About

Toti weaves together design, creativity, and technology with common business sense to create social good, bring better customer experiences, and facilitate meaningful interactions among people, products, and places that create sustainable value for businesses.

With broad experience in private and public sectors in Asia, Europe, and United States involving entrepreneurship, strategy, design, real estate, technology, and business, Toti brings passionate, transdisciplinary expertise to help build better products/services, improve customer satisfaction, spur innovation, and drive business growth. His work crosses over a wide range of disciplines, including strategic and interaction design, brand and identity, product design, development and management, consumer manufacturing and supply chain, technology, real estate and environmental design, asset management and finance, retail, and entrepreneurship. With a strong technical background coupled with a good design sense and an eye for making things better, he helps define the user model and effectively analyze evolving businesses and trends to identify new opportunities. He thrives in fast-paced environments working both independently or in multifunctional teams.

Toti began his career as a product design-entrepreneur specializing in handcrafted arts and home furnishings. He founded Topa, a producer and supplier of arts and crafts to Crate & Barrel, Pier 1, Liz Claiborne, Li & Fung, Saks Fifth, Associated Merchandising Corporation, Safeway, and European clientele such El Corte Ingles, ABM, Interio, and Globus. Toti served as strategic designer for a number of manufacturers in Asia and Europe. He also established and operated a Kodak franchise and was a vital contributor in the early stage of Panjiva.com, an online resource for global suppliers, manufacturers, and international trade. In addition, he was a pioneer and key collaborator in launching the organic coconut product line in the U.S. including organic coconut sugar, syrup, vinegar, flour, and condiments, currently sold at Wholefoods. In 2010, the coconut gluten-free line was selected as among the “Top Five Food Trends” by the Fancy Food Fair organizers in San Francisco. He serves as an advisor to the Organic Farmers and Processors Association of the Philippines (OFPAP), a non-profit community farmers group. Additionally, he was involved in real estate development in the Philippines, and worked with Rossland Corporation, a construction and development company in Newport Beach, CA. He was also involved in asset management overseeing three major affordable housing programs with more than 37 affordable housing portfolio projects (over 2,000 units) with a combined total value of over $215 million.

Toti holds a Master in Design Studies from Harvard University, Master in Strategic Design from Politecnico di Milano in Italy, Executive Business Management Studies (PED) from IMD Business School in Switzerland, and a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from De La Salle University.