The two friends, Jaime Rodas and Roberto Hidalgo, inseparable since high school, live in an apartment-turned innovation pad on the edge of a leafy neighborhood in Mexico City. They contribute to Mexico’s big tech inventions, like building websites for social causes that include teaching the public how to hold government accountable.

“People don’t even know who represents them,” Jaime tells me as he walks me through the apartment, with rooms turned into workspaces, laboratories for experiments. “They have no clue who their representatives are, or even what they’re supposed to do, like be their voice.”

The new narrative

Jaime and Roberto, ages 27 and 29, represent a new face of Mexico. They work out of their apartment, which they share with Roberto’s elderly miniature Schnauzer, Dharma. They are part of a generation of young, high-tech millennials, a group that is quietly expanding into an important global force of innovators. Already there are some 600,000 high-tech professionals in Mexico, and about 115,000 engineering and tech students graduate each year – a vast talent pool in the making.

In recent years, these new techies with their far flung ideas know no borders. They are slowly shifting Mexico’s economy away from traditional industries like banking and manufacturing. As they do, they are creating a new narrative that runs counter to the old story of narcos gone amok, with corruption seeping into every artery of the government.

They are slowly shifting Mexico's economy away from traditional industries like banking and manufacturing ... creating a new narrative that runs counter to the old story of narcos gone amok.

In their own way, Jaime and Roberto are helping rebrand their country’s tattered image. The pair is part of a post-North American generation living in a region with increased mobility and competition – innovators in a country they say hasn’t fully grasped its own potential, even as the outside world increasingly zeroes in on Mexico.

Microsoft alone plans to invest $1 billion in digital education over the next three years, underscoring why Mexico represents one of the fastest growing hubs in Latin America for high-tech innovators.

“Globalization and technology are allowing Mexican entrepreneurs and companies to innovate like never before,” said Ramir Camu, CEO of Dallas-based Werx Studio, which operates under a hybrid model of in-house software development with a near shore component.

For instance, the company has a development group in Aguascalientes, Mexico that helps the company be competitive and nimble in delivering software solutions to clients. “Tech startups are flourishing in Guadalajara, or the Latin Silicon Valley. Major tech giants like Oracle, Intel and others are creating a demand for trained engineers.”

Indeed, in the summer 2015 Amazon began selling physical goods in Mexico and launched a Spanish-language site for a Mexican audience. Google, Facebook, and Uber have operations in Mexico City, as well. Communications giant ATT plans to invest $3 billion in order to expand into Mexico, a process which is already underway.

Old challenges await

But while the new narrative is fresh, old challenges lie ahead. In 2015’s Global Innovation Index, Mexico was ranked 57 out of 141. Innovation continues to lag in Mexico relative to global standards, though it ranks well among Latin American countries.

Official policy seeks to address these lackluster statistics. Despite government budget cuts, President Enrique Peña Nieto intends to increase investment in science, technology, and innovation to 1 percent of GDP. There have already been increases—from 0.43 percent of GDP in 2012 to 0.56 percent of GDP in 2015.

Women’s participation in the technological sector lags behind. Only about 10 percent of tech workers in Mexico are women. Organizations like Women Who Code, which has a Mexico City office, seek to address this discrepancy.

Moreover, Mexico’s private sector remains heavily dominated by stubborn monopolies and duopolies, with little competition and established broad distribution routes - no match for upstart companies.

“There are definitely many people innovating in many fields in Mexico, and Mexico has always had talented people that want to break molds,” said Carlos Gomez Andonaegui, chairman of the board of Endeavor Mexico. “I think that what is lacking is the aspirational model of the innovator. What I mean by this is that the business community admires scale and sheer size of companies. Admired companies in Mexico are usually monopolies or government concessions (banks, telecoms, and mining companies). There needs to be a shift in that what Mexicans admire in companies is the capacity to disrupt an industry or to develop intellectual property through patent development.”

"There needs to be a shift in that what Mexicans admire in companies is the capacity to disrupt an industry or to develop intellectual property through patent development."

Spreading the spirit of innovation

The potential, nonetheless, is vast, especially if a culture of innovation takes root. To some extent, that already is happening.

Camu is on the board of the Dallas-Fort Worth chapter of the Association of Mexican Entrepreneurs, or AEM, part of a national organization founded in San Antonio with 34 chapters nationwide.

Part of the organization’s mission is to bridge the gap between both countries by partnering with public, educational, and private sectors in an effort "to create business opportunities that promote progress and innovation, by strengthening ties and developing programs that help and guide binational business people and young entrepreneurs to become global leaders for their companies’ growth, development, and success."