities PERSPECTIVES By Tanya T. Lara (The Philippine Star) Updated November 23, 2009 12:00 AM Ayala Land Businesscapes’ Abreeza masterplan in Davao: For government, the spread of development and employment opportunities outside Metro Manila and key cities is a primary objective as it gives more jobs and boosts the economy. Ayala Land Businesscapes expands its footprint in areas where investors can potentially locate.

Smartmatic work for you.

In May 2010 the Republic of the Philippines carried out the first automated elections in Southeast Asia: 82,200 voting machines for 50 million voters, were distributed among the 7,107 islands comprising the archipelago. Smartmatic won the bid for this automation project, the largest that any private company has ever undertaken.

After a complex bidding process with the participation of seven suppliers of automated voting systems, Smartmatic-TIM’s proposal, besides being the most economic offer, was regarded by the COMELEC’s (Philippine Commission on Elections) Special Bids and Awards Committee Chairman to be the only one that fulfilled every requirement, including the automation of a 100% of voting centers, the capacity to conduct audits from start to finish, full monitoring during the event, and the ability to obtain results in a very short time. Additionally, per COMELEC’s requirements, Smartmatic’s voting machines were tested many times and always arrived at exact results.

Process of Change

During decades the Filipino people participated in electoral processes, some of which were allegedly marred by the manipulation of results and delays even of over a month in announcing elected officials.

Due to this situation, and as a way to promote transparency in electoral processes, the Congress of the Philippines passed Law RA 9369 in 2007, which made the automation of all subsequent local and national elections compulsory. Complying with this mandate, for the May 2010 elections the Electoral Commission selected a scanning technology which allows for the quick and effective counting of votes that have been marked and cast manually.

This first automated national election in the Philippines represents the prospect of getting reliable, swift and legitimate results, a massive task in itself, given the country’s geographical peculiarities. The easiness to audit results is a key factor in this process, and the benefits of the technology have been confirmed through multiple field tests carried out during the months prior to the election.

Already in 2008, Smartmatic supplied its electoral technology to the Philippines, specifically in the Maguindanao Province, one of the six provinces of the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). In short, the project included the deployment of some 3,050 voting machines with accessories, 274 servers for the processing and canvassing of electoral data, over 600 field operators, and the deployment of Support Centers to deal with contingencies and the management of the electoral process. This project proved to be highly successful, reinforcing the decision of the electoral authority to fully automate the upcoming elections.

Smartmatic and the COMELEC have launched two voter education websites along some TV and Radio infomercials. Voters can visit www.ibanangayon.ph and www.bagongbotante.ph for more information about the elections.