Take part in international trade fair abroad

You wish to develop your company's internationalization

• Your company has a credible readiness to engage in continuous profitable export operations.
• You are starting export operations and wish to improve your company's readiness for internationalization.
• You are advancing the initiation of new export operations or the opening of a new market area.
• You wish to increase exports to your company's existing market areas.
• You wish to diversify the structure of exportation.
• You are promoting the entry of your company and innovations into the markets.
• You are promoting your company's international competitiveness.

You have made a decision to participate in a trade fair

• Your company is participating in an international B2B trade fair event abroad or virtually, and the participation incurs stand costs; the exception are events of the music and audiovisual industries.

In which situations can the Exhibition Explorer not be granted?

• Your company is not in the prepayment register.
• Your company's credit rating (Rating Alfa) according to Suomen Asiakastieto is below A.
• Your company has violated its obligation to notify or has tax debts for which a payment plan has not been agreed with the tax authorities, or the plan has not been followed.
• Your company is a large company (excl. midcap), a sole trader, a public or non-profit organization, a foundation, an association or an Åland company.
• Your company operates in an industry that is excluded from de minimis funding (primary production of agriculture, fishery and aquaculture).
• Your company's quota for de minimis funding is exceeded.
  • Please note that de minimis funding granted for companies belonging to the same group or controlled by the same party is added together.

Exhibition Explorer funding is intended for your company's participation in a trade fair and the costs arising from the trade fair stand.

The costs of a trade fair stand

• Registration and booking costs
• Floor area costs
• Design and decoration costs
• Technical orders such as electricity and cleaning
• Rented structures and furnishings
• The trade fair stand's construction costs (erection and dismantling)
• Round-trip freight costs to the fair and back to Finland for products presented at the trade fair. Only freight services purchased from freight forwarding companies are accepted as freight costs. Mere outbound freight costs are not accepted, because in that case the financing can be considered to be related to the current costs of export operations. The financing also does not cover the freight costs of brochures, supplies and equipment used at the exhibition stand.
• Any eligible costs of virtual participation at a trade fair, including the basic participation package, are reviewed case-specifically.

In the case of music and audiovisual industries, projects that do not involve fair stand costs may exceptionally be supported, but mainly in terms of registration, accommodation and travel costs. The exception only applies to events where, due to the concept of the event, it is not possible for companies to participate in a joint stand or their own stand. 

General requirements for financiering

Business Finland will not grant funding if

• Suomen Asiakastieto Oy's Rating Alfa for the company is below A
• the company has arrears, payment defaults or other outstanding financial obligations related to previous loans granted by Tekes or Business Finland
• the company has not submitted its financial statements to the Finnish Patent and Registration Office in accordance with the Limited Liability Companies Act
• the company's financial statements have not been audited in accordance with the Auditing Act
• the company is not in the prepayment register
• according to the Finnish Tax Administration, the company has overdue taxes or payments for which a payment plan has not been agreed upon
• the company has neglected registration, notification or payment obligations related to other statutory obligations (for example, notification of loss of share capital or notification of beneficial owners to the Trade Register).

Ensure sufficient self-financing

• Your company has adequate self-financing for the project and for covering the costs of the other business operations. The planning of self-financing should account for the fact that Business Finland's aid is paid in arrears against actualized and paid expenses.
• Suomen Asiakastieto Oy's Rating Alfa for the company must be at least A.

Check de minimis funding

Exhibition Explorer funding is de minimis aid which does not need to be repaid. Your company can receive de minimis funding no more than EUR 300,000 over any period of three years. All companies controlled by the same entity or belonging to the same group of companies are deemed a single company when calculating the de minimis accumulation.

At the application stage, your company must find out how much de minimis funding it has received during the aforementioned period considered. Such aid is granted by a range of public organizations, such as Finnvera and the ELY Centers.

Read more about de minimis funding

Read more about the funding terms and conditions

The funding terms and conditions describe the costs for which Business Finland can provide funding, how we monitor your project costs, and how you should report on the progress of your project.

Read more about the funding terms and conditions

The application must be submitted to Business Finland's online service no later than the day before the start of the trade fair. The application can be submitted earlier as soon as the company has decided to participate in the trade fair and has made an estimate of the costs of the services to be purchased.

Travel expenses are only accepted in connection with trade fairs in the music and audiovisual industries. For this reason, the application related to the fair of music and audiovisual industries must be submitted before traveling to the fair and no later than the day before the start of the fair.

Each enterprise submits its own application in the online service. We will start processing the applications once we have received at least four applications for the same trade fair event. 

You can also keep track of the processing of your application in the online service.

Go to the online service

Fill in the application

When you apply for the funding, select the official name of the trade fair event as the project name of your application and complete the application in accordance with the instructions provided.

Duration of the project

The costs must be incurred during the duration of the project. With the exception of registration and booking costs, costs are accepted from the day you send us your application at the earliest. For this reason, it is recommended that the starting date of the project is the date of submission of the application.

Note:

• in projects that include freight costs, the return freight must be received in Finland during the duration of the project.
• in projects in the music and audiovisual industries, travel days must be included in the duration of the project.

Define your goals

Define 2–5 goals for the participation at the trade fair of which at least one is measurable. The goals will become part of the potential funding decision and Business Finland monitors their achievement. Examples of goals:

• the company met x potential new customers at the trade fair
• the company met x potential resellers at the trade fair
• the company identified x new potential partners or R&D partners at the trade fair.

Describe the implementation

Answer all of the questions included in the application's Implementation section.

Itemize the eligible costs of the purchased services

Costs are accepted starting from the date on which the application was submitted, at earliest. We employ a simple cost estimate in Exhibition Explorer funding. Registration and booking costs may nevertheless by accepted, even if they arose prior to the submission of the application for funding.

Itemize the costs of the purchased services (itemization of purchased services: what was bought and from whom, and a euro-denominated estimate/value [0% VAT]). Purchases from companies of interest are not permitted.

Enter the costs of the purchased services in the cost estimate as follows:

• Purchased services: Enter solely the eligible costs of the purchased services and freight arising from the trade fair stand (found in the section "What can the funding be used for?").
• Other costs: Enter the computed (i.e., "flat rate") 20% proportion of the purchased services.
• Salaries in money and indirect personnel costs: Leave this empty.

If you are participating in a trade fair event of the music or audiovisual industries in which your company does not have a trade fair stand, enter the sum total of the participation/registration, travel and accommodation costs in the space for the project's purchased services. In this case, leave the space for Other costs empty.

Costs for purchased services added to the project after the funding decision cannot be accepted. The amount of aid mentioned in the decision is the maximum aid granted to your company. You can specify the estimate on the costs of the purchased services during the application's processing phase.

Other costs

Other costs incurred by your company from the trade fair participation can be approved based on a flat rate, which is at maximum 20% of the sum of the aforementioned purchased services. These costs may include:

• travel, accommodation, and interpretation costs
• freight costs
• the expenses of a possible consultant/administrator
• marketing costs related to the trade fair, including promotional videos, brochures, calling cards, and roll-ups.

Other costs do not need to be itemized in the application, nor do they need to be included in the project accounting.
For example: If the estimate concerning the costs of the trade fair stand is EUR 10,000, other costs account for 20%, or EUR 2,000, of that. The grant's share of the total amount of 12,000 euros is 50%, i.e. 6,000 euros.