In this post we explain our history with its milestones, its bumps and the lessons we have learned at each stage.
As we have already told you on other occasions, our goal is to empower startups and entrepreneurs. That is what we dedicate all our efforts to. Today, however, we want to tell you how we have made what started as a small coworking startup, Aticco Workspaces, to celebrate its fifth anniversary!
In 2016 three entrepreneurs in love with the flexible work model and its communities decided to open a coworking space in Barcelona. The three co-founders Gabriel Espín, Franz Pallarés y Juan Carlos Moralesfound a penthouse - which gave the group its name - in a former court building in Ronda Sant Pere. They were looking for an open, bright, large environment with a terrace in order to differentiate themselves from the competition by offering coworkers open-plan spaces in which to hold events, networkings and, of course, parties.
After a first round of investment in which many friends, family and stakeholders participated, they opened the center that has been the beginning of this great adventure: Aticco Urquinaona.
Immediately a strong growth phase began as the demand kept increasing and so it became clear to the co-founders that Aticco Workspaces was not going to be just a coworking space but a coworking company, in plural.
More than coworking
Four years later, in 2020, they had five buildings in Barcelona (Aticco Urquinaona, Aticco MED, Aticco Hospitalet, Aticco Verdaguer y Aticco Bogatell) and were about to open their first center in Madrid.
"In Madrid we visited many buildings until we found one that was centrally located, bright and with a terrace. This one was at ground zero for coworking because we were surrounded by competition," explains Franz Pallarés, COO of Aticco Workspaces. Even so, they were confident that even though there were other operators nearby, they had something more to offer, and they were right. Today Aticco María de Molina in Madrid is operating at full capacity, and Aticco Workspaces' plans for the near future include the opening of a second center in the capital.
But, wait a minute, we said this happened in 2020... there is something else that happened in 2020 that put us all on the ropes. The same week that the Madrid facility was confirmed, home confinement began in Spain because of Covid-19. As Juan Carlos Morales, CFO of Aticco Ecosystem, explains, it was a very difficult time in which we learned many things: resilience, perseverance, perseverance, and the need for resilience, perseverance or even new technological skills.
Directing a work by zoom
Can you imagine what it was like to get the center of Madrid up and running in the middle of a pandemic? It seems unimaginable to us now too, but we did it! Our architecture team managed to steer the remodeling work through zoom.
In record time, given the circumstances, Aticco Workspaces opened its first center in Madrid, with a total of 2,262m2at 39 María de Molina Street, in June 2020.
Aticco Ecosystem, the ecosystem of support for innovation
During this moment of impasse, a new Business Plan was developed in which the Aticco team filled up to 1111 lines of Excel with disruptive ideas. This resulted in proposals to expand the group and incorporate new solutions for companies and startups.
Thus, AticcoLab was launched, a platform to support entrepreneurship and open innovation that has already completed its first year and has accelerated 16 startups through its acceleration program; it supports organizations such as Cellnex Telecom or DAS Legal in the design of their own accelerators; and has more than 150 mentors.
As Gabriel Espín, CEO of Aticco Ecosystem and Aticco Workspaces explains, the goal of supporting startups had been present since the company's inception in 2016, in fact the first logo included the tagline "startup incubator" and now this has materialized with AticcoLab.
This initiative has been joined in the last year by Aticco Living, a flexible shared housing solution that adapts to the lifestyle and needs of new generations of professionals.
This is how Aticco Workspaces has evolved from a coworking, at first, to a coworking company, secondly, and finally giving way to an entire innovation ecosystem, Aticco Ecosystema larger project that includes Aticco Workspaces, AticcoLab and Aticco Living under its umbrella.