HELSINKI

Helsinki, the sustainable capital of Finland, is a vibrant seaside city of beautiful islands and great green urban areas. Helsinki marches to a wonderful and unique beat of its own with dynamic food, design, architecture – and sauna! – scenes. Helsinki and its Nordic culture are made by the locals. Helsinki is the largest city in Finland and the metropolitan area is the home of 1.4 million people. When you look at a map, Helsinki is in the northernmost corner of the Europe but it is an easy hub to reach with fast flight connections from East to West. No flight? No problem. Helsinki can be reached from St. Petersburg, Estonia and Sweden via the Baltic Sea. In fact, the sea is one of the most characterizing elements of the city. The Helsinki Archipelago consists of over 300 mesmerizing islands.

• The current population of Helsinki in 2020 is 1,305,000, a 1.01% increase from 2019.
• In Helsinki, there are 27 beaches, 13 winter swimming places, 14 ice stadiums, 16 swimming halls and outdoor pools, 818 indoor sports facilities and 92 dog parks.
• Russians were the biggest group of foreign travelers to stay in Helsinki overnight. Their overnight stays at registered accommodation establishments was in the excess of 209,000. Next came travelers from Germany (189,000), the United States (177,000), Great Britain (159,000) and Sweden (148,000).
• The most popular museums in 2018 were Helsinki City Museum (about 445,000 visits) and Ateneum (323,000). The municipal libraries registered 6.5 million visits, that is to say about 10 visits for every city resident.
• The Helsinkians’ average age is 40.7 years. In Finland as a whole, the average age is higher, 42.9 years.
• The life expectancy for Helsinkian males who were born in 2018 is 78.7 years, which is almost twelve years higher than the figure for year 1978. Female Helsinkians’ life expectancy at birth (born 2018) is 84.1 years.
• Single-person households made up nearly 49 percent of households in Helsinki. Households composed of two persons accounted for 31 percent, and about 11 percent of the households consisted of at least four people.
• The City of Helsinki employs all told 37,700 people. The most common professional titles were childcare and practical nurse.
• Approximately 40 percent of all municipal employees work for the Social Services and Health Care Division.
• The air quality in Helsinki centre was deemed good or satisfactory during about 91 percent of the hours of that year. The peak daily average temperature was 30.4°C, while 24.2°C had been the previous year’s record.

The highest decision-making organ in Helsinki is the City Council. The Council elects the Mayor and four Deputy Mayors for the duration of the Council term. The Council also makes appointments to city organs and the most important offices. The Mayor serves as the chair of the City Board, and the Deputy Mayors chair the sector committees. The Mayor and Deputy Mayors are full-time elected officials.
 

Helsinki is one of Europe's richest capitals. Contributing approximately a third of Finland's GDP, Helsinki profits on serviced-related IT and public sectors. Having moved from heavy industrial works, shipping companies also employ a substantial number of people. The city centre is the best choice for large investors to settle their businesses, as well as satellite branches of international companies. The central location supplies an adequate availability of highly qualified and skilled employers in Finland. Migration is in steady rate, as neighboring cities develop to their own industrialized peaks as well. Helsinki's tap water coming from the Päijänne Tunnel is valued potable water. It is bottled and sold to mid-eastern countries like Saudi Arabia.

One of the most interesting questions in Silicon Valley today is what will happen with ‘Silicon Island’ and its entrepreneurs: will American startups expand to the country? Will Cuban startups expand their creativity and hustle beyond their borders? As many designers know, constraint breeds creativity. Cubans know this all too well. Having spent decades under embargoes and restrictions, both foreign and domestic, Cuban entrepreneurs have had to jerry-rig their way to success. Rest assured that as a result, the country is home to some of the most ingenious creators and entrepreneurs on the planet. In Cuba, lateral thinking is a way of life.

As American relations with Cuba continue to improve, Startup Angels sought to answer some of the questions that tech entrepreneurs and startup investors have about the country. In advance of our AngelSummit Americas, we sat down with Cuba Emprende Chairman John McIntire and Ramphis Castro, a VC at ScienceVest and co-organizer of Startup Weekend Cuba, plus several Cuban founders to uncover what we need to know.

The average Cuban earns $20-30 per month. Cuban developers earn much more but are under $500 per month. As a result, many have focused their time on creative efforts. That spills over into other parts of the Cuban economy and offers promise to its future role in technology innovation.Cubans work around this regulatory restriction by working together as «contractors» on a startup idea. They can be located in the same workspace, work under a single brand and collaborate as if they were a company, but they do not have legal standing as a corporate entity.Cooperatives are worker-owned business structures that have legal standing in Cuba. They also offer significant tax incentives over being self-employed. They can range from farmers to beauty providers and auto repairs shops to business consultants. Traditionally an agriculture-only structure, cooperative regulations have been easing since 2011 to include more industries and gradually decentralize Cuba’s economy.

Despite being one of the most powerful skill sets for economic development across the world, a computer programming cooperative has not yet been approved in Cuba. There is ample hope that the cooperative regulatory framework will be broadened to encompass the tech sector and a number of other professional service industries, like lawyers and engineers.The combination of very low wages, a highly educated population and societal safety nets mean that even tiny «investments» can have massive impact. Because of government policies around free education, free healthcare and more...any size of investment can power a startup to operate in an exceptionally capital efficient way. Most companies with foreign capital are 49/51 percent joint ventures with the government having control.U.S. software companies are starting to contract Cuban programmers, both for the low cost but also their skills. Some Cuban startups are considering registering their companies in the U.S. via the newly announced Stripe Atlas program.IT outsourcing is one of Cuba’s most promising short term industries. Despite poor Internet access, some are likening Cuba to the next India due to its strong, affordable developer talent. The country graduates over 4,000 IT engineers a year but there are too few state jobs to absorb this supply. As a result, many graduates enter IT consulting or start businesses. Cuba’s much more reasonable time zone and its physical proximity to the U.S. are added bonuses for American outsourcers.

Cuba has a very well-educated population in general, with a 99 percent literacy rate and excellent engineers stemming from universities across the country. The best talent graduates from Cuba’s University of Information Sciences , which in Cuba is like Harvard, Stanford, and MIT combined. Despite recent improvements, there are still many unknowns for scaling startups and technology businesses in Cuba.

In Helsinki, traffic infrastructure investments and land use are always planned together. Traffic infrastructure investments are made to secure the functionality of the entire traffic and transport system and infrastructure. The share of travel made on sustainable means of transport will be increased. All modes of transport will be developed and those kinds of transport that are key to business will be secured. Planning of the implementation of the city plan will start with the Vihdintie boulevard. Planning of the light rail line in that area will proceed to the decision phase during the Council’s term, and planning the Tuusulanväylä boulevard will move forward. The conditions for building a light rail line to Malmi will also be investigated. Development of the tramway network in central Helsinki and the implementation of the tramway plan for the Kalasatama area will proceed. Alongside the new housing areas being built in Helsinki, also infill construction will be enhanced.

The Urban Eco Islands project, together with the City of Helsinki innovation company Forum Virium, is testing smart solutions for monitoring nature and the environment on Vasikkasaari. New, developing technology facilitates the utilisation of drones, for example, in monitoring nature on the island. Smart technology also makes it possible for people to enjoy the Vasikkasaari atmosphere virtually on a break from work, for example, thanks to the live-feed camera installed on the island. Smart technology identifies ships sailing past the camera and provides real-time information on air quality and noise levels.