Startup Compass and DAMVAD put Denmark on the map

For the moment Danish startups do not have the opportunity to compare themselves to their counterparts in the international arena. A collaboration with DAMVAD and Startup Compass hopes to put Danish startups on the map.

Limited Information
Denmark is international renown for its startup scene. Yet there is little data available about the startup industry. This lack of data makes it difficult to for startups to analyze their own and industry performance as a whole, and stand out in the international sphere. This has further consequences in terms of attracting talent and capital to Denmark.

“Startups and investors have an interest in investing in Denmark. But attracting investment requires that we have some data to display. We need to know our potential, our opportunities and our weaknesses in order to grow – and no one has the data. “says Anette Norgaard from Microsoft BizSpark program for digital entrepreneurs. “A national startup survey is entirely appropriate.”

“Startup DK” benchmarking.
Currently a taskforce called Startup DK is attempting to collect map Danish startups. The project is a collaboration between DAMVAD and the Silicon Valley based Startup Compass (best known as Startup Genome Project). The project has three main objectives.

-The mapping of Danish startups
-Implement international benchmarking
-To tell the story of the Danish ecosystem 

“We need more strong Danish digital startup companies. It is important for the Danish economy. We will support the many good startup stories with a data-based characterization of the Danish startup ecosystem that we can compare with other ecosystems. With the new data we will be able to identify strengths and weaknesses for the benefit of Danish startups, investors and politicians,”says Kristian Dark Puggaard, Group CEO DAMVAD

Danish startups have to volunteer themselves to participate in the project. To motivate entrepreneurs to answer the questionnaire each startup is given a personal benchmarking report immediately.

No Nordic Data
Startup Compass’s latest ecosystem report from 2012 contained data from over 50,000 startup’s globally. However there was no information or data on the startup environment from the Nordic regions. Hopefully this collaboration with DAMVAD and Startup Compass will set a precedent for other Nordic countries.