Interview

This piece is part of the Slush Chronicles series, “Founders Unplugged,” where we interview founders and key personnel of innovative companies, to hear their thoughts on the event we’re attending or dive into other spontaneously chosen topics. Slush 2024 founder: Jukka Tuhkanen, HIIL I ran into Jukka Tuhkanen, Director of Sales and Partnerships from Hiil, a wood “startup” transforming waste …

In the era of AI, Hunome talks mostly about HI   So, at Arctic15 we met many AI companies, and then we met Hunome, more into Human Intelligence, HI, and especially for Collective Sensemaking.  With that, and a bit wider purpose statement of “helping humanity make sense of itself”, I had a pleasure to talk to Dominique  & Mika  from …

At a sizable booth, Samar Malik was promoting SAP for startups, emphasizing the company’s wealth of knowledge and expertise. It marked her inaugural attendance at Slush, where she commended the event and its arrangements. However, the genuine slush and sleet outdoors left the London resident a bit hesitant. Sami Vuorenmaa recently established his consultancy, Clarinum Insights, which focuses on helping …

Slush mainstage acted as a platform for company launches and product announcements, and the Media Area right behind the stage had instant Q&A session with the launchers and announcers. What a great concept, hoping this would cover even more of the speakers. One of the launches was Starstuff, that came out of the stealth mode with bells, whistles, Hanna and …

  At the Slush startup event in Helsinki, Nico Rosberg, the 2016 Formula 1 World Champion, revealed what led him to pass by a lucrative contract extension in the pinnacle of motorsport and transition into an investor. – Nice to be back to my roots, said the 38-year-old to the extensive audience. By a fireside chat with Robert Lacher, the …

As an event, Slush succeeds to impress all the attendees, even those Teflon-surfaced veterans, who have many previous Slushes on their belt. So it is no wonder, that the first-timers are generally astonished what comes to the atmosphere, solid arrangements, and the solid flux of meeting interesting people, especially  new ones. Deirdre Mc Gettrick from U.K. was attending Slush to …

Mbegu Solar AB was founded in 2020 and its team is based in Stockholm, Lund and Nairobi. They bring solar products in a completely new format to the East African market and target micro-entrepreneurs as opposed to the end consumer. Solar products are already widely available all over the world for off grid electricity, but Mbegu Solar states this is …

This month, the first VC in the Nordics focusing purely on startups with a background in deeptech and science launched.  Headed by serial entrepreneur Inka Mero, Voima Ventures targeting a final closing of €50 million and has already announced commitments at €40 million. The fund’s press release states that their mission is to build a strong bridge between the scientific …

PINC is Paulig Group’s corporate venture capital unit. We sat down with the head of PINC, Marika King, for a Q&A to learn more about their investment thesis and how they’re shaping the future of taste. What is PINC? PINC stands for Paulig Incubator and is the innovation and venture arm for radical innovation within the Paulig Group. We were …

Nordic Startup Bits sat down for an interesting talk about the foodtech startup scene at SLUSH in December with Accelerace’s Investment Manager, Business Accelerator and Head of Venture Scouting Martin Holmboe. Accelerace is the Nordics’ leading startup accelerator and pioneering in the corporate – startup matchmaking space. Martin has many years of experience as a food entrepreneur and we were …

This year at Slush – one of Europe’s largest tech summits, Nordic Startup Bits wanted to take a closer look at some interesting FoodTech startups. We met one of the most exciting entrepreneurs in this scene, Martti Paatela, a former rocket scientist and now CEO and co-founder of the Finish FoodTech startup Epic Foods. According to a report launched in …

Husky is a Belgian startup, designed to bundle marketers’ needs in one digital tool. It is made by marketers, for marketers. A digital platform like Husky allows you to plan and organize quickly. Managing tasks, projects and communication gets easier. In a recent talk, CEO Peter Desmyttere explains what he learned from the Nordic startup culture. By Robbe Desmyttere “To …

As Norway tops quality of life and gender equality indexes consistently, it is no surprise that more and more women are looking to leave Silicon Valley – and the bro-culture that dominates the valley- behind for beautiful fjords and generous paternal leave.  We interview 4 women who took the plunge and embraced the Nordic lifestyle. “I have been here three …

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, …

The Redefining School program, which covered the challenges of education, was featured at Slush 2015. Among the speakers was Saku Tuominen, CEO and Co-Founder of Scool. Scool aims to find the best practices in education and share all the insights and know-how with the world, for free. As Tuominen said in his speech at Slush, the challenges of future education …

Juwan Lee has spent over 30 years working around the world in financial services, before leaving money management to create NexChange, a global social network for the financial services industry. Armed with in-depth experience from the worlds major financial capitals, he shares his insights for the Nordic countries. Fintech, such as electronic finance, digital wallets, and cryptocurrencies, are changing the …

We caught up with  Juha Huttunen, co-founder of Vibecatch, and asked him a few questions about how to improve company culture – and profitability – with 15 questions. How did you come up with the idea for Vibecatch? We originally worked for a software company and wanted to measure, internally, how satisfied the employees were with the company and their …

BreedReply is an accelerator focused solely on IoT (Internet of Things) early stage startups in Europe and the US started byReply, a consulting, systems integration and digital services company. Similar accelerators  such as Startupbootcamp IoT & Data and HAXLR8R are organized around varied sponsors in the public and private sector. Breed’s offer is a 12 month “bespoke” incubation period, where …

Imagine using your phone to discover new sustainable businesses and services. But wait – anyone can do that, if they have internet connection.  But what about just by texting?  SURE. Sure is a startup that allows you to be more sustainable by using Artificial Intelligence (AI). It is not an app – it’s a local number. You simply text Sure, …

They have a mission to strengthen and equip the city of Aarhus’ music industry for the great challenges the music scene faces. As a meeting point for skills, networking and production, Promus is the first of its kind in Denmark. Since 2010, Promus has functioned as a community and networking center for both the music industry and musicians in Denmark. …