Tech City

Tech City was created by leaders in the technology industry of Barcelona to foster a collaborative environment among growing startups. It is privately funded these tech leaders to run as a club association where tech founders can apply for membership and have access to office space and investment network resources. The Tech City building houses small and large startups, and a not-for-profit organization called Mobile World which hosts a mobile centered conference in Barcelona that is attended by over 100,000 participants. The most shocking part of hearing from Mobile World is how willing competitors are to it together to discuss how the new innovations in technology will affect their business. Even the idea of Tech City is centered on fostering a community of tech startups, rather than propagating the idea of “every man for themselves.” Although business incubators in New York provide the same space that Tech City may provide startups, I haven’t heard of any incubator that focuses on helping startups network with each other or investors.

At Tech City, we also heard from the Director of Commercial Sales, Aleix Miol, at Tiendeo, a online provider of printed shopping catalogs based on geolocation. The part that stood out most to me about the talk was about the guiding principles the founders used to build the company. According to the speaker, two of the three founders quit their job to start the company, and relied on the salary of the third partner to live while the company was getting off the ground. Due to these origins, the most important thing for the founders was to keep costs low while they were growing the company, a principle which they are still abiding 10 years later. I think part of their success can be attributed to having a value which evolved into an operations strategy. Not only has Tiendeo had to find creative solutions with little to no budget, but the way that they evaluate each part of their business to see how they can have it produce money is genius. From selling the catalogue management systems back to distributors and producers to hiring freelancers to code all of the brochures, it is an excellent business model that keeps costs low. I also admire the decisions of the founders to keep the majority ownership of their business, which was only possible through their commitment to keeping costs low instead of focusing on making a high profit.

We wrapped up the day with a three hour walking tour through the Gothic Quarter of Barcelona guided by Professor Xavier Puertas. The tour started with a comparison on two sides of a street between what is considered the Modern style of buildings vs. the Gothic style, with a 300 year gap between the two. Professor Xavier explained that the discovery of America completely halted growth in Barcelona, so a small pocket of the city has maintained the architect from the 12th Century. The reason for this was the accord between Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand, that prevented the Catalan people from traveling to the newly discovered America, as it had been financed by the Castilian people. It is amazing the deep impacts that history has had on the city, and how it is clearly displayed in the architecture of the city. I can see the effects of this lack of growth for so many years in the places we have been visiting. It seems the citizens of Barcelona are very proud of their achievements so far (as they should be) and are working very hard for Barcelona to once again grow and flourish as it did in the 15th Century. Although no one has explicitly mentioned this, it is apparent in how the city is focused on innovation and making sure the citizens of the city can thrive in the new age of technology.