Role and impact of Business Angels in the Italian ecosystem with a focus on Impact investing

This thesis aims at understanding the presence and the impact of Business Angels in the Italian ecosystem. In the first part, a literature analysis was performed, investigating the importance and the different types of Business Angels, categorizing them according to their investment experience as Business Angels, the additional services they provide to the investees and the type of firms they invest in. Furthermore, the appearance of forms of aggregation of Angels such as Business Angels Groups, Networks and Platforms and the investment process of the Angels were further explored. Additionally, throughout all the thesis, particular attention was paid to Impact investing and a deep dive on Impact-oriented and Hybrid Angels has been carried out. The research, conducted by the team of the Social Innovation Monitor (SIM), led to identifying the population of Business Angels in Italy and, thanks to the creation and submission of a questionnaire, to identify a statistically significant sample that was then analysed. The analysis performed on the data obtained allowed to extract relevant data on Business Angels, spacing from the demographics, the investing preferences of the Business Angels for example taking into consideration the minimum IRR accepted or the favourite sectors to invest in, the number of startups funded and the amount of money provided. Finally, a comparison with panel data from last year was performed to identify relevant trends.