Spanish startups have become very important in recent years. It is a business model that not only more and more entrepreneurs are betting on, but also large investors. But, what are the most outstanding startups in our country? Don’t be surprised to learn that you may have come into contact with one of these small businesses at least once.
Discover the most successful Spanish startups
According to a study carried out by Informa D&B, there were 22,771 startups in Spain until 2020 and they were capable of billing just over 500 million euros, at least before the health crisis caused by Covid-19. In addition, Spanish startups created 5.7% of jobs per company; This is a higher percentage than the jobs generated in other types of companies. As if that were not enough, in a startup there are more chances that the staff contracts will be permanent and not temporary, as is the case in many companies.
These companies are found mainly in Madrid, La Rioja and Navarra.
Cabify
Among the best known Spanish startups we find Cabify. Basically because it is a very popular service that has a strong presence in our country and that most of us have used at some point in our lives. This Spanish company was founded in 2011 by Juan de Antonio; Although it has the Spanish seal and is considered made in Spain, it was founded in the United States thanks to the association of its creator with Adeyemi Ajao (co-founder of Tuenti and a successful man in Silicon Valley).
As you probably already know, Cabify is a company in the transport sector that comes from the carsharing concept. The idea is simple. A person needs a vehicle to get from one place to another and they only have to order and pay for it through a simple phone application. Among the most important things of this company is that the transport is totally safe, state- of-the-art and, in addition, it is possible to monitor the trip at all times. In recent years the company has grown exponentially and is currently in several countries around the world. By 2018, the company had a strong investment of more than 100 million dollars from Rakuten.
Glovo
Glovo cannot be missing from our list of the most successful Spanish startups. Glovo is one of four companies (along with Jobandtalent, Wallapop and Idealista) to raise more than €1.5bn from cumulative funding. Glovo was founded by Oscar PIerre and Sacha Michaud in 2015 in Barcelona and, in a short time, it has become one of the most requested home delivery services.
The premise is basic: one person orders something through an app and another person takes it. The human capital is made up of the glovers , who are Spanish self-employed workers who provide their own means of transport, receive an order through the app and deliver it. The orders are not limited to food, but users can even order medicines and the delivery man delivers it in a matter of minutes.
Aelix Therapeutics
One of the Spanish startups that is constantly growing and not as popular as others is Aelix Therapeutics. Aelix was born in 2015 as a kind of spin-off of the Catalan public-private company HIVACAT; who also specializes in AIDS research. At Aelix, therapeutic vaccines are developed with the intention of curing HIV; These vaccines have been able to immunize animals in the trials carried out and also present good levels of safety and tolerance in Phase 1 studies. It was precisely last year when Aelix managed to obtain a first Phase 2 proof-of-concept study in patients infected with HIV.
Aelix has the investment of Ysios Capital (a Spanish investment group), Johnson & Johnson and la Caixa in its venture capital division.
Capital Index
Indexa Capital was founded in 2015 by Unai Asenjo and François Derbaix Blanco and belongs to the financial sector. Indexa Capital is one of the most popular companies in this sector and of this type in Spain; in fact, it is the only startup recognized by the National Securities Market Commission. But what does Indexa do? Invest. Indexa is responsible for making fixed or variable income investments with quite affordable commissions.
Indexa works with the roboadvisor system and currently has more than 25,000 clients and manages nearly 485 million euros.
Wetaca: one of the most ingenious Spanish startups
When we thought we had seen it all, Wetaca came into our lives. This happened in 2014 at the hands of two Galicians: Efrén Álvarez and Andrés Casal. This couple of guys are known as “the Galicians who conquered Madrid selling tupperware”, because Wetaca is basically what they do. Here the user subscribes and asks for a good supply of tupperware for the week that arrive at home ready to take to the office, school, etc. Thus, the user does not have to cook, but order their food directly with Wetaca. Here you can choose a quite diverse series of options, but, above all, nutritious.
Wetaca is a story of success and improvement in every rule, because according to what they say, the Galicians began cooking on their own more than twelve hours a day to be able to deliver their orders. Today, they are in charge of a team of more than 30 people to be able to deliver more than 5,000 orders a week.
hawkers
Hawkers is a startup made in Spain based in Elche that is responsible for selling sunglasses over the Internet. Hawkers has its origins in 2013, and was born from Saldum, the first company of the Saldum Ventures consortium. The founders of Hawkers were Iñaki Soriano, Pablo Sánchez and the brothers Alejandro and David Moreno. Hawkers’ business model was a revolution, which led it to grow exponentially in recent years. In 2014, a year after its foundation, Hawkers had a turnover of more than 15 million euros. By 2015, the figure reached 40 million.
But, to what is the success of Hawkers due? To begin with, in 2016, the founders opened their capital to foreign investment. Thus, they obtained capital from Alejandro Betancourt (current president of Hawkers) who represented O’Hara Financial; but they also received capital from the co-founders of Tuenti, Félix Ruiz and Hugo Arévalo. As they say, after the arrival of Betancourt to the presidency of Hawkers, the company managed to sell one goggle per second in 2019 during the Black Friday campaign.
Hawkers’ secret lies in Growth Hacking, a technique widely used in marketing. Through Growth Hacking or accelerated growth, it is intended to capture users at low cost and in a short time. Similar strategies used Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Airbnb, Spotify and even YouTube , at the time. Throughout its few years of existence, Hawkers has used controversial social media campaigns to engage its customers. However, Hawkers has been expanding little by little; In this way, not only can their products be found online, but they already have more than 90 physical stores around the world.
