Ateneo de Manila to offer elective units in blockchain starting 2019

The Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU) on Monday said it is offering elective subjects on blockchain technology starting 2019 under its newly launched technology research laboratory.

Dubbed as the Ateneo-MediXserve Blockchain Education and Research Laboratory (AMBERLab), the facility was launched on Monday and is set to serve as a think tank and research center.

The first university-based blockchain education and research laboratory in the Philippines, AMBERLab is scheduled to offer elective units to ADMU students starting January 2019.

Initial funding for AMBERLab will be provided by health tech startup MediXserve which will give an annual budget of P1 million a year in the first five years of operations.

“Blockchain is a technology so it’s more than just a technology that we want to teach our students,” said AMBERLab executive director Regina Estuar.

A company offering blockchain technologies to healthcare providers to enhance the medical histories of their patients, MediXserve is keeping its fingers crossed that AMBERLab will be about to secure funding from other sources.

“We’ve committed to some funds for the next five years, so we’ve made pledges. One million pesos lang naman a year, pero ano ‘yun that’s the start,” said MediXserve CEO Jojy Azurin.

“We’re hoping the other organizations like the commercial services ng mga embassies and the NGOs will also help fund mga reasearch efforts because it’s an R&D (research and development) lab,” he said.
Estuar noted the approach would encompass the multi-disciplinary aspects of bockchain technology.

“It’s really going to be multi-disciplinary. We will teach them how to develop and put stuff on the chain and the different types of ledgers that are there, and how these information aggregates on the chain, and the value of the information and how to protect it and all that,” she said.

The subjects will be open electives for ADMU students, with the possibility of creating a full course in the future.

“I think to build a course, we need more time. I think the way to go is research-based for now. That’s why the focus is on the lab and then just give them enough skills so they will be able to get their hands dirty,” Estuar said.

AMBERLab now offers training and seminars in blockchain technology for interested non-ADMU individuals.

“We’ll also have short courses and maybe workshops for teachers—share also the electives in other universities. We need manpower to build blockchain technologies for the country,” Estuar noted.

“For the workshop itself, the first set who attended a two-day workshop, they can actually be trainers already in the use of applied blockchain,” she added.

AMBERLab plans to design and build prototypes and develop training programs and curricula to support blockchain technologies in the country.

According to Estuar, AMBERLab will first focus on developing blockchain technologies for the healthcare sector given the partnership with MediXserve.

“First is healthcare. A lot of our information is already online and we want to make sure that at least those that we carry are protected and secured, immutable, cannot be changed,” she said.

“Everyone who accesses our information, the owner is informed, and all those things will only happen if it’s on the chain.” —VDS, GMA News