A positive assessment for Invest-NL and a great start to 2023!

Invest-NL does what it was established for

Rinke Zonneveld, Invest-NL's CEO, is proud of the results of the interim assessment. 'Since Invest-NL's establishment in late 2019, the Netherlands has finally had a national finance and development institution, or National Promotional Institution (NPI). As the assessment acknowledges, this makes Invest-NL an essential tool for the government in terms of accelerating sustainable transitions in the Netherlands and better mobilising European capital. The researchers who carried out the assessment have emphasised that Invest-NL was established only a short time ago and is therefore a work in progress. Despite this, we now have a professional organisation, over € 610 million in investment volume was committed by the end of 2022 and approximately € 1.2 billion in capital was mobilised from private investors and € 293 million in European funding raised in the first two years alone. These funds resulted in innovative, fast-growing SMEs that often have sky-high ambitions when it comes to creating a more sustainable, innovative future for the Netherlands.'

However, there is room for improvement

On the recommendations arising from the assessment, Invest-NL's CEO commented: 'Clearly, some improvements still need to be made. We need to fine-tune our processes so that we can be more transparent to our entrepreneurs. Our visibility and communication could also be improved so that the message is clear regarding what we represent. There are some real gems, which can often be discovered through our Business Development activities. They show how – even without making your own investment – you can make something fundable that appears unfundable. As we continue to improve as an organisation and our stakeholders become more aware of the reasons why they can turn to Invest-NL, I can identify lots of opportunities to increase our relevance within the context of a sustainable, innovative future.'

To make the unfundable fundable

The assessment report also shows that Invest-NL is coming on leaps and bounds compared with other risk capital providers. The minister noted in her letter that Invest-NL always invests with private market participants. There is also increasing collaboration with public risk capital providers such as the regional development corporations. Rinke Zonneveld explains: Our key task is to make the seemingly unfundable fundable. To that end, Invest-NL works very closely with a broad, diverse network of private and public investors. Indeed, co-financing is our starting point in all of our transactions. I welcome the evaluator's positive assessment of our fund investments, especially considering they received quite a lot of criticism during the early years. At the same time, our strategy is to increase our direct investments in order to shift the balance between direct and indirect investments towards 70% direct and 30% indirect through funds. By doing that, we believe that we can create a greater impact for a more sustainable, innovative future for the Netherlands.'

Download Letter Minister EZK

Download Evaluation report (Dutch)