Latvian Startup Association Startin.LV

📈 The Baltic VC ecosystem is regaining momentum: We visited KPMG Latvia and Latvian Private Equity and Venture Capital Association (LVCA) to hear the highlights from the Baltic Private Equity and Venture Capital Market Overview 2025: 💰 €749M raised by PE/VC firms in 2025, a major rebound after the difficult 2024 🗺️ 116 active funds across the Baltics 🤝 243 deals involving Baltic companies 💡 ICT (which includes a lot of defencetech) and Energy remained the dominant sectors, while 🧬 Life Sciences saw notable growth For Latvia, investment activity remained rather cautious (€11M invested by Baltic funds), but the outlook ahead looks stronger as the new ALTUM-backed funds Outlast Fund, Buildit VC and BADideas.fund are now entering active deployment phases. Standout success story: Aerones raised €54M, the second-largest VC investment in the Baltics this year - though the investment came from abroad. Particularly interesting insights came from Mik Krams from Trace.Space: 👉 In today’s AI-saturated market, pre-seed rounds are often bets on teams and vision, and less on real traction. 👉 Global investors can sometimes move faster than local ones — and once international investors commit, local confidence follows. 👉 Baltic and European founders are still often far too conservative when pitching to US investors who expect extravagant pitches. 👉 For investor confidence, one strong, recognizable customer can matter more than dozens of smaller logos on your website. You might have missed out on the discussion, but the report is live with a lot of in-depth data - go read it! Of the 1.4B EUR of dry powder held by Baltic fund managers, about 671M is expected to be deployed into Baltic companies soon, and at least 89M of that is planned for Latvia. So, hopefully we’ll see more Latvian startups in local dealflow! 💸

Our partner StartupBlink has published the Global Startup Ecosystem Index 2026, and Latvia continues its steady climb on the global startup map. 🌍 Latvia in the Global Startup Ecosystem Index 2026: 📍Global Rank: #48 (+1) 📍Europe Rank: #28 (+1) 📍Eastern Europe Rank: #10 (=) ⭐An additional positive signal comes from the Innovators Business Environment Index, where Latvia ranks #35 globally, highlighting the country’s strong foundations for innovators to start, operate, and scale businesses. The report notes that these favourable business conditions create further opportunities to accelerate startup ecosystem growth. Latvia remains among the world’s top 50 startup ecosystems, continuing its upward trajectory in Europe and Eastern Europe. While our ambition is to climb even higher, sustainable growth happens step by step, and maintaining this positive momentum is what matters most. These results reflect the collective efforts of Latvia’s startup community and show that we are moving in the right direction together.  📣As highlighted in the report: “Latvia's startup ecosystem is defined by its close-knit community and the organisations that sustain it - from accelerators, networking events and founder programmes to the national startup association. Startup-specific legislation is in place, an employee stock option regime is functional and tax-efficient, and the regulatory environment is founder-friendly. With a growing deep-tech segment, active early-stage VC funds, and a position in Northern Europe, Latvia offers a natural base for cross-border scaling, with a culture of sharing experience and building together.” - Roberts Alhimionoks, CEO, Latvian Startup Association Startin.LV We are also excited to strengthen our collaboration with StartupBlink as an ecosystem partner, continuing to showcase Latvia’s startup ecosystem internationally and supporting its long-term growth and visibility. 🤝 ➡️ Receive the full report here: https://lnkd.in/ghMxkU-y #StartupEcosystem #StartupBlink #Innovation #Startups #Entrepreneurship #Latvia

Still riding yesterday’s Deep Tech Atelier 2026 day 1 energy! ⚡ We were glad to contribute to the conversation at “Investor’s Guide to the Latvian Deep Tech Ecosystem”. While Latvia’s deep tech ecosystem continues to grow and show strong potential, the broader ecosystem discussion is increasingly focused on how to strengthen support and investment mechanisms for science-based startups. Latvian deep tech ecosystem in numbers: 🚀 150+ active startups 👥 1,538 employees (in 2025) 📊 26% of the total startup ecosystem 💶 €149M turnover (in 2024) 🏛️ €35.4M in taxes paid (in 2025) The ecosystem is evolving, and it’s exciting to see more ambitious founders, researchers, investors, and ecosystem players working together to build globally competitive companies. P.S. For those who couldn’t make it yesterday, Deep Tech Atelier 2026 is still ongoing today! And don’t forget to stop by the photo booth for a few pictures too! Great people, sharp conversations, and a lot of exciting energy in one place! #DeepTechAtelier #DeepTech #Innovation #StartupEcosystem #Latvia

The startup ecosystem is learning that building ambitious companies and building families shouldn’t be mutually exclusive. 🌱 That’s why Sorainen and Latvian Startup Association Startin.LV recently released free, open-source parental leave model clause templates for startup shareholder agreements and VC fund limited partnership agreements. Now this conversation is continued by Riga TechGirls in cooperation with Sorainen and Startin.LV at the next Female Founders Lunch. 🚀 📍Topic: Building Families While Building Companies Parental leave in the startup world, the legal side and the human side, all in one afternoon. 📍 19.05.2026 | 15:00–17:00 📍 Sorainen, Rīga ➡️ Get your ticket here: https://lnkd.in/dyxFi8af ➡️ 📄 Check out the templates here: https://lnkd.in/dBcr6WCM Powered by Riga City Council, Riga TechGirls, Sorainen, Latvian Startup Association Startin.LV.

👇 Deeptech Atelier starts tomorrow! If you are new to Latvia's deeptech ecosystem, this side event (on the Fantadroms premises, 14th of May, 15:00) will be a good orientation to find out the stakeholders, see the data, and learn about useful resources.

Big congratulations to our member BirdyChat on launching across Europe! 🚀 BirdyChat has launched in Europe, making the chat app tailored for business messaging available to anyone, including to the waitlist of 50,000 users across Europe and the UK on iOS, Android, and macOS. BirdyChat has also recently raised €1.7M from a group of UK and EU early-stage investors with a track record of backing globally scalable technology companies. “We're incredibly excited to make BirdyChat available to our users in the EEA, the UK, and Switzerland. We're grateful for the 50k people who signed up to our waitlist before we launched.” — Rolands Mesters, Co-founder of BirdyChat We’re proud to see founders from our community building globally scalable products and representing the Latvian startup ecosystem internationally!🌍 #LatvianStartups #StartupEurope #BusinessMessaging #StartupEcosystem

🤔 Want to get a better, data-driven view on Latvia's surging deeptech scene? While with a focus on the investment landscape, this Deeptech Atelier conference side event will be valuable to anyone who wants to base their understanding of Latvia's deeptech ecosystem on real data. Join us at 14th of May 15:00, on-site at Fantadroms. 📊 Startin.LV will present expanded deeptech insights from Latvian Startup Report 2025, Iron Wolf Capital will give the regional context from their freshly published Baltic Deep Tech Report 2025, and our local investors at Buildit VC will cap it off with their boots-on-the-ground insight on the deeptech investment landscape. 🥂 We hope you'll also use the opportunity for networking at the end - people who are brought together by data, stick together! Also - don't forget to register for free to Deeptech Atelier. Part of the FINEST SCALEUP project.

Today we organised a join Latvian founder and investor roundtable with the European Commissioner Michael McGrath. He is responsible for the EU–INC proposal: one set of company rules across the EU, incorporation in 48 hours for under €100, and a harmonised stock option regime. The core problem is well known. US investors find Europe complicated. When a fund spends €20,000+ on legal due diligence not because laws are bad but because they are unfamiliar with 27 different jurisdictions, something is broken. Capital pulls founders out of the EU to set up Delaware entities. EU Inc. aims to fix this by creating a standardised framework where negotiation is only about deviations from the template, not 180-page custom documents. EU Inc. should raise all Member States to a high standard, not allow lagging implementation to drag down countries that are already ahead. Latvia already has a lot of things EU Inc proposes. The priority now is to ensure EU Inc. is consistent, predictable and usable in practice across all Member States. Otherwise the regulation risks reproducing the very fragmentation it aims to solve. EU Inc. should also play the first part of enabling an even closer cooperation among regional players, something like, an enhanced cooperation. The ambitious countries could move even further by adopting a more advanced version on top of EU Inc. For us this is an opportunity. The political will is there. The Commission wants agreement by end of 2026. Our job is to make sure the proposal stays simple and practical through negotiations. Thanks to Kristians Jenciuss (Startup House Riga) for the tour and participants for sharing their experience building and investing: Rolands Mesters, Ernest Jenavs, Agnese Kalnina, Inese Lazdovska, Mik Krams, Roberts Alhimionoks Allied For Startups | European Startup Network Photo by: European Commission Audiovisual Department, Toms Kalniņš

📣 Latvian founders - this is your moment to go global! 📣 If you are a startup entrepreneur ready to test the strength and full potential of your business, the Entrepreneurship World Cup is for you! 🌟 Why this matters? • Compete for a $1,000,000 prize pool • Get in front of global investors and ecosystem leaders • Unlock real opportunities to scale internationally 🌟Who can apply? Startups registered in Latvia and established within the past 10 years. 🌟What's at stake? This years' total prize pool amounts to $1 million, along with additional investment opportunities and support for global growth. Apply by 31 May and earn your chance to break into the Top 100 startups globally and secure a spot at the finals in Riyadh this November. ➡️ Find out more here: https://ewc26.short.gy/GEN Supported by Swedbank Latvija in partnership with Latvijas Tirdzniecības un rūpniecības kamera, Latvijas Investīciju un attīstības aģentūra - LIAA and Latvian Startup Association Startin.LV. #EWCLatvia #Startups #Entrepreneurship

🎉 Congratulations to our member PrintyMed, as well as P-Agro Minerals, for being selected among Latvian startups for the EIC Pre-Accelerator! In total, 70 early-stage deeptech startups from 22 countries will receive €32.5 million in EU funding, marking a significant investment in science-driven innovation across Europe. “Within the framework of the EIC Pre-Accelerator project, we will optimize and validate the functionality of spider silk membrane for specific applications, as well as integrate this membrane into an organ-on-a-chip model – which will increase our TRL level and get closer to the first sale. This is a really important funding for us, which will help us overcome the “valley of death”.” – Jekaterina Romanova, CEO of PrintyMed 🧪 📊 The EIC Pre-Accelerator received many applications, with 320 startups awarded Seals of Excellence, meaning they met the quality threshold but were not funded due to competition and limited resources. Seven of these were from Latvia, raising the question of whether such evaluations could better inform national funding decisions. For example, through a transfer fund mechanism that allows ERDF resources to be channelled toward Horizon Europe instruments, including support for highly evaluated EIC applications, helping to create stronger synergies between Cohesion funding and Horizon Europe. Similar approaches are already used in countries like Lithuania, Malta, Germany, and Poland. Alternatively, Latvia could introduce a middle-intensity lump sum grant aligned with EIC project funding levels, helping startups attract early-stage private investment by combining a Seal of Excellence or strong EIC evaluation with targeted public support. This is one of the advocacy topics we’re currently working on at Startin.LV. If you’re interested in contributing or sharing your perspective, we’d be happy to connect. 🤝 #Startups #DeepTech #Innovation #EIC #EICPreAccelerator #HorizonEurope #EUFunding #Latvia