Tec Guadalajara, UN Women launch preaccelerator for women's care-economy startups
What's the deal? Tec Guadalajara and UN Women have launched the Preaceleradora de Cuidados, a program for women-led ventures building solutions in the care economy. It aims to turn impact-driven ideas into sustainable or scalable businesses.
Who's it for? The program targets early-stage and consolidating ventures that already have a product, service, or pilot. Focus areas include childcare, digital care platforms, elder and disability care, technologies that reduce domestic work, and tools for domestic workers.
How it works: Across eight national sites — Guadalajara among them — each cohort will take 25 ventures, with Jalisco aiming for at least 25 local entrepreneurs. Participants complete 30 hours of hybrid training over five modules covering leadership, the care economy, business models, financial management, and growth.
Two modules run virtually at the national level, followed by three in-person sessions in Guadalajara to build community, delivered with the Instituto de Emprendimiento Eugenio Garza Lagüera and local partners. Applications close November 7, 2026.
What's the endgame? Organisers want to build a national community of more than 100 women running care-economy ventures. "Women who apply to the call will have the chance to be part of a large national community of women entrepreneurs in care," said Joshua Hammerschlag, social entrepreneurship lead at Tec's incubator and accelerator (translated from Spanish).
Why now? The program extends an earlier Tec–UN Women effort: Mexico's first nationwide care-entrepreneurship accelerator, backed by Visa FoundationDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, recently graduated 11 women-led ventures and connected them with potential investors and partners. The new preaccelerator sits earlier in that pipeline.
The signal: Unpaid care work was valued at 23.9% of Mexico's GDP in 2024, with women accounting for more than 70% of that value, even as policymakers debate a national care system. By widening local, early-stage support, the initiative aims to turn that structural gap into a market — though the launch alone does not mean its ventures have secured financing or scaled.
Read more: conecta.tec.mx
Image credit: US Embassy Colombo
