The Finnish Cleantech Market In 2010
Recently, we have seen increasing investor interest in the Finnish cleantech market, which closed a total of €40-50m worth of investments in Q3 including those in companies such as European Batteries, a large scale lithium ion battery manufacturer, Nokia spin-off There Corporation, a sub/smart metering technology provider, and Preseco, a waste-to-energy company. Investments in Finnish clean technologies represented around 50% of cleantech VC investments in the Nordics, which closed a total of €100m worth of investments (source: Cleantech Scandinavia). Examples of Nordic investments are in companies like Danish biomass fuelled engine technology provides Stirling, Swedish nanowire semiconductor LED developer Glo (a link to release), Norwegian solar cell manufacturer Innotech Solar and EV company Think Global.
But will the investments in Finnish clean technologies in 2010 exceed those for 2009? We do not know the final figures for 2009 yet. In 2008, Finnish cleantech companies posted a total of €139.5m in investments, which represented the highest proportion (37%) of total investments (€372m) in all Nordic countries.
Venture Cup Finland hands out second stage awards
Venture Cup Finland, the national business plan competition, announced the winners for the second round of this year's competition. The award criteria emphasized innovativeness, customer benefits and potential market, and feasibility of the business model.
Numcore from Kuopio won the main award, and got also additional environment and safety prize. The company develops and markets innovative high-tech monitoring and controlling instruments for online use in process industry. With its products complex processes can be monitored and controlled continuously, helping its customers to refine their processes and reduce the environmental impact. Numcore is planning to expand internationally and is looking for venture capital at the moment. The CEO Anssi Lehikoinen states they are now ready to commercialize more than a decade of research, and have invested a lot in their team, which has industry experience and expertise in R&D, sales, and financing.
Other winners and their business concepts:
- Beautiful9 - offering a virtual wardrobe for pregnant women, from which they can rent affordable evening dresses and business outfits.
- BlueFors - commercial fully automated cooling device capable of reaching -273.15 degrees Celsius, just 0.025 degrees away from the absolute zero.
- LaTiDa - skin care products produced without any chemicals and with environmentally-friendly supply chain.
- Sinteri - natural baby food produced locally, innovatively combining production, sales, and community-based service.
