Riskkapitalinvesteringar i svensk miljöteknik - obalans mellan utbudet och efterfrågan?
Earth?s resources have been exploited unsustainably. If an entire conception of exploitationof natural resources does not change now, this will entail enormous costs in the future.This insight has lead to a recently increased interest in clean technologies among privateequity capitalists. In the fourth quarter of 2006 about 10 percent of all private equityinvestments made in the US market were placed in the cleantech industry. Despite a goodinvesting climate in Sweden, Swedish capitalists have shown little interest in cleantechinvestments. Of all private equity investments made in the Swedish market, only 0.6percent was invested in cleantech during the fourth quarter of 2006. A shortage of privateequity capital may have a negative impact on the development of the industry and thereforethe purpose of this thesis is to investigate whether Swedish cleantech companiesexperiences a lack of private equity capital or not.The method used in this thesis is abductive and research has been made by sending outquestionnaires to Swedish cleantech companies and private equity capitalists. The surveyhas also been improved by making interviews with highly qualified persons within thefield. A firm's optimal capital structure forms the basis of this thesis theory and is used toexplain why companies choose to finance their business in certain ways. The theories inthis report are the Pecking Order theorem, Agency theory, Information asymmetry,Managerial choice and the financial gap.The result of this thesis has shown that the examined cleantech companies mainly consistof small-sized firms approaching later development stages. Historically, these companieshave been financed foremost with other types of capital than private equity capital. Thiscan be explained by a number of factors. A part of them refer to companies choosing othersources of financing to avoid potential disadvantages of external private equity, other ? tothe lack of available private equity capital willing to invest in Swedish cleantech.Nevertheless the deficit of capital has begun to decrease lately as a consequence of anextended interest in the cleantech market. In the near future both supply and demand forprivate equity investments is expected to increase at the same time as the interactionbetween those two Swedish industries will improve and the gap will decline.