CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2014
| Author | Saraf, Saurabh |
|---|---|
| Title | What should a public venture capital fund intend? A study on Denmark, Finland, Norway & Sweden |
| Summary | The cleantech sector has had its own issues regarding attracting venture capital (VC). Capital intensity, longer time horizons, exit issues etc have either led VC to transition from early to later stages where technology risks are low or to totally disappear from the sector. The early stages and demonstration phases of the technology cycle have been particularly suffering from lack of funding. In order to address these issues governments have come to the rescue and are infusing VC to support the sector. Government playing the role of a VC investor may be contested on the grounds that it may compete against other private players and public agencies may not necessarily be adept at doing an investor‟s job. Therefore it becomes important to understand how a public VC fund should operate such that it catalyses private capital rather than inhibiting it and is able to guide its investees to success. This study is therefore an attempt to understand how public VC funding initiatives in four NORDIC countries, viz. Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden, work. Inputs received from 16 interviewees representing different public & private organisations have helped shape this work. It was understood that public VC intervention should aim at alleviating risks of the private investors and catalysing private capital into the sector. It should help address the funding gap issues and thus support technologies that have a growth potential but are not able to raise apt capital. Public VC agencies should also be able to provide adequate governance support to their investee firms and may thus syndicate investments with private players to gain from their expertise. The idea of government being fund-of-fund‟s can be explored where it lets the private investors make the investment choices but funds a VC fund. Last, it was suggested by interviewees that government may help create mutually beneficial synergies by developing an ecosystem involving large corporations, investors and ventures. |
| Supervisor | Dalhammar, Carl;Vendel, Martin |
| Department | Environment Sciences and Policy MSc |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2014/saraf_saurabh.pdf |
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