What happened to MyPhilippines.com?

Ok, first I used to work there as Design Executive back in 2001. A startup Philippine portal backed by the Ayalas, ImpactNET and DMCI Holdings, one cannot go wrong with it.

Dubbed as the next big portal after Yehey and PinoyCentral, MyPhilippines.com was using AltaVista’s proprietary search engine to crawl Philippine sites. It was also the sister company of PinoyExchange.com which is still alive and kicking but the stakeholders realized they have to part ways (and offices too). It has over 40+ employees when it started and trickled down to just 3 in it’s last months of operation.

Anyway, the company burned almosy half a million every month and only earned a measly Php50,000 in its 18 months of existence.

First off, the advertising model didn’t work back then. All banners and ads were just exchange deals. Then, they allowed kids straight from college to run a company and relied on gut feel. Good thing they had deep pockets or they wouldn’t have lasted a year.

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12 Comments

jp · 20 years ago

hehehe naaalala ko pa nung nanalo ako ng promo nila ng premiere tickets sa Jurassic Park III. Kaso di ko naclaim, nakalimutan ko na kung bakit.

Marc · 21 years ago

I remember sitting in one of the seminars the MyP and PEX founders conducted during one of our Marketing classes at the Ateneo. I remember hearing their main evangelist talking about the Internet and how successful it could be for people with really great ideas. I was sold back then (I’m still sold now). I think I even applied at MyP (forgot for what position though).

Come to think of it, portals never really grew on Filipinos.