Aalto University’s Venture Garage to kickstart growth entrepreneurship in the Baltic Rim

Press release 17.6.2010

Aalto Venture Garage is the hub where entrepreneurs throughout the Baltic Rim get support and work together to grow their businesses. The Garage started as a grassroots initiative by a group of students and entrepreneurs at Aalto University who saw the need for change in the entrepreneurship ecosystem in Finland.

Aalto Venture Garage runs a growth entrepreneurship program, Bootcamp, four times a year. During Bootcamp, the most potential startups build up their product and test their ideas with the most experienced entrepreneurs and investors who coach and challenge them. The winners receive 5000€ in seed funding, exclusive coaching and workspace in the Garage as they become Garage Startups.

“We offer entrepreneurs a place to work on their business. The Garage hosts 10 startups and regularly welcomes speakers like Mårten Mickos, former CEO of MySQL, to meet the students and entrepreneurs”, explains Kristo Ovaska, the founder of Aalto Venture Garage, “We are in collaboration with Stanford University and partnering with the top players in Israel”.

“It’s about sharing”

Openness and collaboration are central themes in the Garage: “Teams at Bootcamp are co-operating; they are working on each other’s ideas and challenging them. It’s not only a competition but more about sharing and team building” says Juha Ruohonen, the Entrepreneur-in-Residence at the Aalto Venture Garage.

AudioDraft, a Garage Startup and a graduate of the first Bootcamp, has incorporated the open source model in a unique way. The company, recently featured in New York Times, is a web community for managing collaborative audio projects.“The Garage has been an excellent place to work, it provides a great opportunity to push ideas further with the help of enthusiastic entrepreneurs and coaches.” says Teemu Yli-Hollo, the rapper CEO of AudioDraft.

What next?

The next Bootcamp will take place during the last two weeks of September. It is expected that more than 200 teams from all around the world will apply to the next Bootcamp, of which ten teams will be selected. Deadline for all applications is September 8, 2010.

For more information:

• Aalto Venture Garage: www.aaltovg.com
• Kristo Ovaska, kristo@aaltovg.com, +358 50 593 8907
• Natalie Gaudet, natalie@aaltovg.com, +358 50 599 9442

Aalto Venture Garage’s Bootcamp is an intensive two week training program for the best startup teams from all around the world. Bootcamp is free and supported by Aalto University. It is designed to help pre-seed startups to become successful ventures with the coaching of the Nordics’ best entrepreneurs and investors.