B-Venture, the largest start-up event in northern Spain, has offered more than a hundred companies this year their proposals. "How many of you are here or are you an entrepreneur?" This question was often repeated in interviews with investors, executives and successful startups who participated in the fourth edition of B-Venture. And although the auditorium has been constantly renewed, the raised hands repeatedly filled the Bilbao Euskalduna Palace's stools on October 29 and 30.

In the meantime, Bilbao has become the focal point of entrepreneurship related to new technologies, with more than 1,100 people approaching it, trying to find out how entrepreneurship is moving and supporting them.

The first thing they saw when they came to this forum, the largest startup meeting in northern Spain, was the abundance of people attending, all around the stands of 24 companies selected to submit their projects, as well as seminars at the University of Deusto and the University of Deusto, Basque Entrepreneurship Systems, Demium and Metxa shuttles and Even for those who have chosen Innolab accelerators.

Innovative applications

The promoters were enthusiastic about the innovative applications that technology has brought in many areas, such as healthcare, industry 4.0, cybersecurity, education, agriculture, architecture, recycling or sport. The main protagonists of this year were data analytics and artificial intelligence, both of whom were able to diagnose or treat cancer in a timely manner, to control access to a communication network in a factory or to improve the return on our financial investments.

Also behind the stand line, in the area reserved for more formal meetings, the pace was tremendous. The promoters set up an appointment with individual investors, venture capital fund representatives, financial institutions, business angels, accelerators or B-Venture event organizers who were invited to attend this meeting, as more and more multinationals met. because they are. This year, this meeting was sponsored by the Basque Government, SPRI, the Provincial Council of Biscay and the City of Bilbao; and has also received support from Telefónica, the Port of Bilbao, BStartup Banco Sabadell, Laboral Kutxa, CaixaBank, BBK, Elkargi and the University of Deusto.

In total, through the digital platform of the event, 613 meetings were scheduled, which, of course, had to be added after the stands were suddenly created. "I do not know how I am left speechless. I had eleven meetings yesterday," said Eriz Zárat, one of the promoters of ZM Algorithmic Systems, prior to the conference. "The balance is very positive. It has given us great visibility," said Eider Sánchez, one of the founders of Naru, who just completed a quick marathon of ten interviews. "We were very happy to have finished. We had fifteen meetings, of which we expected many things, especially in the business field," said Javi Nogueira of Send2me.

Meanwhile, conversations and roundtables were held in the auditorium, for example, with more than fifty speakers this year, such as: one of the founders of Antai Venture Builder, a company that helped Gerard Olivé, Wallapop or Glovo; José Galíndez, promoter and president of Solarpack; Rodolfo Carpintier, President of the Assets Deployment incubator specializing in Digital Internet; Itxaso Del Palacio, Investment Manager at Notion; or Patricia Casado, director of the BerriUp San Sebastian accelerator.

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