Top CEE startups founded in 2024. How many are there, and what have they achieved in just one year?

Photo by Rodrigo Ardilha

2024 posed significant challenges for the global economy and the startup ecosystem in the Central and Eastern European (CEE) region. Venture funding in CEE experienced a steep 35% decline in Q3 2024, dropping from €560 million to €360 million, as stated in Vestbee’s CEE 3Q24 report. According to Colliers, investment volumes for the year are projected to remain 40% below the 2018-2022 average. However, optimism surrounds the region, with expectations of a strong recovery in 2025 driven by improving economic and inflationary conditions.

Despite numerous hurdles, CEE startups also demonstrated resilience and adaptability in 2024. Many newly formed startups seized opportunities in niche markets, successfully attracting venture capital funding or grants, successfully launching their products, or getting media recognition. AIN identified 65 startups founded or launched in 2024 across the CEE region that have already achieved noteworthy milestones, proving that even in a tough economic climate, innovation and determination can thrive in Europe.

General overview on the CEE startups founded in 2024:

Throughout the year, 65 startups founded in 2024 across Central and Eastern Europe managed to secure just under €61 million in investment capital. The number of pre-seed deals amounted to 25 deals, which is one third of the list, and seed stage deals reached 15. 

The majority of startups secured funding primarily from venture capital funds, 8 startups received grants or went through acceleration programs and 6 startups secured funding from angel investors. The rest of the deals were undisclosed.

Country of origin

• Finland produced the most startups in 2024 (16 startups). These startups received over €34 million, which is more than half of the total investments in our list. 

• The second and third places go to Romania (8 startups) and Lithuania (7 startups). Romanian startups managed to secure €1.9 million and Lithuanian - €3.6 million in 2024

• Estonia, Austria and Ukraine nurtured 7 startups in 2024, the Czech Republic had 4 new tech startups, Poland and Hungary had 3, Bulgaria - 2 and Serbia - 1.

Industry highlights

• Unsurprisingly, nearly half of the companies on our list - 31 startups - use artificial intelligence in their solutions, reflecting the global trend toward AI adoption that has also influenced the CEE ecosystem.

• In addition, 8 startups focus on automation, including business and sales processes. 5 startups are developing AI agents, and another 5 specialize in Big Data.

• Interestingly, there are an equal number of deeptech and cleantech startups - 4 each - while 3 startups are dedicated to cybersecurity. Other sectors, including fintech, blockchain, sales and marketing, biotech, cloud data, medtech, each have 2 or fewer startups.

• Notably, Ukraine leads the defense tech sector, with at least 2 newly founded startups having secured significant funding in 2024.

Among the 66 startups on our list, the majority have multiple founders. Specifically:

• 33.3% of startups established in CEE in 2024 have more than two founders.

• 25.75% have two founders.

• Another 25.75% are led by a single founder.

• The remaining 15.15% did not disclose their founding team details.

Top 5 startups founded in 2024 across CEE. Ranked by deal amount:

Distance Technologies

Founded by Urho Konttori and Jussi Makinen, Distance Technologies is based in Helsinki, Finland.

The startup uses the technology of a computer-generated 3D light field which mixes with the environment and provides flawless per-pixel depth covering the entire field of view for maximum immersion.

The company managed to raise €13.8 million in total funding during 2024, through its pre-seed and seed rounds.

Adalid Sciences

Founded by Klara Grantz Saskova, Petr Cigler, Frantisek Sedlak, and David Schreib, Adalid Sciences is based in Prague, Czechia. 

Adalid Sciences is a healthtech company developing advanced drug delivery system for genomic medicine, utilizing innovative lipids. 

The startup secured €7.9 million during its seed investment round in 2024.

QMill

Founded by Dr. Hannu Kauppinen, Prof. Mikko Möttönen, Dr. Ville Kotovirta, Dr. Toni Annala, QMill is based in Espoo, Finland.

The company is developing quantum algorithms that provide near-term, practical benefits for industrial applications. 

The startup managed to raise a total of $5.5 million in a seed round during 2024.

Flow Computing

Founded by Timo Valtonen, CEO, Martti Forsell, CTO, Jussi Roivainen, the startup is another company from Espoo, Finland.

Flow computing develops a Parallel Processing Unit (PPU) licensable architecture and compiler ecosystem. 

In 2024, the startup secured €4 million in pre-seed funding.

Blocksense

Founded by Zahary Karadjov, Blocksense hails from Sofia, Bulgaria.

The company develops a decentralized and permissionless protocol for the efficient creation and consumption of Oracle data feeds, designed as a ZK rollup. 

In total, the startup raised nearly $4 million in seed financing during 2024.

The full list of CEE companies founded in 2024 showcasing great accomplishments (in alphabetical order):

* Some company names were purposefully ommitted due to their founders having close ties with russia:
giving such companies a platform is against our editorial policy.

Methodology

Our analysis focused on startups from Central and Eastern European countries, as well as a selection of others. The countries included in the analysis are: Ukraine, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Finland, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Austria, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Slovenia, Romania, Hungary, and Bulgaria.

It is important to note that the list of startups may not be exhaustive. The material includes only startups that have publicly announced their launch or disclosed investment rounds. The analysis was prepared using information from open sources, including news outlets and specialized databases such as Dealroom, Crunchbase, PitchBook, reports by FIRSTPICK and Vestee, as well as our own startup database at AIN. If your company was not featured or if the data is incorrect, be sure to contact us at [email protected] so we can update the list!

Text and data collected by Oleksandra Orekhova and Rostyslav Sobachynskyi