By Pasi Tasanen, CEO and Founder
From DVD to accounting
“I started my first business during my matriculation leave in 2001. The company was an online shop for dvd movies. I decided to learn how to keep accounts and manage my company’s bookkeeping myself. I found it interesting to learn accounting. It must have been about a year or so when a friend of mine asked me if you could do his accounts too. I accepted the challenge and started my own accountancy business. Clients gradually started to come from friends, but for years the accountancy business was a sideline.
The e-commerce business was not a success and I stopped after a few years. I learned a lot of things that have been useful later on. I set up my first limited company in 2004. I did a variety of odd jobs through the company and, on the side, I ran an accountancy business.
“I sold my stake in Biisoni and focused entirely on the Valjas as a business.”
Pasi Tasanen
In the summer of 2006, a couple of people I knew set up Biisoni Oy. They started from scratch in the recruitment and staffing business. I was asked to join the company as an outsourced finance manager. Things got off to a good start and within a few months it was clear that there was a full-time job to be done. I joined Biison’s payroll and bought shares in the company. I continued the accountancy business on the side as an evening job. At some point there were too many clients for evening work and I sold the accountancy business to Biison. The finance team handled my own team’s affairs and external clients.
Along the way, I became very familiar with the world of collective agreements and payroll administration. Over the next nine years, we grew Biison into a group of six companies, making a few acquisitions and setting up new offices. Our turnover grew to over €7 million and we employed 250 temporary workers every day.
An interesting sector in transition
In the summer of 2014, the idea to start Valjas was born with Lari and Iiro Christensen. Lari was also my partner at Biisoni. We founded Valjas in January 2015. We bought Biisoni’s accountancy business and started to grow Valjas. I sold my stake in Biisoni and focused entirely on Valjas’s business. Along the way, Lari and Iiro had an opportunity outside Valjas that was not worth turning down and they moved on to other roles.
The accounting industry is at an interesting stage. Automation is changing the way we work and making things more efficient. Today, we still handle a lot of financial management routines by humans; in the future, automation and artificial intelligence will do some of this work. People are no longer willing to pay for a rearview mirror of the past. Interpreting numbers and giving advice will continue to be tasks that need people. The experience and insight of an entrepreneur is also something I can share with my clients.
I believe that with our good team and extensive expertise, Valjas will continue to be the most agile accounting firm on the market.”
