29 May HOT May Nordic/Baltic Tech News, Events and Opportunities
Hello all and Welcome to our latest newsletter…
As summer creeps towards us over the horizon, hopefully bringing some sunshine to us in the Nordics and Baltics, we look, both forward and back, at everything happening in our corner of the tech world.
So many fantastic milestones are being reached: This month has seen us hit the half way stage for Cohort 1 of our “Women in Tech” International Mentoring Programme in Denmark. Printful became Latvia’s first unicorn company. Finland was named top of the “Invest Europe” chart for “Most VC funding for startups” by GDP, with Sweden 4th…and too many more to mention here.
More milestones are coming for us, as our own work and programmes continue all through the Summer, expanding our partnerships and innovation projects, both here in the Nordics and Baltics, and worldwide – however, lots to be done before we break out the suncream, as we continue to deliver more startup and scaleup support, great events, partnerships and action-based initiatives, so let’s get straight to the updates, and tell you more about our highlights and plans…
“WOMEN IN TECH” COMMUNITY. BIG NEWS…
Cohort 3 starts next week!!
The final Cohort of our 2021 “Women in Tech – International Mentoring” Programme, kicks off on June 1st. Our next group of amazing female tech founders and leaders in Denmark are matched with Rockstar mentors and ready to go. Let’s wish them all lots of luck. Based on the feedback from Cohorts 1 and 2, they’re going to have a fantastic and fulfilling experience. You can see who they all are here:
AND we mustn’t forget our “Rockstar mentors…. without them, there would be no Programme. So, the second Covid allowed, we opened our doors and hosted a mentor networking event at BloxHub in Copenhagen for our local Programme mentors with our international mentors joining us on Zoom.
So refreshing to get together face to face, and reminded us of the importance of being together.
Thanks once again to all of our mentors, and we look forward to doing it again soon.
Our diversity work is being highlighted more and more – shown this month through our CEO and Founder, Jeanette Carlsson, running a panel discussion at IWDK21 in Århus, on “DENMARK AS A WOMEN ENTREPRENEUR FRONTRUNNER” joined by our programme mentees Paula Jota Pedersen, Sara Schjemte Madsen and Jannike Borg, along with partners Sam Jalaei from Magnusson Law and Katrine Gybel from KPMG. If you are interested in running similar events, reach out to us for support here
NEWS FROM…SWEDEN 
We are pleased to announce our partnership with epicenter – working together to bring local and international tech ecosystem stars to the amazing Epicenter hub in central Stockholm and host our future events, as we open up! More to follow…
NEWS FROM…NORWAY 
Our Norwegian Board Member, Susanne Hannestad, will be presenting, and participating, on an expert panel at the ISPIM Innovation Conference in Berlin, digitally, on June 21st – Find out more, and join her here
NEWS FROM THE BALTICS 
We were delighted to partner with TechChill this month, contributing to their online conference, which showed off the best of Baltic tech. It was a great event, and we made lots of new connections, that we know will lead to exciting things.
Our Board Member for the Baltic region, Elvira Tulvik, partner at Magnusson moderated an expert panel discussion on “How startups can influence sustainable development and climate change”.
Also, Eva Grønbjerg Christensen, Founder of Sustainify, one of our “Women in Tech” Mentoring Programme startups, led a great session as moderator of ‘How do start-ups speed up the circular economy’.
We are also pleased to share news that Latvia has announced plans to develop two national policies to support the startup ecosystem – a national startup support policy, as well as a dedicated fintech strategy to support the rapidly-growing vertical.
The Latvian fintech strategy is under development by a workgroup made up of the Ministry of Finance, the Financial and Capital Market Commission of Latvia, fintech industry representatives, banks, the Investment and Development Agency of Latvia (LIAA), and various professional industry associations. Read the full details here
STARTUP OF THE MONTH!
Congratulations to Danish payroll automation startup Pento who have raised $15.6 million in a Series A funding round joined by high-profile angels, including Monzo founder Tom Blomfield, Zoom CEO Eric Yuan and Stripe vets Diede van Lamoen and Timothy Thairu.
Read more about the round and their growth plans here
IN THE GLOBAL MEDIA PROMOTING NORDIC/BALTIC TECH…
Our Board Member and COO for Sweden, Barry O’Brien, was interviewed for this Forbes Japan article, on the Stockholm Startup ecosystem, providing his insights on why Stockholm is such a hot city for unicorn growth and how covid has changed the community events scene.
Our in-depth article on “Women in Tech” and
how we are tackling the diversity challenge, led the launch of the new tech news media platform – “GTA Connects – The Voice of Global Tech” which is run by our parent organisation Global Tech Advocates.
We look forward to contributing more to this news outlet and encourage you to hop over there and have a read, as there is a lot of great content from our international groups, that highlights their work and opportunities for you, worldwide.
IMPORTANT STUFF FROM OUR PARTNERS TO SUPPORT YOUR GROWTH
Magnusson Corporate M&A Partner, Nikolaj Juhl Hansen‘s latest article on issues around IPR and copyright, provides great advice on getting written agreements, design rights, and issues that can arise when seeking funding.
You can read Nikolaj’s full article on the topic here and learn how Magnusson can support youhere👈🏽
Interested to understand more about FinTech?
TNA member 4ire Labs have written an expert guide that covers “Why FinTech popularity is booming” and a lot more on the topic. Read the full article here and learn more about how they can help you, by getting in touch here👈🏽
Great news from Finland on developing skilled digital talent – The Shortcut, an impact-driven organization dedicated to career transformation in Finland, through working with highly educated foreigners and the unemployed in the greater Helsinki region, saw their first online digital marketing cohort graduate in early May, achieving high success rates.
Their programmes layer tech training on top of more traditional skill sets to help modernise the workforce and meet the growing demands of industry and the booming start up community.
Coming soon – a Digital Lounge for their community. Follow their latest news or contact them here
OUR STARTUP ECOSYSTEM AT WORK 
Our CEO and Founder, Jeanette Carlsson, recently met with The Embassy of Pakistan in Copenhagen, to discuss collaboration projects which will help female founders in Pakistan. This was swiftly followed up with an online event – a panel discussion to create awareness on women empowerment, and exchange views and experiences from Denmark/Pakistan – hosted by the Denmark/Pakistan IT Entrepreneur Forum (DPEF), where Jeanette was a guest panelist – you can see the full discussion over on YouTube here
FUNDRAISING FOUNDERS: JOIN “TNA TALKS” WITH THE HEAD OF WESTERN EUROPE AND NORDICS, PRIMARY CAPITAL MARKETS – AT THE LONDON STOCK EXCHANGE
🎙 On TNA Talks Episode 5 – Tamara Gehring, from the London Stock Exchange discusses “Going Public” where we cover – Access to capital in London, how it all works, Nordic success cases, business during the Covid19 crisis…+ lots more. Watch the video and subscribe to our YouTube channel here
FROM US…. RAISING CAPITAL TO SUPPORT YOUR GROWTH?
💰 Did you know we offer a Startup/Investor Scouting Programme, connecting fundraising startups/scaleups with suitable investorsfrom our network? If you’re a startup/scaleup raising funds, get in touch here OR if you’re an investor looking for deal flow, please get in touch.
OR COULD YOU DO WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM A FRIEND? 💡 Could a Mentor help you?Did you know that we offer a global mentoring programme matching our members with mentors across the globe from our Global Tech Advocates network, spanning over 20 tech hubs globally? Join today (Solo membership or Business Membership) and get access to top quality mentors across all continents, who can help accelerate your growth.
UPCOMING EVENTS
We are Co-Hosting an investment focussed event with Nordic Startup School and Startup Wise Guys on June 10th – online of course!
Learn from investors, and startups who have raised investment:
– How to raise funds successfully?
– Where to find the money?
– How investors decide where and when to invest?
Register for the event here
AND check out our full events programme here
GLOBAL TECH ADVOCATES (GTA) NEWS
“Tech for Net Zero” is our major focus, and Global Tech Advocates invite you to be part of the campaign, says Russ Shaw CBE, founder of Tech London Advocates and Global Tech Advocates.
Global Tech Advocates is calling on technology ecosystems around the world to commit to a series of steps to address climate change and inspire action across the wider business landscape.
This is a campaign to harness the power of the private sector to do two things:
• Accelerate the growth of startups using technology to address climate change
• Minimise the environmental impact of tech startups around the world
Read the full campaign outline here
PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT
Show your support for the GTA Climate Commitments by emailing Global Tech Advocates to virtually sign the pledge and ensure your name is included. Global Tech Advocates: gta@wearesevenhills.com