With the Global Entrepreneurship Congress just a week away, startup champions from around the world are looking to Milan. Some event attendees however, including the delegation from Colombia, are already looking ahead to the next Congress, which Colombia is set to host in Medellín in March 2016.
We checked in with Marcela Gaviria from Endeavor Colombia, the host official host organization of GEW Colombia, to learn more about the entrepreneurial ecosystem, GEW’s growth and why Medellín is a great fit for the GEC.
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Why is Global Entrepreneurship Week important—overall and to Colombia, specifically?
Global Entrepreneurship Week is important in Colombia because it brings together cities, institutions and universities, among other public and private organizations to reinforce the entrepreneurial culture.
In the last three years, Global Entrepreneurship Week has grown dramatically in Colombia and has become a major event on the entrepreneurship calendar. In fact, GEW Colombia has grown from 2,200 participants and 44 activities in 2012, to an attendance of approximately 118,000 people this year and over 480 activities. In addition, new remote regions of Colombia held entrepreneurial events during the week. This is largely the result of an engaged committee formed by eight different organizations including Endeavor, iNNpulsa Colombia, MinCIT, Alcaldía de Medellín, Somos Mas, CCB, Confecamras, and ANDI, promoting entrepreneurship across the country and reinforcing the entrepreneurial culture for Colombian citizens of all ages.
What makes your Global Entrepreneurship Week campaign unique?
GEW Colombia has a public/private committee that allows us to engage and reach people and institutions at a local, regional and national level. We also have a communication strategy that involves the Chamber of Commerce in every capital city in the country. The objective is to collect stories of successful entrepreneurs and give them national visibility during GEW to promote entrepreneurship as the solution and to position entrepreneurs as local heroes.
What methods and mechanisms are you using to encourage entrepreneurship?
To create more successful entrepreneurs, we need to inspire people to think big. We need to create a network that supports entrepreneurs, partnering with organizations that work with entrepreneurs at various stages from nascent to well-established. This means encouraging government participation with programs that support entrepreneurs financially and as well as help build an entrepreneurial culture.
What can other countries learn from the study of entrepreneurship in Colombia?
From April to October 2013, Endeavor Insight and Endeavor Colombia interviewed more than 200 tech entrepreneurs in Bogotá to create a social network map of the city’s tech ecosystem. The study found that more than 230 tech companies connect to Bogotá’s tech network through five different types of connections: inspiration, mentorship, former employment, investment, and serial entrepreneurship. The network’s more than 300 connections indicate that the ecosystem is robust and growing, with more than 150 new companies founded in the last five years and aggregate employment in the tech sector of approximately 6,000 workers.
The most influential companies in the ecosystem have 20 or more connections to other in-network companies, and have contributed disproportionately to the growth of the ecosystem and subsequent generations of entrepreneurship. In particular, these influential companies demonstrate the power of the Multiplier Effect, whereby successful entrepreneurs can multiply their impact by inspiring, mentoring, and investing in younger entrepreneurs. The study finds that despite rapid growth over the past five years, the stakeholders in Bogotá’s tech ecosystem must help more companies to scale, increase intra-network angel investment, and focus on cultivating a large exit, or “big win,” in order to continue the ecosystem’s current growth trajectory. There is more work to be done but taking the time to examine the ecosystem is a critical first step for anyone wishing to study entrepreneurship.
What kind of an impact has GEW had on the entrepreneurial ecosystem in your country?
GEW has helped frame entrepreneurship as a new solution to social issues. The best example of this is that Colombians now believe in entrepreneurship as a way of living, innovating and making people believe that “It is possible!” GEW has also had an impact on collaborations within the ecosystem and has been the perfect reason to make leading organizations cooperate for events at a national level.
Why did Colombia want to host the Global Entrepreneurship Congress?
During the past five years, Colombia has faced a very important transformation in relation to innovation and entrepreneurship. New institutions have emerged, both public and private, in order to solve local problems, and this has allowed Colombian citizens to scale their business, get better resources and reaching international markets.
This has brought a change of mindsets among the Colombian people, who now think of entrepreneurship not only as a strategy for self-employment, but as a way to generate wealth, knowledge and innovation.
Ten years ago, Colombia was seen as a violent country with a gray future ahead. Now it is one of the most admired economies of Latin America and entrepreneurship and innovation are part of the public agenda, generating huge transformations. Entrepreneurs from all over the world are starting their business in Colombia in order to reach the Latin American market.
The national government has made decisions that have helped to foster a dynamic environment for the creations of new companies. The laws have improved and it is easier and cheaper to create a new business and some public institutions such as Bancoldex and iNNpulsa, have helped thousands of companies reach global goals that a few years ago seemed impossible in the region. The efforts have paid off and fostered a positive attitude towards entrepreneurship allowing new companies to base their growth in different innovative models.
This is best exemplified in Medellín, a city that 20 years ago was recognized as one of the most dangerous cities in the world. Now it is known as one of the most innovative cities in the world and the host city for the GEC 2016. It is a city with a clear public policy for innovation and entrepreneurship, and is the only city in Colombia that has created a district of innovation with a clear strategy for strengthening strategic clusters, with a high component of research and development.
The time has arrived for Latin America time to show the world that problems it is facing can be solved with creativity, passion and effort, and these solutions can create new companies with a global impact. The GEC will be the perfect event to make global connections and to generate global solutions from Latin America to the world.