The Swedish-American Chamber of Commerce’s magazine Current goes online in a move to increase transatlantic business relations and fight the troubled ad market.

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On Monday the Swedish-American Chamber of Commerce in USA, the second largest European Chamber of Commerce in the United States with 19 regional chambers across the country, launched a news website covering Swedish-American business, Currents Online.

“We built it on a shoestring budget, but I think it will quickly grow into an important news and feature site for the Swedish-American business community”, said Hans Sandberg, editor of the print and web editions.

More than 27,000 Swedish and American professionals read the magazine. But the financial crisis and declining ad revenues forced the editor to think outside the box.

“The last two years have been really hard for our advertisers and for us, but I believe that we now can see the light at the end of the tunnel. It was under the tremendous pressure from the weak ad market that we started to discuss building a website for Currents”, Hans Sandberg said.

At the same time the chamber launches a new online directory of companies specializing in helping Swedish companies do business in the U.S. It now contains some 1,500 companies.

The chamber will continue with a 24 page magazine while at the same time launching the web edition.

"It’s hard to overstate the role Currents plays for the Swedish-American business community and the SACC-USA-network. Currents Online and SACC-USA's new website will make it easier to do business with America, and help Americans find and work with Swedish companies.”, Gunilla Girardo, President, SACC-USA said.