About GEN in Slovenia

The Global Entrepreneurship Network (GEN) has been engaged with Slovenia since the earliest days of its flagship campaign, when the country joined the inaugural Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW) in 2008. Slovenia’s first national campaign was led by GEA College Business Education Center in Ljubljana, which hosted the country’s introductory activities and helped establish entrepreneurship as a public conversation. The campaign reached roughly 300 participants in its first year and grew steadily through GEA College’s leadership over the following years, with the 2010 campaign expanding to 23 activities and more than 400 participants. 

Stewardship of the Slovenian campaign passed to the Institute of Youth Entrepreneurship, with Žiga Koršiga coordinating GEW activities and bringing a stronger focus on younger founders and student entrepreneurs. Slovenian universities and ecosystem partners have continued to expand the campaign’s reach through cross-border collaborations – including a Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) Hackathon convened during GEW that has paired GEA College in Slovenia with the University of Salford in the United Kingdom and Humber College in Canada to give students an international entrepreneurial experience without leaving their home campuses. 

Slovenia has also been part of GEN’s broader policy conversations in Europe, with engagement from the Ministry of Economy, Tourism and Sport on aspects of GEN’s Startup Nations community. GEN’s research community has separately produced and curated work focused on Slovenian policy and ecosystem performance, including a review of Slovenia’s Industrial Strategy 2021–2030 for green, creative and smart development published by the OECD and indexed in the GEN Research Library, alongside an academic paper extending the work of Coad and Srhoj on entrepreneurial ecosystems in Croatia and Slovenia that examines the persistence of productive entrepreneurship in the region. 

Beyond GEW, Slovenian founders have engaged with GEN’s flagship competition for global founders, the Entrepreneurship World Cup (EWC), run by GEN and Monsha’at since its global launch in 2019. Slovenian companies including Insur.Cap and QVEDO d.o.o. advanced into the 2024 EWC Top 250, accessing free training resources, mentorship and exposure to potential investors as part of the global competition for a share of the $1 million prize pool. 

Slovenia has been a recurring reference point in GEN’s research and ecosystem-builder networks. The PODIM conference, one of the largest startup and tech gatherings in Central and Eastern Europe, has featured GEN Space members presenting on space entrepreneurship alongside the New Space Economy European ExpoForum, the International Astronautical Congress and other leading global venues. Slovenian ecosystem leaders have also contributed to the Womenpreneurs Stories initiative uniting Balkan startup ecosystems, with Tjaša Sobočan of CEED Slovenia representing the country alongside peers from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania and Serbia in a GEW 2020 Womenpreneurs Balkans roundtable on regional collaboration, market access and shared challenges. 

GEN maintains relationships with key Slovenian ecosystem stakeholders, including the Ministry of Economy, Tourism and Sport, GEA College, the Institute of Youth Entrepreneurship, CEED Slovenia and the University of Ljubljana. The Business Angels of Slovenia – Poslovni Angeli, led for many years by former president Branko Drobnak, is a long-standing national lead within GEN’s Global Business Angels Network (GBAN) and has been a consistent point of connection between Slovenian early-stage investors and the wider global angel community. 

GEN’s ongoing mission in Slovenia is to deepen the country’s connections to leading-edge research, innovative programs and communities of seasoned experts – supporting the work of GEA College, the Institute of Youth Entrepreneurship, the Business Angels of Slovenia and other local partners as they continue to build the next generation of Slovenian founders and connect them to global markets, capital and knowledge.