Launching an orange future Fifteen questions for getting to know the creative entrepreneurs of Latin America and the Caribbean Content How can we assure that creative entrepreneurships Question 1. 04 blossom in Latin America and the Caribbean? What is the orange economy? Question 2. 08 Understanding the importance of being creative Who are the creative entrepreneurs Question 3. 16 of Latin America and the Caribbean? Question 4. How can you learn how to launch an entrepreneurship? 19 Question 5. How are creative entrepreneurships like? 23 Question 6. Do creative entrepreneurships have a social impact? 32 Question 7. Where do creative entrepreneurs work? 37 Question 8. How are creative entrepreneurships financed? 62 How healthy are the creative entrepreneurships Question 9. 66 in Latin America and the Caribbean? Why do creative entrepreneurships fail Question 10. 70 and how often? What factors influence the happiness Question 11. 79 of creative entrepreneurs? How much do creative entrepreneurs understand Question 12. 83 about intellectual property? How could different social actors contribute Question 13. 88 to the growth of creative industries? How can we encourage creative entrepreneurship Question 14. 95 through a regional brand? What can we learn from laws that Question 15. 101 have supported creative industries? Stories & interviews 104 Data 128 Glossary 155 In order to learn how a creative entrepreneurship can flourish in Latin America and the Caribbean, first it is necessary to know the talent that will develop the projects. Launching an Orange Future, you will not only get to know what the creative entrepreneurs in the region are like, you will also get to know their perceptions, failures, successes as well as the health of their entrepreneurships. This study will help you understand that those who take big risks achieve even higher rewards. Are you ready to be a creative entrepreneur? Launching an orange future 03 How can we assure that creative entrepreneurships blossom in Latin America and the Caribbean? 1 To answer that, first you must know the people behind the projects. The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) entrusted The Failure Institute, based in Mexico, to identify creative entrepreneurs in Latin America and the Caribbean. Given this objective, an effort was made to compile and understand not only basic information about more than 200 creative entrepreneur- ships in the region, but also other factors such as the educa- tional levels and work satisfaction of those who are behind these creative entrepreneurships. Other characteristics of the businesses studied include the number of employees, partners, solvency, social commitment, successes, failures and their personal stories and experiences. The methodology involved several phases in the digital world the only things that exist of research: are those that are mapped and if we don’t make a map of creative entrepreneurs and The first phase included a literature entrepreneurships, opportunities for them review covering some of the subjects related to take off and be able to collaborate togeth- to the creative economies. Afterwards we er are lost. Despite the economic impact reviewed the survey questions, the scope produced by these industries, there is still and methods of the study. no directory that registers the incubators, The second phase entailed inter- accelerators and coworking spaces of the viewing 53 creative and cultural entrepre- region. This lack of information makes it neurs in the region, which allowed us to difficult to know the number of business- design an online survey that was posted es currently being incubated, what type on social networks and elicited participa- of creative entrepreneurships participate tion by 208 validated respondents about in accelerator programs and how many of their creative and cultural businesses. these are integrated with global markets. The sample of entrepreneurs who partici- The fourth phase was to use the pated in the interviews or responded to our data and its interpretation to contextual- online survey exceeded 250 individuals, the ize and narrate the interviews, stories and majority from Latin American countries and facts gathered in the research in order to some of the Caribbean nations. understand the creative entrepreneurs of The third phase consisted of setting up latin america and the caribbean better, as a crowdsourcing of accelerators, incubators well as the challenges they face and what and coworking spaces focused on creative opportunities exist for promoting the talent and cultural industries (CCI). We believe that of these entrepreneurs. Launching an orange future — Question 1 05 Phase 1 Literature review Phase 2 Interviews + online survey Phase 3 Crowdsourcing Phase 4 Data interpretation Launching an orange future — Question 1 06 The methodology of The Failure Institute Relies equally on traditional statistical The IDB and The Failure Institute recognize techniques and modern tools such as that creativity is an engine for growth in cognitive computing, geospatial analysis the region and that stimulating it is essen- and machine learning. We used all of these tial. As part of the creativity and innovation instruments for taking an in-depth look at movement, Demand Solutions, the IDB has the data and, in combination, for drawing dedicated itself to bringing together the conclusions and reflections that allow us most brilliant minds of the orange economy to read the creative faces of our region. We to discuss, inspire and co-create innova- hope that those who decide to strength- tive solutions that improve the lives of the en creative businesses here will use this inhabitants of this region. Since creative data to their advantage in order to make industries will play an increasingly important decisions that take in consideration not role in the digital economy, this movement only the challenges but also the nature of bets on the exchange of knowledge as a key the creative entrepreneurs in the region. ingredient for stimulating innovation. Crea- tivity and entrepreneurship gain strength by We formulated a series of questions to get the day as a cross-cutting axis that touches to know the personal stories of 53 creative every segment of the orange industry. enterpreneurs better, including: How were Failing to take advantage of its great social you trained? How did you decide to launch potential would be an enormous loss for all. a business? How old are you? What did you Within the IDB, we know that Latin America study? What are your business models? and the Caribbean is a region possessing What devices or gadgets do you use? What unlimited creativity and ideas that, given the are your ambitions and hopes? If you could right support, can promote the economy of change the world, how would you do it? the area and provide a better future for all. We know that having numbers, statistics If we encourage the entrepreneurial spirit and charts is not enough: if we aspire to of citizens, our countries would be able to understand creativity in Latin America and take advantage of a resource they already the Caribbean, it is necessary to listen to have: a tradition of invention and ingenuity, the entrepreneurs and tell their stories. an enormously rich cultural heritage and With the intent of taking into account the evident creativity and innovative sense the human side of creative and cultural of our entrepreneurs, creators and artists. industries, we have woven into this text the stories of several entrepreneurs, their The time has come to look ahead. Let’s dreams and the ideas they have made a launch a better future: a smarter, more reality in the world. creative and more prosperous future. Let’s launch an orange future. Launching an orange future — Question 1 07 What is the orange economy? Understanding the importance of being creative 2 Latin America and the Caribbean own a prodigious resource. Thanks to a long history of encounters between cultures, unparalleled natural richness and the longstanding exchange of ideas within our region, that resource has built up and now it is urgent to take advantage of it: we refer to creativity. For years it was considered as an accessory quality or, even worse, as a folkloric curiosity, only in recent times have we begun to understand the enormous value played by creativity in the region’s prosperity. Beneath each cultural, economic and intellectual expression lies nothing less than a turning point for future well-being. What exactly is creativity? According to What do we refer to when we speak of the Latin America and the Caribbean have the book, The Creative City by Charles orange economy? The IDB defined it in 2013 succeeded in making the region’s culture Landry and Franco Bianchini, creativity as “the set of activities that in an interlock- known in many corners of the planet. is a state of mind that allows “thinking a ing way allow for ideas to be transformed Artistic, gastronomic, musical and liter- problem afresh and from first principles; into cultural goods and services.” 2 It is that ary creativity have crossed borders and experimentation; originality; the capacity sector of the economy that has “talent and delighted people across the globe. And to rewrite rules; to be unconventional; creativity as leading inputs.” The orange beyond the undeniable strength of these to discover common threads amid the economy benefits us since it contributes to types of creativity, scientific and economic seemingly disparate; to look at situations producing wealth and value, generating jobs creativity are also apparent through differ- laterally and with flexibility. These ways of and creating a social impact. ent inventions. Bypass surgery, contra- thinking encourage innovation and gener- ceptives and the first prototype for color We often associate the future of the world ate new possibilities.” 1 televisions are all Latin American innova- with the development of cutting-edge tools tions that, in the 20th century, transformed The challenges that creativity strives to and technological processes, such as artifi- millions of lives.