Cuatrecasas Acelera Begins 10th Year of Start-up Program

Cuatrecasas Acelera, the firm's innovation program for promoting entrepreneurial projects seeking to validate their legal and business strategies, recently had closed its registration period. Under the umbrella of Cuatrecasas Innova, the initiative shows the firm’s commitment to driving the sector’s technological transformation and providing a response to the continuing needs of the international entrepreneurial ecosystem.

For four months, Cuatrecasas Acelera will offer support to six startups in the validation process of their legal strategies, covering all areas of law they may need to drive the growth of their respective business models. The advice will be tailormade to the features and needs of each project. Startups interested in participating must, in addition to belonging to the areas of new technologies, fintech, healthtech, insurtech and energy, face significant legal challenges arising from their own business model or from the application of disruptive technologies in regulated sectors. They must also be in the first phases of their development, as well as having a functional minimum viable product, a solid work team, and an innovative and market-oriented solution.

After the application deadline, a selection committee made up of Cuatrecasas partners, lawyers and external collaborators will review all the proposals and inform the startups that have been shortlisted. In September, the pre-selected projects will make their pitch to the committee and, after evaluation, the committee will choose the six startups that will have the opportunity to participate in the 10th edition of this accelerator program. In October and November, bootcamps will take place where the selected startups will receive legal and business training from their mentors—professionals with recognized expertise in the different areas and sectors of the entrepreneurial ecosystem—and will carry out investment simulations. After months of intense work and progress, in February 2026 in Barcelona, they will participate in a closing event that investors, clients and agents of the entrepreneurial ecosystem will attend.

All startups considering submitting their proposals can register for the legal seminars, face-to-face law workshops focused on (i) identifying the startups’ regulatory needs, (ii) optimizing an exchange of value between the different initiatives and actors in the ecosystem, and (iii) contributing value to the innovation stakeholders in areas as important as intellectual property and commercial law. The legal seminars will take place on June 2 in Lisbon, June 3 in Madrid and June 12 in Barcelona.

Cuatrecasas Fast Track, a program also promoted by Cuatrecasas Innova, maintains its open-call format permanently throughout the year. Its objective is to identify, co-create and drive the development and implementation of solutions to the challenges the firm identifies. Legaltech startups with an advanced level of development can apply, as well as technological scaleups with mature technology and a functional prototype that are not yet operating in the legal sector. Applicants that respond to any of the following challenges will be considered: maximizing collective knowledge in Cuatrecasas, fostering productivity and efficiency in the legal sector through automation systems, creating intelligent contracts applicable to business, and developing solutions that enable digitalization of the relationship and improve collaboration with the client.