An Estonian Startup With €25 Million Turnover | Hacker News Reader

An Estonian Startup With €25 Million Turnover

arcticstartup.com

37 pointsjkaljundi20 comments

Ah yes, the #not_quite_estonian_mafia or as some commenter put it on the site #foreignermafia (as opposed to the #estonianmafia label that goes around every time an Estonian start up is mentioned). In all honesty I'm very happy to see foreigners achieve good results with their start ups in Tallinn. I would love nothing more than to see Tallinn become this international hub for start ups.

We love foreigner-started startups as part of #estonianmafia. That's the joy of the broad term, it can include both Estonians abroad, foreigners in Estonia as well as anyone with any relation to Estonia. You're definitely part of it as well :)

Although I'm a believer in bootstrapped startups, I just hope that if AdCash raises capital they make it from European funds, and not foreign ones. Europe needs to considerably develop is own venture funds and funding resources, and that won't happen if capital comes from abroad.

What Europe needs is less bureaucracy and taxes, Here in Ireland i have to handover 23% (likely to be more in upcoming budget) in VAT on all EU sales!

Not only thats almost a quarter of your price gone in sales tax but, there is a quite abit of added work in remaining tax compliant

Of course if you are Google etc of this island you can just launder your money onto Bahamas or somewhere else warmer and barely pay any taxes

Well... Google and Apple pay their taxes in Ireland, rather then where the money is made.

Except they don't.

“And under Irish tax law, the second Irish resident subsidiary is not taxed on the royalty payment because it is controlled by managers elsewhere.”

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/22/how_vendors_avoid_ta...

Google (as a verb, no pun intended) for “Double Irish” and “Dutch Sandwich” if you want the full picture of the scheme.

Despite these tax-avoidance shenanigans, I think they do pay tax in Ireland, just a ridiculously small amount.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/ireland-business-blog-wi...

Oh they do pay some taxes, but rather insignificant amount when compared to the billions they launder thru' here.

And not just Google I believe Apple laundered north of 50 billion and only have a handful of employees here http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/29/business/apples-tax-strate...

As a small business owner it sickens me with how these large companies can get away with so much here, ok granted they are creating jobs (badly needed) and have other positive effects on a sinking economy but having Revenue put a blind eye on these shenanigans while making life miserable for small companies is unfair.

Having "only a handful of employees" is hardly creating jobs. And Apple is a notorious example of a company that doesn't actually reinvest most of the money they avoid paying in taxes, they just sit on enormous cash reserves (reinvestment is often used as an excuse for tax breaks and tax holidays here in the US).

Apple's one of the largest employers in Cork, and Google's headcount in Ireland is measured in the thousands.

As I'm sure you know, VAT is paid by the customer and you're simply collecting it, it's never your money to begin with. And if you are selling to businesses, they can rebate all or part of it.

Tell that to my customers in EU who see 23% higher prices than nonEU, doing vat calculations and returns also adds time to my already busy workload.

It is also misleading and annoys customers when you show prices exVAT, it is you who gets blamed for this tax not the government or EU

Most of the competition who are outside of the EU dont have to worry about this VAT shit and can have lower prices hence shown to endusers

What is it you are selling? We are an accommodation booking site and only have to pay VAT (we have it in writing from the tax office) on Irish sales, not EU wide.

Hosting, I will ask Revenue for a ruling and a clarification.

Jersey (Channel Islands) is working on becoming a focus point for technology investment and startups. While technically it's not part of the EU, it is part of Europe. There's very low taxes and gigabit fibre is being rolled out too.

There are quite a few companies like this (and much better ones) that power infrastructure for whole industries. I'm always very much impressed by these submarine operations.

Try this one: http://www.iponweb.com/

imho it is much more impressive than AdCash.

The €25 Million turnover number is misleading. Later, the article notes, "AdCash gives about 70% - 90% of revenue to their publishers, so with a turnover of €25 million, you can do the math on their theoretical profitability."

Let's say they keep 20% (the middle of that range). That's €5 Million. Of course, that's not profitability. That's essentially their revenue before the expense of having 40 employees, etc.

Still impressive but more realistic with that aspect clarified.

don't confuse revenue/turnover with gross margin.

gross margin is turnover minus cost of goods sold.

Sure, so this is a company with a paltry 20% gross margins.

I guess PayPal, eBay, VISA, and all the banks should just shut up shop then...

The number alone means nothing without understanding the business that they're in.

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