CRANEbrunch: entrepreneurs, institutions and business angels on Start-ups in Croatia

On Friday September 18, this year’s second CRANEbrunch was held – a gathering of members of CRANE and its partners, organized by the Croatian Business Angels Network, Ministry of Entrepreneurship and Crafts, and the agency HAMAG-BICRO. They were joined by the representatives of the Prime Minister’ office, Economic Advisor to the President, members of the European Business Angels Network (EBAN), the leadership of VERN, representatives of the META group and Core Incubator, and many other successful entrepreneurs and investors.

CRANEbrunch was opened by Davorin Štetner, president of CRANE, welcoming all the participants, briefly reviewing CRANE’s progress of the current year, and presenting the strategic goals for the upcoming period.

“It is extremely important to have an open communication between organizations in the private and public sector, which is built at events like CRANEbrunch” – said Maja Pokrovac, Minister Gordan Maras’ advisor. At CRANEbrunch, Maja Pokrovac presented the programs of the Ministry of Entrepreneurship and Crafts intended for small and medium entrepreneurs.

“HAMAG-BICRO and CRANE have been successfully cooperating for a while now and I believe that our continued cooperation will be even more successful” – added Darko Liović, president of the Board of Directors of HAMAG-BICRO and presented the possibilities for start-ups and business angels offered by HAMAG-BICRO.

The guest of honor at CRANEbrunch was Paulo Andrez, president emeritus of the Europe Business Angels Network (EBAN), member of the Board of Directors of the Portuguese Business Angels Federation and advisor to many European governments on the matters of investing in early-stages companies and pointed to the possible directions of the development of the start-up scene in Croatia.

“Croatia as a country has a lot of potential for entrepreneurship development, and the business angels have an important role in that process. CRANE has proved itself as an extremely successful organization of business angels and I believe that they can induce positive changes” – concluded Paulo Andrez.

Hrvoje Prpić, a member of the Board of Directors of CRANE described the business of start-ups from the perspective of business angels, and conveyed to the gathered participants his experience from the recent crowd-investing campaign for Trillenium.

The CRANEbrunch was concluded with the signing of a partnership agreement between the Zagreb Entrepreneurship Incubator (ZIP) and the Croatian Business Angels Network, signed by Ivo Šigel for ZIP and Davorin Štetner for CRANE.

After the successful CRANEbrunch, Davorin Štetner, president of CRANE, added –

“I am glad that many institutions recognized the importance of our initiative, which is confirmed by their attendance of the CRANEbrunch. This is a great indicator of the great things ahead of us, and the changes start precisely through communication at these kinds of events.”