The idea for BagoSphere was conceived in 2010 by Ivan Lau, Ellwyn Tan and Zhihan Lee. Zhihan had then recently returned
from a month-long study trip to India with a social enterprise that trained rural youths and employed them in call centers.
Due to community service projects, Ivan and Ellwyn had strong ties with the city government of Bago City, a small city in central Philippines.
In 2011, they started a successful pilot to train high school graduates and college dropouts.
After a year of research, they officially launched the first BagoSphere programs in 2013.
Together with Tippi Fernandez, a former HR executive, they began to rethink education to tackle the global skills gap crisis, eventually making Human-Centered Development the foundation of BagoSphere.
Since then, BagoSphere has helped over 2,000 people like Lisa and work with global brands such as Teleperformance, Panasiatic, NWTF,
with proven results; a 85% employment rate and have proven to help companies achieve an 200% increase in retention rate.
Defined by our purpose to awaken the hidden potential in every youth, we created an end-end talent pipeline solution
to help companies transition their workforce to be purpose, performance-driven and human-centered in the face of rapid technological disruption.
And, we are not alone.
We work with numerous partners such as Globe Telecom, UBS, Ashoka, NUS, Frontier Innovators, elea, Fossil Foundation and many more.
Today, BagoSphere is headquartered in Bacolod City, and has satellite offices in Manila and Iloilo.
Who We Are
BagoSphere is an international multi-award winning social enterprise that provides a faster and smarter way
for disconnected youths to go from poverty to transformational, professional careers.
We deconstruct what employers need, run immersive and experiential training programs, and connect students directly with employers.
We work with employers to assess, onboard and upskill new talents to thrive in today’s fast-changing world. We call our model “last-mile education”.
Our aim is to transform the lives of 1 million youths. We target individuals 18-35 years old
who are open to learning and are eager about improving their lives.
We also work with companies who are passionate about finding and molding employees with the right mindset, skillset,
and heartset needed to propel their business goals forward.
