Startup Poland is a grassroots organization created by Polish startup founders with the goal to help build better conditions for Polish startups by influencing policy-makers, educators, academics and media. What are the founders and investors willing to achieve? - Easy Procedures for Investors As it’s been so far, many founders have needed to relocate company outside Poland in order to get investments as a result of complicated local regulations. As the number of successful startups has been growing, and the investment sector is still developing, the organization has decided to push for improved, easier and more modern regulations that will make the market more attractive for foreign investors. - Access to talent outside of the EU Even though Poland is one of very few countries in a favorable position of having a relatively minor lack of IT professionals, looking ahead to and aware of the economic growth and quickly growing ICT sector, the co-founders decided to lobby for liberalised regulations for hiring skilled labour from outside the EU. This is supposed to additionally help creating international teams and foster global thinking among Polish startups. - Pro-Entrepreneurship Education Together with actions leading to more people entering science-oriented fields, the co-founders opt for a more effective entrepreneurship education in order to change role models and switch people’s thinking from “how to be a good worker” to “how to be a good employer”. - CTO for Poland’s major cities Poland has a few startup centers apart from its capital city, including Cracow, Poznan and Gdansk. In order to ensure that requirements of startups are met by municipalities, the co-founders decided to work together with local presidents on establishing the position of CTO in major cities, a person whose role would be to bridge the demands of startups with plans of local government as well as supporting e-government solutions.
