15 years of Start-Up Chile: new generation with more women and foreigners in BIG 9
These entrepreneurs will travel to Chile to develop their businesses through the three acceleration programs of Start-Up Chile: Build, Ignite, and Growth, which vary according to the level of development of the projects.
In its 15th anniversary year, Start-Up Chile, Corfo's public accelerator, announced the 64 technology-based startups that were selected to join the BIG 9 generation. Of these, 50% are national startups, while the other half (an increase compared to the previous generation) come from another 9 countries: Argentina, Colombia, Brazil, Uruguay, United States, Spain, Italy, Nigeria, and Uzbekistan.
These entrepreneurs will travel to Chile to develop their businesses through the three acceleration programs of Start-Up Chile: Build, Ignite, and Growth, which vary depending on the level of development of the projects.
At the same time, the new generation considers a higher participation of projects led by women, reaching almost 37%. For this generation, there is not only gender parity in the Build program, focused on early-stage start-ups, but there has also been a significant increase in female presence in more advanced programs. Among the selected ones are Vesicly (Health and Biotechnology), Abastella (Gastronomy), and Umano (Human Resources).
The high female presence aligns with Start-Up Chile's Female Founder Factor initiative, which seeks to provide special support to women in the innovation ecosystem. In addition to the gender quota, it considers providing a higher percentage of co-financing for entrepreneurs (90% in Ignite and 60% in Growth) and exclusive activities. Moreover, 30% of those who assessed the applications were women.
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"We are beginning the celebration of our accelerator's 15th anniversary with the excellent news brought by BIG 9. On one hand, achieving equitable presence between national and foreign startups allows us to continue promoting Chile as an interesting market, where entrepreneurs can look for clients, generate employment, and address pressing issues of people and industries in the country," says Javiera Araneda, manager of Start-Up Chile.
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He added that, "On the other hand, at Start-Up Chile, we are certain of the value of having more women participating in the innovation ecosystem, therefore, having more founders in this new generation, especially in more advanced stages, is something we celebrate and look upon optimistically, thinking of all that they can contribute."
More than 900 startups applied for the BIG 9 generation of the Corfo accelerator, which will begin its acceleration process in the early days of April. Within this, they will receive equity-free co-financing, that is, free from equity participation, free co-work space, mentoring sessions, and connections with investors and corporates.
Industries and Projects
As for the industries, the majority of the selected startups belong to the Health and Biotechnology area (16%), followed by Financial Services (13%) and Human Resources and Productivity (11%).
For the initial program, Build, 18 startups were selected to receive co-financing of $15 million. Among them are Comuhack (Education), Safeguard360 (Social Impact), and Bioplastix (Health and Biotechnology).
The projects that already have a functional product and are seeking to achieve product-market fit have been selected for Ignite, to which a fund of $30 million is allocated. Among the 29 chosen projects, are 2IT (IT Development and Tools), Wmas, and Mycorium Biotech (Health and Biotechnology).
The most developed startups enter Growth, which seeks to support them in their stage of expansion, capital raising, and team growth, through a co-financing of $75 million. In this generation, 17 startups have been chosen, among which are ACOT Systems (Energy and Environment), Prócer Tecnologías (Social Impact) and Cheers (Legal).