BalticVC

Startup Estonia presented data on Estonian startups for the year 2024.

Estonia's e-residents opened 4,818 new companies in 2024, an average of 400 new companies per month, which is an absolute record in the 10 years of the program's operation. 

In 2024, funding for startups in the Baltic countries decreased. However, the situation stabilized somewhat in the second half of the year. This is the conclusion reached by Change Ventures and FIRSTPICK in a new report on startup funding in the Baltic States for the second half of 2024. 

Estonia has retained its status as the leading EU country in AI for the second year in a row, scoring 15% more points than Germany, the runner-up in the Startup Ecosystem Awards. France, Switzerland and Romania also made it into the top five. Estonia ranks 6th place in the world country ranking.

According to Dealroom's latest report, Lithuania's startup ecosystem continues to grow strongly. Last year, its total value increased by €2B, and in the decade since 2014, the value of Lithuanian startups has grown 39 times - from €419M to €16B.

Venture capitalist with Estonian roots Steve Juvertson, founder of the US fund Future Ventures, gave an interview to BalticVC in which he spoke about his vision of the future of AI and other modern technologies. He also explained how he chooses companies to invest in and gave some advice on how Baltic startups can find their place in the international market.

We want to share a podcast, made by Google AI-pilot. It consists of a short review of the Baltic Startups Survey 2024, revealing its main ideas in plain English. If you prefer to get information informally, you should listen to it.

Goals and methodology of the survey The BalticVC team studied the startup ecosystem in Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania for its Baltic Startup Survey. We sent questionnaires to startup founders from these countries.

According to the government organization Startup Estonia, Estonian startups reached a turnover of €2.7Bln in the first nine months of 2024. This is 10% more than in the same period of 2023 when their turnover reached about €2.4Bln.

Estonian startups received €238.9M in investments in the first six months of 2024, which is twice as much as in 2023 when startups raised €119.3M. The data was published in Startup Estonia, based on open data from Statistics Estonia, the Estonian Tax and Customs Board, Dealroom, and other sources.

Wages in the information technology sector in the Baltic countries grew by 7.4%, almost twice as much as in 2023. This is 0.1% less than the forecast (7.5%), according to the study conducted by Figure Baltic Advisory.

According to the StartupBlink Global Startup Ecosystem Index 2024, the Baltic States ranked among the top 50 best countries to found a startup. Estonia became a leader in the Baltics, taking 12th place, moving up two places from last year. Lithuania also moved up one place to 16th in the ranking. Latvia has dropped eight places to 47th.

The Baltic deeptech startups have raised over €164M in almost five months of 2024, while, in total, the Baltic startups across all the industries have raised €310M in the same period. Most of the investments for Baltic deeptech startups came from C rounds (€40-100M).

The turnover of Estonian deeptech startups increased  by 38% to €87M in the first quarter of 2024, compared to the same period in 2023. 

The startups from the Estonian county Ida Virumaa reached  a turnover of €1,2M in the first quarter of 2024, which is 167% more than in the same period of 2023. 

Estonian startups raised  €148,9M in Q1 2024, which is almost 2,5 times more than in Q1 2023. In Q1 2023, Estonian startups raised €62M.  

Members of the Estonian syndicate EstBAN invested €13,32M in startups in 2023. This is slightly less than in 2022 when they invested €13,36M. Angel investors contributed €7,64M, while various funds invested €5,49M, and crowdfunding platforms accounted for €0,19M.

In 2023, Lithuanian fintech startups raised only €5,5M of venture fundraising, which is 12 times less than the amount raised in 2022 (€67,9M). This data was noted in the 2023 fintech report of the government investment promotion agency Invest Lithuania. The report highlighted that regtech, green finance, and DeFi, where AI and quantum computing were used a lot, were the main areas that secured investments.

In 2023, Estonian startups and growth companies paid  €323M in employment taxes, which is 18% more than in 2022, when they paid €273M. The Estonian Tax and Customs Board statistics reveal that startups contributed 65% of these taxes, while growth companies contributed the rest 35%. Among the top 10 companies that paid the most taxes were Bolt (€36,9M), money transfer service Wise (€34,9M), and provider of web-based sales CRM Pipedrive (€16,4M).

The turnover of Estonian deep technology companies increased  to €227,2M in 2023, which is 14% more than in 2022. These companies paid €45,1M in labor taxes, which is a 20% increase from the previous year.