Rovio's 2011 Financial Results Are Out
Rovio has today announced their 2011 financial results on their own website. Their 2011, full year, revenue is €75.4 million with earnings before tax €48 million (64% of total revenue). The financial results are definitely strong and in the expected ball park. In the last six months of 2010, Rovio's revenue was around €5 million. Most of the money came in from digital purchases, downloads and add-ons to games. Around 30% fo the income came from sales of merchandise.
In 2011 the total number of game downloads grew to 648 million, while the total number of active monthly users grew to 200 million across all platforms. Rovio launched Angry Birds, Angry Birds Seasons and Angry Birds Rio in 2011 across different mobile platforms and PC operating systems.
Alekstra To Disrupt Everything You Hate About Your Mobile Carrier
A Finnish company is quietly laying the groundwork to disrupt a trillion dollar industry by providing global and local services for only 10% of the cost.
Alekstra CEO Toni Toikka got his start in 1998 as salesman at Elisa, a Finnish telecommunications company, where he discovered no one had any idea what they used or paid for when they purchased mobile services. Toikka recalls that everyone argued over the minute price, but the devil was in the details. What he envisioned was not only a transparent system, but a global system updated for the modern era.
After a stint as a Director at Nokia, Toikka is the founder and CEO of Helsinki-based Alekstra. Looking at the company right now, you'll see a suite of services designed to lower the mobile phone bills of large organizations, with the overall theme of efficiency and the reduction of billing errors. Their services optimize company's rate plans so they aren't buying features they don't need, and they offer features like Ratemizer, an automated phone bill analyzer that lowers costs due to billing mistakes.
Less E-mail And Fewer Meetings With Teamvisio
E-mail and meetings are sucking productivity even from the most dynamic and agile of companies. The founders of Somia Reality, a Finnish startup, know this from experience and looked to innovate in this space to reduce the clutter. The founders of the company are also the founders of IRC-Gallery, a hugely popular online social network that has seen its brightest days for the time time being. Regardless of rising competition from the likes of Facebook and other social networking services, IRC-Gallery continues to generate enough revenue to keep Somia Reality ramen profitable to sustain a team of 9 to develop their new service, Teamvisio, further.
Teamvisio is heavily influenced by the ageless communication service, IRC, that is mostly used by developers and other online afficionados. Teamvisio takes IRC further though. Where as IRC users are limited to text only, Teamvisio adds audio and video to allow more depth to conversations. However, the basic use case of Teamvisio is very similar to that of IRC - both are considered to be the most useful when used in the background.
Groupon Acquihires Ditto
Ditto has just announced that it has been acquired by Groupon. While being registered into the US, Ditto has been founded by Jyri Engeström the co-founder of Jaiku. Jaiku was a Finnish company that was sold to Google in 2007. There is no announcement on the price of the acquisition, but by all factors it looks like an acquihire. In other words, Groupon is acquiring the team behind Ditto. Nevertheless, an exit is always an exit.
According to the blog post, Ditto will be pulling the plug on their applications on April 30th. The Ditto mobile application was available to users on the Nokia and Apple platforms. The service allowed people to tell before hand what they were going to do, as to allow for more spontaneous meet-ups. In addition to this, you were able to leave out the specific place you were going to, which allowed for crowdsourcing of ideas from your friends.
Nearing Bankruptcy, Fruugo Burned Through €40 Million to Generate €100K
Fruugo was one of the most talked about companies in the Finnish startup scene, perhaps due to the fact that the company was able to attract the top executives of the Finnish business world. In the early days, the most well known people on board were Jorma Ollila (the former CEO and Chairman of Nokia), Risto Siilasmaa (Chairman, Founder and former CEO of F-Secure and current Chairman of Nokia) as well as Marko Parkkinen (co-founder of Bob Helsinki and a board member of various Finnish companies), among others. The company has also gained some infamy in Finland due to the millions of euros it burned through in anticipation of their global, multi-retailer online store.
Fruugo has tried to innovate in the space of e-commerce through a multi-retailer site where consumers would be able buy goods from numerous stores on one site and pay in their own, local currency through one check out. The company was started in 2006 by Nils Forsblom, now currently running TenFarms.
Nordic Countries Lead World In Global Information Technology Report
The 11th edition of The Global Information Technology Report 2012: Living in a Hyperconnected World was released by the World Economic Forum with a special focus on the transformational impacts of ICT on the economy and society. The Nordic countries rang in high on the list, withs Sweden ranking first, followed by Singapore and Finland. Denmark came in as fourth on the list, while Norway placed seventh-- one place higher than the United States. The report assessed 142 world economies to assess the impact of ICT on the competitiveness and well-being of the nation.
The Google Effect On Media Business
This week has been a good week for ArcticStartup if you would quantify it over the traditional media metrics - pageviews and visits. Our critical piece on the Finnish government's decisions over a strategy group was read by some 25 000 people in just a couple of days. Yesterday on the other hand, our in-depth post on Denmark's questionable Entrepreneur Tax has also built traction around the world, mostly thanks to Hacker News.
As I was watching real time Google Analytics (which tell you how many people are on your site and how your site's analytics are developing in real time) on Tuesday as the ICT-strategy group story spread to new social circles, I noticed something interesting in the way Google treated us as a site. The realisation was that as more people found our story, Google also began sending more people through search results.
C-Care Helps Companies Better Understand The Lifecycle Of A Product
Editor's note: This post is part of a series of posts sponsored by Microsoft Finland. You can read the other posts over here.
Today we talk to Jari Jukantupa, the managing director of Cieltum, a software company in Finland, on what they are developing and how they leverage Microsoft technology to take their business further. Cieltum has created a cloud based service called C-Care. It's a service that enables clients to manage the complete lifecycle of their products and also reap profits from after sales activities for example. Furthermore C-Care is able to give a complete understanding in the status of your products. The service is aimed for companies who sell technical, complicated, and unique (in the sense that they are custom made) products.
The Best April Fools Joke Is From Finland, A Couple of Days Late
I had to read this article on Tietoviikko (in Finnish) three times to realise that no, it's not an April fool's joke at all. It was published today and is apparently and very unfortunately true. The article is in Finnish, but it's about the government creating a strategy group to form a new strategy for the Finnish ICT-industry for the future. There are three really big problems in this approach. The first is that most of the people in the strategy group are the wrong people for so many reasons (hint: take a look at how their companies are doing). Secondly, just as no business plan is able to survive customer contact, no strategy is able to completely survive market contact. It's all assumptions against market forces. Thirdly, all the truly growing industries that work in the digital space have been left out, no matter how you cut the definition of ICT.
Let's dive in.
Scoopshot Getting International Traction With Impressive Figures
I've covered Scoopshot in the past as well and I've found the idea really intriguing - most possibly for its simplicity. The app helps media companies crowdsource images from their communities through the app. The media companies can either freely purchase images the community has taken or give more detailed tasks for the photographers on specific topics. We've learned of some very impressive numbers on traction the app has achieved.
Digna IT Uses Windows Azure To Get Payments Faster
Editor's note: This post is part of a series of posts sponsored by Microsoft Finland. You can read the other posts over here.
In this article we talk to Jukka Partanen, the CEO of Digna IT Oy, which is a company that specialises in invoice collection services. They help companies manage invoice collection through their service instead of using expensive third party solutions, that can lower the amount of money your company would get. In essence, they're making more money for their clients by giving them more tools for collecting late payments.
Muxlim Debate A Great Reminder - Startups Far From Mainstream
Much of the Finnish startup scene has been debating the aftermaths of an article Helsingin Sanomat (largest Finnish daily) published on Sunday about the CEO and founder of Muxlim Inc, Mohamed El-Fatatry. The title of the article, directly translated, is Mohamed's Bubble. We've covered Muxlim in the past as well. In the article, Helsingin Sanomat journalist Esa Mäkinen, paints quite a dim picture of the entrepreneur and how he received hundreds of thousands of euro in government support and then shut down the site.
Grand Cru Games Announces $2 Million In Seed Funding And Their First Game - Supernauts
Helsinki based Grand Cru Games (previous coverage here) is announcing a $2 million seed financing round from Idinvest Partners. In addition to this, the company is also making public its first game title it is working on - Supernauts. The $2 million in funding comes mostly from Idinvest Partners, who is a France based venture capital firm that has around €3 billion of assets under management. Other investors in the round include Rick Thompson, Anil Hansjee, Henric Suuronen and Nicolas Béraud. We talked to Markus Pasula, the CEO and one of the six co-founders of the firm about the deal and the upcoming game.
Lifeline Ventures Announces €20 Million Fund
Lifeline Ventures, also one of the Vigo accelerators, has announced the launch of a €20 million fund for early stage growth companies. The investors in the fund include Pension Insurance Ilmarinen, FoF Growth, Sitra, Finnvera, Troll Ventures, Juuranto Invest and the founders of Lifeline Ventures. We talked to Petteri Koponen, one of the co-founders of the firm to understand more about the fund.
The fund is called Lifeline Ventures Fund I and it has an investment period of 5 years which is included with the 10 years of the overall age of the fund. The first five years of the fund lifecycle will be used to make new investments and the latter five will be used for follow-up investments.
Meetin.gs Receives Funding From KoppiCatch, Launches In Netherlands
Meetin.gs, the Helsinki-based meeting organization tool, announces today that it has made an acceleration deal and has received early-stage funding from KoppiCatch, an accelerator in the Vigo program. On top of that, Meetin.gs has found what seems to be a perfectly suited partnership with the Netherlands-based Seats2meet.com's network of business centers.
We covered Arctic15 finalist Meetin.gs in depth last fall, and noted its ease of use, low friction for new users, and the removal of unproductive conversations out of your email inbox. The service takes care of the whole meeting lifecycle, from planning a suitable time, collaborating on materials, and including online meeting participants through Skype.
Marko Ahtisaari Confirms Work On Tablet And A New Way To Control Your Phone
We've finally gotten our hands on the Kauppalehti Optio, which has an extensive interview with Marko Ahtisaari, the Executive VP of Design at Nokia. The article talks in detail about Ahtisaari's past, but also discusses his work to a great extent. Earlier today Reuters came out with a story that Nokia is working on a tablet device, but that's just half the story.
Finnish Startups Ring The Bell At NASDAQ
A group of Finnish startups traveling in the US together with Alexander Stubb, Minister for European Affairs and Foreign Trade, rang the famous bell opening the trading session this morning in New York. Stubb is traveling with a group of startups in the US, meeting with members of media, investors and other stake holders while promoting Finland as a rising startup nation. Later in the journey, the delegation will travel to Silicon Valley to visit networking events, universities, internet companies as well as investors to promote the companies coming out from the region. Below we have a few photos of the event from this morning.
Innovation Funding And The Crowd
Editorial note: This is a guest post by Richard von Kaufmann, co-founder of Zipipop and Chairman at Reality Creating Media. He has studied in great detail the different crowdfunding opportunities for some of their clients and we thought that it would be a great chance to understand the industry by sharing his findings with our community.
Government-based innovation funding agencies around the world have a great challenge to continually identify the innovative concepts and teams with the best chances of success. In recent times there has been growing criticism of the effectiveness of some Finnish funding mechanisms, but similar issues affect public funding agencies around the world.
It is now generally accepted that diversity in team compositions leads to better decision making, and there is growing evidence that, given the right conditions, other means of increasing the range of opinions also produces better results.
This then begs the question as to the validity of relying on just two or three staff, or at best a small committee, to make decisions on the funding applications that are submitted to national innovation funding agencies.
This article makes the case for opening up the decision-making to involve larger communities, using known crowdsourcing principles and social technologies, to improve the quality of funding decisions. It also introduces the potential benefits that could come from developing a government-backed crowdfunding platform that would make it easier for private individuals to invest in early-stage startups.
Ants Is A Fast And Simple Ridesharing App
The ridesharing options in the Nordic countries are few and far between, and the available options don't leave users with much access when unteathered from a computer. Ants is a mobile-based ridesharing service inspired by Foursquare and Instagram, and is free to use. The service allows users to search and offer rides, give feedback, follow favorite drivers, and instantly share details on Facebook and Twitter. Payment for the ride is independently settled between the riders.
Future Female Connects Women Interested In Digital Opportunities
A network worth mentioning that's playing a large supporting role in getting women interested in digital entrepreneurship is Future Female, Helsinki-based network of likeminded women who are inspired by new ideas and the world of digital opportunities. Future Female is for women, who work, use or are interested in technology.
The organization operates as a platform for women to mentor, share, learn, connect, contribute and enable the next generation of excellence via informal and interactive get-togethers, workshops and seminars. They pride themselves on being a friendly and easily approachable network, balancing business with pleasure. There are no age or title limits, you can come as you are.
Finnish Open Ocean Capital Invests In A $5 Million Round To Commerce Guys
Finnish VC firm Open Ocean Capital has taken part in investing to a French company, Commerce Guys. The size of the round is $5 million in total and other investors that participated include Alven Capital and ISAI, the French entrepreneurs' fund. Commerce Guys are the creators of Drupal Commerce, one of the leading eCommerce solutions working with Drupal. Commerce Guys looks to serve internet merchants by helping them leverage the Drupal platform for their online stores. Open Ocean Capital is famous for supporting companies building value on top of open source projects, for example the likes of Drupal.
Cabforce Announces Seed Investment, Adds Gregg Brockway (Hotwire, Tripit) As Investor
Cabforce continues with the good news about their cab-booking service, after recently launching and integrating into Estonian Air's web booking. The Helsinki-based company announces today that Gregg Brockway, the past co-founder of Hotwire and Tripit has joined in on their seed round. The size of the round, which includes Vera Ventures and KoppiCatch accelerator, with further backing from Tekes, was not revealed, but described as substantial.
"We have just announced that our service will cover the top 40 European cities by the end of 2012, and we are proud to reveal who is backing us in our mission. We chose Gregg as an investor for obvious reasons: he is one of the most respected names in the online travel industry and he’s experience raises the company to a new level", says Tommi Holmgren, Co-founder and CEO of Cabforce.com.
Warrantify Releases Android App To Manage Receipts and Warranties On-The-Go
Lord knows everyone has a shoebox, folder, or some messy way to store receipts and warranties. Helsinki-based Warrantify seeks to take us into the paperless future, and just came out with a nice, clean redesign to their website as well as a free android app that plugs you into the Warrantify service on-the-go. An iPhone app is also in the works. The mobile app is a great extension of the service, which allows you to scan, store, and manage receipts and warranties on products, without being tied to a computer.
iZettle's Nordic Launch Starts Tomorrow, Offers 5000 Devices Per Country
iZettle has announced that they will begin their Nordic launch tomorrow, and will be releasing 5000 devices in Denmark, Norway, and Finland, each, for beta testing. If you haven't seen our previous coverage, iZettle’s iPhone and iPad app lets anyone take credit or debit card payments on the go, with or without iZettle’s chip-card reader.
The company offers a service similar to the US-based competitor, Square, although Square is built for magnetic strip cards and plugs into the headphone jack. The device has already been beta testing in Sweden since November, a month after the company raised €8.2M in venture funding. We've already gotten our hands on the device, and will be releasing a more detailed review later this week.
Rovio Ownership Structure Revealed
The Finnish Arvopaperi magazine has announced the ownership structure of Rovio, the creators of Angry Birds. The information has not come up in any IPO filing, but through public information in the Finnish governmental registry. The biggest chunk of the Rovio is owned by Trema Holdings International BV, the holding company of Kaj Hed. Kaj Hed is Mikael's father and Mikael is Niklas' cousin. It seems that Accel and Atomico, who together invested $42 million into the company last year, own around 20% of the company.
Mobile Acceleration Week Debuts In Finland
Editor's note: This post is part of a series of posts sponsored by Microsoft Finland. You can read the other posts over here.
Last week saw Mobile Acceleration Week (MAW) take place in the Aalto Venture Garage, where a group of mobile developers gathered to create applications for the Windows Phone platform. The series of events under MAW take place in many different parts of the world Moscow, Shanghai, London and Berlin to name a few. In Helsinki, 16 team participated in the program. On Thursday, the teams finalised their work and came on stage to present their results.
The winner of the competition was Entetrainer, which had by far the most impressive app, even in our opinion. We'll outline in the list below all the different apps and what they set out to do. The runner up was Star Arcade, which enables gaming to hundreds of thousands of people.
The Daily Deals Market In Finland
There seems to be at least one daily deal aggregator in each country, and it's interesting to get their take on the local daily deals from their vantage point above the market. According to the daily deals aggregator, Dealfins, the daily deals business in Finland is different from other North European countries. It lacks the niche sites that sell specific deals, and the market is almost completely dominated by Groupon – Citydeal, which holds 89% market share. Dealfins has also noticed that business is also very much concentrated in the Greater Helsinki area.
Sulake's CEO: Our Changes Are Strategy Driven, Games Will Be A Big Part Of Our Future
We've just gotten off the phone with Sulake's CEO Paul LaFontaine about today's announcements. He did not want to comment on the specifics of the announcement, but what we really wanted to understand is what is the future direction Sulake will take. LaFontaine stated that Sulake is modernizing their strategy and this involves changes to how the company currently operates. A big part of the company's future will have to do with games and user generated content.
Sulake is also moving towards a model where their current Habbo community will further evolve into a platform on which third parties will be able to develop additional services on. LaFontaine did not want to comment at this moment on what kind of a time frame we are talking about at the moment. However, he did disclose that they are working with some third parties today already.
Dome.fi: Sulake To Lay Off 25% Of Workforce, Shuts All Country Offices
According to Finnish publication Dome.fi, Sulake the creator of Habbo Hotel, will be laying off some 40-60 people from their workforce. In total, they have about 210 people working for the company so this is effectively 25% of their workforce. We also heard this from a different source, so the chatter is definitely picking up. Sulake.com was down as of just now and there is no official announcement on this so far.
In showing the door to 25% of their workforce, Sulake will also close all of their 11 country offices according to the article on Dome.fi.
Startup Sauna Goes On Tour This Spring As Well
Startup Sauna is going on tour this spring as well with their warmups. Warmups are short events that take usually a day, where local entrepreneurs in the cities they visit get to pitch to the Startup Sauna coaches and organisers for a chance to get accepted into the program. The winner of each warmup will receive €1500 as prize money to cover travel and accommodation for the program in Finland. The six week program is taking place in April and May this spring. Based on the quality of the applications, the program will select 10 to 15 companies to participate. Each company will further develop their product or service during the 6-week intesive and present it at the end of the program at the demo day.
During the coming one and a half months, Startup Sauna will visit 11 different places from Shangai to Warsaw as well as Moscow to Kuopio. Below is the schedule as of today:
