Start-up Chile Invites a Hundred More Innovators to Come to Chile

BY STAFF REPORT

The Chilean Government has unveiled a new list of 105 tech startups who are part of the next round of young organizations participating in the widely heralded ‘StartUp Chile’ program.

The startups, selected for funding under the government’s popular accelerator program, represent more than 30 countries and a variety of industries. As part of the program, the government will provide participating companies with $40,000 of equity-free seed funding and access to a network of mentors and experts.

The startups, for their part, will contribute to the growth of the local technology sector and they must stay in Chile for at least six months.

Most of the companies come from the U.S. (24 percent), followed by host country Chile (19 percent) Argentina (9 percent) and India (7 percent). There also startups from countries like Morocco, Ukraine, Pakistan and the Netherlands.

The program received nearly 1,400 applications from companies as well as educational institutions including Brown University, Stanford University, University of California, Berkeley, MIT and Oxford University.

The chosen firms are working in e-commerce (24%) mobile & wireless (10%), media (10%), IT & enterprise software (10%) and social media (10%).

“They have contributed to transform our country into the leading innovation hub of LatAm,” said Horacio Melo, Start-Up Chile´s executive director.

“What´s more important, more and more Chileans are becoming entrepreneurs, and we can´t be happier about that. We hope many global entrepreneurs keep coming to Chile to make their businesses global.”

Start-Up Chile is a revolutionary initiative that’s paved the way for similar programs like Startup America, Britain, and Greece.