Tallinn, Riga, Vilnius, Helsinki - We Have A Problem
Allan Martinson, one of the most best known and experienced investors from Estonia (currently the founding and managing partner of MTVP), has cast concern about the amount of new accelerators and different support programs for startups. He states a valid point, that if every town and your brother has an accelerator they will fail to attract critical mass to support their functions. Martinson states that Baltics really need one big accelerator with strong financing and a strong team to make a splash in the global pond of startup activities.
There really cannot be too much discussion around this topic, and therefore we have included Allan Martinson's original statement from his public Facebook status below.
DealDash Recruiting Talent With Strong Growth And $1M Investment
Our January's recruiting partner is DealDash, a Helsinki, Finland based startup. They operate a "gamified" shopping site that we've been covering recently. Back in October we covered their growth in quite a bit of detail, but we're very happy to report that this growth has further continued and seems to continue into the future. To fuel this, they of course require the best of talent that is out there.
Currently DealDash is looking for front-end developers. If you've got your doubts about the financials of this particular startup, you need not worry.
Wishbhone Is A Tangle Free Way To Store Headphones
We stick to digital startups here at ArcticStartup, but we're not afraid to wander if something catches our eye. A new project on KickStarter has done just that: a couple of guys from Helsinki have created Wishbhone, a clever piece of plastic that allows you to actually store your headphones without them turning into the strongest, most complicated knot known to man. You can receive the product if they reach their goal, and if you donate more than $10 (€7.50).
Future Female + ArcticStartup Pre-Christmas Party December 1st
Mark it down in your calendar - December 1st. That's the day we will be throwing a little pre-Christmas party together with Future Female. The event will take place in Siltanen, Hämeentie 13B here in Helsinki, Finland. The event is expected to kick-off at around 6pm. Even though, the event is free we'd like you to sign-up with a form that will be provided at a later date. To learn more about signing up to the event, join the Future Female facebook page. This is also the first time Future Female events are open for men.
Rovio's Plan: Conquer And Command (In The Good Way)
I managed to grab Peter Vesterbacka for a few minutes at Slush today to talk about how Angry Birds sees the world after 500 million downloads. Basically, there's a lot more out there for them to grab than one would expect - simply looking at them what they've done so far. Everyone knows that the company is looking to grow into an entertainment empire, but in my opinion they're already there. They're not just as big yet, even though they are.
Breaking: Angry Birds Cross 500 Million Downloads
We got an exclusive tip from the Mighty Eagle himself, that Rovio will be announcing something new at this year's Slush. The tip held through, as Mikael Hed, the CEO of the company made the announcement on stage through a video; Angry Birds has now been downloaded more than 500 million times. That's one hell of a milestone.
Only a little over a year ago, the company announced that they will try to reach 100 million downloads in 12 months. How wrong they were (and how crazy we all thought they were).
Richard White At Arctic15
Here's more of our keynote talks at Arctic15 earlier this autumn. Richard White gave one of the fastest, action filled talks I've ever heard. He talked through the story of his past startups, but also how came to found Uservoice.com. A nice coincidence was that Richard White and Steve Huffman both knew each other previously and thus he made quite a few references to Steve Huffman's Reddit along the way as well. More keynote videos and all the startup pitches coming up in the next few weeks.
Bike Baron Tops App Store Charts In 62 Countries, In Less Than A Week
Ok, this is a story I was supposed to write earlier this week. First, when I set out to take some screenshots of the game on my iPad I ended up spending a good 30 minutes with the game before forgetting what I was meant to do. The game is addictive as hell and it's called Bike Baron. It's an iPhone and iPad game from Mountain Sheep (produced together with Qwiboo). It's also understandable why it took a while for Kimmo Vihola, the CEO of Mountain Sheep, to get back to my questions too. The game has shot to the top 1 spot in 62 countries, in less than a week. That's faster than Angry Birds!
DealDash Sees Explosion Of Growth
DealDash filled us in with some exciting numbers that must make the Helsinki/Sunnyvale based "shopping as entertainment" company one of the fastest growing startups coming out of Finland today. CEO William Wolfram tells us during the last 12 months the company has quadrupled its revenue and is operating profitably. And today, DealDash ships more than 10,000 products a month with revenue approaching the 8-figure mark.
Miivies Takes 3D Animation To The Browser And Everyone
Miivies is a new browser based 3D animation service available to consumers. The service enables users to create 3D short animations to portray their message. The offering is very similar to that of xtranormal, an online service that has been used quite a bit on the other side of the pond to create parodies of startup investments that have made circles in the startup ecosystem at least. The service is free, but if users want to share and finalise their projects they will have to purchase rendering tokens.
Three Events To Watch: StartupGarage + Goto Conf + Slush
Every now and then we highlight a few good events people should attend to make the most of their networking, business opportunities or learning new things. There are three good conferences we believe people should watch in the coming month or so. They are Goto Conference organised in Aarhus, Denmark, Slush organised in Helsinki, Finland and StartupGarage -event organised in Tallinn, Estonia. All slightly different, but surely worth your time to check them out if they're of interest to you. Below's a short break down of each event.
Mancx, Graduateland Win At Arctic15
Close to 400 startup enthusiasts from all over the region came together in Helsinki to witness 15 stellar pitches from companies on stage at Arctic15 yesterday. The day was all about winning and despite the hard choice of the jury to pick one winner - all the companies already won, by getting tons of coverage and visibility on stage for their products and services. In addition to this, Amazon Web Services decided to give a substantial amount of credit to all the 15 finalists (we'll contact you directly regarding the details on this).
Arctic15 Week Is Full Of Startup Action
Arctic15 is less than two weeks away. We've worked with multiple different organisations to spice up the week and it seems it's full of interesting startup action for everyone. In this post, we've covered the different events and activities taking place that week. We'll also link to this post from the Arctic15 website and update this accordingly.
Scoopshot Revolutionizes Media Photography
Scoopshot is a service by a Helsinki, Finland based startup PS2 Media Group Inc that changes the way media companies work with photos. It's a lot said, but I'm willing to back it up as a person running a media company myself. In all simplicity, Scoopshot makes smartphone owners photographers for media companies. Users can take newsworthy photos and send them to the service through the Scoopshot mobile app and sell them at a set price. Journalists writing stories can purchase the photos at the price the photographer has set. If they wish to purchase the exclusive right to use the photo, they pay ten times the set price. I talked with Petri Rahja and Jussi Liimatainen about the service and what the company is up to.
Well Done Arctic Valley!
The startup ecosystem in the Arctic Valley (pardon us for our selfish term) hasn't always been a very well functioning one. Not that it is extremely functioning today, we're increasingly getting more evidence that the world is noticing your startups, your efforts and most importantly - your passion to change the world.
This week Wired UK wrote a piece on the hottest startup cities in Europe. Three of the nine startup cities in the outlined story are from the region; Tallinn, Stockholm and Helsinki.
Arctic15 Summer Special Sale Ends August 19th (Or As Long As Tickets Available)
Arctic15 is getting close and we're getting very excited. For a couple of reasons actually. First of all, this will be the biggest event we've pulled together in a long time. In addition to that, we're going to have very high quality startups in the final, not to mention the speakers we have. We're going to announce the last speaker this week, but trust us - it's going to be hot. So for these, and a ton of other reasons - if you're thinking of coming, please book your ticket today. The summer special sale will end August 19th (or as long as tickets are available).
Quick Update On Arctic15
Last night the deadline for Arctic15 startup competition closed. This morning, as I checked the final amount of companies who applied to the competition - my jaw dropped. All in all, 90 companies from the region applied to the competition. While we haven't yet had time to analyze the data on a more detailed level, each country is pretty equally represented in the applications. We'll now dive into analyzing these applications with our secret jury and choose 30 or so companies to compete for a chance to pitch on stage at Arctic15.
Student Tickets For Arctic15
Students ahoy! We've announced instructions and pricing for tickets for full-time students. You can see these instructions from the Arctic15 website as well.
Tickets for full-time students are priced at 79€, including all VATs, fees and what have you. We wanted to get the price down as much as possible and we think 79€ for the show is an excellent bargain.
Rovio Acquires Helsinki Based Animation Studio Kombo
Rovio, the creators of the hugely popular game Angry Birds, have today announced that they have acquired the Helsinki based animation studio Kombo. The acquisition was financed through cash and Rovio stock. The sum was not disclosed. According to the press release, after the acquisition, Kombo will focus solely on Rovio's animation properties.
Nordic And Baltic Startups: Launch At Arctic15!
Is your company still in development mode, but looking to launch a product or a service later this year to the public, or in open beta? How would you like to attract hundreds of influential users to your service while speaking in front of a huge crowd of investors and other opinion leaders? Without sounding too much like a telemarketer, all this is possible if you wish to apply to the Arctic15 competition. All you need to do is fill out this form.
Flow'd Strides Further Into Music Scene
Back in December 2010 we mentioned Digia’s entry into the music scene with a new mobile app called Flow’d. The application enables users to connect with their favorite artists and in doing so, gives artists some nice tools to engage their fans. The app isn’t a new idea but rather an improvement to previous location based applications that adds more value to the existing concept.
Interview With Mohamed El-Fatatry Of Muxlim (Part 1)
We haven't covered Muxlim at ArcticStartup in the way it deserves to be covered. So, what better way to do it than have a talk with the founder and CEO of the company, Mohamed El-Fatatry. El-Fatatry isn't your usual startup founder in Finland. He's of Egyptian background and went on to start the world's largest muslim-oriented site when still in school. Muxlim grew immensely fast in the early days they didn't really have any competition. One of the drivers of their growth can be attributed to excellent media coverage.
Garage48 This Weekend In Riga, Many More To Follow
Garage48 is one of those startup weekend type events, where people gather together for about 48 hours and develop something that could potentially be founded into a startup. The concept isn't all that old, but the people behind it have been active. This weekend Garage48 will take place in Riga and in the coming months, a lot of other cities will also see a Garage48 event take place. In April (15th-17th), Garage48 will take place in Tallinn, at the end of August in Tartu. Later in the year Garage48 will most likely be visiting Stockholm and Helsinki as well. Additionally, the team will have 5 events in Africa this year.
Aalto Venture Garage Launches Startup Sauna
Aalto Venture Garage is launching Startup Sauna, which includes a month long tour around the Baltic rim to promote a new kind of startup acceleration program called Startup Sauna. Startup Sauna is direct continuum to the Summer of Startups program as well as the Bootcamp initiatives the venue organised last year. The program has been put in place to help pre-seed startups succeed through better mentorship of serial entrepreneurs as well as investors. What's best, it's open to all startups from the region.
Making Growth Entrepreneurship Political
Finland will be having its parliamentary this April. Naturally, entrepreneurship and welfare are on the agenda, but one aspect of entrepreneurship that has been missing is the lobbying of growth entrepreneurship. On 21st of March, Aalto ES will be putting together an event together with a whole bunch of organisations to promote growth entrepreneurship for the candidates running for parliament. The event is controversially called Finland Post Welfare.
Duunitori Grew Huge In The Shadows
Duunitori ("job-market square" in English) is a service by the Finland based Skyhood. It's a recruiting service with a few interesting twists and it has gone head on with the traditional household names in the market. However, the most interesting aspect of the service perhaps is that in all quietness, it has become the largest job listing service in Finland, according to Thomas Grönholm, co-founder of Skyhood.
Event Not To Be Missed: Mobile Dev Camp
For the third time ever Mobile Dev Camp will take place on Saturday 26th February in Helsinki, Finland. The event is a special treat for 200+ developers, business people and proud geeks who want to find out the next big thing on mobile. Mobile Dev Camp is known for launching new platforms and products before they are out in the mainstream. For example, at its first event in 2009 the organizers presented Android platform when it was not even out in Finland. Last year Rovio and Windows 7 were the highlights. Back then few people knew about Angry Birds and no Window 7 phones were around. This year Applifier and Samusung Bada will be at the center of attention. On top of that, the event includes a competition for developers to create a simple and fun application for different mobile platforms in 48 hours. Each platform has its own category and a great prize, like a new Wave mobile phone in Samsung's Bada category. Best part: the event is completely free, though you should probably register to let organizers know how many people to expect.
Last Weekend's Experience Called Garage48
Last weekend I took part in a 48-hour event called Garage48. Garage48 is an intensive hackathon where on the final day teams gather to pitch their results. While we've written about these and similar kinds of events before, I thought I should take part this time round to see what the atmosphere is "on the ground". I had to take a day's rest and think about the whole experience and what it means before writing about it.
Garage48 HKI - Live Updates Through The Weekend
Garage48 Helsinki will take place this weekend in the Aalto Venture Garage, where about a hundred enthusiasts will compete in a friendly manner to build the best business/product -combination in only 48 hours. We'll be bringing you updates through out the weekend and they will be added to this post. Garage48 has originated from Estonia and already two such events have been organised. The reason why Garage48 is worth following so widely, is the cross border effect it has - Estonians, Finns, Latvians, Lithuanians as well as some from the US and UK, all coming together for a weekend to build something great.
ArcticEvening Helsinki Tickets Are Here
Earlier this week we announced the date and setup for our upcoming ArcticEvening in Helsinki. The tickets are now available for free registration below. As a summary, we'll be having presentations from two very interesting speakers and founders of companies on their journey and how they got to where they are now.
The event will be held on 4th of November, from 6pm to 10pm in Korjaamo (Töölönkatu 51), Helsinki. We'll start the event soon after 6pm, so try to be there as early as possible. Thanks to our wonderful sponsors, we're able to offer everyone a complimentary drink upon arrival - so do take a minute to get to know our sponsors as well.
ArcticEvening Helsinki is also the official after party of IBP Camp Helsinki held earlier that day in Korjaamo as well. The day will feature world class speakers, including Andreas Ehn, ex-Spotify and Timo Soininen, CEO of Sulake. Themes of the day handle productization, challenges of the international sales and marketing with scarce resources, building the international team, and successes and failures in internationalization. Highly recommended, if you're in Helsinki for the day as well. For more information, check out the IBP event page.
