Swedish Tech Weekly #259

đź’ˇ
This newsletter was sent on May 27, 2024, to subscribers of Swedish Tech Weekly. To receive future editions, you can sign up for free on swedishtechweekly.com.


Welcome to the latest from Sweden's startup & tech sector.

I'm Martin Weigert. Swedish Tech Weekly brings you a selection of some of the news I covered in my PRO newsletters last week. Today's email is being sent to 2403 subscribers.

Mergers & acquisitions

• Stratsys (Gothenburg, SaaS compliance platform for mid- to large organizations in the Nordics) acquires the Stockholm-based startup Evaluate, which offers digital tools to empower businesses' sustainability work (English).

• Pepins, the Swedish crowdfunding and investments platform which was about to shut down following two failed attempts to be acquired, says it has found a buyer, once more. The name will be revealed once the deal is approved by the Sweden's Financial Supervisory Authority (Swedish, machine translation).

Funding news

Do you have unreported funding news you want to see here? Fill out this form or respond to this email.

• Syre (Stockholm, textile-to-textile recycling at hyperscale): $50M in a Series A extension, bringing the total to $100M. In addition to the already announced founding investors TPG Rise Climate and H&M, new investors joining are Giant Ventures, IMAS Foundation, Norrsken VC, and Volvo Cars (English).

• Doconomy (Stockholm, creator of climate-friendly fintech solutions: SEK395M (€34M, $37M) mostly from existing investors, according to information obtained by Di Digital. The company did not comment (Swedish / Di Digital paywall).

• Majority (Stockholm & Houston, all-in-one mobile banking for migrants in the US): $20M in a Series B extension, of which $12.5M are equity funding from existing investors, led by Klarna co-founder Victor Jacobsson and Swedish serial entrepreneur Hjalmar Winbladh. $7.5M represent debt financing from an unnamed bank (English).

• ZeroPoint (Gothenburg, technology for increased performance per watt for servers and embedded products): €5M ($5.4M) in a Series A funding round led by Matterwave Ventures, with participation from existing investors Industrifonden, Climentum Capital and Chalmers Ventures (English). ➡️ Partial closing of this round first covered on May 2 in my PRO subscription.

• QA.tech (Stockholm, autonomous QA testing solution): €3M ($3.3M) seed funding round led by PROfounders, with participation from Curiosity, existing investor byFounders, and angel investors (English).

• Quartr (Stockholm, investor relations app): SEK30M (€2.6M, $2.8M) from existing investors including Öhman and Flat Capital, and some new investors. Following this round, Yanno Capital also joined as new investor, by buying stock worth SEK20M from undisclosed existing shareholders (Swedish / Breakit paywall). ➡️ Funding first covered on April 25 in my PRO subscription.

• Modvion (Gothenburg, developer of modular wind turbine towers in laminated wood): SEK20.6M (€1.8M, $1.9M) grant from the Swedish Energy Agency (Swedish, machine translation).

• Enigma (Stockholm, developing advanced quantitative trading strategies for digital assets by leveraging state-of-the-art technology and data-driven insights): SEK20M (€1.7M, $1.9M) from undisclosed investors (English).

• Bizzdo (Skövde, database for Swedish company information): SEK18M (€1.6M, $1.7M) from existing investors including Erlingsson & Daughters and Akcelo AB, as well as from employees (Swedish / Di Digital paywall).

• Lightbringer (Lund, AI-powered patenting tools): SEK8.5M (€730K, $800K) in a funding round led by Skåne Ventures (Swedish / Breakit paywall).

• Defentry (Stockholm; white-label cyber safety SaaS platform designed to monitor, alert, and support customers' users in the event of identity fraud): SEK7M (€650K, $660K) from existing investors and some undisclosed new investors (English).

• PRO subscribers only: Stealth startup from Stockholm: $500K from Y Combinator (English).

• PRO subscribers only: Stealth startup with co-founder and CEO from Gothenburg: $500K from Y Combinator (English).

• Carjoy (Alingsås, B2B mobile mechanics service for cars): SEK2.3M (€200K, $210K) in an equity funding round, which includes a strategic investment from the younger Gothenburg-based startup and industry peer CARMATE. ➡️ First covered in my PRO subscription on May 23.

• Junipeer (Stockholm, iPaaS platform made for e-commerce): SEK2.1M (€180K, $200K) from existing angel investor Anders Lundström, for the continued European expansion (Swedish, machine translation).

• Pharem / Zymatic (Södertälje, developer of enzymatic products for removing organic pollutants in water environments): €170K ($200K) grant from the Baltic Sea Action Plan Fund (English).

• I.S.A.A.C. (Stockholm, provider of a B2B spacetech database): SEK1.5M (€130K, $140K) from angel investors including Johanna Fagrell-Köhler, in an ongoing round with a target of SEK4M. (Swedish / Di Digital paywall). ➡️ Company first covered in my PRO subscription in November 2022.

• Ljusgårda, aka Supernormal Greens (Tibro, vertical farming startup): SEK1M (€86K, €93K) grant from Vinnova, for a project that aims to develop and validate the use of advanced AI/ML and sensor technology to optimize cultivation in controlled ecosystems (English).

• Creandum participated in a gigantic $220M+ seed round raised by a French AI startup with the one letter name "H" (English).

• J12 Ventures participated in a $8M funding round raised by UK-based AI startup Unify (English).

• PRO subscribers only: Various additional rounds, as well as more details (English).

• PRO subscribers only: Google Sheet with funding data, 1000+ rounds added during the past 12 months (English).

News from Swedish startups & the tech sector

• Vinden, the bankrupt Stockholm-based provider of an on-demand storage service, is saved: The leadership group surrounding founder and CEO Sebastian Wiberg acquired the entire estate, backed by financing from so far undisclosed investors (Swedish / Breakit paywall).

• Bannerflow, mostly bootstrapped and profitable Stockholm-based creative management platform for marketing teams, is reportedly for sale (Swedish / Affärsvärlden paywall).

• Malmö-based startup Covr Security is gearing up for growth after many years of development of its multifactor authentication as-a-service solution "Onyon", which can be described as a "BankID for emerging markets" – and involves one of the key people behind BankID (Swedish / Rapidus paywall).

• PRO subscribers only: A Swedish veteran entrepreneur founded a climate tech startup in stealth mode, working on a product in the solar energy space (English).

• PRO subscribers only: A Swede who previously was Director of Engineering at a major US tech company, is behind a new Swedish legaltech startup utilizing autonomous agents (English).

• Aerit, Stockholm-based sustainable drone delivery startup, is bankrupt, and the assets are now for sale (English).

• Handiscover, Malmö-based accessibility and disability data platform, is bankrupt, after a funding round fell apart at the last minute (Swedish / Rapidus paywall).

• Subscriby, Stockholm-based startup offering a subscription management software and market platform for brands, is shutting down, co-founder and CEO Josefina Sonnhammer shares in a LinkedIn post (English).

• Vimotek, Luleå-based startup developing vision and motion tech for space, was selected to join an EU consortium for a 36-months project backed with €6.5M, aiming to develop autonomous space situational awareness capabilities onboard satellites (English).

• Elonroad, Lund-based developer of electric road technology that allows for automatic charging of EVs, is entering the US market (English).

• memmo, Stockholm-based provider of personalised greeting messages from celebrities which was acquired from bankruptcy by Meetly in August last year, is for sale again, after having reached profitability (Swedish / Di Digital paywall).

• PANTER, Stockholm-based startup offering a return system for reusable packaging, increased the number of customers in Q1 from 30 to 800 following new regulation on single-use products (Swedish / Impact Loop paywall).

• PRO subscribers only: A  Swedish startup is working on a web-based product to allow for the creation of games through prompts, following a pivot (English).

• Skellefteå-based startup Videung has launched the online store for its modular bed, made from interchangeable parts that can be replaced at any time (Swedish, machine translation). ➡️ Company first covered in my PRO subscription in October 2023.

• Plussa, Stockholm-based startup offering a mental coaching app for parents, has launched an AI-powered chatbot, which the company says is the only product of its kind in Sweden (Swedish / Impact Loop paywall).

• Potential trouble for Swedish fintechs in the lending space ahead: The Swedish government proposes forcing them to apply for a full-fledged bank license, which is costly and comes with a lengthy process (Swedish / Breakit paywall).

• Lassie, Stockholm-based digital pet insurance provider, announced its expansion to France, following rapid growth in Sweden and Germany (English).

• Företagarnas annual list of 103 innovative Swedish companies founded by young entrepreneurs has been released (Swedish, machine translation).

• Truecaller, the publicly traded Swedish caller ID company, will let paying users in selected countries (including Sweden) create an AI version of their voice to answer calls (English).

• This year's Startup 4 Climate competition has been launched. As usual, 2x SEK1M are up for grabs for Swedish startups and scaleups that speed up the energy transition.

• Minc, the Startup House of Malmö, is launching Haven – an incubator for gaming startups.

• Almi Invest GreenTech announced its new fund, GT2, of almost SEK600M (English).

• Starbright Invest, Jönköping-based VC firm, has closed its third fund at close to SEK300M, for early stage and growth stage tech startups (Swedish, machine translation).

• 📺 Swedish AI startup Sana shared the recordings from all the in-person sessions held at its recent AI Summit (English).

• PRO subscribers only: Curated list with bankruptcies and shutdowns of Swedish tech startups. Also available as Google Sheet.

• PRO subscribers only: Curated list with new Swedish tech startups; 250 added so far this year. Also available as Google Sheet.

Join PRO, if you are a startup investor, an analyst, or in an adjacent role.

Other interesting things from the startup/VC world & beyond

• GP Bullhound's annual Titans of Tech report is out, highlighting and analysing the growth trends in Europe's tech ecosystem (English).

• Instead of just one Seed stage, there's now Seed Inception and Seed Expansion (English).

• The most used startup databases among VCs (top 3: Crunchbase, Pitchbook, Dealroom), and how they compare (English).

• The "secret sauce" of what Y Combinator is looking for when selecting startups for its accelerator program: Founders with a "fringe idea", who can create a market by seeing a technology no one has envisioned yet (English).

• When European founders start hiring in the US, a culture of understated accomplishment meets a culture of overstated achievement (English).

• "This downturn has highlighted just how often software companies sell to other software companies" (English).

•  The importance and power of Mudita (finding joy in the success of others) in startup investing (English).

• Starting from July 1, companies in Sweden are not required anymore to store paper receipts or invoices in their original physical form, as long as a digital scan exists (Swedish, machine translation).

• The widely popular radio program series "Sommar i P1", broadcasted every summer by Swedish public service broadcaster SR, will only be streamable through the SR app this year, and not through any third party apps (Swedish).

• After ABBA won the Eurovision Song Contest in 1974, it triggered a furious reaction in Sweden, culminating in a huge demonstration on the streets of Stockholm against the country hosting the following year’s contest, due to its commercial nature (English).

• Volvo revealed its first “production-ready” self-driving truck that it is making with US-based autonomous driving technology company Aurora (English).

• Long piece exploring how Sweden created the "Vision Zero" approach to road safety, and how it has influenced perspectives on car accidents everywhere (English).

• Stockholm-based restaurant AG ranks #9 in this year's list of the "World's 101 best steak restaurants".

đź’ˇ
This newsletter was sent on May 27, 2024, to subscribers of Swedish Tech Weekly. To receive future editions, you can sign up for free on swedishtechweekly.com.