Startup.Flanders to put Flanders on the map as a start-up nation
Flemish Prime Minister Jan Jambon launched a new digital platform for Flemish start-ups and scale-ups with Flanders Tech Ecosystem. He presented Startup.Flanders during the Flanders International Economic Summit of Flanders Investment & Trade (FIT).
The new platform is intended to give Flanders a reputation among entrepreneurs and investors. In addition, foreign parties should easily find Flemish partners and compare Flanders with other regions. Via the website flanders.dealroom.co, anyone can browse through the data of large and small Flemish tech companies, brought together by the Dutch data cruncher Dealroom.
“An initial analysis of the data shows a stable ecosystem of expanding companies in the past six years with an enterprise value of EUR 32.6 billion. With that significant growth of 500 percent, we are at the top in Europe although we can not compete with regions such as Berlin (159 billion) or Amsterdam (222 billion),” says FIT marketing strategy specialist Olivier Van Orshoven.
The company aims to focus more on approaching foreign investors. “We always hear that the quality of our companies is great, so that’s not an issue,” says Van Orshoven. “But we need to sell our assets better.”
Startup. Flanders should therefore become the international banner of the Flemish start-up ecosystem, according to Jambon. “The entire Flemish start-up community must focus on acceleration, a definitive international breakthrough and up-scaling,” he concludes.
(AS)
Flemish Prime Minister Jan Jambon pictured during the official opening of the Belgian pavilion at the 59th Venice Biennale © Belga Photo James Arthur Gekiere