Turning Creativity into Business

Best Practices Study Tour Employment and Economic Development Centre Foundation for Finnish Inventions Matti Ropponen, Regional Innovation Advisor 8.9.2009

What is the Foundation for Finnish Inventions? – Facts • Founded in 1971 • A private foundation; funded from the budget of the Ministry of Employment and the Economy • Headquarters: Innopoli, City of Espoo • Regional network: Invention advisors at Employment and Economic Development Centres (T&E Centres) Innovation advisors at universities

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What is the Foundation for Finnish Inventions? – Figures • Contacts for advice • Applications for funding • Venture capital funding projects • Projects reaching commercialisation stage

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20,000 / year 1,000 / year 300 / year 40–50 / year

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What do we do? – We develop creative ideas into business ventures • We seek out, evaluate and help to develop inventions and innovative business ideas. • We offer systematic and consistent evaluation of business ideas for private persons and small enterprises. • Together with senior business advisors we develop promising business ideas with growth potential into pre-seed ventures or licensable projects. • We help people with new ideas at the initial stages of development and in this way help to create new growth ventures and success stories.

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What kind of business ideas are developed? – Inventions and innovative ideas • A commercialisable innovative device, method or service, or a combination of these. • The idea has growth potential on the market. We emphasize international business opportunities. • The owner of the idea is committed to developing it. – The owner need not necessarily want to be the entrepreneur. • The owner of the idea is, if necessary, willing to share ownership.

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Who are our target group? – Inventors and starting entrepreneurs • Private persons. • Starting businesses. • Starting spin-off companies.

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Turning Ideas into Business – Our services in a nutshell

Ideas

REGIONAL PHASE Preliminary screening

Activation

Identification Initial evaluation

NATIONAL PHASE Development Indepth evaluation

Future growth ventures

Business idea development

Licensable projects

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Organization • Specialists of innovations located in all 15 regional TEcentres • Specialists of innovations located in major university campuses • Regional evaluation – teams: a group people to evaluate inventions; guidance and research in patentability and business plans • Business Development - teams: a group of specialists dedicated to help inventors in creating innovations out of the original inventions

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What is the Development Stage? – Operation in a nutshell Network of senior business advisors

Regional evaluation teams

Business idea proposals

Business Development teams

Prototypes

Future growth ventures

Proof of concept IPR strategy Service concepts

Business plan Financing Operative team

Team building Entrepreneurial training Licensing services Legal services Funding

Licensable projects

Domestic enterprises

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Path to Innovation Regional Evaluations - teams

Individuals and small companies

Business Development - teams

University campuses

TE Centre – service packages

TuLi – services

Business Incubators

TE Centre -subsidies

TEKES – loans and subsidies

Business Angels

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Future Growth Ventures Entrepreneurs New Businesses Partnerships Licenses Venture Capital Bank Loans

M&A IPO

Finnvera – financial services

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What is the outcome? – A pre-seed venture or licensable project • PRE-SEED VENTURE Often the creator of the idea or invention will want to establish a business, in which case we can help to find a suitable team for the enterprise – if necessary even a suitable managing director. We also make every effort to find suitable funding partners. • LICENSABLE PROJECT Sometimes it is recommended to sell the business idea wholly or partly to external partners. In this case we help the creator (of the idea or invention) to find suitable licensing partners or prospective buyers.

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Success Stories Success Stories www.sleipner.fi New type of transport system for crawler excavators and shovels. Co-operation with Terex O&K world-wide. www.preseco.eu Biogas power plants based on patented Anaerobic Digestion Accelerator (ADA). Several power plants in use world-wide

www.footbalance.com Personal foot analysis and individual insoles. Partnership with Intersport.

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Thank you for your attention! Any questions?

Matti Ropponen [email protected]

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