Summer postcards

work in progress

• Cross that border. This thread got started during Tech Philomaths' dinner, when Robolabs acquisition was mentioned. How scalable is this model? Accounting is notoriously complex following local taxation laws. Indeed in Europe many things aren't scalable – but at this point, that's precisely the opportunity. Businesses that are immediately scalable (think e-commerce) also have little moat against competition. But if you can unlock services that used to be "local" – the advantage will be game-changing. This is part of big story behind Vinted's ongoing success (breaking out of flea markets and local listings), or the skyrocketing of Deel, a $12B monster (before, companies needed a local entity to hire in each country). Ovoko brought Vinted's playbook for used car parts, at speed and scale, making the marketplace much more fluid. Anyone who has moved (even within EU) have experienced European fragmentation – your new doctors won't have health data, you'll have no credit history, it will be tricky with education, and a few more headaches. No surprise simple solution as eTools won the public choice award at the Plug & Play pitch battle in Vilnius – there is room for many more.
• Fintech has been toxic in the media lately, due to that weird Foxpay political scandal. Let's move beyond that. Lithuania's fintech story is an obvious success story, just look at EUR 340m exports from almost nothing just 5 years ago. ByMyBond doing well, raising EUR 3m in a day (not equity, financing projects). ConnectPay launched European Fintech Index, and it clearly puts New Nordics at the very top. Paysera closed 2023 with EUR 7m profit, and heading to physical retail locations with a new acquisition (virtuali kasa). Greet was awarded as the winner of the JCDecaux Nurture Startup Challenge. Max is building wCard – a supercard for superfans, hiring. He is also keen to connect more with fellow entrepreneurs - DM him for a founder meetup.

• Marketplaces should be a recurring topic here – many attempts. Boop (pet owners and caregivers) is making steady progress, and won pitch battle at Plug & Play Expo Day. We are tracking Eany.io as they are assembling an experienced team for the B2B marketplace. Commody is a new collectable car marketplace, with Savy+HFinance founders joining the venture.
• AI. Aleph Alpha is reported to be in trouble – more voices telling the company will not survive (despite having a founder of Lithuanian origin). There is suspicion that the product is not delivering well, and the last round was inflated in numbers. Others argue Europeans don't offer enough capital to sustain this as a standalone business. In the meantime, Hostinger has a lot to show in how to deploy AI chatbots, they got 103k convos resolved by AI in the last 12-months.
• Always making. Our repeat founder list keeps expanding, love to see. Here is one project that kept Ignas Survila busy lately – Memstagram, a socialfi dApp designed to help memers monetize their creativity. Justas Albertynas (RatePunk and other travel ventures) also launched new - Glimpsefy is AI-powered product encyclopedia, which leverages user comments on the web to help you choose the best product.
• New breeds. Top 20 Lithuanian scale-ups, all EUR 25m in revenue and more (much more). Missed anyone?