I and Miikka had a chat yesterday with Tatu Laurila, CEO of Greater Helsinki Promotions about a venture they are organising for Finnish startups and prospects to Israel. Greater Helsinki Promotions is co-organising the event with Technopolis ventures.

Ten of the finest Finnish companies eligible for this venture will be sent to Israel to the IVA Hi-Tech Conference 2008. The event is held in Tel Aviv 19.-20.5.2008. The Israeli Venture Capital Association (IVA) has offered the Finnish organizers an opportunity to bring 5-10 promising start-ups plus an accompanying delegation to Tel Aviv for IVA’s annual conference, which attracts about 1,500 global players from the high tech industry, including VC and Corporate investors. Large number of global VC’s will attend the conference. The estimated cost for the whole program is a maximum of 5000 € at the maximum, a more exact budget will be available in the next couple weeks.

Deadline for enrollment is 2.4.2008. If you’re interested, contact Will Cardwell of Technopolis Ventures for more information on how to apply.

For those who are unaware with the startup and entrepreneurship environment in Israel, it is a lot more effective than it is in Finland. The countries themselves are similar in size and population. With a focus on entrepreneurship and a 15-year strong track record, Israel has managed to enlist over 100 companies to Nasdaq and there seems to be more in the pipeline. There’s definitely a lot there to learn. Arctic Startup will try to cover the process, preparaion up to the event and the event itself as thoroughly as possible. Stay tuned!

Eniram received a major investment from Conor Venture Partners earlier this month. The exact amount was not disclosed, but it’s believed to be around €1 million (major by Finnish standards). The purpose of the investment is to strengthen Eniram’s marketing and sales operations in order to expand globally.

Eniram was founded in 2005 as a spin-off from US-based engineering consultant Edec, which remains a partner to Eniram. Eniram focuses on the maritime industry, providing system integration solutions allowing its customers to save costs and lower emissions through lower fuel consumption. The team reportedly has a great deal of knowledge of the industry and software development. The rumor also has it that Pekka Roine from Conor joined Eniram’s board, bringing the company extensive experience of running technology and software business.

Press release.

First Line Angel Group FLAG.fi, a Finnish business angel community with a global reach, is launching on 25-26th of February 2008 at EU EASY Event in Milano, Italy. FLAG.fi is stated to be the the first and only global portal dedicated to investors, entrepreneurs, and business angels.

The founder Peter Bougdanos, a well-acclaimed business angel, hopes FLAG will be “a solution to the startup situation in Finland and all over Europe”. The problem statement manifests that many entrepreneurs and opportunities go unnoticed and/or unfunded in Finland - and also in Europe in general - because of a lack of a true angel community, consensus, support, and meaningful interaction among professionals in the field. This is something that was also identified recently in Growth Forum 08 as reported by Tomi. In addition many investors get caught up in long exit cycles, ending up tying up their valuable resources of time, money, and expertise.

The vision of FLAG is to become the first true Angel Group in Finland which mirrors the activities of angel groups in the USA. It’s mission is to make Finland, Finnish companies, Finnish business angels, and the Finnish venture capital industry a healthy, competitive, and interactive community. FLAG targets to create a currently missing dynamic forum with both a professional and social function for business angels to meet and discuss angel investments. Peter Bougdanos aims to promote Finnish startups and help them “get the commercialization and business concept traction that many fail to do”. Recent members of FLAG include online business traveller tool Dopplr and free news service forum ampparit.com.

The service will be Finland centric, but it’s claimed that already over 3000 pan-European interested members have been identified, and the majority of them have expressed keen interest to enroll. FLAG also looks to integrate Middle Eastern and Asian flare of active members. It is planned to be the melting pot for existing angel associations, stand-alone organizations, network clusters, and independent actors on local, regional, and international levels, operating both online and offline.

FLAG will offer a whole community universe for connecting investors, with a wide spectrum of tools and services, including facilitating selling of companies angel-to-angel, and providing company information and management bios. FLAG also believes in giving back to the community and 25 percent of profits will go to funding stipends for young students, lower income families’ teens, and budding entrepreneurs to gain international experience, overseas exposure and professional and academics skills.

Greek American Bougdanos has helped to foster nearly 50 startups in Finland, since moving from NYC after surviving 9/11/2001. His background includes investments in companies like Google, Skype, and Finnish Helmi Technologies, Nordic Koivu, FogScreen, Concilio Networks, and Trackway, among many others. Peter is also a founding partner of FirstRound Startup Center, which has a unique smart money approach to incubating fast track early stage companies.

It is great to see something of this scale being initiated in Finland, and hopefully FLAG will be able to give rise to new business angels activity and many new fast growing firms. If you’re interested in joining FLAG, be sure to check the web page. We can also put you in touch with Mr. Bougdanos, just drop a note at info [at] arcticstartup.com.

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Edit: I have heard there are some two-fold opinions on how Mr. Bougdanos works, so it’s advisable that you first discuss with people who have worked with him before jumping right in, to make sure there is a good match (as would be good with any new relationship in general).

Nexit Ventures, a venture capital firm stating to offer Nordic mobile companies a bridge to Silicon Valley markets, has announced an investment in Axel Technologies, a Finnish developer of mobile TV technologies. Other investor in the funding round led by Nexit is the company’s existing investor, a government-owned investment company Finnish Industry Investment Ltd. According to ITviikko the round was worth over one million euros.

Axel Technologies will use the financing to growth and internationalization, focus being on developing sales, marketing, and customer support.

The company provides mobile TV middleware and client solutions, and is targeting to get on the wave of first commercial digital mobile DVB-H standard TV services expected to be launched in Europe during 2008. So far there have been only 3G-based services available.

According to Pekka Salonoja, General Partner, Nexit Ventures, Axel Technologies is already one of top five developers of mobile TV middleware globally, customers including AMD and Thomson. Potential clients for the firm are mobile phone manufacturers, semiconductor suppliers, and mobile operators.

Nexit Ventures’ press release.

Teemu Selänne, the NHL hockey player, has cashed in on the MySQL deal, where Sun Microsystems acquired MySQL for a billion dollars.

Teemu had invested about 330 000 euros seven years ago into Holtron Capital Fund I, which is managed by Inventure Oy, according to the Finnish Venture Capital Association. The exit value for Teemu’s initial investment was worth just over 1 million euros, according to Ilta-Sanomat.

Congrats to Teemu!