by Juan Casado
5th May 2026
A Vibrant Ecosystem, Still Maturing
Published in 2026, the OECD's Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Diagnostics of Spain is the most comprehensive international benchmarking of Spain's startup and scaleup landscape to date. The report applies a ten-element ecosystem framework spanning institutions, culture, networks, finance, knowledge, and talent to assess where Spain stands and where it must go next.
The headline conclusion is encouraging: Spain has built a genuinely vibrant entrepreneurial ecosystem over the past two decades, propelled by the landmark Startup Law of 2022. Its business churn rate stands at 17.9%, above the European OECD average, and its unicorn rate nearly tripled between 2016 and 2023. The ecosystem is, in OECD language, "vibrant but not yet mature."
Where Spain Leads
The OECD identifies several areas of genuine strength. Spain's physical and digital infrastructure ranks among the strongest in Europe, its domestic market is one of the continent's largest, and the density of serial entrepreneurs gives Spain a leadership dynamic that many smaller European ecosystems lack. The 2022 Startup Law introduced simplified business registration, new fiscal incentives for investors, and provisions that for the first time allow public researchers to participate in spinouts while retaining their academic posts.
The Knowledge Gap
It is in the Knowledge dimension that the findings are most consequential. The report is unambiguous: Knowledge is a systemic bottleneck for Spain's entrepreneurial ecosystem. At 1.4% of GDP, R&D expenditure lags well behind the 2 to 3% range of leading EU ecosystems. Only around 15% of Enisa-certified innovative startups are deep tech spinoffs, and just 7% of Spanish SMEs have active innovation co-operations with other firms. Knowledge Transfer Offices vary widely in resources, commercial expertise, and IP policy clarity, creating uncertainty for researchers and investors alike.
The OECD identifies a persistent gap between initial technology development and market-ready commercialization, driven by a lack of effective bridging organizations between academia and industry, weak absorptive capacity in many startups, and a cultural divide that stigmatizes commercial engagement in academic settings.
KnowTransfer's Role
The OECD's recommended actions read as a direct validation of what KnowTransfer does: matchmaking between startups, corporates, and universities; supporting researchers in finding commercial applications for their work; and professionalizing knowledge transfer operations to reduce IP uncertainty and accelerate licensing. The report also calls for the development of co-creation environments that better integrate universities, entrepreneurs, and industry. These are not aspirational policy ideas. They are the daily work of knowledge transfer professionals.
The Broader Picture
On finance, growth-stage capital remains critically scarce, with 91% of domestic funding rounds below 5 million euros. On talent, startups face acute shortages in technical roles despite growing STEM graduate numbers. On culture, fewer than half of Spanish adults consider entrepreneurship a good career option, and the stigma around commercial engagement in academia persists. Each of these dimensions reinforces the central finding: Spain has the raw ingredients of a world-class innovation economy, but converting that potential into commercial outcomes requires professional intermediaries that most of the ecosystem still lacks.
This post draws on: OECD (2026), Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Diagnostics of Spain, OECD Publishing, Paris. doi.org/10.1787/05f463ae-en