The Digitalization, Innovation and Investments Unit of Sofia Municipality presented the vibrant startup and innovation ecosystem in Sofia during the Startup Ecosystem Development webinar by StartupBlink, which took place on July 30, 2020 with the participation of entrepreneurs and ecosystem developers from different cities around the world. Ana Georgieva from Innovative Sofia presented Sofia’s development as one of the hottest entrepreneurial spots in Europe, a diversified tech hub with startups innovating across multiple industries, with a great number of stakeholders and supporting organisations on government, municipal and business level.
StartupBlink is among the world’s largest platforms for startups and research centres. The platform is working with dozens of stakeholders from the public sector on various modules including ecosystem promotion, mapping, and consulting. Two months ago, Sofia climbed two positions – tо 86th place among 1 000 cities in the 2020 edition of the Global Ecosystem Ranking Report by StartupBlink. In addition, the ranking now includes an updated profile of Sofia’s startup ecosystem and a case study about Sofia in the deep dive section of the report. Find out more about Sofia’s profile in ‘Global Ecosystem 2020’ here.
Highlights about Sofia’s startup ecosystem, presented during the webinar:
- – Since 2013, over 2000 startups have been created in Bulgaria, mainly in Sofia. Nowadays there are 650+ active startups and scaleups.
- – Around 1/3 of the founders are foreigners.
- – Approx. 15% of Bulgarian start-ups are in the deep tech sector, including AI, aerospace, robotics and IoT, biotech, createch, etc.
- – There are 15+ VC funds and a well-developed network of angel investors (angel association and angel investment clubs).
- – There are 30+ coworking spaces in the city
- – 220 high-schools, 15 universities and 30+ software academies offer IT, innovation and tech-related programs.
- – 42% of university students are in STEM fields
- – 30.2% of the employed in the ICT sector are women (vs.16.7% in the EU)
- – Sofia hosts many international flagship events (e.g. WEBIT, DigitalK, Innovation Explorer, TedX Sofia, Global Tech Summit, etc.)
- – In 2019, Sofia became a French Tech label city, joining 50 innovation and tech hubs across the Globe.
- In 2019, Sofia completed the Digital Transformation Strategy for the city Sofia (DTSS) to enhance the local tech ecosystem by turning the city into a market for the digital products created in Sofia.
- A new Big Data and AI Centre of Excellence – GATE, was launched in 2019.
You can find more data and facts about Sofia’s startup ecosystem and watch the full discussion in the recording of the Zoom webinar here.
