for W3c validation

Startup Chile is an incubator program sponsored by the Chilean government with the focus of branding Chile as the “Silicon Valley” of South/Latin America. I first heard about the program through my friend Leslie Foreman, who volunteered for Wokai a few years ago and shares my passion for microfinance and then went through the Startup Chile program. Since then, it’s sat in the back of my mind – until now. As you may know, Oh Hey World just applied to the program — we were one of 1421 applicants of which 100 will make it in. Will did some searching, and Yupi Studios is the pitch video we were most impressed with (besides our own):

If we make it in, we’ll be in Chile from mid January until mid June (at a minimum).

Startup Chile has received awesome press over the past week:

• Economist – The Chilecon Valley challenge: In the war for talent, America can learn a lot from Chile
• Forbes – Start-Up Chile: Attracting Bootstrappers from Harvard, MIT, Oxford, Uganda, Latvia…
• ABC – How a Chile Startup Initiative is Changing Latin America

And even got featured on CNN…

In my mind, Startup Chile is a brilliant strategy by the Chilean government to brand their country in the eyes of the tech community – they now have over 600 well-connected entrepreneurs across the globe spreading the word about the program and the country. I have no idea why other countries aren’t scrambling to launch their own initiatives. After all, great entrepreneurial talent is the lifeblood of the world economy.