The Startup Ecosystem of Portugal

With easy access to the European market and the Schengen Zone, Portugal has the potential to become one of the strongest startup economies in Europe. The country’s economic ties to Brazil, with whom Portugal shares a common language, also provide Portuguese startups access to the huge Brazilian market.

The nation is home to high-tech companies that play a part in the exchange and sharing of knowledge, as well as to local innovators that have created successful startup stories, success of Farfetch, a global platform for the luxury fashion industry, Outsystems, a high-performance low-code platform for app development, Talkdesk, a global AI-powered cloud contact center platform to improve customer experiences, Feedzai, a market leader in fighting financial crime with AI, Remote, a global solution that eliminates barriers to international hiring, Sword Health, the first and only end-to-end healthcare platform, and most recently Anchorage Digital, a regulated crypto platform for institutions.

That said, Portugal’s startup scene can still improve, mainly by pushing more potential entrepreneurs to create startups.
The public sector is aware of the strategic importance of entrepreneurship, and there are an impressive amount of resources allocated towards improving local startup ecosystems. There are also a growing number of startup support facilities, such as Startup Portugal and Startup Lisboa. With the massive branding benefit for Portugal and its startup economy in the annual global dominating event, Web Summit we hope to see this ecosystem reach its full potential in the coming years.

If you are an entrepreneur and wish to learn more about the Portuguese entrepreneurship ecosystem and its opportunities, you can reach out to Startup Portugal’s One Stop Shop - where you can get all the information you need to set up operations in Portugal.