The Gaia Innovation City is already underway, a new technology center that a group of Brazilian investors wants to create in the city, and which will involve an investment of between 700 and 1,000 million euros over the next 5 years.
According to Negócios, Gaia Innovation City closed the purchase of 21 hectares of land currently occupied by the Madalena Camping Park, for 8 million euros, from the Gaia Douro fund, and wants to create this new “tech hub” of innovation, which will link technology and education, and could represent the creation of 15,000 direct jobs. The campsite will, however, only be reduced.
The municipality analyzed the project and approved the deal on January 24. Eduardo Vítor Rodrigues, Mayor of Gaia, says that this is «the biggest investment project for a technological campus in the North of the country, which will add higher education to a technological park, with a view to the large-scale integration of the technology research, education and economic entrepreneurship, in an environmentally sustainable framework».
Owned by three Brazilian investors, Gestão de Capital & Management – GCMP, Gaia Innovation City will develop this project in several phases. The first will cover a total construction area of 166,000 square meters, which can reach 250,000, 35% for offices, 20% for student residences, 14% for education facilities and research and health centers, 13% for housing. for professors and executives, 11% to a hotel and congress center and 7% to commercial units.
The Gaia Innovation City will «integrate a whole set of services and infrastructures that enhance the incubation of talent, with an estimated learning and entrepreneurship curve of ten years, which will allow training and catapulting those who will be the future managers of the largest companies in the world», quotes TimeOut. Amazon, Facebook, Tesla, Apple or IBM and Google are some of the “potential candidate companies” to set up shop in Gaia.