Small business and entrepreneurship in northern Finland

High tech industries, small and medium sized enterprises and Nokia are almost synonymous with Northern Finland in that the past twenty five years have witnessed significant structural, economic and social changes in Finland's northernmost provinces of Ostrobothnia and Lapland. The traditional economy of the region was based on agriculture, forest based industries such as timber and paper and the exploitation of small mineral deposits. In the 1950s and 1960s it was evident that these were insufficient to sustain future economic growth as both provinces suffered from serious economic and social deprivation and outwards migration. Governmental responses to these problems were to tackle the basic infrastructural problems that existed, including the founding of a university in Oulu and later one in Rovaniemi. It was also clear that future growth would depend upon industries, based on 'knowledge,' rather than natural resources and so attempts were made to bring about a paradigm shift in the North's economic structure. This was effected jointly between the government, the local authorities, higher education and research institutions and local entrepreneurs. The aim of this paper is to explore how the economy was transformed through looking at the interplay between government, institutions and the entrepreneurs.