It is a relatively nascent segment within the broader fintech sector, but investments in insurance-tech have soared in the first quarter of 2016.  Is insurance-tech the next big thing? According to CB Insights, the first quarter of 2016 saw early stage investments break all previous records for the same period in previous years.  Over $55 million has been invested in …

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, …

Media Honeypot, a “reverse pitching” event for startups and the traditional media industry, was held in Helsinki on April 6, 2016. I sat down with organizers Heikki “Hegu” Rotko, a long time media executive professional and Dmitri Sarle & Jan Ameri from Arctic Startup. Heikki  was recently at SXSW with me as part of the Team Finland Nordic Lighthouse program, …

Adjacent to the Helsinki University’s Department of Teacher Education, housed at the same University campus that once hosted Finland’s first particle accelerator, xEdu is firing up the first ed-tech accelerator for startups in Northern Europe. The education system in Finland has famously high rankings in world education polls.  While it might seem like Finland’s crown jewel should not be tampered …

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 …

Want to help shape the future of green cities and create sustainable solutions to climate challenges on a regional level? Join the Nordic Cities Workshop, held in Malmö, Sweden from the 28-29th of April, 2016. Climate-KIC works to create consistency between private, public, and academic initiatives on climate change. Their goal is to find solutions to environmental challenges through cooperation …

Across the Nordic region, schools are looking to use ed-tech solutions to create a more individualized educational experience for students through adaptive and interactive learning, and help teachers better manage their classrooms.  While ed-tech companies rush to fill this need, it is worth remembering that it takes more than hardware to make adaptive and interactive learning a success. Ed-tech has …

Doubling each year over recent years, Crowdfunding has seen dynamic growth from $2.7 billion in 2012, to an expected level greater than $34 billion for last year 2015.  In the Nordics, crowdfunding continues to gain legitimacy, with Finland-based Invesdor becoming the first crowdfunding platform to be granted a MiFID license, which legitimizes the companies ability to do business across Europe. …

Trip Republic, the Helsinki-based startup based on travel planning and booking, has just secured a €200,000 round,  bringing their total funding amount since starting to €325,000. The startup was featured earlier this year at Travel Technology Europe  in London, where they were the sole Nordic company nominated for the prestigious Travel Technology Disrupt Award. The funding will be used to …

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 …

Live from Media Honeypot: I visited the deal room just before lunchtime and talked to Tuomas Maisala from Spinno, who was tasked with overseeing the matchmaking process. Though busy, the large room was running like clockwork.  Tuomas has years of experience under his belt arranging such events and whilst it was mainly an automated process, it still required talented human …

EzyInsights, a Finnish startup that has developed a social media analytics tool aimed at content providers, has launched a new product, the “SoMe Index”, at Media Honeypot 2016. The SoMe Index streamlines how content is accesses across all of the main social media platforms by finding the most relevant content to increase organic traffic. Duane Atkins from Ezyinsights hit the …