Compiled by Nina Joyce

The European Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (EVCA) promotes and facilitates European venture capital and private equity. It provides information for members, creates networking opportunities, and acts as a lobbying and campaigning organisation. The association is based in Brussels and is acknowledged as the leading representative of the pan-European industry.

Forrester is a leading independent research firm that analyses the future of technology change and its impact on businesses, consumers, and society. The press resources page has interesting facts and figures on the marketplace and includes European contact details.

The Community Research and Development Information Service (CORDIS) is financed and run by the EU. The web site has loads of interesting research projects in the pipeline plus press demos of its services.

The European Commission has established a new Directorate General for enterprise. Its policy areas were formerly under the auspices of [DG XXIII and you can still obtain the relevant online information there. The new DG looks after venture capital interests and works very closely with the EVCA in an effort to optimise its activities.

E-Commerce Times is a free online publication, with daily news and feature articles for entrepreneurs and companies doing business on the Internet.

Red Herring magazine covers the direct and indirect business of technology. It contains loads of articles on investing and innovation.

Register now for the fourth annual International Venture Capital Summit. The previous three conferences took place in the industrial park Sophia Antipolis, near Nice in the south of France. To see who has already participated click here.

The Cambridge Venture Capital Club has a list of online resources, most of which are of local interest.

The European Investment Fund is a joint venture between the EU, EIB and private and public institutions. One of its missions is to foster the growth of SMEs, particularly in early stage high-tech investments. It details its venture capital activities here.

DataMerge provides financing sources and financing "how to" programs to more than 21,000 business owners, commercial real estate finance professionals and finance consultants. Its goal is to help people secure funding using time-efficient, easy-to-master methods.

Tornado Insider aims to connect the people of high-growth Europe and accelerate the growth of the ICT industry by providing information, education and inspiration.

Initiative - Europe provides quality information to private equity professionals.

The European Venture Capital Journal (EVCJ) site is still under construction.

Click2think.com hosts a VC site "for enterprising minds". Its private equity page contains a list of additonal resources links.

National venture capital associations:

Belgium:
Belgian Venturing Association

Britain:
British Venture Capital Association

Czech Republic:
Fond rizikového kapitálu (FRK). This is an arm of the EU's PHARE programme.

Finland:
Finnish Venture Capital Association

Germany:
German Venture Capital Association (BVK)

Hungary:
Hungarian Venture Capital and Private Equity Association

Italy:
Associazione Italiana degli Investitori Instituzionali nel Capitale di Rischio (AIFI )

Netherlands:
Dutch Venture Capital Association (NVP)

Portugal:
Associaçao Portuguesa de Capital De Risco (APCRI)

Russia:
Russian Venture Capital Association

Slovakia:
Slovak American Enterprise Fund

Spain:
Asociación Española de Capital Inversión (ASCRI)

Sweden:
Swedish Venture Capital Association

Switzerland:
Swiss Private Equity & Corporate Finance Association (SECA)