New national tech plan targets AI, data centers and cybersecurity
Colombia’s technology minister opened ANDICOM 2026 in Cartagena on September 2, 2026, with a proposal to rebuild the country’s national technology policy around applied artificial intelligence, data centers, cybersecurity and exportable digital services, and to measure the results in jobs, income and business productivity rather than only in connections delivered.
Alexandra Falla Zerrate, who heads the Ministerio de Tecnologías de la Información y las Comunicaciones (Ministry of Information and Communications Technologies, MinTIC), presented the framework for the Plan TIC Colombia 2026–2030 (Colombia ICT Plan 2026–2030), subtitled Colombia: el milagro tecnológico (Colombia: the technological miracle). The stated ambition, according to the ministry, is for Colombia to become the technology hub of the Americas and to create, adapt and export technology rather than only consume it.
The ministry named the areas in which it intends to build capacity: applied artificial intelligence, AI agents, GovTech, FinTech, HealthTech, AgroTech, cybersecurity, analytics, data infrastructure, digital public infrastructure, computing and exportable digital services. Its list of tasks for the first 100 days includes a national strategy for computing and data centers, a national roadmap for applied AI, a national cybersecurity architecture, a review of spectrum use and assignment policy, a new connectivity policy, a national digital talent mission, and the identification of the 20 government procedures whose digitalization would have the greatest impact.
“Colombia has the position, it has the cables, it has the talent, it has the energy, and now it has the direction,” Falla said, according to the ministry. “Together, we are going to build the Technological Miracle 2026–2030.”
The setting
ANDICOM is organized by CINTEL, Colombia’s Center for Research and Development in Information and Communications Technologies, founded in 1991, which has organized the congress in Cartagena since 1995. The 41st edition takes place from September 1 to September 4 under the theme “Unleashing the Power of AI,” with the European Union as guest of honor. Hernán Díaz, the congress’s academic coordinator, told El Universal that the program covers artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and digital trust, connectivity and infrastructure, and public policy and regulation, and the newspaper reported that the organizers expect more than 6,000 attendees, 180 speakers and participants from 40 countries. According to CINTEL, the 2025 edition drew 6,200 attendees from more than 35 countries, and 61% of the congress audience holds senior management roles. Cognitive Business News reported earlier this year on the European Union’s participation.
Falla addressed the congress by video link from a television studio in Bogotá, according to Infobae, which reported that she apologized for not attending in person because she is touring the regions affected by the earthquake that struck Colombia on August 10, 2026. Falla took office in August 2026 with the new government of President Abelardo de la Espriella.
An open call, with a deadline
Rather than present a finished plan, the minister put seven questions to the audience, which Infobae reported included operators, infrastructure providers, academia, entrepreneurs, trade associations, multilateral banks, international cooperation agencies and companies including Google, a unit of Alphabet (Nasdaq: GOOGL), and Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT). The questions ask what the main problem the government must solve is, what its most important decision is, what it should stop doing, what it should start doing, what the country’s big technology bet for 2030 should be, what result should be measured, and what each organization is prepared to contribute. Answers are collected through a form on a MinTIC microsite that the ministry says will remain open only during ANDICOM, after which a sector-wide consultation phase will follow.
“This invitation is not an invitation to offer opinions from the stands,” Falla said, according to Infobae. “It is to make a commitment on the field.”
The ministry describes the process as a sequence of listening, diagnosing, prioritizing, designing, validating, executing and measuring, and says it will involve national government, regulators, regional and municipal governments, operators, companies, startups, universities, research centers and civil society. Falla said MinTIC works with the National Planning Department and the ministries of science, education, labor and finance, and on regulatory matters with the Communications Regulation Commission, the National Spectrum Agency and the Superintendency of Industry and Commerce, Infobae reported.
Changing what gets measured
The ministry’s argument for the new plan is that previous technology plans measured what the government delivered rather than what changed. For years, the ministry says, progress was measured in coverage, connections, speed, devices delivered and people trained. The new plan proposes to track outcomes: reductions in digital poverty, technology adoption, employability, income, business productivity and the productive use of AI. Falla cited the ministry’s own record of training 22,000 people in artificial intelligence and said the relevant question is now what that training produced in productive development, employability and living conditions. “We cannot keep counting how many diplomas we hand out,” she said, according to Infobae.
The baseline she presented, as reported by Infobae, is the starting point for those metrics. Internet use rose from 58% to 87% of Colombians between 2020 and 2025, but only 35.7% of households own a computer, 10 of 32 departments are below 50% connectivity, and 45% of people without internet say they cannot afford it. On AI specifically, 24% of Colombians use AI tools, 98% of Colombian startups have incorporated AI into their business models, and the country ranks fourth among the 19 countries covered by the 2025 Latin American Artificial Intelligence Index, produced by the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) and Chile’s National Center for Artificial Intelligence (CENIA). “If we do not close this gap today, AI will not be a leveler of opportunities but an amplifier of inequalities,” Falla said.
Five missions
The plan groups its work into five national missions: connecting Colombia with universal, relevant, high-quality connectivity; preparing Colombia through talent, education, STEM and AI; making Colombia produce through AI, data, business digitalization and the digital economy; transforming the state through interoperability, GovTech, data and public-sector AI; and protecting Colombia through cybersecurity, digital sovereignty and digital trust. Among the 100-day tasks, the ministry also intends to reorganize the Fondo Único de Tecnologías de la Información y las Comunicaciones (Single Fund for Information and Communications Technologies, FUTIC), which finances universal access programs and public television, to build a portfolio of ICT projects with high regional impact, and to propose a permanent coordination mechanism linking government, industry, academia and the regions.
The targets for 2030 are connectivity as an effective right, technology training that leads to jobs and income, companies using AI to raise productivity, a state operating as a digital platform, regions participating in the digital economy, protected critical infrastructure, and Colombian technology able to compete internationally. Falla framed the division of labor as a new Colombian digital compact: the government leads and enables, companies invest and transform, universities research and train, regions adapt and adopt, and citizens use, participate and demand results.
“Colombia’s technological future cannot be designed from a single office,” Falla said. “We have to listen to one another, understand the needs of the regions, and work together with those who are part of the country’s technological and productive ecosystem.”
Headline photo: Minister Alexandra Falla Zerrate appears by video link at the opening of ANDICOM 2026 in Cartagena. (Photo courtesy MinTIC)
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