Countless sunny days and wonderful cuisine make Portugal the perfect tourist destination. But this small country on the far western side of Europe has much more to offer, especially for entrepreneurs and digital nomads.
Why is Portugal one of the best destinations in Europe for start-ups and businesses and a leading technology center worldwide?

The place where lifestyle meets technology

Historically, the country was the starting point for marine research. Today, instead, the world is coming to Portugal. In 2020, for the fourth time in a row, Portugal was chosen as the leading destination in the world by < a href="https://www.euronews.com/travel/2020/11/05/portugal-named-europe-s-leading-destination-at-world-travel-awards" target="_blank" rel=" noopener noreferrer">World Travel Awards, with Lisbon winning “the world’s leading destination for city breaks”. Lisbon is more than a tourist destination and people move to it to work and live there, with a significant increase in positive immigration in 2020 and 2021. In fact, with a population of about 10 million, GDP per capita of about 22,000 dollars and undoubtedly one of the best places in the world in terms of weather, Portugal consistently ranks among the best places to live in for expats and locals alike. A safe country (Portugal ranks among the first 15 in the World Peace Index ) with first class infrastructure (96% of the country Enjoying 4G coverage), Portugal is seen as a great blend of EU stability, relatively low cost of living, high command of the English language, and excellent access to the EU’s vast consumer market of over 500 million.

Although the local startup ecosystem is relatively small compared to hubs like Paris, London or Berlin, Portugal is an international technological hotspot, hosting the Web Summit – the annual internet summit – as well as several other technological events. This contributed significantly to the number of European unicorns: 6 companies with Portuguese DNA are now valued at 1 billion, three of them in 2021, Feedzai, Remote and Sword Health. Portugal is also on the radar of several international companies interested in recruiting technological talent in Europe: Google, Uber, PipeDrive, Salsify, Cloudflare and even Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz recently opened new technology-focused centers in Portugal.

Pipedrive has announced its new Lisbon office citing language skills and technical talent pool as reasons to choose open their third location in Portugal. Salsify began its international expansion with Portugal, citing as key reasons for the decision the business climate, the weather, the startup ecosystem, language skills, but In the end, the people. As for Cloudflare, the choice was made after analysis of 45 cities< /a> in 29 countries. Lisbon< /a> was chosen based on the combination of a large and growing ecosystem, an attractive immigration policy, political stability, a high standard of living, as well as the time zone and direct flights to San Francisco.

The article is published in collaboration with our strategic partner BRIDGE IN – a company that offers business relocation services for companies and startups Those interested in launching an activity in Portugal.