Swedish Tech Weekly #276

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This newsletter was sent on October 6, 2024 to subscribers of Swedish Tech Weekly.


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, and is sent to 2578 subscribers today.

Mergers & acquisitions

Last week marked a major moment for Gothenburg's tech startup ecosystem, with three VC-backed companies exiting.

• Minna Technologies (Gothenburg, provider of subscription management solutions) is being acquired by Mastercard. Financial details were not disclosed, though according to information obtained by Breakit, Mastercard pays $75M (English, Swedish / Breakit paywall).

• Finnish PE firm Intera Partners is acquiring a majority stake in Halon, Gothenburg-based email infrastructure platform for service providers (English).

• Jobtip (Gothenburg, SaaS solution for automated social media recruitment) is being acquired by Norway-based HR software provider Talentech (English).

• Medimi (Lund, publicly traded company that develops and markets e-health solutions that improve compliance with and monitoring of medication) is acquiring the Norwegian startup Medthings (English).

Funding news

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

• Polarium (Stockholm, smart modular energy storage solutions): SEK500M (€44M, $49M) from existing investors Vargas Holding, AMF, Alecta, Stefan Jansson, and Roosgruppen (English).

• Avassa (Stockholm, solution for managing distributed applications across on-site edge resources): SEK30M (€2.7M, $2.9M) from new strategic investor H&M Group, and existing investors Fairpoint Capital and Industrifonden (English, Swedish).

• Ekolution (Malmö, developer of climate-friendly construction materials made from industrial hemp): SEK25M (€2.2M, $2.4M) from existing investors including Longrun Capital, South Bay Ventures, Neptunia Invest, and Gunnar Hagman (Swedish / Breakit paywall).

• Sensative (Lund; provider of solutions in the physical worlds' digitization): SEK14M (€1.2M, $1.4M) from undisclosed investors (Swedish / Rapidus paywall).

• AAX Biotech (Stockholm, proprietary technologies that solve unmet needs in the development of next-generation antibody therapeutics): SEK7M (€620K, $680K) from new investors including Life Science Invest, and existing investors (English).

• Generation Waste (Gothenburg, SaaS tool that helps restaurants and municipal kitchens to reduce food waste): SEK3.4M (€300K, $330K) from existing investors including GU Ventures and TKlein (Swedish / Impact Loop paywall).

• FLOX Robotics (Stockholm, provider of autonomous wildlife management as a service): SEK3.3M (€290K, $320K) grant from Vinnova, for a joint project with French rolling stock manufacturer Alstom, to test AI technology to combat railway wildlife accidents (English).

• Arbon Earth (greater Gothenburg area, producer of oceanpods to accomplish carbon removal at scale through algae): undisclosed amount from three undisclosed angel investors (English). ➡️ Startup first covered in my PRO subscription in April 2023.

• Printler (Stockholm, creator platform that connects independent artists with art lovers): SEK3M (€260K, $290K) convertible note from existing investor True Global Ventures, which also acquires existing shares for SEK17M (English, Swedish).

• IDfier (SolidWare) (Växjö; solution for verifying personal identities): SEK1.6M from Almi Invest and others, in first funding (Swedish, machine translation). ➡️ Startup first covered in my PRO subscription on May 22.

• PhysAct (Karlstad, SaaS tool for organisations dedicated to fighting stress-related ill-health through the power of physical activity): undisclosed amount from new investor Gorilla Capital, existing investor Almi Invest, and angel investors. ➡️ Funding first covered in my PRO subscription last week.

• EQT Foundation participated in a $1.5M funding round raised by Malaysian agritech and nanotech startup Qarbotec (English).

• For PRO subscribers: 9 additional rounds as well as more details and numbers for many of the above mentioned rounds (English).

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

News from the Swedish startup & tech sector

• I published the monthly Swedish Tech Startup Report for September. It's exclusively available for PRO subscribers, but if you are a startup investor, I'll send it to you for free. Just reply "report" to this email.

• Klarna Checkout is rebranding as Kustom, following the completion of the divestment to a consortium of new owners announced in June (English).

• Swedish startup KASI Technologies has developed technology to convert an ordinary used car with a traditional internal combustion engine into a hybrid, in any car shop, in four hours (Swedish, machine translation).

• Mevisio, bootstrapped Stockholm-based digital platform for visualization and teamwork, grew revenue by 46% to SEK24.8M last year, and doubled profit to over SEK2M (Swedish, machine translation). ➡️ First covered in my PRO subscription on Sep 5.

• Flightradar24, Stockholm-based flight tracking platform, launched an API, offering live access to real-time aircraft flight movement information (English).

• Satcube, fast growing and profitable Gothenburg-based developer of portable satellite terminals, opened a new facility for mass-production that brings an "almost threefold increase in the production area" (English).

• NitroCapt, Uppsala-based startup that develops fossil-free nitrogen fertilizers, has secured a SEK10M offtake agreement from a Norwegian company (Swedish / Impact Loop paywall).

• Österlensaffran, agtech startup and saffron producer based in southern Sweden, announced the launch of an autonomous saffron harvesting robot (English).

• Harvest Moon, Stockholm-based developer of regenerative sanitation solutions, is bankrupt (Swedish, machine translation). ➡️ Several other unreported bankruptcies and shutdowns covered last week in my PRO subscription.

• Minut, Malmö-based camera-less home security solution for short-term rental properties, will launch a feature for Marijuana smoke detection (English).

• Mentimeter, Stockholm-based audience engagement platform, is clearly preparing for an IPO: Breakit stumbled upon a job ad for a Head of Investor Relations (Swedish / Breakit paywall).

• Spotify is not allowed to let staff in Sweden work night shifts, a Swedish appeals court has ruled, upholding a decision by the administrative court. The audio streaming giant says that the relevant tasks, which were until now being carried out by 250 employees in Sweden, will be moved abroad (English).

• Stockholm ranks #49 and Gothenburg #95 in a Pitchbook VC ecosystem ranking highlighting "the world’s top startup cities" (English).

• HETCH, the Helsingborg-based tech hub, has opened the applications for its next accelerator program, starting in January 2025 (English).

• Tregion Startup Invest, an angel fund investing in startups from the regions Dalarna, Gävleborg and Västernorrland, is now raising for its second fund (Swedish).

• For PRO subscribers: 14 new Swedish tech startups covered last week (English).

Other interesting things from the startup/VC world & beyond

• OpenAI has closed the largest VC round of all time: $6.6B raised at a post-money valuation of $157B (English).

• Final Frontier is a new Denmark-based seed-stage fund with a target of €150M, focusing on European startups in the space and defence technology sectors (English).

• Global venture capital activity declined in Q3, according to Pitchbook/NVCA numbers. Overall, 2024 does not look good (English). Crunchbase data also shows a weak quarter (English).

• "Product Hunt isn’t dying – its become gentrified" (English). The CEO of Product Hunt responds in a Hacker News comment (English).

• Lots of startup and scaleup wisdom from the Hubspot founder (English).

• ARR may be losing its meaning (English).

• Seed valuations don’t behave anything like valuations in either their volatility over time or their sensitivity to interest rates (English).

• The annual "The Swedes and the Internet" report about the internet habits and attitudes of Swedes has been published (English, Swedish).

• September’s auto sales saw plugin EVs at 65.0% share in Sweden, modestly up YoY from 63.4% (English).

• The 100,000th Volvo EX30, the Swedish car company's cheapest EV, just rolled off the assembly line (English).

• The 30-year-old Swedish high-performance sports car manufacturer Koenigsegg received a €50M investment (English).

• Luleå Municipality will jointly with AI Sweden develop an AI assistant for school leaders that can streamline their working day (Swedish, machine translation).

• Skövde, known as a Swedish video game hub, has unveiled Sweden's first "Walk of Game", honoring top games developed in the city (Swedish, machine translation).

• Two Swedish subtitlers ask politicians to regulate the subtitle quality in TV broadcasts. They say that due to the increasing use of AI-generated subtitles, the texts are getting worse (Swedish).

• The bankruptcy estate of Swedish distillery Mackmyra Whiskey was acquired by one of the previous major shareholders, and an investment company, for around SEK100M (Swedish, machine translation).