There were four cats and now there are more than 2,000. There are probably a few more at this point, considering Annual growth rate of the number of startups in CataloniaAccording to the census carried out by the Generalitat. A few days ago he commented: “People don’t realize how much the ecosystem in Barcelona has grown since we started.” Ana Maiques, Co-founder of Neuroelectrics, above the Spirit of Technology stage. This refers to what he calls the entrepreneurial generation fractus In honor of the Catalan company that discovered the technology that eliminates the (physical) antennas of the phone. And in fact, think about a handful of entrepreneurs who started something that is now iconic. Tech Barcelona FoundationCelebrating its tenth anniversary at this congress.
Same ten years ago, Xavi Pont, Maite Fibla And Clara NavarroThey met in a bar to find a way to promote what was then known as. social entrepreneurship: start a company and make money solving social problems. “I came from supporting entrepreneurs and seeing that this movement that was growing in other countries was not emerging strongly in Spain,” Navarro recalls. Given this panorama, his proposal was: Ship2B Foundationa kind of accelerator that would help develop such projects and connect them with investors sensitive to what is now known as “”.influence entrepreneurship”.
And what started with 4 dying projects turned into this: An accelerator where they spent over 200initiatives‘ (an extraordinary 86% of them are still alive) 55 million euro investment vehicle (Ship2B Ventures) funded almost 25 projects. Success stories include, for example: Sylvestris Groupand now proposes to reforest forests by giving jobs to people at risk of exclusion repsol already Hispasat own shareholding or cebiotexa biotechnology with a biodegradable fabric impregnated with small doses of radiation or chemotherapy, wants to prevent metastases from appearing after removal of a tumor.
The thing is, Ship2B seems to have found a new direction after ten years of operation. The beginning of the turn was the moment when the accelerator started to specialize in different verticals. A channel focusing on “fundamentally social” projects has been launched, but this may be sustainableThat is, giving money to whoever establishes this.
“These projects cannot receive financing from venture capital because they are not very large-scale projects, they will not provide great returns, but they will, they are not NGOs, so they are not looking for donations.” Navarro poses. Before explaining his answer, he asked: “Who finances these?” he asks: enterprise philanthropy. “This is an area we want to focus much more on: Fundamentally it was already strong but we believe it is time to explode.”
Enterprise Philanthropy
English’enterprise philanthropy‘ venture philanthropy suggests taking the money and channeling it like a traditional investor would, for much less return. Well The most important thing behind the operation is the social impact it creates.
“Ten years ago we showed that you could make money creating a better world, now we believe the next frontier is the ‘philanthropic enterprise’,” he believes Ship2B Foundation CEO. “There are social problems that are very important to everyone, and there are things that we cannot solve if we just leave them in the hands of the state, with pure subsidies, or just in the hands of philanthropists. If we all cooperate, we can attack them more efficiently: we won’t get rich, but we will be able to get a return on investment,” says this expert.mixed finance‘ [financiación combinada entre el capital riesgo convencional o la administración pública y la filantropía de riesgo] One of the possible keys.
The vein is so obvious and the bells ring so loud that even the Government has this type of investment on its radar. Ship2B recently exited the traditional accelerator business (who is hiding Impact Center) and designs his strategy to devote himself entirely to this new project. Still don’t know if they’re launching another one specialized investment fund or with training programs like the one they just launched So that the heirs of the richest families in the country will get used to influencing investment when they get their hands on a fortunebut they know that this is clearly the new direction.
Navarro concludes: “There is a clear desire to start experimenting.” We are in the process of starting a pilot: Trying small things so that in a few years someone can be encouraged to raise a fund of 100 million euros.”