The first Caribbean Diamond Leaders Seminar took place in the last week of February. The event was held at the Ecobox, Fundación Metrópoli’s headquarter in Madrid and was attended by Mayors and Governors from several Departments within the Diamond, Europe-based Colombian Ambassadors and high profile national government officials.

One objective of the seminar was to potentially incorporate the experiences of leading Spanish public and private entities within the project as strategic partners. Entities such as COFIDES, Fundación ONCE, Ilunion, Fundación Real Madrid, Microsoft, Bismart, Puerto de Valencia, Segittur y Renfe, among others, shared their experiences with Colombian leaders. In addition, the successful experiences of Fundación Metrópoli and Next Cities Lab (Fundación Metrópoli + Microsoft) in defining an a intelligent territories framework for Spain and other countries were also presented during the event.

The experiences and concepts shared during the seminar were also aimed at advancing the construction of a consensual vision for the future of the Caribbean and the Santander Department. Strategic scenarios for each of the Department within the Diamond project were also discussed, and channels were developed to identify funding mechanisms and potential investors from Europe for the development of projects.