The Startup Ecosystem of Santander

Santander, capital city of the Cantabria region, has an ideal strategic location for the development of any economic activity. Cantabria is an Autonomous Community located in the north of Spain with infrastructures that allow considerable commercial expansion beyond its borders, both to the rest of the country and other European Union states. The historical links and close ties consolidated over the years with Latin America and Europe make Cantabria the ideal base from which to tackle these markets.

Santander has an incipient startup ecosystem, with a few small companies developing a variety of technological activities, mainly in the fields of electronic components, internet, and digital industry.

In addition to its natural capabilities, the region has strategic alliances through which it has created marketing networks that open up a vast amount of possibilities for the companies located in Cantabria.

Santander has been selected as one of the main Smart Cities in Spain, forming part of the “Spanish Smart Cities Network”. “SmartSantander” proposes a unique in the world city-scale experimental research facility in support of typical applications and services for a smart city. This unique experimental facility will be sufficiently large, open and flexible to enable horizontal and vertical federation with other experimental facilities and stimulate the development of new applications by users of various types including experimental advanced research on IoT technologies and realistic assessment of users’ acceptability tests.