Produced by Mobile World Capital (MWCapital) with support from the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), the study outlines an emerging and growing ecosystem that reflects the expansion of the technology transfer model in Spain, enabling research from classrooms and laboratories to reach the market through the creation of companies. The 2025 census identifies 1,007 active companies, a 3.6% increase from the previous year, with an estimated annual turnover of €1.4 billion and more than 13,400 skilled jobs.

The Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya - BarcelonaTech (UPC) is ranked as the third institution in Spain for spin-off creation and the first in Catalonia, accounting for 5.3% of the total, just behind the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (8.7%) and the CSIC (8.5%). Deep tech initiatives mainly focus on three sectors: biotechnology (19.8%), information and communication technologies (17.4%) and healthcare (16.7%), which together represent more than half of all deep tech companies in Spain.

Catalonia is also the main regional hub of this ecosystem, concentrating 28.2% of Spanish spin-offs, followed by Madrid (23.7%). This concentration highlights the strength of Catalonia’s university and research system, as well as its capacity to turn knowledge into economic and social impact.

Public universities play a key role

The report also shows that more than two-thirds of all spin-offs emerged from Spanish universities (67%), with public universities serving as the main incubators (64.1%). They are followed by research centres (18%), technology centres (7%) and health research institutes (8%). 

Regarding funding sources, the MWCapital report notes that more than half of the spin-offs analysed rely on a mix of public and private funding (61%), while almost one in three depend exclusively on public financing (26%) and 13% on private funds alone.

Further information

• Spain’s deep tech spin-off ecosystem grows by 3.6 %