Startups pay more than other companies in Portugal. The Web Summit has started

Artificial Intelligence highlighted in this year’s edition – which the Government wants to use to make the State “smarter”.

A Web Summit kicked off this Monday in Lisbon, with more than 900 speakers and 70,000 participants, according to data from the organization, in an event where artificial intelligence (AI) continues to be highlighted.

In this year’s edition, the 9th since the technological ‘summit’ began to be held in the Portuguese capital, more than 2,500 ‘startups’ are expected to showcase their products and services and more than 1,000 investors.

At the event, which runs until November 13, the organization expects “more than 900 speakers to gather in Lisbon”.

Among the key themes of this year’s edition are programming based on , which uses the IA to generate code, which will address whether this is the next big leap or death of programming and who controls the AI ​​and who receives it.

As AI models are trained with online content, the competition for access and profit intensifies, says Web Summit.

Governments in the age of artificial intelligence, China’s silent influence on global innovation, ‘data centers’ and new energy requirements are other topics highlighted at the event.

In fact, at the opening of the summit, Gonçalo Matias, deputy minister of State Reform, said that the Portuguese state must be “smartermore agile and more human”, with the help of AI – which should simplify public administration, bring citizens closer to services and reinforce transparency. “Technology must empower citizens and strengthen democracy”, commented the minister.

This edition brings new features such as China Forum. Artur Pereira, director of the event, details: “A significant Chinese delegation from the Ministry of Commerce, which also brings together the cyberspace agency and several companies from China to bring a vision of the innovation that is happening in this part of the world”.

As startups

In an event full of startups (or from conversations that later give rise to startups), Miguel Aguiar, executive director of Startup Portugal, sees a “very positive” scenario for these companies, which have grown in recent years in Portugal: 30% per year since the start of the Web Summit in Portugal.

In , Miguel indicates that companies at the beginning of their careers are already responsible for more than 1% of the Portuguese gross domestic product (GDP).

Most recipes come from exports. Startups, he says, pay “substantially above” the average salary of other companies in Portugal.

Furthermore, they have created a lot job, namely 26 thousand jobs – a number that could increase with the update that will be carried out precisely during the Web Summit.

Therefore, “we want there to be more and more companies of this type, more entrepreneurs, who get the economy moving and bring added value to the economy”.

Startups have been tinkering with a variety of sectors. There is a “crucial importance” of AI, applied to different sectors of the economy, such as deeptech, cybersecurity, combining AI and manufacturing, financial services, or technology for medicine

Lisbon and Porto continue to be cities very important in the distribution of new companies; but this importance has been decreasing, giving way to innovation centers in Covilhã, Braga, Leiria, Guimarães or Coimbra.