Fifty cities, including the co-organizers, have joined the project to implement carbon footprint neutral climate solutions and improve the well-being of citizens

The unique summit brought together a total of 458 companies, investors and institutions from 20 European countries on November 24 in Malaga to showcase their entrepreneurial ecosystems and to promote new business opportunities

The City of Malaga became the international epicenter of entrepreneurship on November 24 with the first face-to-face edition of the ‘Global StartupCities Summit’, which was held at FYCMA (Trade Fairs and Congress Centre of Malaga).

The summit was organized by the Malaga City Council through Promalaga, a municipal company belonging to the Area of Tourism, City Promotion and Local & Foreign Investments. In addition, eight cities from eight countries acted as co-organizers: Braga (Portugal), Cluj-Napoca (Romania), Cologne (Germany), Heraklion (Greece), Ostrava (Czech Republic), Vantaa (Finland), Valencia (Spain) and Varna (Bulgaria).

One of the highlighted outcomes of the event was the ‘Global StartupCities Climate-Neutral Group’ project which was launched as a group of almost 50 cities, including co-organizers, which will share in real-time the best climate solutions proposed by global startups. The aim of this proposal is the implementation of carbon footprint neutral climate solutions, in which Global StartupCities will have a competitive advantage as cities with low impact on the environment, thus achieving better well-being for their citizens by the year 2030.

Under the slogan ‘Transforming Innovation’, the global summit brought together 458 attendees among startups, investors and institutions from 20 European countries, which showed their ecosystems of emerging companies and entrepreneurship around four main themes: market, talent, women and youth. During the summit, a pioneer group of investors was created that aims to promote collaboration between investors, entrepreneurs and local institutions to promote and accelerate economic growth. Through the ‘Global StartupCities Investors Group’, each year during the summit, previously selected investors will have exclusive access to a large number of emerging startups from each of the sectors selected by the initiative at global level.

The creation of an honorary science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics (STEAM) ambassador was also announced. The global ambassadors program, of which the European Commissioner Mariya Gabriel is already a member, aims to promote local entrepreneurs and innovators in these areas with references that can support their development.

INNOVATION AND TALENT, KEY PILLARS OF THE ECONOMIC RECOVERY
The Malaga Mayor and symbolic CEO of StartupCity Malaga, Francisco de la Torre, was in charge of opening the unique summit by highlighting the importance of cities and local innovative ecosystems in the construction of European identity, as well as the relevance of innovation and local talent as central axes of the economic recovery in the coming years. Also present was the Deputy Mayor for Tourism, City Promotion and Local & Foreign Investments, Rosa Sánchez; the founder and coordinator of the Global StartupCities Initiative, Arturo Villar, and representatives from the 8 coorganizing delegations. The European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth, Mariya Gabriel, and the Vice-President of the European Commission Dubravka Šuica participated virtually. Both sent messages of recognition to the initiative and to the participating cities, encouraging them to continue with the work that is being developed and highlighting the importance of policies born in local settings but that have an impact on a European level. On behalf of Vice President Dubravka Šuica, Toma Sutic attended in person and emphasized connecting ecosystems and giving visibility to startup projects

SCENARIO TO GENERATE NEW BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES FOR THE MALAGA INNOVATIVE ECOSYSTEM
‘Global StartupCities Summit’ was an opportunity for the attended disruptive cities, called StartupCities, to exchange experiences, present best practices, launch new global activities and generate new business opportunities. These companies with growth potential met with other organizations, public administrations and investors to share ideas, to present solutions for their territories under the umbrella of StartupCity Malaga and to explore business acceleration between emerging companies in the province with international investors.

The startups, investors and institutions of the Malaga ecosystem were present at the unique summit promoting technological developments and generating visibility for Malaga projects at the European level. Specifically, eight strategic projects in Malaga were presented: Expo 2027, Malaga TechPark, City Council Investor Office, MalagaWorkBay, Promalaga Municipal Incubator Network, Smart Cities Cluster, Talent Woman, and SOHO Project.

MORE THAN ONE HUNDRED MATCHMAKING MEETINGS
To promote entrepreneurship and business opportunities, the startups that participated in the summit had at their disposal a matchmaking management tool to schedule meetings through the virtual initiative called FYCMA On. More than 110 face-to-face meetings were organized between emerging companies, investors and public administrations at an international level, thus fulfilling one of the main objectives of the network: connecting innovation ecosystems, companies, and entrepreneurs that they could take advantage of the European single market. Malaga is consolidating itself as a benchmark city in boosting innovation projects and entrepreneurship through the promotion of new opportunities for startups and companies with growth potential.

VIRTUAL SPACE ‘CITIES VIDEOS’
The summit also featured a virtual space called ‘Cities videos’, in which 104 startups, investors and institutions from more than 40 different cities in five continents presented their innovative ecosystems, promoted new companies and demonstrated disruptive application solutions through videos. The selected proposals are available on the ‘Global StartupCities Summit’ website with the idea of promoting the interconnection of innovative environments around the world. In addition, an agenda of ‘Global Matchmaking Online’ connected participants from any part of the world who could not be present at the summit in Malaga.

PIONEERING INITIATIVE: ‘EUROPEAN INNOVATION AREA’
This global unique summit was created with the aim of being held annually on a different continent. Malaga won the open call to be the host city in 2020. Due to
the pandemic it was held online and it was decided that the 2021 summit would take place physically in Malaga.

At last year’s virtual event, the pioneering and cross-cutting bottom-up initiative European Innovation Area (#EiA) was launched by local actors and with the official support of the European Commission. In this year’s face-to-face edition, some of the results obtained in the framework of the project were displayed. The goal is to boost local innovative ecosystems in cities and villages that include rural and remote areas so that no one is excluded no matter where they are located.

In 2022, the ‘Global StartupCities Summit’ will be held from November 28 to 30 in StartupCity Braga, Portugal