Get To Know Barcelona’s Newest Fund: mVenturesBCN And The Man Behind It

This week the news about the Mobile World Capital latest initiative – mVenturesBCN – was officially announced. Their goal is to draw international talent to Barcelona and to promote the creation of technology-based companies. They will also allocate €15 million into the launching of 110 startups over the next three years.

Aleix Valls is the man in charge of the ambitious program. He and his team have planned mVentureBCN for one and a half year, and in november they will finally be up and running.

“When I travel abroad I tell people what we have in Barcelona, and people thinks its amazing. But the next thing they say is that we’re doing a really bad job explaining it to the world, and I hope that changes with the launch of mVentureBCN”, says Valls.

Attracting talent

Barcelona is full of bright ambitious people, but Valls want to attract talent from all over the world over the next three years.

“First and foremost, mVenturesBCN is about talent, attracting the best people to the city. When I say people I of course meen entrepreneurs, but also the best investors and mentors out there”

The city is already attracting talent, both from Spain and the world, but Valls think they can do this in an even better way than its done today.

“Our advantage is our partners, the Mobile World Capital (MWC), the city in itself as partner and we have a great network of investors and companies”, he says.

The best accelerator

Great accelerators exists all around Barcelona, Wayra, Conector, Startupbootcamp, Seedrocket and Activa, to mention a few. So what does mVentureBCN want to do in regard to acceleration, when there already are so many good accelerators.

“We don’t want to reinvent the wheel. We want to partner up with the best accelerators out there”, says Valls.

When Barcinno asks which accelerators he is talking about, he has a mysteric answer.

“Browse the web and you’ll find the best”, Valls says encouraging.

“We already have good accelerators in city, both public and private, but we want to add a layer to the existing programs that will help the whole ecosystem to reach global markets”, he continues.

Not venture capitalists

Exactly what kind of initiative mVentureBCN is, has been unclear until today, but Valls underlines what they are not.

“It’s not about investment, we are not a venture capital-firm and we will not behave as venture capitalists. But yes, in the end we want to be partners with the companies and have equity in the projects”, Valls explains.

Their main objective is to develop talent and do so in a sustainable way over the years to come.

We will always aim at a fast exit from the company’s accelerated through our program, and then reinvest this money into the next generation of startups working with mVenturesBCN.

From the € 15 million allocated to the program, eight of these comes from the public, and to this date their only funded by public money. Their wish is that the rest of the seven million comes from private capital, but Valls explains that they also have the possibility for the Capital to invest more.

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