“What I have been highlighting is that capital inflow to those cities is growing. “It took a lot of time to convince them,” he said. His strategy of investing in companies from the Nordic capitals, removed from the main European hubs, turned up some noses from prospective backers. While raising money for the fund, which started closing deals this year, Tomosaku initially found some resistance. “Everybody focuses on London, Israel, Paris, but they are kind of missing areas that should be attractive to investors, that investors should see carefully,” said Tomosaku Sohara, partner of NordicNinja, a VC firm backed by Japanese blue-chip investors such as carmaker Honda, tech company Panasonic and the Japanese Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), property of the Japanese government. From The Investor Perspectiveįor investors, hunting for good deals in alternative startup spheres tends to pay off since these markets are much less crowded.Įverybody focuses on London, Israel, Paris, but they are kind of missing areas that should be attractive to investors. The capitals of neighboring Baltic countries Latvia and Lithuania lagged behind its closest competitor: Riga and Vilnius bagged just €10.7 million and €165 million, respectively. According to, Tallinn-based startups garnered €207 million in 2018, a very substantial rise from the €57.8 million collected from investors in the previous year. Money has been flowing to the Baltic nation.
Estonian president Kersti Kajulaid even bragged about the country’s four unicorns on Twitter-even though only Bolt kept its headquarters in the capital Tallinn.
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It boasts stories of success such as communications software Skype-whose popularity led eBay to pay $2.5 billion for it in 2005 and later prompted deep-pocketed Microsoft to pay $8.5 billion in 2011-gaming software company Playtech, money transfer app TransferWise, and ride-hailing app Bolt. Startups founded in smaller markets have a higher incentive to focus on scalable businesses, even though they have a higher probability of having to deal with scarcity of talent and hesitant investors.Įstonia, a country of 1.3 million people, has made an effort to present itself as a nation spearheading technological innovation. Portugal And Estoniaĭespite their differences, Portugal and Estonia tell a similar story of how startups founded in smaller markets have a higher incentive to focus on scalable businesses, even though they have a higher probability of having to deal with scarcity of talent and hesitant investors. Both companies were founded, and still keep headquarters, in their countries of origin and intend to keep being so. That is the case of Portugal’s Outsystems and Estonia’s Bolt, which have reached recently the mythical valuation of $1 billion. While the larger countries clearly take the lead, startups from smaller countries not known for their economic and financial firepower still manage to attract large volumes of capital that churn out unicorns. In the European tally, the unicorn count is led by the United Kingdom (14 companies), leaving behind Germany (7), Israel (8), and France (5) according to data compiled by Crunchbase News. Visibility and being part of a larger scene where knowledge and experience are abundant and easily reachable seem to make investors more at ease when the time comes to put large sums of cash in a fresh project. Most European unicorns hail from countries with a steady flow of venture capital and easier access to talent.
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