As part of the activities of the Enterprise Europe Network, the Technology Center of the ASCR organized the first part of the webinar "Access to finance: Modern trends in financing technology companies" on Tuesday, September 15. Given the current situation, all performances had to be transferred to a virtual form, which fortunately did not change the attractiveness of the contributions. Below we offer a brief summary (more detailed information will be published in the coming days):

The introductory speech dedicated to licensing brought, among other things, that companies owning rights to intellectual property should not forget to evaluate them and set a strategy for their protection. IInetlectual property rights play an important role in innovative financing - they are an indicator of quality and represent a certain value for a potential investor, eg they can reduce investment risk. V. Chloupek from the law company BIRD & BIRD also pointed out the proper drafting of the license agreement, especially the correct definition of the subject of the agreement and the license fee.

The second part was started by J. Trojan from the recently established Nation 1 fund, which supports companies primarily in their earliest phase. The selection of the company is based on 5 criteria: team strength, product practicality, market size, customer interest in the product and a clearly defined business model. In parallel with financial support, the fund also offers companies participation in an acceleration program. So far, 13 companies have passed through the fund.

T. Michálek from KB Smart Solutions presented the services of a corporate venture capital fund, which is a subsidiary of KB. The fund targets the area of ​​so-called fintech start-ups that come up with innovative solutions and technologies within the financial sector, have the initial stages of product development behind them and want to grow. In addition to financing, it helps companies test their new technologies and services and provides the necessary infrastructure.

Representatives from the Prague Stock Exchange, P. Fischerová and P. Papp, concluded a webinar with a presentation of the capital market (Start Market) for smaller innovative companies. They reminded companies that "being traded on the stock exchange" is not just about finances, but it increases the company's credibility and credibility brings it prestige and motivates employees.

On Wednesday, September 23, you can look forward to the second part of the webinar. This time we will focus on the possibilities of financing innovative companies from European and Czech support programs and introduce the services of digital innovation hubs.