A note from the newspaper Clarín of Argentina highlighted Uruguay as an entrepreneurial country in the last few hours. Under the title “Why is Uruguay the new mecca for entrepreneurs?”, it is a chronicle of the event Test and invest Uruguayorganized between the government and the IDB last week at the Punta del Este Convention Center, where, among other things, the the Uruguay Innovation Hub to strengthen the country as a regional innovation hub.
The article in the Argentine newspaper underlines that “with 1,000 software companies, Uruguay generates US$ 1,000 million in exports, and if measured per capita it leads the world ranking”, and details the investments of the Institut Pasteur of France, the laboratory of Microsoft services intelligenceand the harvard business school center which will be installed soon.
Also points out the speech of President Luis Lacalle Pou, who recognized his predecessors, “the visionaries who in the 90s began to lay the foundations.” “Uruguay has talent, infrastructure, but the most important thing is stability, long-term laws, respect for contracts, strong institutions. It is fertile ground for global ventures. Everything that was achieved was imperceptible and now it is an eruption, globalization gave these possibilities, the world shrank and it no longer matters where one lives or works. The next frontier is for those who think outside the box, we have an obligation to become a hub for Latin America and beyond.”
Lacalle said that Test Uruguay “is to come and test innovations on a small scale and then launch into the world.” same guarantees. In Uruguay they can dream, take long-term risks and stand firm.”
The Minister of Industry, Omar Paganini, highlighted in his speech the importance of Uruguay going from being a business center to an innovation hub. “We are not expensive in this sector in digital talent we are at an international level”.
In this sense, the minister explained that Uruguay is in a propitious stage to add more public policies that accelerate the creation of local startups and, also, promote the arrival of startups from other parts of the world, so that they can be founded and developed in the country, through public-private funds.
The executive director of the Innovation Hub, Carolina Gutiérrez highlighted the country’s competitive advantages in technology industries, the high rate of internet connection, renewable energies, which represent 97% of electricity generation, and biotechnology.
In an interview for of the first summit of El Observador Events on Technology and New BusinessesGutiérrez had said that “there are certain rules of the game that should be re-examined because they have not been reviewed for a long time to give a better context to the development of innovation”, and pointed out that the oldest regulations “have a hard time framing innovation” .
“The great base is legal stability to attract industries that require long periods of maturation,” explained Gutiérrez in Test and Investhighlighting that there is an “absolute political commitment, of alignment of the ministries to accelerate this process.”
Gabriela Couto, Founder and President, InnovaMarket Plaza and BioGerentes of Costa Rica pointed out that new actors must be incorporated into the helixes of innovation. And she distinguished companies, governments, universities, entrepreneurs and banks.
The note highlights more testimonies from the conference, for example that of Carlos Batthyány, CEO of the Institut Pasteur, who drew attention by recalling that “none of our countries was able to put a drug in the pharmacy.” Or Graciela Ciccia, director of Research and Development of the Insud Group, who spoke “of the low investment in the region in research and development”. Lisandro Bril, an Argentine investor, “pointed out that if things go well, Uruguay could be the new Singapore.”
The Clarín note also highlighted that Gerardo Werthein, Facundo Garretón with strong investments in the cannabis industry, Roberto Wagmaister, founder of the Assa group and the current Price, Juan Procaccini, were seen in the corridors. These Argentines highlighted Uruguay’s political decision to expand the unicorn club led by dLocal, OrdensYa and Nowports. The text of the Argentine newspaper also highlighted Newlab, an innovation company that has the advice of the Argentine María Eugenia Estenssoro, who highlighted Uruguay’s political decision to make innovation a country strategy.
“This is its first landing in the region for Newlab. It arrived in Montevideo with the support of Mercado Libre and Globant, whose CEOs Marcos Galperin and Martín Migoya reside in Uruguay. MercadoLibre has 1,500 people hired and Globant employs another 1,000 people in Uruguay” , close the note.
