Europe’s mining startups and also the ones from critical raw materials sector happen to be underfunded, remarked the speakers at the EIT raw materials summit.
Jessika Roswall, the EU Commissioner, opened the second day by way of addressing fragmentation in the raw materials market in Europe and the requirement for a single capital market—a call that was echoed by the EIT RawMaterials CEO, Bernd Schafer. The EIT RawMaterials happens to offer funding and support to start-ups throughout the continent.
He went on to state that one must make sure that there is a follow-up with public financing so as to bring start-ups to the market and also avoid mushrooming of more of the same kind of innovations but standardize them.
Roswall, the EU Commissioner for Environment, Water Resilience, and Competitive Circular Economy, went on to confirm that the EU happens to be working in order to simplify its funding as well as grant processes, which at present are a barrier to smaller companies – the ones that are looking to gain a foothold within the mining sector.
Ella Cullen is the co-founder as well as the CMO of Minespider, which is a Berlin-based start-up offering a blockchain-based disability platform. When it comes to the miningy, he went on to echo the call for less fragmentation within the region.
Cullen stated that it is an absolute struggle when it comes to start-ups operating with all varied languages as well as legal implications of every country and bureaucracy.
It is well to be noted that Minespider has received numerous grants, some even from the EIT RawMaterials booster program, and goes on to work on almost €30 millions of EU-funded projects, added Cullen.
What are the investment challenges for mining startups?
EIT RawMaterials access when it comes to finance director Anthony Slotboom agreed that a single capital market is very critical for start-ups. There have been talks when it comes to this for almost a decade. Someone who is willing to take a risk when it comes to raw materials would find there is a much bigger pool from which start-ups can access capital in a more seamless and easier way.
The CEO of Alpha Future Funds and also former CEO of Eurasian Resources Group, Benedikt Sobotka, asserted that when it comes to the private investment landscape, things are not any better.
As per Sobotka, predominantly the mining startups, the ones from tech within geospatial data analysis, happen to be privately funded outside of Europe. He went on to note that the investment ecosystem happens to be much smaller as compared to the US.
He added that such companies grow as well as scale at a much faster rate in the US, and the possibility for prominent exit is better than compared to Europe. This is due to the fact that in the US, there are large buyers as well as an IPO market, whereas in Europe for new technology companies, it is comparatively dead.
Apart from offering a single product, scalability when it comes to taking advantage of the global nature of the mining industry was preferred as a major strategy for start-ups, wherein mining software solutions were underscored as a promising area in order to attract private investors and also secure public funding.
The EIT RawMaterials summit has already taken place in Brussels, Belgium, between the 13th and 15th of May.
