After many months of planning and numerous trips to Barcelona, the International Technology Forum (ITF) 2007 held November 26 – 30th at the historic Casa Llotja de Mar was a huge success. Working to enhance the technology sector within Barcelona and to ensure that the Catalan capital becomes the “hub” for technology in southern Europe the presidents of both the Barcelona Chamber of Commerce and the American Chamber of Commerce in Spain fully endorsed and supported ITF 2007 as key sponsors of the event. The objective of this year’s event was to introduce prominent Silicon Valley business leaders to the burgeoning technology industry in Barcelona.
The president of the Barcelona Chamber of Commerce, Miquel Valls stated that “this event shows that American investors have continued interest in Catalonia and Spain as a place for technology growth and investment”. Jaume Malet, president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Spain pointed to the need to “make Barcelona a technology capital, because of the many technology businesses and infrastructure projects in the area.” “The importance of the forum was to transcend the forum itself, which is to convince the ‘smart money’ to take risks and that Barcelona is a place that believes in innovation,” stated Malet.
The result of the partnership between ITF 2007 and the Barcelona Chamber of Commerce and the American Chamber of Commerce was an energetic, resource-rich environment for honing ideas and exploring new, innovative business opportunities. The event drew Barcelona business leaders along with entrepreneurs interested in learning from the successes of Silicon Valley. And interested they were. With panels covering ICT, Life Sciences and Energy, attendance by the Barcelona business community and the Spanish media was overwhelming. Attendees included local Spanish business leaders and educators, successful Silicon Valley VC firms and industry experts along with the aspiring young companies looking to learn how to do business with the prominent Silicon Valley VC’s in attendance.
“ITF 2007 creates a community of experts that is needed to focus on high-tech development. This community is united with certain interests and common objectives,” stated Dr. William Miller, ITF Chairman of the Board in his opening remarks. As outlined by Dr. Miller, the objectives for the event are to “first, forge new relationships, secondly, share best practices and third, discover new opportunities and capitalize on them.”
Industry experts and educators including Tapan Munroe, consultant and advisor in economic and policy analysis; Kamran Elahiam, president and founder Global Catalyst Partners; Faraj Aalaei, co-founder and CEO of Centillium Communications; Rudy Mazzocchi, CEO of Triton BioSystems; Ross Haghighat, founder and Chairman of the Board of Triton Systems, Inc.; Professor Frenanco Ablericio, director of the Barcelona Science Park; Dr. Carlos Buesa, Founder and CEO Oryzon Genomics; Joaquim Faura Batlle, General Manager of Telefonica Catalonia; Francesc Godia, Professor of Chemical Engineering and vice-Rector at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona each provided their thoughts on the current status and future of the Information and Communications Technology (ICT), Life Sciences and Energy markets.
VC’s attending ITF described the current situation in the VC market, defined the areas where VC’s are investing today, provided insight on what is happening in the VC community, and gave feedback to the young companies on how to approach the VC market with their new ideas. One area of focus for VC’s today is the Energy sector. “Global warming is the greatest challenge facing our generation and the new technologies that are being developed will change history,” said Steve Westly, founder of the Westly Group. “Furthermore, VC’s are funding solutions in the Energy area. Cleantech is the 3rd largest venture investment area with investments up 48% over 2006.” During his keynote speech, Doug Hamilton, Managing Director with Silicon Valley Bank stated that “Silicon Valley Bank had the foresight to expand its reach oversees by opening up offices in various locations around the world and take the VC’s into these regions to expose them to the numerous opportunities around the world.” “Companies need to walk before they run. Our strategy in these regions is to help these small emerging companies establish market entry strategies,” stated Hamilton.
VC attendees included; Daniel Weiss, co-founder and Managing Partner of Angeleno Group LLC, Joyce Tsang, General Partner ProQuest; Simon Cook, CEO of DFJ Esprit; Mike Dorsey, Managing Director at JP Morgan; Jaleh Daie, Managing Partner with Aurora Equity; Doug Hamilton, Managing Director with the Private Equity Group of Silicon Valley Bank Capital, Steve Westly, founder of the Westly Group; and Roger Wyse with Burrill & Company.
The young companies selected to participate in this exclusive event included: Biozone Scientific International; Global Bionanomics S.L.; Neos Surgery S.L.; Omnia Molecular S.L.; Sator & Fata; Starlab Barcelona S.L.; Bio Fuel Systems S.L.; Elea Forest S.L.; Inteternationl Product Design; Hidroflot S.L.; Sunileo SA; Artes Tecnologia Energetica S. L.; Acellera Ltd; BCN sharing Projects S.L.; Cetemar S.L. Decomat; DiceLock Security S.L.; Elephant Memo; Emovilia; eNeo Labs; Focus on Emotions; Fotocodex S.L.; FUTURLINK; Ingenieria para el Control del Ruido S.L.; Innosonic Ltd.; InOut TV; Iris Experience; Justinmind; Kalerion Computing S.L.; Keonn; Merkart; OpenCreation; Pataforrma Tecnologica Econtainers SL; Polymita Technologies; Presence Technology; Dafira Solutions; Sensing Fabrics SL; Signaletics SL; Strategic Attention Management; Ta with you; taalka.com; Tratamiento y Gestion de la Identidad, TEGEIDEN; Unilocus; VozTelecom Sistemans S.L.; Welcome and WUTUTU SL.
Polymita Technologies was honored as one of the most innovative companies in Catalonia. Adara partner, Roberto Saint-Malo, commented, “It is a great boost to see Polymita in the top 10 in Catalonia, an emerging hot-spot for high-tech innovation in Europe.”
Presence Technology was honored in the ICT category for “Excellence Entrepreneurship”. The award was delivered to Araceli Aranda, CEO of Presence Technology, who states, “We are very proud of this new acknowledgement of the work done by the entire organization. This award reinforces our position as a market leader and pushes us to keep on working in order to continue offering the best solutions in the Contact Center market”.
Over 150 local Catalonia business leaders attended a luncheon and keynote “What makes Silicon Valley unique; how to create an environment for innovation and economic growth in other emerging regions”, presented by Regis McKenna, Chairman and Founder of Regis McKenna, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in the application of ICT to business strategies.
ITF 2007 made a splash in over 10 media outlets with mainstream media (Europa Press, Lavanguardia, El Pais, Diari, Expansion Catalunya, and Hispanidad.com) prior to the event and numerous articles and radio and television spots during and after the event. There continues to be requests for media coverage for this groundbreaking event.
The success of ITF 2007 is directly attributable to the unfailing work of its organizers; Susan Akbarpour, Fariba Rezvani and Cyrus Akbarpour, the support of the ITF board, friends and supporters. Its multi-faceted network of business leaders, VC’s and community leaders formed the platform for this year’s successful event and has laid the groundwork for ITF’s continued success.
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