GoWest – Nordic Venture Capital Forum has gathered a wide interest. Tickets were sold out and between 29-30^th of January 2025 the facilities in Karlatornet welcomed startups, investors and participants from around the world. With both local and international touch, Gothenburg has been listed as a hub for deeptech and innovation. 

GoWest was arranged January 29-30 at Clarion Hotel in Karlatornet. Photo: Elina Maaranen 

“There are only two things that make markets grow – talent and capital. And we have both here in Sweden.” With that, GoWest – Nordic Venture Capital Forum was kicked off, being Gothenburg and Western Sweden’s risk capital conference that this year took place at Karlatornet January 29-30, in collaboration with the Trade and Industry Group at Göteborg & Co. 

With over 900 participants, 20 countries were represented, among them Denmark and United Kingdom. The event welcomed over 370 startup- and scaleup companies, 300 investors and around 1700 investment meetings were prebooked – a 20% growth in comparison to last year. The conference acts as a natural connection between investor and startups, where the hope is that national and international investors find investment projects. Klementina Österberg, CEO of GU Ventures, the main organizer of the event, believes that GoWest is important for Gothenburg’s status as a city of innovation, solely based on how the conference gathers multiple parts of the ecosystem. 

“Without GoWest we wouldn’t have this natural meeting point where we can invite international investors, particularly also co-investors, where we can display our investor communities but also our companies.”, says Klementina Österberg. 

Klementina Österberg. Photo: Elina Maaranen 

A hub for innovation

GoWest gathered companies within many areas of what is called deeptech, such as AI, biotech- and medicine, greentech, mobility and fintech. Startups from both within and outside of the Nordic gathered to seek collaboration with the ecosystem actors and investors, to explore how you can join forces.  

“Gothenburg has become a hub for innovation much because of the connection between academia, industry and public sector that puts a lot of effort into this area. To host the conference in the city is an obvious choice.” continues Klementina Österberg. 

It’s not just Klementina that argues that Gothenburg has become an important place for innovation, not lest within deeptech. Forbes recently noted the ecosystem of sustainability and innovation which the city inhabits – where collaboration between international companies, universities, public sector and entrepreneurs have created an environment where ideas can thrive. The piece interviewed multiple ecosystem actors from the city, where everyone seems to agree that Gothenburg is unique mainly because of the collaboration that exists. There’s also an idea of wanting Gothenburg as the main hub for a company, partly because the city is a sustainable and innovative leader, partly because they want to contribute to that way of thinking. In that sense, it’s also a contribution to the idea of the city as a central for deeptech and sustainability.