One of the roles of FiBAN is to participate in public decision-making with the goal of developing the Finnish angel investing landscape. One of the stakeholders we cooperate closely with is the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment (MEAE).

Over the years we have had several discussions on how to support angel investing in Finland. MEAE sees angel investing as an important element in creating and growing Finnish startups and growth companies, and has been very supportive of initiatives supporting angel investing. Some of you may recall discussions a couple of years ago about potential business angel tax deduction.

Unfortunately, the current political climate is not well suited for tax incentives. Thus, the business angels’ tax incentive has to be parked for the time being. However, as angel investing is seen important for the Finnish startup and growth company ecosystems we have worked with MEAE to find other ways to support angel investing. And this work is starting to bear fruit.

Last year MEAE initiated the Steering Group for Domestic Ownership, with the goal to find ways to enhance, diversify and equalize ownership in the Finnish companies. FiBAN has been actively involved in the work of the steering group, with several of our members participating in the hearings of the group and FiBAN providing background materials and discussions to support the decision making.

The steering group issued its report a couple of weeks ago. In the report, which contained several proposals that could positively affect the angel investment landscape in Finland (relating to e.g. listing requirements, commercialization of inventions in universities, doubling the use of Finnvera junior loans, etc.), there was one proposal drawing the attention of the angel investors: The creation of a business angel co-investment fund.

The business angel co-investment fund is planned to be a 100 million euro fund that would invest alongside angel investors in the funding round. The aim would be to make approximately 20 to 30 million investments annually. MEAE has been assigned as the responsible party for the measures to prepare and design the fund.

As this is still heavily a work in progress, going into the details of this fund is not feasible at this point. However, FiBAN has set out our own proposals for the goals and guiding principles for the fund to be taken into account the work of MEAE. You can find these in a separate article here.

More information:

Reima Linnanvirta
Chair of the Board, FiBAN
reima@readyfireaim.fi