FOMO.11: From West Coast to Iran, Kosovo and Oulu
Carmen organised a hackathon in United States, Alejandro analysed the impacts of war, and Liina dived into all-male founding teams.
Hope you are celebrating the long weekend with your families and loved ones. We certainly are. Before escaping for a weekend in Oulu, we ran some amazing columnists’ stories on topics ranging from startup culture to the impact of the war in Iran on startups.
CARMEN KIVISILD: Are hackathons for children?
When I was inviting people to our hackathon, one guy told me he wasn’t coming because it was going to be a bunch of children. I said okay with a laughing emoji and moved on. But it made me realise that most people have no idea what a hackathon actually is, who shows up, or what it can do for a company.
ALEJANDRO JIMENEZ: "But he started it!"
“But he started it!” is a common cry from my kids whenever I intervene to break up a scuffle. Europe can point to Donald Trump and say the same about his incursion into Iran, a war that affects Europe far worse economically than it does the US, “but he started it!”
LIINA LAAS: If your idea of ‘the best people’ all look the same, you’re probably building blind
There is a very predictable ritual in startup culture. Every few months, someone runs a piece about all-male founding teams, or the microscopic percentage of funding going to women, or the strange persistence of 996 as if exhaustion itself were a moat. Then a particular corner of the internet reacts as though someone has proposed banning ambition.
Although we are focusing on Estonia, we also shared a few more stories from around the world — a bit like a glimpse of foreign news in local newspapers.
I met Chris Cunningham, one of the first members of ClickUp, to get a glimpse of the backstory of this Silicon Valley unicorn. We met a few hours before his speech at TechChill the other week, and, listening to him on stage later, presenting the social media strategies for 2026, I thought back to the interview and realised we had not even mentioned marketing and advertising a word during our discussion.
Clicking Up: Taking on the giants
RIGA - In 2017, the founding team of ClickUp lived in a single house, working seven days a week to build a productivity tool designed to replace the fragmented “app-for-everything” landscape. Today, with 1,300 employees and a valuation in the billions, the company is eyeing the Baltic states as its next frontier in a David-and-Goliath battle against tec…
Fiona wrote up the story of the 14-year-old edtech founder from Kosovo, who is already creating some nice FOMO on social media.
The 14 year old building an edtech startup in Europe
Kaon Krasniqi is a fourteen-year-old founder from Kosovo. Last week, he donned the founders stage at TechChill to discuss his startup journey with Dealroom’s Head of News, Andrii Degeler.
FUNDING
Turkish-founded, Estonia-registered, life sciences compliance startup Validfor has raised $1.2 million in a pre-seed round led by DOMiNO Ventures, to modernise validation processes across pharma, biotech, and medtech.
More locally, Pickmybrain.com, a Tallinn-based startup building AI-powered digital “brains” for celebrities, experts, and public figures, raised a €1.8 million pre-seed round to fuel its growth.
MOVES
Former Beamline and Prototron CEO Jana Budkovskaja joined BSV Ventures as a Partner, becoming part of a tiny tribe of Estonian female partners at venture funds.
The new EstBAN board now includes Lauri Antalainen, Jan Lätt, Martin Gorosko, Jana Budkovskaja, Olga Lustsik, Aleksander Tõnnisson, and Peeter P. Mõtsküla. Lauri, Jan, and Martin were elected for another term, and Peeter is a new board member. EstBAN awarded Jana the “Lead Investor of the Year” title.
Sergei Anikin (ex-Pipedrive) left Bolt after running their engineering for just 5 months and set up his own AI consultancy Kodulabor.ai.