About GEN in Colombia

GEN began operating in Colombia in 2009 by launching Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW) through a series of events across the country. In partnership with Endeavor Colombia, more than 10,000 people participated in events hosted by government ministries, entrepreneurship support organizations (ESOs), corporations, universities and secondary schools. Successive GEW campaigns each following November built community over the years.

GEN operates a platform of projects and programs in 200 countries aimed at making it easier for anyone, anywhere to start and scale a business. GEN’s mission in Colombia is to support economic growth by fostering startup activity and the development of Colombia’s entrepreneurial ecosystem. By engaging entrepreneurs, investors, researchers, policymakers, and support organizations, GEN aims to build thriving entrepreneurship communities in Colombia that accelerate innovation and new business formation.

GEN’s objectives in Colombia are to:

• Connect entrepreneurs to the best global resources and networks
• Enable interaction and collaboration with global partners and investors
• Expand the number of citizens working for startups in Colombia by fully legitimizing entrepreneurship
• Support the emergence of a new class of global entrepreneurs with access to research, programs and networks through GEN
• Connect an emerging community of national startup policy advisors with a next-generation network of world-class entrepreneurship research institutions to generate evidence-based policymaking
• Collaborate with ecosystem role players and strengthen the current entrepreneurial ecosystem.

GEN IN COLOMBIA: HISTORY + MILESTONES

GEW and Building Community

Through annual GEW campaigns each November and miscellaneous activities in between, GEN learned about the ecosystem by working in partnership with: Alcaldía de Medellín, ANDI del Futuro, Cámara de Comercio de Bogotá, Cámara de Comercio de Barranquilla, Confecámaras, CREAME, Endeavor Colombia, Industria y Turismo (MinTIC), iNNpulsa Colombia, Ministerio de Comercio, Red Universitaria de Emprendimiento, and Somos Más.

GEC Medellín

As GEN’s brand became more widely known through the annual GEW campaign and other activities, Medellín, Colombia emerged to host the Global Entrepreneurship Congress in March of 2016.

GEC Medellín brought together nearly 4,000 entrepreneurship leaders from more than 100 countries with thousands more participants from Colombia. Explore the photo recap of the four-day event for each day: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.

Startup Huddle

As more volunteers started to take notice, Startup Huddle communities began to emerge. The capital of Bogotá emerged as the first Startup Huddle chapter in 2019, followed by Barranquilla in 2022.