Welcome to ‘The Startup State’ - a weekly bulletin from the GEN Policy and Research team highlighting key entrepreneurship announcements, reports, commentary and features from around the world.
News
- South Korea is to establish ten ‘Startup Cities’ by 2030, with five recognized in the global 100, to decentralize the ecosystem from Seoul. Measures include a $305m regional growth fund, additional ‘Deep Tech Startup Hub Universities’, regulatory-free special zones, and the rollout of angel investment hubs and Korea Venture Investment Corporation regional offices (Chosun)
South Sudan is drafting a ‘women enterprise development bill, intended to address challenges faced by women engaged in small-scale businesses, including multiple taxation and domestic restrictions that limit their economic activities (Eye Radio)
Comment and analysis
- Norway’s sovereign wealth fund is Europe’s missing venture capitalist (Elif Memet and Erik Dalaker, contributors, Tech Policy Press)
- How Barcelona became Southern Europe’s startup hub - and why Madrid is closing in (Isaac Jackson, contributor, Novobrief)
- The origins and fate of digital sovereignty (Robin Rivaton, CEO, Stonal)
- Europe is pouring tens of billions of public money not VC. The hard part is making it work (Allison Steffens, Herrera, The Next Web)
- People make the magic, institutions make the brochure (Chris Heivly, managing director, Build the Fort)
From M-PESA and Flutterwave: Why Africa built the systems the world now needs (Ray Langa, group CEO, Leagas Delaney South Africa)
Features
- A small country with a big playbook: How Slovenia is rethinking internationalization (The Recursive)
- Why venture capital alone can’t build Central Asia’s startup ecosystem (AsiaTechDaily)
- Greece’s innovation engine gathers momentum (Tovima)
- Cote d’Ivoire’s startup surge gathers pace (African Business)
- ‘Davos for good’ aims to scale up social entrepreneurship (Observer)
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The opinions expressed in the articles above are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Global Entrepreneurship Network.