The Venture Capital Programs continue to experience high demand, resulting in the 2008 New Media Budget being fully utilized.  All unused equity authorizations under the Equity Capital Budget are rescinded effective  April 11, 2008.

 The Venture Capital Programs continue to experience high demand, resulting in the 2008 Equity Capital Budget being fully utilized.  All unused equity authorizations under the Equity Capital Budget are rescinded effective  March 5, 2008.

This is to advise you that the Investment Capital Branch has obtained approval to proceed with a project to automate the tax credit application process for the following types of program clients:

1. eligible business corporation (EBC)
2. employee share ownership plan (ESOP)
3. employee venture capital corporation (EVCC)
4. venture capital corporation (VCC)

The goals of this project include the following:

1. Provide our clients with a web access to the Tax Credit Application process. The single access will allow clients to use the appropriate features.

2. Create a process that minimizes or eliminates manual intervention by Ministry staff. This means that the process will be accessible, consistent and timely to all clients.

3. Provide clients with the ability to submit data with respect to their investors and the relevant investment detail directly to the system and obtain confirmation that data has been accepted or error messages in a timely manner.

4. Generate an electronic tax credit certificate record that can be accessed and printed by the individual investors. If this goal is not possible the system will allow clients to access and print the tax credit certificates for distribution to the investors.

5. Create reports, accessible to each client that would provide information about investor investments processed, tax credit certificates generated, the status of each company’s equity capital authorization (amount used, amount remaining, etc.) and the tax credit budget that your equity authorization is using (ECP, CVCP, ESOP, EVCC, etc.).

We will be finalizing the system design over the next two or three weeks and we will provide updates on the ‘What’s New’ section of our web site.

Our plan is to have the system in place by March 31, 2008 so that we can process investor investments eligible for the 2008 tax credit through the system.

As part of the development process we hope to obtain the cooperation of clients from the various programs to provide input in to the development and possibly test the application before it goes in to production.

If we contact you for assistance, we hope that you can make yourselves available. Your commitment could be as much as the equivalent of a week’s work but it would be spread over the period of the project and would likely include only one or two sessions of one to four hours each. The rest of the time would be time that could be broken in to short periods of less than one hour.

Once this web access is operating we will examine the value of expanding it to other parts of our programs. This could include the Additional Equity Applications, Reporting Business Investments, Annual Returns, the IPA Releases and Registration Applications.

Please be informed that the 2007 program budget for VCC/EBC single year allocations under the New Media Venture Capital Program is now effectively sold out.

Therefore, under Section 29.1 of the Small Business Venture Capital Act, all unused equity authorizations under this program budget are hereby rescinded effective immediately. Any funds raised that have not been reported in accordance with our notice dated August 17, 2007 will not be eligible for tax credits.

We are now accepting "Additional Equity Applications" for the 2008 program year.

Due to the success of the Investment Capital Programs, we are rapidly achieving budget capacity for 2007 allocations under the New Media Budget. Please see the graph below. In anticipation of reaching budget capacity, our office has established the following procedures:

1. If you have a completed Share Purchase report (SPR) please fax it to our office (250-952-0371) before 4:30 PM today. These will be allocated 2007 tax credits.

2. Any SPRs received after 4:00 PM will be allocated 2007 tax credits on a first come, first served basis. We will confirm receipt of the SPR within two days.

3. Effective Monday morning (August 20th), before accepting monies from investors, you must call our office toll free at 1-800-665-6597 and speak with the Portfolio Manager of the Day (POD).

4. The POD will confirm whether the budget capacity is sufficient to accommodate your request and add your request to the waiting list.

5. If there are budget funds available, you will have 48 hours to submit the Share Purchase Report (SPR) to our office by fax (250-952-0371). If the SPR is not received within 48 hours, the confirmation will be null and the tax credits will be returned to the budget pool.

6. The website will be updated daily with the latest budget figures. It is important that you follow these instructions.

They have been designed to give all clients an equal opportunity to access the maximum amount of 2007 tax credits available.

Please ensure that the e-mail address being used is accurate and is being monitored on a regular basis.

If you have any questions regarding these procedures, please send your questions by e-mail or phone the POD at 1-800-665-6597.

As further evidence of our British Columbia’s strong business environment I wish to advise that the 2007 program budget for VCC/EBC single year allocations under the Equity Capital Program and Community Venture Capital Program are effectively sold out.

Therefore, under Section 29.1 of the Small Business Venture Capital Act, all unused equity authorizations under these two program budgets are hereby rescinded effective immediately 12:30pm, June 26, 2007.

Any funds raised after this time will not be eligible for tax credits.

This does not apply to those Program Registrants who are authorized to raise funds under the New Media Venture Capital Program.

The final deadline to submit outstanding signed Share Purchase Reports to the Investment Capital Branch is 9:00am Wednesday, June 27, 2007. Documents can be submitted via fax (250 9520371) or emailed to your Portfolio Manager, who will confirm receipt.

We are now accepting "Additional Equity Applications" for the 2008 program year. 

Due to the success of our office's programs again this year, as can be seen by the graph below, we are rapidly achieving budget capacity for single year allocations granted for 2007 in the Community Venture Capital and Equity Capital program budgets. In anticipation of achieving budget capacity, our office has established the following procedures:

1. The website will be updated daily with the latest budget figures.

2. When budget capacity has been reached an email broadcast will be sent to advise all program registrants.

3. The email broadcast will also indicate that all program registrants have a period of time to send in share purchase reports not previously submitted.  This period may be less than 24 hours and will probably be no more than 36 hours.

4. During this time period share purchase reports will be accepted by either fax or email based on the time of receipt on a first-come-first-serve basis.

5. It is the company's (not the individual investor's) responsibility to send in share purchase reports.

6. Receipt of share purchase reports will be confirmed by your portfolio manager.

7. Any share purchase reports received during this period of time but after budget capacity has been fully allocated will be put on a waitlist for further review.

8. Applications for additional equity authorizations to commence on January 1, 2008 will be accepted upon budget closeout for 2007.

Please ensure that the e-mail address being used is accurate and is being monitored on a regular basis.  If you have any questions regarding these procedures please send your questions by e-mail.

I would like to thank all of our VCC and EBC registrants who submitted their Share Purchase Reports in time for the March 1 deadline. Based on your robust fundraising in the first quarter, I am happy to report the 2006 tax credit budget was fully allocated. My staff are currently processing the remaining Tax Credit Applications and I expect that your investors will receive their 2006 tax credits shortly.

Today is our first update on the status of 2007 fundraising. Everyone is encouraged to monitor the tax credit budget link frequently and keep up to date with fundraising. We intend on publishing the status of the tax credit budgets, based on Share Purchase Reports we receive on the 15th of each month. In order to provide you with the most current information available, we may increase this frequency to bi-monthly or weekly as the tax credit budgets near completion.

Note: To all registrants who hold an equity authorization under the Community Venture Capital Program Budget, you will notice that the Community Budget is now 79% sold out. If the Community Budget sells out and tax credits are still available under the Equity Capital Budget, every registrant with an authorization under the Community Budget will automatically roll over in to the Equity Capital Budget. For more information on how the tax credit budgets work, please visit our questions and answers page.

Alan Thomson
Administrator
Small Business Venture Capital Act

Based on client reportings to date, the 2006 Tax Credit Budget may not be fully utilized. Unfortunately, at this time we are unable to quantify the exact amount of the unused portion.

In the interest of fully utilizing the Tax Credit Budget we are offering Program Registrants an opportunity to provide your investors with a 2006 tax credit instead of a 2007 tax credit – with conditions.

Any unused 2006 tax credits may be allocated to equity capital raised based on the date and time the Share Purchase Reports (SPR) is received by our office on a “first come first serve” basis. To qualify for the 2006 tax credits the EBC/VCC must:

• have an authorization letter to raise equity capital dated on or after January 15, 2007,
• submit by fax or email SPR by March 2, 2007,
• confirm that the funds have been deposited in the EBC/VCC‘s bank or the lawyers trust account prior to March 2, 2007, and
• confirm that the share will be issued within 30 days.

Please note that SPRs already received and those received prior to March 1, 2007, with confirmation that funds have been deposited will be automatically listed as applicants for the 2006 Tax Credits.

By March 15, 2007 we will inform those Program Registrants who submitted SPRs whether or not 2006 tax credits will be issued. At that time we will request that a Tax Credit Application be submitted for these SPRs. Please be aware that the issuance of these Tax Credit Certificates may be delayed until April 15, 2007 depending on the number of applications that are received.

This notice should not be considered as a guarantee that 2006 tax credits will be issued to your investors. As such you should take every effort in communication with investors to insure they understand their investment may not qualify for a 2006 tax credit.

Please contact your portfolio manager if you have any questions.

Regards,

Alan Thomson
Administrator
Small Business Venture Capital Act

January 2007
VENTURE CAPITAL PROGRAMS - STREAMLINING

As we begin another fund-raising season, I would like to inform you of some streamlining changes that we have made over the past several months to reduce the amount of paperwork and "red tape" involved in the administration of our venture capital programs.  I would also like to thank you for your patience -- high program demand impacted on our ability to issue 2007 authorizations on January 1, 2007. Authorizations have now been issued.

Over the past year, we have heard from you that there are high administrative and compliance costs associated with the Province’s venture capital programs. You have raised concerns regarding:

• access to capital and program waitlists,
• the duplication of effort where multiple investors are investing in a business, and
• the number of incomprehensible calculations in our forms and the massive amounts of supporting information that must be submitted.

Our streamlining initiative is focused on addressing the concerns you’ve raised by:

• eliminating administrative formalities that are no longer needed,
• streamlining and simplifying those that are needed, and
• improving the transparency of their application.

So, we’ve eliminated obsolete and duplicate forms, simplified or eliminated complex and/or irrelevant practices, and significantly reduced the amount of documentation that is required to be submitted by you. For details and instructions associated with our streamlining changes please visit our website.

We have also re-designed our website to provide you with more timely and relevant information. We hope that the interactive nature of our web pages and the resources that we have highlighted for you will be of use as you raise capital for your innovative ideas and businesses. Let us know if you found it helpful and what we can do to improve it.

Don’t forget to visit the website often for the latest update on tax credit availability.

Thank you,

November 14, 2006
Venture Capital Programs - 2007 Update from the Administrator

Thank you for making 2006 the most successful year ever for raising capital under the Small Business Venture Capital Act. This year, Eligible Business Corporations and Venture Capital Corporations like yours raised the maximum $44 million from investors under single-year equity authorizations. As you know, the tax credits were spent in record time.

In the coming months, your Portfolio Manager will be busy issuing over $13 million in tax credits to eligible investors. To assist us, please submit your Tax Credit Application as soon as possible. The deadline for these is January 31, 2007.

In anticipation of another record setting year, we are improving the way we allocate the 2007 tax credit budget. As a start, all qualifying registrants who apply for a 2007 equity allocation and who submit their Additional Equity Application on or before December 1, 2006 will receive confirmation of their 2007 allocation by January 1, 2007. For applications received after December 1, we will make every effort to confirm your allocation as soon as possible.

To ensure that all registrants have the opportunity to raise capital from investors, we will continue to process new registration applications and requests for additional equity authorizations throughout the year. As in past years, the amount authorized to all program registrants will exceed the program's budget to allow as many registrants as possible to participate in the program and all unused equity authorizations will be rescinded once the tax credits are exhausted.

Your Portfolio Manager will continue to work with you to ensure that allocations are reasonable and program dollars are used effectively. In addition, we are planning improvements to our website - www.equitycapital.gov.bc.ca - to help you, and your investors, monitor the availability of tax credits as the year progresses.

Looking forward, our staff will work diligently to ensure that this program continues to make a positive contribution to the growth of innovative small businesses in British Columbia.

Thank you,

Sylvia Selig
Administrator
Small Business Venture Capital Act

October 26, 2006
Venture Capital Programs - Annual Tax Credit Budget

Please be advised that the 2006 program budget for VCC/EBC single year allocations is effectively sold out.

Therefore, under Section 29.1 of the Small Business Venture Capital Act, all unused equity authorizations are hereby rescinded effective immediately 12:00pm, October 26, 2006.

The final deadline to submit outstanding signed Share Purchase Reports or Central Securities Registers to the Investment Capital Branch is 2:00pm Friday, October 27, 2006. Documents can be submitted via fax (250-952-0371) or emailed to your Portfolio Manager, who will confirm receipt.

In anticipation of another robust fund-raising year, we are now accepting "Additional Equity Applications" for the 2007 program year.