Slush

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 …

Peter Vesterbacka, one of the founders of Angry Birds mobile game and the biggest technology conference in north Europe – Slush, will visit Tartu from 03-04. October. The purpose of the two day visit is to introduce new educational and business opportunities to Tartu start-up community and local entrepreneurs, and to increase regional cooperation between Finland and Estonia. Peter Vesterbacka …

Every year, EIT Climate-KIC hosts the Climate Impact Battle at Slush. 30 pre-selected startups pitch the first day of the event. Only six makes it to the final on the last day of Slush. This year, the six finalists challenged climate change from a broad spectrum of solutions ranging from tiny insects to large-scale construction. Irish company Hexafly takes low-value …

The startup company Meet Frank is expanding its new recruitment app concept to the Nordic countries and other European markets. The service has become a major recruiter for top talent in Finland and Estonia’s tech job markets within a few months of launch.  At Slush 2017, one in four attendees signed up for Meet Frank. Meet Frank is a mobile-based …

With growth numbers surpassing 3000% over the last four years, a Finnish Nokia spin-off won the 13th Deloitte Technology Fast 50 at Slush 2017. Some new trends had snuck into the yearly list of the Technology Fast 50 that Deloitte and OP Financial Group announced at Slush at the beginning of December. The growth percentage in the top 3 had …

From extending battery life to make value out of wood waste, ten cleantech startups pitched their ideas to tackle the climate crisis at this year’s Slush. This year’s Slush was all about changemakers and the oncoming sustainable revolution. While a lot of startups attending the two-day conference had the potential of making a change, ten cleantech startups were selected to …

At the end of this month at the Slush conference in Helsinki, the Danish startup Valuer.ai will be launching its new platform. Their new matchmaking tool will connect corporations and investors to the startups that best match their needs and interests. Valuer was founded in February this year by Daniel Laursen, previously founder of Trendsonline, Dennis Poulsen, former co-founder of …

Do you want to build a successful hackathon team? Meet five Ultrahack teams and learn how it’s done! Hackathons are often considered as a playground for developers, but even the most brilliant execution is not enough: the concept and how you validate your solution are equally important. And without a proper pitch, the judges and investors might not to see the …

Slush, the largest startup event in the Nordics, took place in the “death month” of November in Helsinki. With over 15,000 attendees comprising 1,700 startups, the array of new companies and technologies can be dizzying.  From the SLUSH 100  pitching competition to the 240 demo booths, here are 5 startups that caught our eye.   FairStart FairStart is a startup …

Slush is finished and if you’re anything like most people you felt overwhelmed by the sheer number of possibilities: from exciting startups and world-famous experts, to inspiring talks and promising parties. So where should you focus your time to get the most out of it next time around? Last week I set out to find the best practical advice to …

November weekend in Helsinki for most of us doesn’t sound like the time of our lives – it’s dark, cold and windy in the seaside city. To make matters worse, the Finnish word for November, Marraskuu, by it’s etymological meaning means the month of death, marras origin from the same word family as Latins mors and French’s mort, death – …

In the startup world the role of an investor is to take “capital off the table”. This means that an entrepreneur can focus on delivering the product, without constantly needing to worry about resources. One of the promises of basic income is to do just that, not only for entrepreneurs but for all of us. But that’s only the beginning. …

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 …

Known for its technologically innovative startup scene, Estonia has spawned many an international startup successes. The likes of Skype, TransferWise, Pipedrive and GrabCAD have dominated the international news until recently. Now, Greenhouse CI hopes to grow mobile apps from it’s base in Tartu. Estonia’s second largest city, Tartu, is emerging as a startup hub. The locally renowned Garage 48 Hub …

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 …

This week, Forbes released their annual “30 under 30” list of young talent, and 5 Swedes made the cut. The list, which totals 600 people in 20 different categories, is an annual compilation of young global talent.  The categories listed include e-commerce, enterprise tech, gaming, and finance. Although the Nordics (and Europe as a whole) were far outnumbered by the …

Atomico and Slush released a study,“The State of European Tech”, at Slush 2015. The study is the most comprehensive review to date carried out on the European tech community, its tech talent, capital flow, entrepreneurial mindset, and success stories. Niklas Zennström, CEO and co-founder of the investment firm Atomico, co-writers of the report,  spoke at Slush about the big changes …

Finnish ed-tech startup Funzi starts with a premise you may be familiar with – learning on a mobile phone. But their unique focus on emerging markets has people around the world sitting up and taking notice. Funzi is reinventing how learning is delivered – not in terms of content, but in terms of the delivery of learning to the individual. …

Helsinki based Health Operator offers personalized diagnostics and monitoring services to the private health sectors as well as commercially to the public. They were one of the winners of this year’s Nokia Open Innovation Challenge, held at Slush 2015. Imagine going to the bathroom to go about your daily routines, while an array of non-invasive sensors monitors your blood pressure, …

The pitching competition at the massive startup conference Slush is high stakes and high pressure.  After some stressful preparations, I was called onto stage to pitch my start, EdTech Foundry, in front of an audience in hopes of winning an investment. Last night ended on a high note, and I felt ready to pitch. But in the morning, will all …