Being busy is a part of our routine. But if you are having FOMO because you are unaware of the latest developments in the innovation ecosystems in the region, we have got you covered. From mergers, to local IPOs and seed investment rounds, learn what the start-up world has been up to.
#1 Bulgarian online supermarkets come together: The Supermag – Gastronom merger
- Bulgarian online supermarkets that offer delivery services Gastronom and Supermag have merged in a complex deal, in which Gastronom acquires major control over Supermag.
- Vencislav Kamenov, Founder of Supermag, receives a minority stake in the acquiring company.
- The two companies will continue working as separate entities and two different brands. Gastronom will focus on end users, whereas Supermag – on business clients.
- The Supermag – Gastronom merger makes the new entity the second largest player on the market after eBag.
#2 WIN with a successful IPO on the Bulgarian BEAM market
- ‘The Webit Investment Network (WIN) attracted around €3M (5.87mln leva) on the BEAM market of the Bulgarian Stock Exchange. 752 investors participated in the IPO of the company, which was oversubscribed 2.4 times.
- The Webit Investment Network (WIN) will use the money to fund selected startup companies. WIN was created to acquire shares in the finalists (winners) of Webit’s Founders Games, tournaments for innovative and technical enterprises.
- WIN shareholders have the right to vote as to which firms should be eliminated from the semi-finals, allowing them to participate and directly influence the selection of the semi-finalists, as well as the finalists.
- Founders Games is also streamed online, providing WIN investors with company presentations, investor comments, and ratings.
“The success of WIN can provide new opportunities for small investors to participate in a market where only the biggest have multiplied their money so far”, says Plamen Russev, Founder and Executive Director of Webit, on Linkedin.
#3 Glovo opens its largest office in the region in Bucharest and names Iustinian Belghir General Manager in Romania
- Glovo, the Spanish on-demand courier service, opens its largest office for Southеast Europe in Bucharest. The Spanish startup is currently present in 25 countries and has about 3 500 employees, 250 of which are based in Romania.
- As Iustinian Belghir is assigned to take over the position of Glovo General Manager for the country, he adds:
“I want to be able to contribute to the development of the team of professionals within Glovo and continue to take the promise of Glovo as far as possible, both by being present in as many cities as possible, but also by adding as many partners and products as possible, so that we can offer Glovo users the best consumer experience.”
- Already present in 65 Romanian cities, Glovo’s plan is to reach 90. This new office will serve as Glovo’s regional headquarters with local teams implementing field development initiatives across SEE. Just last year, the start-up acquired Delivery Hero’s operations in the Balkan region for €170M and took over foodpanda in Bulgaria and Romania.
#4 Romanian startup Profluo receives a 500K euro seed investment
- Profluo, a cloud-based Intelligent Document Processing with a clustered machine learning technology startup, has finalized a 500K euro seed investment from Early Game Ventures. The technology aids professionals to deal with large amounts of documents by quickly getting rid of the routine work and reducing the risk of incorrectly filling in important information.
- Bogdan Năforniță and Cosmin Merișescu, both executives with experience in the field of systems development for the automation of financial-accounting operations, co-founded the company in 2016.
“[…] Profluo helps to drastically reduce the time and errors associated with manual data entry and to easily generate more and more detailed reports required by authorities (such as SAF-T), helping accountants to focus on high value-added activities for customers or their employers. The EGV funding round will help Profluo strengthen its platform and become accountants’ most trusted ally in their ongoing struggle with manual labor”, says Bogdan Năforniță, founder and CEO of Profluo.
#5 Greek Minister of Development and Investment Adonis Georgiadis, announces funding of 34M euros for the Greek Startups of Elevate
- Adonis Georgiadis has made the 2nd National Strategic Reference Framework (NSRM) call, which amounts to 34 million euros, to provide support for start-ups that have been affected by the pandemic, by stating:
“Greece is developing into a pioneer in the new knowledge economy in the wider region of Southeastern Europe. The start-ups, the dynamically developing ecosystem of research and innovation, which really deserve every support of the State, contribute significantly to this. With the 2nd call of the NSRF, amounting to 34 million euros, for financing the Working Capital , in the form of a non-repayable grant, “So we come to support, once again, the start-ups of “Elevate Greece“, which were affected by pandemic Covid-19.
- Applications for the program will begin on the 22nd of June, 2022, until the 31st of October, 2022, at 3 pm.
- It should be highlighted that the registered startups that were funded in the first round are eligible for support from both calls up to a total of € 100K.
#6 BIZkoshnica, Zagreb-based co-working space, launches a new cycle of free workshops for start-up entrepreneurs
- BIZkoshnica is a shared co-working space and a creative hub based in Zagreb.
- Co-Funded by the European Social fund, Let’s BEE social – Become a social entrepreneur, will present a cycle of eight free of charge workshops within the project ‘Social – entrepreneurial hive’.
- The cycle of training will give participants the opportunity to learn the basic principles of entrepreneurship and instances of good skills execution from Croatia and abroad.
- The workshops will be delivered by Croatian entrepreneurs and specialists in their respective sectors on Saturdays from 10 am to 4 pm from June to November this year.
- Sanja Tatalović, owner of Equilibrium, will give the first workshop in the field of Personal and Professional Development – ‘Get to know yourself and your passion!’; while the second one will take place on the 2nd of July with guest speaker Tea Zavacki, business trainer and Founder of TeaTime.com.hr, taking over.
- You can find more information about the project on their official website.
