Contributed article in our entrepreneurial series. Enjoy! – Kimberly
Start-ups or emerging companies are businesses in the construction phase and generally related to technology but there are also many from the travel sector and food industry. Given their potential for revaluation, they are usually supported by venture capital funds. Europe is the home of some of the most important and prominent start-up nurseries on the planet. Cities such as Berlin, Stockholm or London are the ideal ecosystem for this type of companies.
Image Ref: worldatlas.com
But more and more in all corners of the continent show up these types of companies. Ireland, with Future Finance, or Denmark, with Trustpilot, are examples of countries with a technological start-up that has exceeded 100 million dollars of valuation to date.
One of the least known but most notable is the Czech AVAST software, dedicated to cybersecurity, which is valued at 1,000 million dollars. It’s no surprise as attack on the internet have become common and there’s little even great lawyers can do for you in those situations. In Spain, the Cabify map is dedicated to private passenger transport. In Portugal, Uniplaces appears as a company dedicated to web hosting for students. In France, the well-known BlaBlaCar, the company that intermediates so that users can travel by car. This one has proven indispensable for European travellers especially, those who need a ride to the airport for their next trip but don’t want to leave their car at the airport.
In Italy, Shopfully stands out, dedicated to the offers. In Sweden, Spotify, the web par excellence to listen to almost all the music of the planet online. There is also space on the map for start-ups dedicated to the delivery of food at home, as is the case of Deliveroo in the United Kingdom, or Delivery Hero in Germany.
In Greece two start-ups made a huge splash this year and have shown promising results for the upcoming 2018. One of them is Wine Outlet, a start-up and platform dedicated to selling and delivering the best wines in the world directly to the doorstep of all its clients. Its wide variety of wines and quality of service has made it grow really fast.
On the other hand in Greece, Perfect Nutrition has demonstrated incredible growth in the past year. The start-up offers dietary supplements and other athletic products via its e-shop. Having recently launched its newest webpage, the start-up has big plans for the future and the numbers back them up.
The study, conducted by CB Insights, analyses the ‘start-ups’ with better funds according to the capital funds. The financing of the debt has been excluded and only companies backed by Venture Capital have been considered that have collected at least one million dollars of own funds to date. Companies that have not grown since 2014 have not been taken into account.
The worst financed start-up is in Slovakia, it is the online ID and password management company SaferPass, with one million in capital funds. The best funded start-up is the Swedish Spotify, with 2,300 million own funds to date.
On the other hand, the European Commission has launched Start-up Europe Map, an initiative that aims to connect all the people related to entrepreneurship in Europe. According to the European organism, Europe “offers a very interesting panorama for start-ups”, while remembering that the collaboration and connection between all the people involved is “crucial to create a competitive environment”.
This project sees the light of the idea that there is a lot of talent in Europe, but its dispersion means that it is often difficult for entrepreneurs to develop their idea due to lack of connections with other actors who can collaborate in the creation and development process of a start-up.
The map is part of the ‘Start-up Europe’ program whose mission is to strengthen the environment related to start-ups within the EU. Thus it was born as one of the projects of this initiative and aims to connect all start-ups, investors, accelerators, incubators, universities, public administrations and co-working spaces throughout Europe.
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