What resonated with me.
Professionally
The Work & Study model is amazing. It just makes sense. I remember working at 15, and later studying Business Intelligence from a former CIA professor in MBA school and applying those skills directly to a consultancy project in Amman, Jordan. Those tips and real-world frameworks were incredibly helpful — not because they were theoretical, but because I was using them immediately. That's what your model does at scale, and it's the thing that makes the education actually stick. And the fact that you're actively going out and finding the top 2-3% of talent instead of waiting for applications from kids who already have access — that flips everything. Most institutions filter for privilege and call it merit. You're filtering for potential and funding the gap. The ICPC results tell me the bet is working.
Intellectually
The manifesto's premise that self-discovery and mindfulness are prerequisites for professional success, not afterthoughts, is the part I kept coming back to. Most institutions treat human development as a soft elective. You've made it the entry point. That distinction matters.
Your signature course, Limitless Human Becoming, asks students to build a "life business case" before building a product. The framework, combining ancient philosophical concepts with neuroscience and emotional intelligence, suggests you understand something that most tech education misses: that the person building the thing matters as much as the thing being built.
Personally
Honestly? When I read that every student starts with self-discovery and mindfulness before anything technical, something clicked. I looked up Limitless Human Becoming and my first reaction was — I want to take this course. Building a "life business case" before building a product, combining neuroscience with philosophy and emotional intelligence — that kind of integration doesn't usually live inside a tech university. It lives in a self-help, spiritual retreat where nobody builds anything afterward. The fact that it's here, at the foundation, tells me the people behind this actually believe what they're building. That's what made me want to dig deeper.
What I dug into on my own.
The articles and manifesto gave me the thesis. I wanted to understand the trajectory, so I spent time looking at what's happened since and what's coming next.
The Competitive Programming Arc
The trajectory here is unusual. From a Barcelona startup in 2015 to representing Spain internationally in AI by 2026. That's not incremental growth. That's the rough diamond thesis working on the institution itself.
I'll be honest, I noticed the shift from "University" to "Institute of Technology" and the partnership with University of Vic, and I'm still wrapping my head around what that means practically. For an innovative school like this, what does accreditation actually look like for employers? For students who take this degree to a traditional job market? I think this is one of those things I'd love to understand better — not because it's a weakness, but because it's probably the most complex puzzle you're solving and I'm curious how you're thinking about it.
I really like the faculty model. Kamran building 4 unicorns and then teaching students how to do it. Hannes running Allianz in Russia and then coaching people through their own self-discovery. Errichto at Legendary Grandmaster level coaching the ICPC teams. These people aren't teaching about success — they're modeling it. And they're modeling something bigger than just output. They're showing that success is more than the things you produce. It's how you think, how you lead, how you know yourself. That comes through in who you choose to put in front of students.
The AI tiers document shows a thoughtful approach, from free Gemini CLI to full Claude Teams at institutional scale. Most universities are still debating whether students should use AI at all. You're already structuring how they use it at different price points and complexity levels. The framing matters: not "should students use AI?" but "how do we give them the right tools for the right stage of learning?"
What I see through my lens.
So here's what stood out to me as I went through everything — not as an analysis but just honestly how my brain connected the dots.
The thing that keeps pulling me back is the rough diamond concept — that you're giving access to people who have the talent but would never have been able to afford this kind of education otherwise. And it's not charity. It's a bet that pays off. The ICPC results, the career placement numbers, the international reach — that's what happens when you filter for potential instead of pedigree. The international focus makes it even more interesting. Students who know WHY they're building something build differently than students who only know HOW. And when those students come from everywhere — different cultures, different struggles, different ways of seeing — the things they build are different too.
What I see is an institution that's figuring things out in real time — different environments, different regulations, different cultures. Barcelona, Bangkok, and wherever comes next. Each one has its own rules and its own version of "this is how we do things here." The fact that you're navigating that — adapting the model without losing the core — is genuinely hard. Most institutions either stay rigid and fail in new markets, or water themselves down to fit in. You seem to be doing neither, and I find that really interesting to watch. It's an experiment, and I mean that as a compliment.
The 7 Catalonia priorities make sense to me — AI-native curricula, Olympiad dominance, English-taught access, employer placements, fundraising. Those are solid. But the one I keep coming back to is the community and ecosystem.
100 unicorns don't come from curriculum. They come from a network that's been deliberately built — alumni connected to each other, to startup incubators, to investors, to the faculty network. Students with a great business idea need more than a degree. They need someone who says "you should talk to this person in Amsterdam" or "let me introduce you to this incubator" or "here's how you take this idea to the next level." That connective tissue between the classroom and the startup world — that's what turns a graduating class into an ecosystem.
I've seen startup communities and incubators work best when someone is actively connecting the dots across cities and industries. Not managing from the top down, but creating the conditions where the right people bump into each other at the right moment. That's a specific kind of work, and it's different from the academic or technical side of the house.
You're exceptional at finding rough diamonds. But the part I keep thinking about is what happens after they arrive. A student from rural Kazakhstan or coastal Cambodia landing in Barcelona — the academic transition is one thing. The identity transition is another. Moving from a context where your talent made you unusual to one where everyone is unusual — that's disorienting in ways a scholarship doesn't solve. I'm curious whether there's infrastructure for that inner recalibration throughout the journey, not just at the beginning with Limitless Human Becoming.
Questions I'm sitting with.
These are genuine curiosities, not critiques. The materials tell a strong story. What I find interesting is what's implied but not stated.
- Beyond Barcelona and Bangkok. I noticed signals suggesting expansion into other markets. If that's on the horizon — especially North America — the challenges are specific and different from the UTCC model. US higher education accreditation, translating Work & Study for American corporate culture, the international student visa landscape. I'm curious where that stands and what the biggest unknowns are.
- The 7 priorities — what's covered, what's not. The Catalonia priorities are clear: AI-native curricula, Olympiad dominance, English-taught access, employer placements, fundraising, alumni ecosystem, culture of creation. That's an ambitious list for any institution. Of these, which ones already have the talent and operational capacity to execute right now? And which ones are still looking for the right people and resources? The distance between a priority list and execution is where I'd love to hear your honest read.
- Community as infrastructure, not afterthought. Priority 6 — the alumni and ecosystem community — is the one I keep coming back to. The 100 unicorns in the 2036 vision don't come from curriculum. They come from a network that's been deliberately woven. Is someone actively building that connective tissue right now, or is it still in the vision stage?
- Limitless Human Becoming at 10,000 students. The self-discovery foundation works beautifully at current scale. But the 2036 vision is 10,000 students across multiple campuses. How does the human development layer scale without losing its depth? Can you train facilitators, or does it require practitioners like Hannes who bring their own lived experience into the room?