Barcelona
ReAct

The Challenge

Where does the economic future of Barcelona lie? What are the main challenges and opportunities that the global economy—and its recovery following the pandemic—present for the city and its economic sectors? How can a real and cross-cutting debate be stimulated in the city to progress? These were the premises that led the Barcelona City Council to hold, starting in 2021, the Economic Reactivation Days ReAct.

Our Approach

In 2022 and 2023, we partnered with the Ajuntament de Barcelona in curating sessions, topics, speakers, and content for the annual Barcelona ReAct conferences, aimed at highlighting the city’s economic future vision and generating public debate around it with the main stakeholders involved: citizens, business world, public administrations, investors, and research centers.

Additionally, our support included coordinating the production and technical secretariat of the event to ensure its optimal functioning. To provide content for the three-day conferences, we assisted the Barcelona City Council in defining the most relevant themes, in line with the city’s priorities and the local, national, and international context.

Aspects such as talent attraction and retention, international projection, the pivotal role of major events, the Blue Economy, Creative Industries, or Barcelona’s technological and digital leadership were some of the highlighted focuses of the conferences. In parallel, we curated suitable speakers and experts for each session, ensuring that the compositions of each reflected a balanced representation among all actors called to play a role in the city’s future.

The Impact

Under the motto “People. Planet. Progress”, the conferences brought together approximately 80 local and international speakers at the Disseny Hub of the city in each edition, featuring around twenty sessions to discuss Barcelona’s economic outlook, its global positioning, and the trends and projects—both local and international—that will shape its future.

Thus, global experts and references in the mentioned topics such as Bruce Katz, Emily Penn, Martí Romances, or Greg Clark, as well as representatives from the city, the Generalitat de Catalunya, the Government of Spain, and the European Union, leaders from the business sector, and the main research centers of Barcelona completed the panels. With over 1,500 attendees each year, the event was a success.