At 26, Ilonggo founder and Computer Science graduate Cedrick Alegroso is turning his studio’s everyday production struggles into UNCRTN Labs, a browser-based platform where AI handles the busywork, not the creativity. With three agencies having expressed interest in a pilot he is funding himself, he is betting the next big creative tool can come from Iloilo.
In Iloilo, one local founder is taking a different approach to the creative industry: building the technology behind the work itself.
Cedrick Alegroso, a 26-year-old Computer Science graduate and the Founder and Creative Director of UNCRTN, an independent creative development studio, is making the move from creative founder to tech founder through UNCRTN Labs, a developing creative technology platform designed to improve how creative professionals and teams work.
For Alegroso, the next chapter isn’t simply about creating more designs. It’s about rethinking how those designs are produced.
Nobody learned design to resize 47 display ads into 300×250 banners at 2 AM on a Friday. Yet that is often the job. Junior designers spend countless hours resizing, updating layouts and preparing variations. It builds discipline, but it comes at a cost.
Should it consume so much of someone’s creative potential?
For Alegroso, that question is one of the main reasons UNCRTN Labs exists.
Three Agencies, One Founder-Funded Pilot
With three creative agencies expressing interest in UNCRTN Labs, the project is preparing for a pilot that will test the platform against real creative production workflows.
Rather than waiting for external funding, Alegroso is personally financing the pilot, including the development and resources needed for participating agencies to test the platform and share feedback. The goal is to let real-world use, not assumptions, guide what gets built next.
“I’d rather put my own money behind this than wait for permission,” Alegroso said. “The agencies tell us what slows them down, and we build around those problems. If it doesn’t make their teams faster, it isn’t finished.”
UNCRTN positions Labs as a technology partner to creative agencies, not a competitor. Its purpose is to make creative teams more capable by reducing repetitive production work, not to replace them or take away the relationships they’ve built with their clients.
From Creative Work to Building Technology
Building technology is not new for Alegroso. Long before AI tools went mainstream, he was already writing software: both his senior high school and college theses were applications he developed. As a university student, he joined the Google Solution Challenge, NASA Space Apps Challenge and countless hackathons.
Through operating UNCRTN and handling commercial creative projects, including campaigns, installations and 3D simulations as a creative execution partner to SM Supermalls across the Visayas, Alegroso experienced firsthand the operational demands of the industry.
Repetitive revisions, resizing requirements, file management and coordination often consume time that could be spent on more meaningful creative work. Rather than simply adapting to these limitations, he began exploring how technology could address them. That exploration led to UNCRTN Labs.
The idea was not to create another design application, but to rethink parts of the creative production process with tools that make everyday work more efficient, without taking creativity away from the people behind it.
Bringing Creative Workflows to the Browser
UNCRTN Labs is developing a browser-based creative platform that makes working with layered design files, including Photoshop Document (PSD) files, more accessible. Creative professionals can open, interact with and edit layered files in a web-based environment, without necessarily needing Photoshop for every workflow.
Beyond file access, the platform’s direction includes workflow automation and collaborative features to help teams handle repetitive production tasks. Artificial intelligence is part of that direction, with one firm rule: the AI in Labs does not generate creative work. It works as an agent for repetitive production tasks, such as resizing and preparing variations, while the creative decisions stay with the designers.
A working alpha is available for early testing, while development continues toward the agency pilot.
Website: https://alpha.labs.uncrtn.studio
Building Beyond Traditional Tech Centers
For Alegroso, building a technology venture from Iloilo is also a personal ambition. With modern development tools and a global digital landscape, independent founders can now build products from anywhere.
UNCRTN Labs is his contribution to Iloilo’s growing culture of innovation, showing how experience in one industry can become the foundation for building in another. Its immediate priorities are refining the alpha, gathering feedback and preparing for agency pilot testing.
At 26, he has already learned what it takes to build and run a creative business. Now, as a tech founder building UNCRTN Labs, he is exploring what it takes to build the technology that could move the creative industry forward.
The next chapter of creativity may be built in Iloilo.
