MarxMelencio
Contributor
Hi. It's good to be here! Looking forward to learn, share and collaborate on interesting projects! ![Smile :) :)](/community/imgs/emoticons/em-smile2.png)
I'm Marx. I'm an entrepreneur. A marketing communication strategist. A Deep Learning engineer. A disability advocate. A Machine Vision developer. A technical SEO campaign designer. A DIY robotics hobbyist. And I've been totally blind, for the past two decades.
To cut to the quick of it — Here's a brief video outlining the stuff I've been doing after that incident of senseless violence in 2003 (I was 23 then):
•
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIj1M6DWbTQ
And for those who want something to read — Here you go:
My Entrepreneurial Adventures
• A year after total blindness — I gradually built a digital marketing agency from a spare bedroom with dial-up Internet in Manila, starting as a freelance content writer working with independent Web affiliates and content publishers in North America, the EU and ASEANA.
• Barely a year after starting out — I found myself running a 100% remote operation in 2005, managing a team of 140 employees and contractors from all around the Philippines and in other areas in SE Asia.
• And right now, my wife and I are running a 19-year old multimedia marketing, multi-lingual telesales and AI engineering company — Here's a feature story in BBC about us: BBC World Service - Business Daily, The Blind Entrepreneur Building a Call Centre Empire
My Advocacy Work
• Right from business inception — We provided gainful employment opportunities to Filipino PWDs (persons with disability), which we found to be more accessible for them (myself included) because of mobility limitations.
• In 2006 — 80% of our remote and onsite workforce were persons with different mobility impairments.
• From that time up to present — I design and facilitate training workshops on assistive tech, remote employment, business development, ecommerce and digital marketing for PWDs, trying to help out and collaborate in any way that I can with local and international social organizations like Resources for the Blind (PH), Nippon Foundation (JP), ICEVI (EU), USAID and others.
• And our national government gave me the 2008 Most Inspiring Entrepreneur of the Philippines award — Here's my opinion piece in Rappler, a local multimedia news group that's run by Nobel Peace Prize recipient Maria Ressa: [OPINION] My life as a completely blind Filipino entrepreneur and tech developer
My Engineering Work
• In 2016 — I started creating wearable DIY electronics and AI technologies for deaf, blind and visually impaired persons, learning all about Deep Learning, Machine Learning, software programming, electronics and robotics on my own.
• A year thereafter — Our national government's Department of Science & Technology awarded me a 2-year R&D grant for a wearable prototype that I created for blind and visually impaired persons, while my wearable prototype for the deaf also won at an AIM university post graduate thesis competition along with R&D seed funding from a local VC group. Here's a BBC News feature story about this: 'Robbed of sight, I have a vision to help the blind see'
• After the same wearable prototype for blind and visually impaired persons won at international tournaments like Microsoft and Intel's Spatial 3D Competition — I'm now the chief Deep Learning engineer, Machine Vision developer and rapid prototyping specialist of a 5-year old biomed tech company in Sydney. We won as the Technology Company of the Year at last year's Australian Technologies Competition (ATC 2023) — Here's a feature story about our biomed tech company: Bionic glasses ‘seeing’ through sound
My Current Hybrid AI Engineering & Digital Marketing Projects
• Since 2022 — I've been developing hybrid generative AI and pro human workflow pipelines through open source LLMs (large language models), LVLMs (large vision language models) and my business resources, customizing and fine-tuning the entire tech and service stack for each business, target verticals, geos, relevant SEO, marketing and ideal audience profile data for optimum impact.
Thanks for your time!![Smile :) :)](/community/imgs/emoticons/em-smile2.png)
![Smile :) :)](/community/imgs/emoticons/em-smile2.png)
I'm Marx. I'm an entrepreneur. A marketing communication strategist. A Deep Learning engineer. A disability advocate. A Machine Vision developer. A technical SEO campaign designer. A DIY robotics hobbyist. And I've been totally blind, for the past two decades.
To cut to the quick of it — Here's a brief video outlining the stuff I've been doing after that incident of senseless violence in 2003 (I was 23 then):
•
![Wink ;) ;)](/community/imgs/emoticons/em-wink.png)
My Entrepreneurial Adventures
• A year after total blindness — I gradually built a digital marketing agency from a spare bedroom with dial-up Internet in Manila, starting as a freelance content writer working with independent Web affiliates and content publishers in North America, the EU and ASEANA.
• Barely a year after starting out — I found myself running a 100% remote operation in 2005, managing a team of 140 employees and contractors from all around the Philippines and in other areas in SE Asia.
• And right now, my wife and I are running a 19-year old multimedia marketing, multi-lingual telesales and AI engineering company — Here's a feature story in BBC about us: BBC World Service - Business Daily, The Blind Entrepreneur Building a Call Centre Empire
My Advocacy Work
• Right from business inception — We provided gainful employment opportunities to Filipino PWDs (persons with disability), which we found to be more accessible for them (myself included) because of mobility limitations.
• In 2006 — 80% of our remote and onsite workforce were persons with different mobility impairments.
• From that time up to present — I design and facilitate training workshops on assistive tech, remote employment, business development, ecommerce and digital marketing for PWDs, trying to help out and collaborate in any way that I can with local and international social organizations like Resources for the Blind (PH), Nippon Foundation (JP), ICEVI (EU), USAID and others.
• And our national government gave me the 2008 Most Inspiring Entrepreneur of the Philippines award — Here's my opinion piece in Rappler, a local multimedia news group that's run by Nobel Peace Prize recipient Maria Ressa: [OPINION] My life as a completely blind Filipino entrepreneur and tech developer
My Engineering Work
• In 2016 — I started creating wearable DIY electronics and AI technologies for deaf, blind and visually impaired persons, learning all about Deep Learning, Machine Learning, software programming, electronics and robotics on my own.
• A year thereafter — Our national government's Department of Science & Technology awarded me a 2-year R&D grant for a wearable prototype that I created for blind and visually impaired persons, while my wearable prototype for the deaf also won at an AIM university post graduate thesis competition along with R&D seed funding from a local VC group. Here's a BBC News feature story about this: 'Robbed of sight, I have a vision to help the blind see'
• After the same wearable prototype for blind and visually impaired persons won at international tournaments like Microsoft and Intel's Spatial 3D Competition — I'm now the chief Deep Learning engineer, Machine Vision developer and rapid prototyping specialist of a 5-year old biomed tech company in Sydney. We won as the Technology Company of the Year at last year's Australian Technologies Competition (ATC 2023) — Here's a feature story about our biomed tech company: Bionic glasses ‘seeing’ through sound
My Current Hybrid AI Engineering & Digital Marketing Projects
• Since 2022 — I've been developing hybrid generative AI and pro human workflow pipelines through open source LLMs (large language models), LVLMs (large vision language models) and my business resources, customizing and fine-tuning the entire tech and service stack for each business, target verticals, geos, relevant SEO, marketing and ideal audience profile data for optimum impact.
Thanks for your time!
![Smile :) :)](/community/imgs/emoticons/em-smile2.png)
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