KIRSTY STYLES UNCOVERS EUROPES BEST KEPT SECRETS

BCN#STARTUPSPAIN

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KIRSTY STYLES UNCOVERS EUROPES BEST KEPT SECRETS

Kirsty Styles@kirstystyles1

BCN#STARTUPSPAIN

any in tech will only

brie y touchdown in Barcelona if theyre

heading to quickly dash around the now-throbbing halls of Mobile World Congress trying to spot the next big thing.

As the of cial Mobile World Capital, Barcelona opens its doors to some 80,000 mobile professionals from more than 200 countries each year, as well as hosting so many more additional conferences that it can lay claim to being a top ve global events host.

Spain has been hit hard by the nancial crisis and youth unemployment across the country has hovered around 50% for the past few years. But Barcelona, the capital of the Catalonia region, has consistently outperformed other areas of the country.

Of course, the city doesnt disappear as soon as we all jump on our budget ights back to Blighty. Barcelona is not only a thriving tourist hotspot, welcoming tens of millions every year to explore its 4km of beaches, 46 theatres and 78 museums; its also a pretty smart city. It boasts some 175,000 companies, including multi-million euro tech success stories such as Softonic and eDreams, plus more than 5,500 foreign businesses.

Barcelona is going to be one of the most vibrant startup ecosystems in the future, says Daniela Arens, co-founder and CEO of local networking platform Foundum. It ticks all the boxes for entrepreneurs who want to build up companies with capital

ef ciency and enjoy quality of life at the same time. And if you are focused on mobile, the world will come to you at least once a year.

SMART GOVERNMENTThe city is home to eight universities and has the largest number of top ranked business schools in the world, according to the Wall Street Journal. Polytechnic University of Catalonia students can take advantage of a specially-designed tech startup course, which includes free space for a year to incubate their idea. The EADA business school, meanwhile, has been providing seed capital loans since 2013 and offers its alumni of ce space in the city council-sponsored Business Factory of Barcelona.

While some local councils could be accused of dragging their feet around tech, Barcelona set up its Activa local development agency way back in 1986 and founded its rst business incubator two years later. In 2013 alone, 1,800 companies were created through the Activa programmes, with the Glries Business Incubator touting a business survival rate of 80% and an average turnover of 600,000 in the fourth year of operation.

Barcelona Activa is making good efforts in supporting entrepreneurs, Arens says. Theres also access to entrepreneurial loans from the Spanish State, such as the ENISA, and the public investment agency ICO has launched an innovation nance programme with 1.2bn to invest in startups and growth companies. Some startups are offered a reduction

in corporation tax during the rst two years theyre active, she adds.

The designated innovation district 22@, known to old-timers as Poblenou, has been transformed over the past 15 years, including adding high-speed bre optic internet and 4G, to attract both local and international tech companies. The Barcelona Growth initiative, situated here, is another city council programme and seeking to build public and private partnerships to help boost growth. It houses all of the local governments business accelerators, along with branding and business services, a tech skills scheme and a post-MWC legacy project.

The city is acutely aware that MWC will not last forever and as Barcelonas contract with the GSMA expires in 2018, efforts are being made to create a long-standing bene t to residents. mStartup Barcelona was launched last year and is entirely geared towards mobile tech development. Activa is also ensuring its entrepreneurs are cushioned from the bureaucracy that dogs some areas of the Spanish economy, like the property market. Activa promises online business incorporation for limited liability companies in just 48 hours, for example.

SMART ENTERPRISEBarcelonas startup ecosystem is growing all the time, with Impact Hub and Tag Garden just two new names moving into the co-working space, and there are numerous global brands and local initiatives trying to make

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REPORTbarcelona

5The city is clearly aiming to carve a niche in the

smart cities and big data space, and its doing a

pretty good job

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their mark. In terms of global accelerator

brands, Spains Wayra, created by the telco Telefnica, is now joined by Startupbootcamp, which launched its rst Internet of Things & Data programme in Barcelona just this year. Startupbootcamp offers up to 15,000 per startup, up to 6 months of free of ce space and more than 450,000 worth of partner services.

Not to be outdone, local accelerators include Seed Rocket and Conector, with the latter about to welcome 11 new startups through its doors, its third cohort since launch. While some sound a little me too, the ideas span areas as diverse as logistics, marketing and ecommerce. Perhaps the most interesting, Joyners, focuses on the creation of shared homes for senior citizens, with a tech twist. One of Conectors 2014 alumnus, Viuing, has just received a 700,000 investment to grow its disposable entertainment screen business.

Lifestyle, tourism and bioscience startups will undoubtedly continue to emerge from Catalunya, however were seeing some great new startups in the ntech, IoT and big data arenas as well, says Scott Mackin, founder of English-language startup mag Barcinno. If I had to put a number on it, I would say there are about 400 high-growth startups in Barcelona and a nascent, but emerging investment scene to fuel its growth.

Given Spains weak economy and global perceptions around local bureaucracy, many believe its tough to get investment in BCN. But Catalonia is actually one of the top European foreign investment destinations, with rms based here looking for their next startup including Nauta Capital, Active VP, Highgrowth, Caixa Capital Risc and Inveready.

Its not dif cult to drum up 50,000 to 200,000 seed funding with a good pitch and some networking, however we still have a crunch in the 500,000 to 5m

range, so a lot of companies opt for follow-on bridge rounds to keep going, Mackin says. Unfortunately, at that stage were seeing some very promising ventures leave the country, opting for US or UK headquarters while keeping their dev team and majority of operations in Spain where your money stretches further.

SMART CITIESThe city is clearly aiming to carve a niche in the smart cities and big data space, and its doing a pretty good job. Last year, Barcelona hosted the Smart City Expo World Congress, which welcomed 50 mayors, 41 international delegations and 400 speakers to address the major challenges of our future smart cities. The citys Centre of Contemporary Culture, which is lead sponsored by Telefnica, also hosted the Big Bang Data Exposition, which saw some 65,000 people head through its doors.

Barcelona has now launched The Big Data Centre of Excellence to focus this effort and is already attracting the big guys in big data to its shores, with STRATA+HADOOP hosting its rst Big Data Conference outside of the US in BCN.

It is also one of four participant cities in the EUs iCity open data project, along with Bologna, Genova and London, where it is developing and deploying cost-effective smart city tech.

The city is pouring millions into an effort to brand itself as an innovation capital and world-leading smart city so theres a lot of buzz there, plus the private sector is joining in with massive investments from companies like Cisco and Oracle, Mackin says. Barcelona was chosen among 58 applicants to become the rst European Capital of Innovation last year and the 500,000 prize is being used to expand its efforts on innovation.

Its the Barcelona gherkin, Torre Agbar, a protrusion on the citys skyline, thats said to mark the gateway

to the new tech area, but its not quite Silicon Roundabout. One thing were de nitely missing here is our very own Shoreditch neighbourhood, Mackin adds. Our startup ecosystem is all around the city without any real hub. Luckily, our city is fairly easy to manoeuvre so we nd ourselves meeting up at events like Fest-UP, Startup Grind, weekly Meetup groups, or just over pints at a local pub.

.CATThe Sacred Heart of Jesus looks out from the top of Mount Tibidabo over the city, reminding its residents where they are and who they are; one only need look at the success of the .cat domain name to understand how proud Barcelona is of its identity.

As if you need reminding, Barcelona is also home to the worlds second most valuable sports team, FC Barcelona, owned by the fans and ms que un club (more than a club), which includes its tech efforts. FCB appointed entrepreneur Didac Lee as board member responsible for innovation, aiming to ensure it is a global leader in new media, social media and mobile. In 2012, the club released a whopping eight apps but its most recent launch is a mobile ticketing system over at Camp Nou.

Mobile World Congress clearly has a major impact on Barcelonas economy, as well as blocking up roads and spilling executives out on the streets for one intense week of the year, but its so much more than that. One only needs to check out the rad red Bicing bike scheme, the 100% accessibility of buses for disabled people or the 2,400 hours of sunshine each year to see that.

The city may be accused of being overenthusiastic in using the public sector, local and EU-level funding, to build its tech scene, but lets not forget, thats exactly how the World Wide Web came into being. And where would we all be without that? Not smart at all.

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