Kirk LaughlinFortune magazine named Bogota as one of the 15 best cities for business in its annual Global 500 feature, highlighting several multinational companies that recently established outposts in the Colombian capital.
Fortune included Bogota on its short list of the top 15 new cities in the world to do business—up-and-coming cities in which investors can find skilled workforce, solid infrastructure, and potential customers.
Says writer Josh Dawsey in the “Global 500” article’s enhanced digital map of the 15 best new cities for business: “A World Bank study recently ranked Colombia No. 2 in Latin America for entrepreneurs (it takes just days to incorporate a company), but large multinationals like Bogota, too: Citibank and McDonald’s have set up there, and call centers serving the world are proliferating in the city. Why? Colombians speak clear, unaccented Spanish.”
To select cities for this feature, Fortune consulted corporate and economic development executives to determine where companies are opening new businesses, taking into account (among other factors) the age and prosperity of the locals.
The publication also noted that Bogotá is quickly becoming a shopaholic’s paradise, with two of the largest luxury malls in the country.
Two other Latin American cities were named alongside Bogota: San Jose in Costa Rica, and Santiago in Chile.
Topping out the list were Salt Lake City and Austin in the United States; Vancouver, Canada; Stockholm (Sweden); Warsaw (Poland); Lagos (Nigeria); Doha (Qatar); Ahmedabad and Gurgaon (India); Melbourne (Australia); and Chengdu and Chongqing (China).
Colombia received additional plaudits with the inclusion of Bogotano businessman Luis Munoz on Fortune’s short list of “Four CEO’s on the Edge of Global Business.” With the input of Proexport Colombia for Bogota, the magazine highlighted Munoz’s successful business plan and recent international expansion of Juan Valdez Cafes, “a five-year-old company created by the Colombian Coffee Federation to boost revenue and prestige for Colombian grown coffee.”
Fortune portrays Bogota as a booming city ripe for multinationals, which are flocking there for its young, talented workforce, and business-friendly government policies.
The “Best New Cities for Business” roundup forms part of the report that complements the annual Global 500, where for the first time a Colombian company, Ecopetrol, makes the list.
Read the entire Fortune online report here.
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