We are innovation experts, and our mission is to help people become successful entrepreneurs. Our goal is to foster entrepreneurship and innovation, increase knowledge sharing and strengthen the bond between entrepreneurs from different backgrounds, through ideation and acceleration programs.
KPI’S
+60 programs
+700 startups
+4000 entrepreneurs
“In my point of view there are two different kinds of entrepreneurs: those who undertake out of necessity, because they need it to survive and others who were born with this gift and who have always dreamed of it throughout their lives. However, both types are necessary for the development of entrepreneurship in the world.”– António Lucena de Faria
António Lucena de Faria is the founding partner and president of Fabstart, a company created in April 2012. He led the creation and development of more than 10 companies, having begun his career as an entrepreneur with the launch of Methodus Sistemas in 1987. Currently, António leads a team with diverse backgrounds and experience that holds vast knowledge in the areas of entrepreneurship and innovation.
OUR INNOVATION DNA
Innovation is part of our DNA for the past nine years. We bring together the entrepreneurial startup culture with the corporate need for growth and competitiveness. We help large and medium organizations draw on their innovation potential, by supporting them through the process of finding, validating, and bringing to market profitable new business ideas. Over the last seven years, our step-by-step methodology has proven to increase the probability of a new business being successful in the market by as much as 50%.
OUR LEAD PROGRAMS
Since 2017 Tourism Explorers is the biggest ideation and acceleration program in Portugal. More than 1000 people, in 12 cities, working simultaneously on innovative ideas for the tourism sector. This program, whose main partner is Turismo de Portugal, helps entrepreneurs from the ideation stage when they have to look for a team or innovative solutions to address tourism challenges up until the acceleration phase in which the purpose is to test and validate their business models.
Discoveries is an intensive 5-week acceleration program that aims to boost entrepreneurship in the tourism sector in Portugal, supporting national and international startups with high potential. Launched in 2015, with the support of Turismo de Portugal, the five editions held to date have allowed the main players in the sector to identify entrepreneurial projects with potential and strong alignment with the main strategic challenges of the industry.
Blue Bio Value, an international entrepreneurship program dedicated to scaling up marine biobased projects to global market applications in different industries, fostering science-based and biotech innovations. This acceleration program brings together teams from all over the world and is promoted by Fundação Oceano Azul and Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian.
OUR METHODOLOGY
Our FastStart methodology guarantees the translation of the idea into a business model. This methodology works as a guide for startups and companies that intend to launch innovative offers in the market, following a well-defined, pragmatic, and capable of guaranteeing the pace and rigor necessary to create, validate, and successfully launch new business ideas.
The supporting materials for this methodology are available in physical and digital format. Based on international methodologies of Design Thinking, Service Design, Lean Startup, and Customer Development, our Startup Box has all the materials needed to quickly support entrepreneurs creating and developing new business ideas, including process diagrams, checklists, videos, and templates, with userfriendly instructions.
OUR FABSTART ACADEMY
We also complement our FastStart methodologies with our academy – FabStart Academy. During the bootcamps, startups are monitored through Fabstart Academy’s exclusive platform. This platform allows participants to develop and monitor their work on the validation path of their business model: they have an overview of their progress in the bootcamps, a message board, some working templates as well as the opportunity to upload their exercises and other contents regarding the final pitch.
OUR AWARDS
Last year, our ideation and acceleration program Tourism Explorers was awarded by the European Enterprise Promotion Awards regarding the category of “Promoting Entrepreneurship Spirit”.
OUR FUTURE
Our goal for the future is to continue helping people to be successful entrepreneurs and thus, contribute to the democratization of entrepreneurship, training of national and international entrepreneurs, impacting and making a difference in society.
