Future-proofing the SEC

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has the crucial task of regulating the country's corporate sector.

- IRIS GONZALES

To fulfill this mandate amid a rapidly changing world, the SEC's operations need to be sustainable, adaptive to changes and ready for the future.

One way to achieve this is through digitalization, says SEC Commissioner Rogelio Quevedo, a renowned information technology expert and IT law practitioner since 1983 who joined the SEC in June.

Quevedo, the only appointee of the Marcos administration in the SEC, wants to bring changes to the agency to make the regulator even more innovative and, in the process, help lead the corporate sector into the future.

He said these changes are necessary so that "the business thrust of the present administration can be harmonized and actually bring changes to the formation of the capital sector."

Artificial intelligence What changes does Quevedo have in mind?

"The SEC is actually at the forefront of digitization. And therefore, that is the change or the reform I would really like to spearhead. Not only in the front end but especially in the back end. That is where I want to infuse artificial intelligence into the government bureaucracy," Quevedo said in an email interview.

It is high time, he said, that the SEC adapts to the technology.

"This also comes from my background in the private sector, where way back in the '90s, I was part of a corporation at the forefront of technological innovation" said Quevedo former executive head of the MANCOM of PLDT-Smart and senior vice president of its international business division.

While he recognized that the SEC is already leading in digitization, he said many more reforms still need to be implemented.

"First, we have to remove the government bureaucratic mindset - the so-called institutional knowledge. Everything now has to be digitized. Therefore, not only do we have to eliminate the old-style bureaucracy, but we must also embrace technological changes to improve the government bureaucratic system," he said.