Accélérer l'écosystème entrepreneurial guatémaltèque

The project

A big percentage of the Guatemalan population lives below the poverty line (59,3%). Additionally, there’s a tremendous gap between the labour force and the offer of formal job opportunities. To generate income, Guatemalans have turned to entrepreneurship. According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, 79.8% of Guatemalans have a string desire to be an entrepreneur, and around 40% of the local workforce is self-employed.

This means that, to foster economic development through entrepreneurship, entrepreneurs need access to specialized support and development services and resources to create and grow sustainable businesses. However, the local entrepreneurial support network is predominantly comprised of generalist Entrepreneurship Support Organisations (ESOs), with few examples of specializations, which makes up and downstream collaboration difficult. Entrepreneurs too often find themselves in a land of uncertainty, where they are not ready for later stage programs or investment and cannot find the financial support they require. There is still a pressing need for tools that reinforce the concept that different types of entrepreneurs, in different development stages, require varied types of support, and promote active collaboration between the sectors of the entrepreneurial ecosystem.

In response to these challenges, we are supporting bottom-up initiatives to a) make the ecosystem more inclusive and equitable b) strengthen collaboration and specialization among ecosystem actors c) foster an environment where start-ups can flourish.

The project works in four pillars:

Providing a centralized platform that centralizes the tools and resources available for supporting entrepreneurs in the ecosystem according to the type of business they have and the stage of development they are in. Learn more www.startkit.org
Optimizing the entrepreneurial capital market, through education, collaboration between investors and entrepreneurs and network building. More on www.capca.info
Working with the public sector and key actors from the entrepreneurial ecosystem to develop better, more responsive public policies to support entrepreneurship, innovation and investment.
Working with female founders to develop soft skills and promote representative, inclusive role models for the entrepreneurial ecosystem.

Swisscontact is working closely with local entrepreneurship support organizations, investors, entrepreneurs and the public sector to ensure they can actively collaborate to create a stronger entrepreneurial ecosystem.

Objectives

Capacity Building and Support for ESOs: Building the capacity of local and regional actors, members from Guatemalan ESOs and local companies that work in (and wish to enter) the area of entrepreneurial support as advisors and project enablers
Facilitation of peer-to-peer exchange and mentorship for Female Founders
Handbook for the implementation of Policy Hackathons in Latin America, including strategies and action plans: To ensure a standardized, easy-to-apply approach for a local participative public policy innovation process, it is important to establish guidelines that provide a flexible structure.
Improving the entrepreneurial capital market: To optimize the connection between the right projects and the right investors, it is necessary to promote education, good practices and information sharing in the investment ecosystem.
International exchange of experiences and lessons learned: To guarantee comparability and compatibility of the Guatemalan approach with other existing approaches, international exchange and sharing of lessons learned will be sought.

Résultats attendus

Better orientation services to entrepreneurs are provided

Building of an interactive, automated digital infrastructure where at least 1000 entrepreneurs can consult the offer of services and find information on the entrepreneurial ecosystem in an interactive way.
Create self-diagnostic tools for entrepreneurs
An organization / collective of ESOs continues development at the end of Phase II
Up and downstream collaboration between ESOs strengthened, with 5-7 pipeline partnerships established in the ecosystem.

Diverse role models are promoted and made visible

30+ women are actively participating in the Female Founders Coalition.
80% of members of Female Founders Coalition are turned into mentors, 60 peer-to-peer mentoring relationship established
Local media players create buzz on entrepreneurship through dedicated section
Expand “Success has many shapes” campaign to go beyond just woman: Every two weeks, a local entrepreneur covering the different type and sexes is featured

A self-sustainable investors association operating in Guatemala, training investors and promoting early-stage investment

Building a sustainable business model for CAPCA (Capital of Central America) with clear benefits for members
Investors are trained by their peers trough a facilitated mechanism
Promote best practices for early-stage investment (both for entrepreneurs and investors)

A startup act is created and presented to the local government

Convening working sessions between MINECO and ecosystem champions through a Policy Hackathon
Creating a proposal for local Startup Act and providing technical support for their validation