Startup Leiria will add almost 2,000 square metres to the space it already occupies in Leiria’s municipal market, after winning a tender launched by the local council. With the expansion, the incubator will go from 84 to around 120 companies physically hosted.
The incubator’s community already exceeds 200 start-ups and 1,100 jobs, and the ecosystem has raised around 60 million euros in venture capital. Its spaces were more than 95% occupied and, according to director-general Vítor Ferreira, an average of 47 new projects join every year.
Plans include a “Physical AI” lab, meaning robotics and artificial intelligence applied to industry, which will also be open to small and medium-sized firms in the region and to the university. The idea is to add the robots’ “brain” to the moulds, plastics and metalworking industry that already exists in the region.
The lab represents an investment of around 1.7 million euros, with an application to the Centro 2030 programme still under review, and is expected to be up and running in 2027.
