HomeSpain-StartupsWill there be an explosion of Spanish startups in 2012?

Will there be an explosion of Spanish startups in 2012?

We recently dove into an article by Marek Fodor, a Spanish business angel and founder of the sites Atrapalo and Elecciones.

In case the Spanish language is not your forté, we’ll summarize his main points as to why 2012 should be a bumper year for Spanish startups:

  1. There is a growing proliferation of incubators and accelerators for startups. These include Seedrocket, wayra and Tetuan Valley. These entities can give valuable business knowledge and pass on relevant contact links to new startups.
  2. There is a big increase in investments available at seed stage for startups. Add to this a growing number of entrepreneurs with experience of launching successful startups, and larger entities like Telefonica and BBVA are also investing in the sector.
  3. There’s also a proliferation of startup events that give initial projects visibility and impetus. They act as a meeting point for startups, and bring opportunities like competitions and prizes for startups. Each of these events is overall an opportunity to network, attract early adopters, nab initial customers, and generally to create some interest and hype.

Of course Marek Fodor makes good points, and we tend to agree with them. Indeed, there is already a surge of startups bursting forward in Spain. E-commerce in the country rose by 23% in the first quarter of 2011, marking 8 consecutive quarters of growth in that sector (source: Ojointernet.com).  We are also seeing sites that are aiming for an international audience. For example MedTep, Moodyo and Masterbranch are three recent launches that aim to make it big in their sector on the international stage.

But why specifically Spain? We are actually seeing startups bloom in many countries – we’re sure followers of the Turkish or Polish scenes for example will be able to confirm this too. But in Spain there is an added impetus to all this. Many talented young (and not so young) people have limited job options in the current economic situation. Additionally, one way of overcoming the high cost of starting a business in Spain is to start a website or create an app at very low initial cost. Give the geeks time on their hand, and the technology to play with, and they’ll end up creating things. It also helps that Spanish is spoken by a lot of people worldwide, so there is a potentially large market in that language.

Of course the main obstacle to the growth of Spanish startups, as with anywhere else, is breaking into the international market. They do have the advantage of their language in Latin America, but they aren’t yet as big as they should be on the European stage. There are exceptions of course, and we’ve already seen breakthroughs like Busuu (a social network for language learning) and Fon (wi-fi router suppliers to the world). It may be that 2012 is the year that Spain makes a big international breakthrough in startups, but in order to do this, they will in certain cases have to break into the English-speaking world, i.e. the lingua franca of the internet world. At that level, automatic translation tools are still far from adequate for the job.

Interested in Spanish Startups? Check out more information on Spanish startup funding rounds, acquisitions and launches here.

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Mark Nessfield
Mark Nessfield
Mark Nessfield is a Data Analyst/Miner out of the UK. He is also the creator of SpainUpNews.com - which is a directory of Spanish startups.
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5 COMMENTS

  1. You rightly point out that “the main obstacle to the growth in Spanish start-ups, as with anyone else, is breaking into the international market.” Can Spanish businesses sell their products and services in France, Partugal and Croatia, for example? You seem to assume that English is “the lingua franca of the internet world”. Having just spent time on internet sites in Welsh and French and found sites in dozens of languages in passing, I am not convinced that English is as widespread and universal as you assume. Having English as a mother tongue does not seem to help British business people much.

  2. Hello Bill, thanks for your comments. It is true that there are Spanish startups that are operating internationally in non-English speaking countries – Boda-click and conZumo being a couple of examples. I do feel though, that if a startup wants to make it big on a world scale, then the use of English is very beneficial. I’ve recently entered information on Ideateca on my directory. They’re a startup from the Basque country that from the start launched in English, and already have sold millions of downloads on their iPhone applications. As their owner Eneko Knorr states “a small piece of the world pie can be much larger than being the industry leader in Spain alone”. Of course this doesn’t apply to everyone, and there are plenty of websites out there that only need to be mono-lingual.

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