Tore Tolke
Investment Director
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- Full Name
- Rolf Tore Tolke
- Title
- Senior Investment Director
- Firm
- Industrifonden (Stiftelsen Industrifonden)
- Firm Type
- Venture Capital — government-established, evergreen investment foundation (not an angel investor)
- Investment Stage
- Seed to Series A (occasionally pre-seed / earlier), with follow-on into growth
- Check Size
- First investment typically SEK 10–50 million (~€1–5M), with capacity to invest significantly more over a company's lifetime
- Target Company Profile
- Technology-driven Nordic companies with transformative, defensible technology and long-term scale potential
- Sector Focus
- B2B Software, Transformative Tech, Digitalization, Telecom & IoT, Consumer/Lifestyle, Retail (Industrifonden overall also spans Deep Tech and Life Science)
- Geographic Focus
- Sweden and the Nordics
- Location
- Stockholm, Sweden
Background
Tore Tolke is a Senior Investment Director at Industrifonden, Sweden's evergreen venture capital foundation, which he joined in 2007. He has been working with investments from seed through growth stage since 1998. He began his career in banking and also built extensive experience in the retail industry before moving fully into venture capital. Prior to Industrifonden he held investment roles at the Swedish VC funds Småföretagsinvest and Fylkinvest. He holds a Master's degree in International Business from Stockholm University.
At Industrifonden, Tolke's focus has been on transformational technology and digitalization, spanning B2B software, consumer/lifestyle, telecom and IoT, and retail. He brings more than two decades of venture experience across a wide range of industries, including deep exposure to the industrial sector. Notable exit processes he has been involved in include Airec (sold to Alfa Laval) and Powerbox (sold to Japan's Cosel).
Industrifonden itself was established by the Swedish government in 1979 as an independent foundation and today manages roughly USD 600 million in an evergreen structure — meaning it is not under pressure to return capital on a fixed fund cycle and can back companies over long horizons. Tolke operates within this mandate, taking active board roles in portfolio companies (he has served as a board member at companies including Micvac, Nextory, and Footway).
Investment Thesis & Focus
- Invests primarily at seed to Series A in Nordic (mostly Swedish) technology companies, with first checks generally in the SEK 10–50M range and follow-on capacity for later rounds.
- Thematic focus on transformative technology and digitalization — B2B software, telecom/IoT, consumer and lifestyle brands, and retail/e-commerce.
- Backs companies with genuinely differentiated, industry-challenging models; commenting on the Telness Tech round, he highlighted the company's "industry-challenging approach" to a legacy market (telecom).
- Benefits from Industrifonden's evergreen structure, which supports patient, long-term ownership rather than fixed-cycle exits.
- Takes an active, hands-on ownership style, typically joining boards of portfolio companies.
Notable Investments
- Telness / Telness Tech — Swedish B2B telecom-as-a-service startup; Industrifonden led the €8.5M Series A (announced June 2022) with Tolke commenting on the deal.
- Nextory — Swedish audiobook/e-book subscription platform; Tolke has served as a board member.
- Soundtrack Your Brand — B2B background-music service (spun out of Spotify) offering a licensed commercial catalog of tens of millions of songs for businesses.
- Footway — Nordic online footwear/e-commerce group; Tolke has held a board role.
- Micvac — Swedish food-tech company (in-pack cook-and-pasteurize technology); Tolke board member.
- Apica — monitoring / application performance and load-testing software.
- Digip — digital IP / trademark management platform.
- Detail Online — e-commerce/retail digital-shelf analytics.
- Airec — industrial heat-exchanger company; exit to Alfa Laval.
- Powerbox — power-supply manufacturer; exit to Cosel (Japan).
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