“The Future of Malta’s Equity and Startup Environment” Event
Johan Zammit had the pleasure to speak on a panel at InvestMT o.b.o Business Angels Malta.
The event discussed “The Future of Malta’s Equity and Startup Environment” and he had the opportunity to explain the current positive trends with both startups and business angels in Malta.
When asked about what can be done to better support the startup ecosystem in Malta he borrowed a 4 pillar framework used at the Malta Innovation Forum – the Capacity Building Framework. This can be applied to the startup ecosystem too.
Despite the positive trends, here is what more can be done IMO :
1. Training : The quality and number of both startups and investors is growing however, as we have seen from the Shark Tank Malta episodes, the ecosystem still has a lot of work in the areas of startups preparedness (and also investor preparedness) to increase the numbers and the quality on both sides. Training startups & investors is a key reason of why Business Angels Malta exists.
2. Coordination between all the stakeholders that form part of the startup ecosystem – both public and private. Malta Enterprise StartinMalta, MIMCOL’s Seed Investment Scheme, Basement2Boardroom by Firstbridge, GO Ventures by GO etc etc etc
3. A well defined path a startup can follow through the various chapters of its lifetime – especially those relating to support and funding.
4. Having global accelerators like the launch of Plug and Play Tech Center.
5. Study, promote and build upon existing success stories. The local ecosystem can learn a lot from its recent success stories like Weavr.io and from successful exists like those of Hotjar and Altaro Software.
Johan was in great company on the panel : Andrea Marcello from European Investment Fund (EIF), Herald Bonnici from Malta Government Investments (MGI) and Nick Calamatta from Calamatta Cuschieri Finance Group. The panel was moderated by Matthew Xuereb from Deloitte.
InventMT was organised by Malta Development Bank with the support of Deloitte.
Well done Rene Saliba Paul V. Azzopardi Joseph Darmanin Matthew Xuereb