International

Ultrahack 2016, which launched at the beginning of June, invites participants to compete for more than 1 million euro investments plus other significant prizes. The investments will be awarded by Nestholma in cooperation with Ultrahack, surpassing previous investments in hackathons in Finland. The best teams have also an opportunity to meet FiBAN (Finnish Business Angels Network) investors after the finals. …

The UK and Singapore regulators are joining forces to form a so-called “fintech bridge” in a bid to both bolster Singapore’s fintech credentials and strengthen UK links to Asia.  The Nordics, which are competing with Singapore to become the next fintech hub, will surely be left in the dust. In a joint statement with the UKs Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) …

Triin Kask, co-founder and CMO/CFO of Estonian based Greenhouse CI, profiled earlier on Nordic Startup Bits, took the stage at infoShare 2016 to share her experience in handling organizational crisis in different growth stages and how founders must stay humble in the face of exponential growth, which creates crisis and turbulence for a company.  Triin’s talk was based on Larry …

“There are 2 main views, both well qualified.  One is the venture capital situation in the US, which says that VCs do much more than provide capital – they help companies grow.  Another view is that more than 95% of VCs add 0 value to companies, and perhaps 70 or 80% add negative value.” This is how Bakhrom Ibragimov of …

Peak, the successful UK-based brain training app, backed in part by Creandum, has launched in Norway, Denmark, and Sweden with localised versions to the native languages of each country. Peak is the app that trains your cognitive function with challenging and fun games, exercising skills such as memory, focus, attention, problem solving, and mental agility. They also offer non-traditional games …

Startup Fest Europe takes place in the Netherlands from 24 – 28 May and aims to bring the world together and help startups grow faster. With more than 28 events will take place in 14 cities across 5 days, Netherlands will transform into the center of the global startup community. These are the hard facts. The real fun is to …

I had the great pleasure of paying a week long visit to South By South West (SXSW) in Austin, Texas in May 2016. My first thoughts on scene were that the interesting mixture of music, film and interactive events created a relaxed environment for people to present their companies and find common goals in their future business. By Kaius Meskanen, …

Many of the world’s most successful companies and organizations are building open innovation platforms and communities and repositioning their brands as part of a global innovation network. As part of Crowdsourcing Week, April 11-15th,  Roland Harwood, co-founder and managing director of 100%Open, shares his tips on how to build your own open innovation ecosystem. By Roland Harwood Building on some …

This coming weekend, 15-17th April, the 7th Startup Weekend Helsinki comes to town. To “Launch a Startup in 54 hours” is the opportunity. Kicking-off on Friday evening, designers, developers, and innovators will pitch ideas to the crowd, form teams and build amazing startups over the course of the weekend. Results will be presented late on Sunday to an expectant crowd, …

Lemonsqueeze helps European startups scale into the US market from their offices in Brooklyn.  Now, the company will be expanding internationally themselves – back to founder Mik Strøyberg’s home country, Denmark, and much more.  For the first time, local startups will have access to Lemonsqueeze’s specialized knowledge in reaching outside of their home market. While the Nordics are one of …

Reshopper helps families to recycle items such as clothes through their platform, which joins local buyers and sellers.  Now, former AirBnB manager Aja Guldhammer Henderson has joined Reshopper to help them flourish abroad. For last four years, 31-year-old Aja Guldhammer Henderson has been a key figure behind the sharing economy-success of AirBNB in Scandinavia and the Netherlands.  She has now …

As Money2020 Europe, the largest fintech event in Europe, winds down this week, we take a deeper look at what makes a successful fintech hub.  The Nordics are competing for the mantle of best fintech ecosystem. Should London, the current frontrunner, be worried? The UK currently occupies one of the top positions within fintech hubs, but they cannot afford to …

As London continues to gain dominance as the undisputed fintech capital of Europe, we look at some of the contributing factors for this success and what lessons aspiring fintech cities can learn from their example. The UK fintech sector accounted for more than £6.6 billion in revenue in 2015 and attracted over £520 million in investment over the same period. …

SV House TV, aiming to help startups from all over the world learn the learn the know-how, mindset, and culture of Silicon Valley, hosted a Corporate Investor Panel to discuss the hottest investments in 2016. The investors pinpointed mobile technologies and Internet of Things (IoT) as the hottest investments in 2016, and discussed the role of big corporations in the …

Ever thought on working abroad? Taking a Jobbatical? Teleporting yourself to a new country? That’s something Erik did when he came all the way from LA to work at Startup Wise Guys in Estonia. This happened in March 2014. For two years, he was living in Tallinn, Estonia. Having great time and working at Startup Wise Guys accelerator. But now …

Technology has undoubtedly changed the way we live our lives. It’s changed our social habits, it’s changed our relationships and it’s changed the way we access information, and of course the sheer amount of that information. If my 40-year-old self could revisit my 16-year-old self and present him with the latest iPhone, or the even more advanced Microsoft Lumia 950 …

The “tech startup ecosystem” Livit, which operates internationally,  focuses strongly on international talent. Why? To get the best educated employees, gain local insights on specific countries, be able to communicate fluently with international customers – and have the most dedicated employees. Livit has a combined 100 employees in 5 offices worldwide; Bandung in Indonesia, Copenhagen, Zurich, Switzerland, Ukraine and Bali.  …

Earlier this month, a #nordicmade delegation of 30 Nordic startups attended the LAUNCH Festival in San Francisco.  The tour, organized by STARTNordic, was part of an initiative that promotes the Nordic startup scene by connecting it to other startup ecosystems around the globe.  Juraj Pal of Sure gives a recap of the festival. Juraj Pal is a founder of Sure, …

For years, it’s been a norm that sending something in long distance means going to a post office or using Fedex-like businesses. Shipitwise is here to change the way people experience logistics. Sander Gansen writes about their path to success from Garage48, the largest startup hub in Estonia. By Sander Gansen On average, the complete process to send something long …

The phenomenon of innovations from the emerging world making great impact in developed markets, popularly known as “reverse innovation”,  has been keenly observed since the 80’s. Read on to learn which trends in fintech from emerging economies gaining traction in the developed world. Reverse innovation is generally a response to global MNCs falling short of fulfilling the market needs in …