Portugal second largest contingent at Web Summit Brazil after US

The founder of the Web Summit, Paddy Cosgrave, told Lusa on Wednesday that the Portuguese are the “second largest international participation” in the first edition of the conference in Rio de Janeiro, after the North Americans.

“We have a fearful number of Portuguese here. I think the second largest international participation. The first is the United States,” Paddy Cosgrave told Lusa, information later confirmed by his advisory.

“The second is Portugal because of the close relationship” between the countries, but also because of the Web Summit that has been held in Lisbon since 2016.

Portugal is represented at Web Summit Rio by 25 startups linked to areas such as software, education or artificial intelligence.

BlockBee, Blue Insight Technologies, Deeploy.me, Dizconto, Enline, Frontfiles, Go Beesiness, Hoopers, IDE Social Hub, Infinite Foundry, ITERCARE, Knok Healthcare, LEADZAI, Mentorise, Modatta and Move, as well as My Data Manager, MyCareforce, ndBIM, Neroes, Sensei, SheerME, Swood, Vawlt Technologies and Wallstreeters are the Portuguese representatives.

The Irish entrepreneur also explained that the decision for the Web Summit to be held in Rio de Janeiro was made due to the large participation of Brazilians in Lisbon.

“Last year, there were around 3,000, 4,000,” he said.

“It was clear to us that Brazil was the most important market in Latin America,” he stressed.

Paddy Cosgrave also said he hoped that business people’s perceptions of Rio de Janeiro would change just as they have changed in relation to Lisbon.

“I think the brand of Portugal has changed. Not just because of Web Summit. Web Summit played a small role. Hopefully, with time the perception that one has of Rio [de Janeiro], as a party city, will be taken much more seriously, as has happened in Lisbon in the last five, six, seven years,” he stressed.