Entrepreneurs in Latin America

The lure of Chilecon Valley

As America shuts out immigrant entrepreneurs, Chile welcomes them

ONE by one they came to the stage and pitched their ideas to the crowd. There was the founder of Kwelia.com, which makes software that helps landlords mint more money from their properties. There was the co-founder of Chef Surfing, an online service for people looking to hire chefs, and for culinary wizards keen to tout their skills. And the creator of Kedzoh, which has an app that lets firms send short training videos to workers via their mobile phones or tablet computers. 

These and other start-ups, some sporting fashionably weird names such as Chu Shu, Wallwisher and IguanaBee, won rapturous applause from the entrepreneurs and venture capitalists in the audience. To your correspondent, who is based in Silicon Valley, it all felt very familiar. Yet this scene took place in Chile, a nation better known for copper-mining and cheap wine than for innovation.

Many countries have sought to create their own versions of Silicon Valley. Nearly all have failed. Yet Chile’s attempt is interesting because it exploits the original Silicon Valley’s weak spot—America’s awful immigration system. When the home of free enterprise turns away entrepreneurs, Chile welcomes them.

“Start-Up Chile” is the brainchild of Nicolas Shea, a Chilean businessman who had a brief stint in government. The programme selects promising young firms and gives their founders the equivalent of $40,000 and a year’s visa to come and work on their ideas in Chile. Since 2010, when Start-Up Chile started, some 500 companies and almost 900 entrepreneurs from a total of 37 countries have taken part. Start-Up Chile has doled out money to Chileans, too (see chart).

 Singapore, however, has a long track record. Start-Up Chile is only two years old, and it is closely identified with the current centre-right government, which may be turfed out at the polls next year. A new government could axe it. 

Whichever party wins, José Miguel Musalem of Aurus, a Chilean venture-capital firm, says he hopes that Start-Up Chile survives. It has already delivered one hefty benefit, he says: “Chileans have seen what smart graduates of Stanford and other leading universities can do, and said to themselves: ‘Hey, I could do that too’.” If Start-Up Chile spurs locals to think big, that would be no small achievement.

DYI Comments:  Apparently as stated in the article Singapore has been doing this for years as one method of many to create a continuous flow of  business investment and most importantly job creation. Other countries will eventually fall into line with programs similar to Chile or Singapore as the Great Recession continues to drag on as a method to revitalize their economies.  Many countries unfortunately, especially the U.S., their citizens only see this as cheap labor that will drop their wages even further due to the poor economy.

Once the Great Recession becomes a distant memory in the late 2020's the U.S. will become very aggressive with programs to spur emigration.  The birth rates of 1st world economies have been dropping for decades and many are under replacement.  Here in America as the Boomer generation dies off unless we have a vibrant emigration policy our population will begin to decline.  By the early 2030's emigration will be highly competitive among nations especially 1st world counties with low birth rates.

DYI