05.03.2012
The last StartSmart! spring session seminar for start-ups titled ”Roadmap2GlobalMarkets“ was held at Ülemiste City in Tallinn at the end of last week.
This time the focus was on internationalization, and the event was aimed at Estonian and Finnish companies. However, due to the fact, that all events organised in the framework of StartSmart! series are in English, and the main events streamed live, they have become extremely popular among budding entrepreneurs all around the world.
More than 3,000 people from 25 countries such as Australia, Brazil, Hong Kong, Japan, Cameroon, and the USA followed the live broadcast of the last seminar.
The keynote speaker Andy Lopata, whom the Financial Times has called one of the leading business networking strategist in Europe, gave start-ups pointers how to efficiently conduct their business networking. He spoke from his own personal experience, and said that about 60% of people who have been made redundant, do not wish to return to work as salaried employees, but instead prefer to start their own businesses.
“Today an estimated 5% of the working-age population in Estonia are entrepreneurs, and the objective of the StartSmart! series is to facilitate the growth of private entrepreneurship in Estonia. We hope that in 5 years this figure will be at least double of what it is today,” said Heidi Kakko, Head of Investment Division at the Estonian Development Fund.
Timo Rein, founder of Estonian start-up Pipedrive, talked about his success, how his start-up company that offers sales software has managed to link over 1,000 customers in 55 different countries in only 2 years time.
In addition to Andy Lopata and Timo Rein the seminar hosted Bill Payne, 2009 US angel investor of the year, who shared his thoughts how to attract angel money for their business projects. During the networking event held that very same evening, Bill Payne took notice of an Estonian start-up called Pult.io that enables transforming your smart phone into a multimedia remote control.
According to Gert Jostov, the chairman of the board of Technopolis Ülemiste AS, it is truly wonderful that renowned investors and entrepreneurs have come to share their experiences with seed companies. „We hope that the experiences gained from StartSmart! seminars will help new companies in establishing relations with investors and successfully entering foreign markets,“ he added.
Dr. Martin Seppäla, who has advised such companies as Nokia, Teliasonera, and HP on the topic of strategic management, also gave a lecture in the globalization seminar hosted at Ülemiste City. On the second day seed companies and new entrepreneurs received practical instructions on how to transform their ideas into reality by preparing, testing and implementing an action plan for expanding into foreign markets. Given working seminar was led by entrepreneur, investor and legal consultant Yrjö Ojasaar.
StartSmart! is a series of conferences, seminars, workshops and networking events, targeted at the starting entrepreneurs of Estonia and Finland. The series of events will be conducted until mid-2013 in cooperation with Estonian Development Fund, Aalto University School of Economics Small Business Center, Enterprise Estonia, Technopolis Ülemiste and consulting company BDA Consulting. The project is co-financed from the Interreg IV A Program 2007-2013 funds.
Additional information: http://www.start-smart.me/roadmap2globalmarkets
StartSmart communication channels:
www.start-smart.me
http://www.youtube.com/startsmartme
http://www.facebook.com/Start.Smart.FinEst.Startups
www.twitter.com/startsmartme #StartSmart
http://www.slideshare.net/startsmartme
For additional information please contact:
Indrek Anepaio
Development consultant
Innovation division of Enterprise Estonia
Tel 52 08 074
indrek.anepaio[A]eas.ee
Merilin Pärli
Communication coordinator
Enterprise Estonia
Tel 6279 417, 56 505 695
merilin.parli[A]eas.ee
Karin Tamm
PR Manager
Technopolis Ülemiste
AS
Tel 51 388 62
karin.tamm[A]technopolis.ee
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