What we do

Catálisis

The Catálisis Program was a comprehensive support and strategic acceleration initiative for science- and technology-based startups (EBCTs), created in 2021 by the Ministry of Science, Technology, Knowledge and Innovation (MinCiencia).

What it involves

Its main goal was to provide specialized training, high-level mentoring and commercial connections to the winning teams of the public Startup Ciencia call, ensuring that public funding came with the tools they needed to reach the market and scale globally.

It was run, for the first time, through a strategic alliance between the country's three technology transfer hubs (Know Hub Chile, APTA and HubTec) and Endeavor Chile, with the support of key partners such as the University of California, Riverside (UCR), the Chilean Venture Capital Association (ACVC), GaneshaLab, Fundación Chile and RedBionova. Through leveling, training and acceleration phases, the program helped entrepreneurs build commercial roadmaps, access funding and consolidate a learning community in the science and technology ecosystem.

Historical context

In 2021, Know Hub Chile temporarily set aside running its flagship program, Know Hub Ignition, on its own in order to put its methodologies and team into co-creating and running Catálisis. This milestone showed Know Hub Chile's ability to act as a national convener and strategic partner of the State, setting an unprecedented example of public-private collaboration by bringing the country's entire technology transfer ecosystem together in a coordinated effort.

By the numbers

national collaborative edition (2021): 1
Startup Ciencia teams in leveling and acceleration: 23
teams in training: 15
technology transfer hubs, together with Endeavor and more than 5 partner organizations: 3

Catálisis for Startup Ciencia

Testimonials

We are happy to launch this support program for science- and technology-based startups, whose purpose is to build a learning community through the exchange of experiences. These startups are a master key to transforming our society.

Carolina Torrealba

Undersecretary (2018-2022) of the Ministry of Science, Technology, Knowledge and Innovation
The sooner entrepreneurs pass their experience on to new entrepreneurs, the faster we can build a community and a more sophisticated national industry. The idea is to avoid the mistakes others have already made and cut down the huge amount of time spent trying to "reinvent the wheel".

Jorge Karadima

Mentor of the Catálisis Program and member of the Know Hub Chile Board