LIfe in Estonia. Autumn 2018 by EAS, Enterprise Estonia

Photo by Sixten Sepp

cover photo by Atko Januson

Why start up in Estonia? Over 400 million people in China use the Estonian taxi and mobility app Taxify, Estonian robots made by Cleveron deliver packages in Walmarts and the technology company Nortal is helping the government of Dubai to become fully digital by the year 2021. With over 500 active startups in Estonia, we have one of the highest number of startup companies per capita in Europe. Our governmental e-services have gone a long way in fruitful cooperation with Estonian ICT-companies, who have made governmental initiatives into clever e-services. executive publisher Positive Projects Pärnu mnt 69, 10134 Tallinn, Estonia lifeinestonia@positive.ee editor Reet Grosberg reetgrosberg@positive.ee

translations Ingrid Hübscher language editor Daniel Warren design & layout Positive Design

Tight collaboration between the government and companies, especially startup-minded entrepreneurs, is still the key to Estonia’s success. I sincerely hope that the keenness of the Estonian government to create a business-friendly ecosystem has resulted in making Estonia a great place for investing and realising big ideas. We are proud that so many company founders around the world choose Estonia as their headquarters, start their business here or bring a substantial part of it to Tallinn. But we shouldn’t stop here – together with both Estonian and international startups, we aspire to create the best startup environment in the world. This means constant growth. As former COO of Starship Technologies Allan Martinson points out in his interview in this issue: a new generation of Estonian startups is rising. Not only has the number of startups been growing in Estonia, but a rapidly increasing number of them have become serious game-changers in the international arena. You probably know about Skype and TransferWise, but you will hear more from Taxify, Pipedrive, Grabcad, Cleveron, Veriff and many others in the following months. Markets are more open now than they have ever been. Estonia offers the business environment, talent and connectivity to start new businesses and launch products and services in the global market.

Rene Tammist, Estonian Minister for Entrepreneurship and IT Estonian Investment Agency supports companies investing and expanding in Estonia. World-class human capital, unique digital capabilities and a competitive business environment make Estonia a smart, agile location for businesses with global ambitions. investinestonia.com

Printed on 100% recycled paper, inspired by green technology.

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News & events

International House of Estonia welcomes new talent

‘The best way to predict the future is to invent it!’

Starting from November, all international specialists arriving in Estonia as well as foreign employers will receive information about life in Estonia from one place – the International House of Estonia. Providing a unique service centre in Estonia, all public bodies that people moving to Estonia need will offer information about their services there.

Having invested in hundreds of startups, the Japanese/Singaporean entrepreneur-turned-VC Taizo Son now wants to revolutionize the education system.

12 Allan Martinson: the perfect storm for Estonian startups Allan Martinson has long been a key player on the Estonian VC and startup scene, having established MTVP – one of the first VC funds of the region – back in 2004. In an interview with Life in Estonia, Martinson talks about a powerful new generation of local startups, the idea of every Estonian newborn being given a private company, and the future of work.

17 Narva is next. Rediscovering the diamond in the rough Narva, a town of 60 000 inhabitants right on the border of Estonia/EU and Russia, has suddenly become trendy among Estonian hipsters and curious foreigners. Forced to find its place amid geopolitical whirlwinds, Narva decided to turn its border location to its advantage both economically and culturally and announced its candidacy for the European Capital of Culture 2024.

24 Welcome to the country 2.0! What would you do with a foreign friend who has just become an e-resident and is visiting Estonia for the very first time? The family Tamkivi decided to take their Japanese friends to the remotest corner of the country and introduce them to the wonders of Estonian cuisine and steam sauna.

27 Building products of the future How to get teenagers hooked on building something with their own hands? Eesti 2.0, a non-profit organization, empowers 14-19-yearold inventors with the courage to use the latest technology to solve problems and come up with completely new solutions while working in teams under the supervision of world-class mentors.

35 World-famous entrepreneur wants to change the global education system starting with Estonia Vishen Lakhiani quit his day job to do something more fulfilling. The risk paid off: 15 years later, he’s a successful entrepreneur, writer and speaker. His company Mindvalley is working to change the global education system.

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CONTENT

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Veriff – an online identity verification system, backed by actor Ashton Kutcher

Looking to buy an electric car? Nobe 100 could be the solution for you

Arvo Pärt Centre – a unique individual archive in a pine forest

There is a new electric car company on the rise! Nobe is a company hoping to produce a three-wheeled electric car by 2020 called the Nobe 100. Nobe’s CEO Roman Muljar wants the car to become a modern classic.

Laulasmaa, with its beautiful setting away from the hustle and bustle of the city, in the natural environment that supports his music, was chosen as the site for the Arvo Pärt Centre a personal archive containing the entire creative heritage of the composer. The ‘flowing’ house, without any right angles, will be opened to visitors on October 17, 2018.

PORTFOLIO: Kris Lemsalu Life as a performance

Artist Kris Lemsalu will represent Estonia at the next Venice Biennale. She is one of those young artists who helps tell the success stories of the Estonian arts.

Estonia for international meetings and events

41 Estonian-made device is monitoring the life of astronauts The International Space Station got an addition this spring with a new ground-breaking device MyotonPRO. The device was transported to the ISS with the help of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and the spacecraft Dragon CRS-14.

Paavo Järvi – a missionary of classical music

Nanotech pillows are changing the world of healthcare

Paavo Järvi is a world-renowned Estonian conductor. A Grammy winner who has conducted many leading orchestras in most of the famous concert halls around the world. In August, the Estonian Festival Orchestra conducted by Paavo Järvi participated in the BBC Proms in London.

Irish scientists and Estonian entrepreneurs have joined forces to manufacture high-tech bedding solutions.

Estonia is fast becoming the contemporary conference event location of choice. If you’ve yet to consider Estonia for your next event destination, here are the top reasons this ideal location should leap to the top of your list.

80 Events calendar: Highlights from September to December

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One day. One planet. One goal. Millions of people in 150 countries are uniting to clean up our world, in the biggest civic action in human history.

On 15 September, volunteers and partners worldwide will come together to rid our planet of trash – cleaning up litter and mismanaged waste from our beaches, rivers, forests, and streets. A powerful ‘green wave’ of cleanups will start in New Zealand and end 36 hours later in Hawaii, with millions of people working towards one goal: a clean and healthy planet. World Cleanup Day harnesses the power of everyday people to achieve incredible things by joining together. Its beauty lies in cooperation and collaboration: building bridges between disparate communities, and including all levels of society – from citizens, to business, to government.

imaginations of people worldwide, who were inspired to follow suit with the same ambitious ‘one country, one day’ formula. This was the beginning of a global bottom-up civic movement, Let’s Do It! World, which has spread like wildfire around the globe. The movement has grown to be the biggest of its kind in the world – uniting people from all corners of the planet to work together in cleaning the world of trash. But, the Let’s Do It! movement has never been purely about cleaning up trash. It also works to raise global awareness and implement lasting changes to end the global waste epidemic, once and for all.

A world-changing idea with a humble beginning The movement was born 10 years ago in Estonia, when 4% of the population came out to clean the entire country of illegally dumped waste, in a matter of hours. This captured the

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As Estonia celebrates its 100th anniversary this year, World Cleanup Day 2018 is the country’s gift to the world.

Hendrik Albers

The Autonomous Traffic & Logistics Innovation Forum in Munich A platform to connect established transport giants with the innovations of young startups

Tiina Kivikas, Export Adviser of Enterprise Estonia in Germany: Enterpise Estonia and Munich Network have a good track record in pushing innovation between Germany and Estonia. Estonian startups interested in the German market are welcome to contact me and we will find a suitable opportunity to connect their innovative solutions to German corporates.

‘Autonomous driving is only the beginning of the evolution of how we will move in the future and transport goods from A to B,’ said Curt Winnen, Managing Director of Munich Network and one of the organizers of the international forum. The Autonomous Traffic & Logistics Innovation Forum not only enabled the participants to get to know premium providers in the field, but also discover the promising startups pushing the traffic and logistics industry. In a diverse program of expert discussions between aerospace, automotive, railway and logistics companies, the importance of automation was frequently stressed in all sectors. Dirk Hoke, CEO of Airbus Defense and Space presented the company’s latest projects, demonstrating how the aerospace company is contributing to the development of autonomous aircraft.

Showcasing Estonian innovation An event discussing autonomous traffic would not be complete without a Starship delivery robot roaming the venue. Hendrik Albers, Re-

Curt Winnen

gional Business Manager of Starship Technologies, the Estonian-founded robotics startup appeared on stage to talk about revolutionising the autonomous delivery sector and challenges that they have faced. ‘It is essential for startups to build a strong network within their respective industry sector. High level events such as the Autonomous Traffic & Logistics Innovation Forum are an excellent opportunity to showcase our robots live and meet with decision-makers in person,’ he said. Estonian startup High Mobility was among the 15 international startups with the most promising solutions in the field of autonomous transport that were chosen to pitch at the Autonomous Traffic & Logistics Innovation Forum. High Mobility makes it easy for carmakers to work with a worldwide developer community by standardising the access to cars with over 150 APIs. According to Jürgen Mayntz, Head of Business Development at High Mobility, the forum gave a chance to engage with big corporations and learn about industry trends. ‘At events like these, we lay the groundwork for our partnerships with companies like Daimler and Porsche,’ Mayntz highlighted. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Photos by Annika Haas

Conference brought 128 honorary consuls to Tallinn Estonia has almost 200 honorary consuls in 87 countries. Their main function is to provide consular services and assistance to Estonian citizens abroad, but they also help to foster economic relations and educational cooperation and to promote the country around the world. The consuls are respected figures in their own countries who enjoy high social standing. Their work as honorary consuls is undertaken voluntarily. Appointed in 2010, the Estonian honorary consul for the consular region of South Carolina is Harry Huge (81).

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Honorary consul in the US: First I asked – where is Estonia? The energetic gentleman keeps himself in shape by working, by representing and hosting delegations from Estonia and by promoting the cooperation between Estonia and South Carolina on many fronts. And all of that in addition to managing his own law firm – the offices of Harry Huge Law Firm PLLC are based in his home town of Charleston as well as in Washington. A practising attorney for decades who has been involved in civil rights movements and served on the boards of many universities... with a resume like that there simply has to be a story behind how he became the high representative of Estonia, right? And yes, in his interview for Life in Estonia, Harry Huge certainly met our expectations.

This summer, a conference for the honorary consuls of Estonia was held in Tallinn from 26-29 June, bringing together 128 honorary consuls from around the world

‘Becoming a representative for Estonia, I wouldn’t say it was a coincidence, but it was sort of serendipity,’ begins Mr. Huge. ‘Jimmy Carter was still president, so it was the late 70s and he appointed me to a committee – dealing with strategic weapons and foreign affairs and negotiating arms control agreements – which reported directly to the president. It was chaired by Thomas Watson (the manager for IBM) who became the US ambassador for Soviet Union. Tom called me up and he wanted a report from an outsider on what I thought about arms control negotiations that were going on in Geneva. I went to Moscow and stayed a few days with Tom and then he said that there were some people he really wanted me to meet and they were from Estonia. Naturally my first question was “Where is Estonia?”,’ Huge recounts how it all began.

More recently, Mr Huge has built a new venture capital fund investing in Baltic-region startups: Change Ventures. The fund presents US-based investors with a unique opportunity to invest in emerging growth companies from countries bordering the Baltic Sea. CV has already made seven investments in five Estonian companies, as well as one Latvian and one Lithuanian. The first amount is about 6.5 million euros of American investor capital. One of the investment partners, Yrjö Ojasaar, says that there are at least two additional startups in the pipeline for Change Ventures’ portfolio. When the first fund proves successful, the team is planning to set up a second fund with about 35 million euros for investments; finances will come mostly from European investors. Harry Huge says that the fund was set up because Estonian and Baltic startups are relatively modest in valuation and are basically undiscovered by the high-level tech investors and funds. ‘I saw that as a great opportunity. We focus on the Baltics, because if you compare the Baltics to Israel for example, then Israeli companies are very highly valued, but here they are mostly undiscovered.’

‘At that time I couldn’t make it to the meeting, but two or three years later I went to Tallinn, I met with Arnold Rüütel, former president of Estonia, academician Endel Lippmaa and the rest of the politicians who were planning Estonia’s re-independence from the Soviet Union. They asked me whether I’d represent Estonia in the US with the Congress and the White House. So I came back to the US and registered as a foreign agent for a country that didn’t really exist independently at that time.’ Now he has been an honorary consul for eight years, but in 2006 he was already awarded with the Medal of the Order of the Cross of Terra Mariana for representing Estonia’s interests in Washington in the 90s. In the same year, Harry Huge’s contacts with the University of Tartu began when he visited the University for the first time in order to establish collaborative contacts between UT and Nebraska Wesleyan University, which is also his Alma Mater where he is a major sponsor. As a result of his active mediation, a partnership agreement was signed with Nebraska Wesleyan University in 2007, and with the College of Charleston in 2013. The student exchanges are supported by travel grants from the Harry and Reba Huge Foundation, founded by Harry Huge. ‘All this time for me has been really rewarding,’ says Huge. ‘To see a country developing from “grim and grey days” and Soviet occupation to this bright and colourful Estonia as it is today – it has been a wonder to watch!’

Harry Huge with President Kersti Kaljulaid

Mr. Huge describes the changes of Estonia as very visual. ‘People are very stylish and bright. Once you get past the initial iciness, people are very friendly, humorous, enthusiastic.’ And then adds, laughing: ‘Except for the winters, of course!’

This fall, Huge is supposed to have another delegation of the Prime Minister of Estonia accompanied by business people and representatives of the Estonian Ministry of Economic Affairs. ‘So these things take time, but they are very important.’

Generally speaking, honorary consuls have two tasks or directions of work. ‘Several times per month we meet passport applicants and annul old passports. We are like a support system to Estonians, we are always there to assist them. In other words, we often help Estonians who happen to be in the US. As there is no honorary consul in North Carolina any more, we work for two states. In addition, we get people from Atlanta (Georgia) and Florida that also come to Charleston.’ Harry Huge says there are about 100 to 200 Estonians in the two states. ‘That’s only a guess, but there are quite a number of them! Because every time one of them comes, we ask “how many of you live in SC?” and they always say “we’re quite a few!”’

Just last year, Harry Huge negotiated an agreement called the Global Alliance for South Carolina which was formed to stimulate business, economic growth and research partnerships involving companies and academic institutions in South Carolina, Israel and Estonia. He got the idea from Jonathan Zucker, Charleston businessman and president of The InterTech Group, who had just worked out an agreement with the College of Charleston and state of Israel. ‘Then I thought, why isn’t there this kind of agreement to develop joint ventures on economic and entrepreneurial ties with Estonia? Jonathan suggested to put these two agreements together – develop high-tech communities in South Carolina, Estonia and Israel. We are just getting ready to make the request for proposals from Estonian companies to partnership with SC companies.’

The second task is representing Estonia and entertaining visiting delegations in South Carolina and Washington. ‘For example, there was a delegation of trade representatives from the European Union last year, twenty of them from all over the EU. They visited Greenville where the big BMW manufacturing plant is and then in Columbia they met with the governor. Then they came to Charleston where we hosted them at the dinner and planned meetings at the colleges.’

Mr. Huge agrees that all this work (while working as a lawyer!) is tiring and time-consuming. ‘But it gives me life,’ he says. ‘I have a very good friend, Dr Robert Gallo (is known for co-discovering HIV) and he’s the same age as I am and still working. So I asked him if he’s ever going to retire? He said: ‘Harry, don’t you know when people retire they die!?,’ he says laughing. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Photos by Arno Mikkor Marten Kaevats and Linnar Viik at Tallinn Digital Summit 2017

Tallinn Digital Summit 2018

AI and the Kratt* momentum In 20 years, Estonia has built a society where public and private digital services are woven into the fabric of everyday life. Armed with secure digital identities, citizens can conduct their governmental and private business online. Marriage, divorce, and real-estate deals are among the rare exceptions. You still need to leave the house for those. A digital society only works when people actually trust and use digital channels. By and large, Estonians do. This pragmatism has helped the country gather mountains of anonymous raw data. This is fuel for machine learning and other technologies. The Estonian government now plans to start building next-generation public services based on artificial intelligence, or AI. This creates interesting obstacles. The government’s newly-formed AI taskforce aims to solve a few critical ones. Among them: legal liability. Who’s responsible when artificial intelligence messes up?

* Kratt is a magical creature in Estonian mythology. Essentially, Kratt was a servant built from hay or old household items. The Estonian government uses this character as a metaphor for AI and its complexities. #krattlaw, #ailaw, #algorithmicliability

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Algorithmic identity A year into the public debate over algorithmic-liability law (a.k.a. the Kratt* law), opinion leans toward avoiding sector-based regulation, opting for general algorithmic liability instead. The biggest conversation starter is the idea of giving algorithms a separate legal status, similar to companies. This is one of the more future-proof methods of keeping AI innovation humming in the longer term. A draft bill should enter parliament for debates by June 2019. Aside from the ethical, moral and philosophical debate over AI liability, the task force is also working on enforcement. How does one ensure the integrity of decision-making within algorithms that evolve and change constantly? How can we be sure that sensor data used in algorithms has not been hacked or changed? Estonia’s experience in using blockchain technology to secure its citizens’ medical records may help.

A balanced debate on AI In these debates, technical and legal expertise goes a long way. But the discussion must also involve the public. Honest, meaningful debate requires that dreamy utopias be balanced with open discussions about AI’s controversial attributes and threats. Only this can create user-friendly legislation that’s equipped to reduce legal nightmares in the long-term. The AI taskforce has another mission. It is working on a national AI strategy to create a common framework for implementation in both the public and private sectors. Estonia is a frequent testbed for new technologies and sees AI as just the latest entry. If it can reduce regulatory complexities in a user-friendly way, the path is clear for mind-blowing innovation.

Our future with AI in Tallinn Naturally, Estonia sees itself fit to lead the global debate on AI. On the 16th of October 2018, it will host the second Tallinn Digital Summit, a platform for discussing the global future with self-learning algorithms and their impact on social systems. Held annually, it’s an invite-only gathering of heads of government from digital-minded nations, the tech community, and influential thinkers. This year’s summit will focus on putting AI and free-moving data in the service of digital governments, economies and societies. See www.digitalsummit.ee for more.

Robotex International 2018 30 November - 2 December 2018 in Tallinn, Estonia

Robotex International is the biggest robotics festival on the planet, as well as the annual event hosted by Robotex â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the Global Robotics Education Network. It is a festival where thousands of engineers, executives, students and families come together to network with industry leaders, examine new startups, build robots for various challenges and learn about the latest technological innovations. Robotex International will be hosted for the 18th time in a row. The festival will be jam-packed with amazing keynotes and competitions, two expo halls, workshops, and much more.

Robotex International Conference at Tallinn Creative Hub, 30 Nov - 1 Dec The Robotex International Conference will be the Frontier Tech Executive Gathering of 2018. It is the safe haven for all technical executives, architects and advocates to have a pioneering discussion on applied robotics and the future of tech. The conference brings together some of the most innovative frontier tech experts to introduce the latest technologies from Data Science and Conversational AI to Cyber Security and Space Tech.

The Robotex Competitions and EXPO at Estonian Fair Centre, 30 Nov - 2 Dec In addition to the Robotex International Conference, Robotex will host robotics competitions throughout the three-day festival with challenges available for people across all technical levels and ages. In 2017, the competitions saw over 1346 robots and 3052 participants from 48 countries. The main purpose of our competitions is to give people the skills enabling them to find jobs as engineers or start their own frontier tech startups. The Robotex International EXPO brings together the latest technological innovations from consumer electronics to the machinery industry, including companies such as Starship Technologies, MakeBlock and Cleveron. The main purpose of the EXPO is to introduce the technology to the world while enabling the corporates direct access to emerging talent and policymakers.

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Photo by Atko Januson

Allan Martinson: the perfect storm for Estonian startups

In March this year, Allan Martinson resigned from the COO and Chief Sales Officer seats of Starship Technologies, a company that builds last-mile delivery robots and is heralded as one of the most promising European tech startups. Martinson (51) has long been a key player on the Estonian VC and startup scene, having established MTVP – one of the first VC funds of the region – back in 2004.

‘Starship can potentially be a much more significant company than Skype was’

In an interview with Life in Estonia, Martinson talks about a powerful new generation of local startups, the idea of every Estonian newborn being given a private company and the future of work.

How does someone quit a key job in the hottest and coolest European startup? You put it interestingly – hottest and coolest at the same time. I have been comparing that time to being in a space capsule for almost four years, but ultimately I wanted to get back on the Earth. It wasn’t rare that I woke up in San Francisco at 4AM and finished at 1AM in another time zone. The main reason to step out of that ride was personal. If your family is on one continent and your job at the HQ of the company is ten time zones away, one of them will suffer.

Why did you decide to step on the spaceship in the first place? Starship was founded in July 2014 by two people best known as Skype co-founders – Ahti Heinla and Janus Friis. In 2012-14, they were brainstorming about their Next Big Thing, and I had helped them to validate – or rather shoot down – their initial ideas. Those, by the way, were not related to robotics at all. So, in June 2014 we had decided to put previous ideas in a box and Ahti and Janus sat down in London for yet another brainstorming session. Ahti at that time was leading a team of ten Estonian engineers participating in NASA Centennial Challenge (team “Kuukulgur” or “Moon Rover”), building experimental sample retrieval robots. It was a hobby project but led him and Janus to think – is there any big problem on the Earth that could be resolved by autonomous robots? Perhaps agriculture? Or house cleaning? Finally, they stopped at the delivery robots, and Starship’s core idea was born. It was initially called Project Echo and operated in total secrecy.

Usually there’s first an idea and then you start creating a team. So, in Starship’s case it worked the other way round. I guess it was both at the same time. Who knows whether the idea would have popped up if not at that NASA contest. Ahti emailed me a day after their London brainstorm. I remember I thought it was a cool idea but was sceptical whether it could really be built, especially in Estonia where the robotics industry was literally absent. Today, it is funny to read my email response to him because I was so wrong! Almost all of that NASA competition team jumped aboard in the first weeks, and

by now Ahti has built one of the most impressive autonomous driving technology startups in the world. Despite my initial scepticism, I agreed to advise Project Echo and became very quickly convinced that it is not only a moonshot idea but also the best tech team I have ever seen. So, a few months later I put down my venture capitalist hat and stepped back into an operational role as a COO of the company.

You mentioned that Starship is now more an American company than European. We like to label startups according to their birthplace here in Estonia and then engage in debates about whether we can call Skype or TransferWise Estonian or not. Is such identity important at all? I think it is important. But it’s obvious that a company can have several country identities at the same time. Skype was at the same time Estonian, Swedish, Danish, Luxembourgian and British. It’s the same with Starship. Its engineering team is Tallinn-based, with a satellite team in Helsinki. It’s engineering DNA is proudly shaped by Ahti Heinla, and he is an Estonian to the core. But Starship’s business and investors are naturally where the markets and capital is, and that’s why its headquarters are in San Francisco. For really capital-intense and disruptive projects like Starship, there are only two places on the Earth you can find enough capital: Silicon Valley and China.

What’s the perspective of Starship? Starship started from the observation that last mile delivery is one of the least efficient and most wasteful industries on a global scale. Last mile – in reality it’s the last 1-20 miles – is the most expensive part of the whole delivery process. Even if an Amazon shipment travels 2000 miles, the last 20 miles still makes up to 50% of the whole delivery cost. Also, most people do not think about it but we are parts of the last mile delivery industry ourselves when we do our shopping and sit in a car for an hour. It’s a huge problem, but the technology is now there that can automate it. In terms of market size, this market is three times larger than the telecom industry that Skype disrupted. So, Starship can potentially be a much more significant company than Skype was. And sidewalk delivery robots are much easier to build than self-driving cars. It drives slowly, has low mass and has significantly less safety issues. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

‘Starship robots connect people left and right!’

I see Starship robots and self-driving cars as essentially different products. Self-driving cars create fear in people and might seem dangerous. The delivery robot makes people smile, they take videos of it and want to pat it. That’s true. More than that – over 80% of people do not care about the robots on the sidewalks at all! I remember when we first drove Starship in London around the Waterloo station. It was rush hour and 3000 people passed by – not a single one stopped to even take a picture of the bot! It was astonishing. But if people stop, they tend to smile. In 2017-18 eight U.S. states approved special laws that allow such robots on the sidewalks. More than 1500 legislators voted for the law and only five voted against. So, it seems to be the least controversial issue in Trump’s America. Starship robots connect people left and right!

What have you been doing after leaving Starship?

when the initial basic components of Estonian e-government were put in place. Then, in 2005, several important things happened – a young upstart Skype was sold to eBay for over €2 billion, and Playtech – another company with Estonian development and co-founder – was listed in London for over €1 billion valuation. Two unicorns in less than a few months! A year later, the state-owned VC Estonian Development Fund started to invest in Estonian tech, and filled the post-crisis gap in funding. Many successful Estonian startups – Pipedrive, Grabcad, Cleveron, Taxify etc. – were born in the end of the 2000s and early 2010s. But now we’re are witnessing the next generation of Estonian startups.

What sets this generation apart from the previous ones?

Can’t say yet, stay tuned. But it’s not about delivery robots!

This generation started somewhere around 2015 and is now gaining speed. The number of startups is now significantly higher than before. My friend in one London-based venture capital company is tracking over 500 Estonian startups! But even more significant is the quality of those companies. Their founders are usually alumni of the startups of the previous generation. It is really interesting. They have seen how to build a startup from inside, they have well-established teams, they have access to funding. All of this is accompanied by the Estonian startup brand and the reputation. It is like a perfect storm. They need three things and they have them all: talent, capital, access to markets.

You’re advising Estonian startups. What impression have you got about the local startup scene?

Isn’t there too much capital? Some people say that it is too easy to get funding.

When I started to look around in May – remember, I was on a spaceship for a few years – I was astonished. The number of startups in Estonia had exploded compared to a few years ago, and most importantly, their quality had taken a quantum leap. When I started a VC fund back in 2005, we had trouble finding promising startups to invest in. Most of them were copycats of successful concepts from elsewhere. Then the 2008 crisis happened, and it became the best thing for Estonian tech. One should never waste a good crisis! Estonia used it really well by quickly restructuring the economy. And that’s when the Estonian startup scene really jumped to life.

I don’t think so. I believe that all of them [who have raised money] have been worth it. At the same time, true, it is a very warm season for funding. Surely some colder seasons will follow at some point. But comparing to 10-15 years ago, there were much more questionable investments then. I would say the biggest issue is where to find enough talent for all of those companies. The €350 million that will likely be raised by startups this year alone will create a few thousand new jobs. There is simply not enough people in Estonia, and unless we want that money be invested elsewhere, Estonia must be pro-actively attracting talent from abroad.

How did the Estonian tech industry evolve?

You must name some of the new startups that seem more interesting or promising.

First I took time off for a couple of months and now I have been working with some startups who need help with fundraising, strategy, sales or with developing their story. At the same time, I’m working on my next idea.

What is it about?

In my career, I have witnessed several waves of startups. In the 90s it was all about building the basic fabric of the economy and the tech startups at that time were producing or importing hardware and did basic system integration. Then, in the early 2000s it evolved into more complex projects, like software development or online media. It was also the time

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I usually ask my VC friends to name three startups that have excited them the most recently. Usually, those tend to be companies with very non-standard concepts – not necessarily the best investments but something that makes you say “Wow, that’s interesting”.

Photo by Atko Januson

â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;I believe the next unicorn will come from Estonian fintechâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;

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‘Every child could receive a private limited company the moment he or she is born. It could be handed over together with a personal identity code’

Let’s take that risk and name some. So, what has fascinated me the most…there are Veriff and eAgronom. The founders of both are even not 25 yet and they make me think of myself when I was 23. They are young and they don’t believe anything is impossible. On the other end of the age spectrum there is Gridio, which was founded by the former Eesti Energia CEO Sandor Liive. In transportation, there are superstars like Taxify and Starship. Lots of cool B2B startups – Scoro, LeapIN, Avokaado, some “baby Pipedrives”. HR tech like Jobbatical or Meet Frank. A whole bunch of bike-tech firms like Bikeep, Comodule, Ampler Bikes. Marduk Technologies shoots drones out of the sky with lasers. Natufia produces upscale smart kitchen gardens. But if I were to bet, then I believe the next unicorn will come from Estonian fintech.

Who are the next superstars of fintech? Of course, we have TransferWise that is already a superstar. I would follow Monese really closely. Then there is Fiizy that deals with consumer loan demand generation in Spanish-speaking countries. Some other firms are in the making. And then we have a whole parallel universe of crypto-startups. Estonian-registered companies have raised over 300m in ICOs this year alone, placing Estonia at #7 in the world – in absolute terms, not per capita. Many of those firms use Estonia just for registration, but that is still an impressive number.

There was a kind of race among the American Big Tech companies to first reach a trillion-dollar market cap. Apple reached it recently. In that context, the first European tech company is somewhere around position 63 in the table. The big players are all in USA or China. Why? These two countries are the biggest economies in the world. They are compact, but Europe is fragmented between 30+ countries. After Brexit I don’t even know where the tech capital of Europe will be.

So it is natural that European companies can’t compete? I don’t think European tech can’t compete but it is facing considerable domestic hurdles. The US and China have one single language and they are large single markets. It is not an issue for a future founder to grow up somewhere in Minnesota, then one day pack a bag and move to San Francisco – it is still the same country. In Europe you would need to move into a city with a different language and culture. We also don’t have a single hub for the tech and capital like Silicon Valley. Venture capitalists that are lined up on Sand Hill Road are collectively controlling hundreds of billions of dollars. There is no such street anywhere in Europe.

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Is it an issue in the end at all that Europe’s tech companies are lagging behind? I do not think we can replicate Silicon Valley in Europe. All such attempts (like Skolkovo in Russia) have resulted in lifeless Frankenstein Valleys. Europe’s model shall be different and based on mini-clusters like London, Berlin or Tallinn plus Helsinki. Let’s also not forget that overall quality of life here is significantly better than in the US. We have a variety of cultures, history, architecture, music and food. That’s valuable.

What would you advise young people who are soon graduating from high school to learn? There will be two types of jobs in the future: where the computer tells you what to do, and where you tell the computer what to do. It is important to be in that second group. My son just started with data science and machine learning in the Netherlands. I have my fingers crossed, hoping he will manage to chew his way through it. But there are also creative professions such as music, theatre or even politics. Machines will be able to do a lot of things that are repetitive and can be put into algorithms but it will take them a long time to get creative.

It is said that Estonians are not entrepreneurial. Entrepreneurship is generally not taught in schools. What could be a way to improve it? I don’t agree with it. I think Estonians are quite entrepreneurial. I think that practically every active person has his or her business. Having a company is rather a norm. But why shouldn’t Estonia be the first country in the world where we don’t distinguish physical and legal persons? Every child could receive a private limited company the moment he or she is born. It could be handed over together with a personal identity code. It would make every Estonian citizen automatically a possible future entrepreneur.

Are you being serious or is it more a provocative mind-game? I’m being provokingly serious. Back in 1999, at the height of the dot-com boom, I suggested Estonia become the first “internet country” and rename itself Estonia.com, or at least put the internet address on its coat of arms. I intended that as a semi-joke but it provoked a serious discussion on e-government. By today, a large number of those initiatives have been completed and it’s time to seek new thought-provoking ideas. What if Estonia became the first country to re-engineer its labour and tax law to erase the boundaries between business, freelancing and traditional employment? Around 10-15% of Estonia’s workforce is already freelancers who sell their service through a company. Why not develop it further and think of becoming a nation of free agents? Giving every child automatically his or her own company would be a really significant innovation. It would allow people to think as entrepreneurs, not as pure subjects of a labour law.

Photo by Aron Urb

Narva is next. Rediscovering the diamond in the rough Narva, a town of 60 000 inhabitants right on the border of Estonia/EU and Russia has suddenly become trendy among Estonian hipsters and curious foreigners. The 96% Russian speaking town has suffered more from the post-industrial decline than any other Estonian city, with its decreasing and aging population, the old feel isolated and forgotten and the young just look for a chance to leave.

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Compared to other Estonian cities, Narva has the greatest potential for a positive transformation.

Photo by Tõnu Tiunnel

www.narva2024.eu

Narva has created a genuine interest in international media that can be turned around and filled with positive content. Due to its geopolitical location (Eastern border of EU and NATO), Narva has a great strategic impact on the relations between Europe and Russia.

The candidacy for European Capital of Culture 2024 and preparation period of six years will offer a unique opportunity to create a comprehensive strategy for Narva and the whole region combining all different spheres of life. Many recent European Capitals of Culture have used this as an opportunity to find a new identity after the industrial era, to regenerate local economy through arts and culture.

Higher unemployment and social vulnerability compared to other regions of Estonia, as well as its geographical location right at the border where the photogenic Narva river separates Europe from Russia (one civilization from another), have prompted many Western journalists to flock to the town in search of the ‘next Crimea’ after 2014. In vane. The decline has left behind a landscape of abandoned industrial architecture and uniquely contradicting identities of the people that curious and creative minds have started to discover and appreciate. Forced to find its place amid geopolitical whirlwinds, Narva has decided to turn the border location to its advantage both economically and culturally. After a few months of preparations last fall, Narva announced in January its candidacy for the European Capital of Culture 2024 – a unique opportunity to regenerate the city, engage the community and reinvigorate the economy. The change of minds and hearts in Narva is visible since President Kersti Kaljulaid announced the temporary move of her office to Narva. In August, more than 400 public servants spent several weeks in the Narva region doing field work with the local officials and citizens, thus connecting many dots. And more is waiting to happen: Vaba Lava is opening a theatre and co-working space in December 2018; the old Baroque city hall, one of the few buildings to survive the WWII bombings, will be restored along with the modern urban space around it; Kreenholm, the largest textile factory in Europe in the 19th century is building a visitor

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President Kersti Kaljulaid

center to breathe new life into the 200 000 m2 architectural heritage site on a river island just between Estonia and Russia. Ivan Sergejev (30) returned to his native Narva as city architect two years ago after studying and working in the USA for three years at the renowned architecture office of Rem Koolhaas. Narva seemed like a great opportunity for the young architect to make a real difference, a carte blanche that one doesn’t usually get handed so early in their career. Sergejev looked at this challenge as his chance to give something back to his hometown. Two years ago he sketched a dream on a photo of the empty courtyard of Kreenholm – shapes of people as an audience for a performance. Now the dream has come true. In August, Tartu Uus Teater staged a grand production in the main courtyard of the former textile factory – a musical performance based on the life and career of Jaak Joala, an Estonian who was once one of the most popular singers in the Soviet Union. Each sold-out performance hosted 2000 viewers bringing more than 20 000 people to Narva and the old factory. This was unprecedented attention for the city and a proof that Sergejev’s approach to filling the spaces with new content is working. ‘The dream was – let’s bring life back to this complex using whatever means possible. So, the success of this project was very important and definitely something I hoped for. There are lots of other things happening as well. This summer Taxify – an Estonian start-up unicorn, got their international staff together at Kreenholm for a few days teambuilding, just as TransferWise has done

Photos by Aron Urb

twice already. Things like these are the right approach at this point in time. I don’t see the factory complex being built up for fully viable commercial use any time soon. But small interventions like this help people visualize and experience a dream of what could be.’

People in Narva have not dared to dream since 1991? Sergejev: ‘I think so. When people in Narva see that someone can actually accomplish a dream here, it is a great encouragement. Success stories elsewhere don’t convince anybody. In this case, it wasn’t just happening here but what’s more important – the production engaged many local people as artists, dancers, backstage crew, dress-makers, volunteers, etc. Local people shared the ownership of the project. One thing is jobs, the other thing is the feeling of constructive pride. Not of something we used to be but of what we could be, connected to this awesome performance.’

Ivan Sergejev

‘Another, smaller similar experience was with a Mexican graffiti artist invited by the city to create a mural on a huge wall. Suddenly after we did that a local artist popped up and made a bunch on pieces all around Narva and the region. She realized that this is a good thing and discovered herself, people discovered her and the city as a community discovered that it’s ok to do beautiful things on the empty walls. It’s about legitimizing ideas and dreams. So, local people can start doing their thing, maybe on a smaller scale to start with and maybe it’s going to take a while, but it’s a start. This hasn’t been present in Narva for a long time.’ LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Photos by Aron Urb

‘The critical part is to engage with the community, not just to import a project. The same thing is happening with the new Station Narva festival in September – a deep cooperation between the Tallinn team of Tallinn Music Week (TMW) and the local Narva team. Both sides hope that this will help to build up local expertise so that the locals can later take it over and do it themselves.’

What is the Narva hype really about? ‘When I came here I sensed that there was something going on. Like a feeling before the storm. I felt there was something brewing. I started to tell people about it, invited them to come over and check it out. And things started happening. Narva has become cool and this was just something that was waiting to happen. Apart from being the city architect, I see my role here also as a facilitator for people with ideas to come and discover Narva and make their dreams happen here.’ Helen Sildna, the founder of Tallinn Music Week, has discovered Narva for herself and is now heading Narva’s bid for the title of European Capital of Culture 2024. ‘Narva is exciting for people with imagination, who can immediately see what could be done there. People who arrive with the expectation: “Narva, what do you have to offer to me?”, will be disappointed. Narva is far from ready. Whenever I go to London, the first feeling is that the city is so dense there is nothing to add. Narva is the exact opposite and attracts people who like a blank canvas: use the original and start creating new. When David Bowie and Iggy Pop moved to Berlin in the 1970s – what attracted them? Probably the minimalism, the roughness, decadence. But maybe also the feeling that a lack of something is an opportunity for new life and innovation. The feeling of hope and opportunity. Narva is a place that motivates people who want to do great and unusual things.’

‘Let’s fill Kreenholm with life! Now we can see clearly that culture is helping us with meaningful content’ Jaanus Mikk, director of Narva Gate (Kreenholm)

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Helen Sildna

‘Narva is Estonia’s consciousness – only if the people of Narva feel free, safe and confident, while speaking their mother tongue, can Estonia be free, strong and democratic’ Kristina Kallas, director of Narva College

Narva Art Residency is a small but steady first injection of contemporary international arts into Narva, hosting international artists in the former director’s office of Kreenholm since 2015. Ann Mirjam Vaikla, director of the residency sees her mission in building a community where people are sharing the same values, or better still – find out what these values are together. A performance artist herself, Vaikla intentionally chose Narva as her next challenge after an internship in New York. The residency gives artists from different fields a chance to dive into the community and co-create contemporary art inspired by the landscapes and identities of the place.

What does #Narvaisnext mean to you? Vaikla: ‘I think it’s something that Narva has had since the break-up of the Soviet Union. That super weird vibe with people even saying things like: Narva is not a part of Estonia. Narva is distant from the rest, sort of isolated. People have been pushing to break out of that bubble and I have a lot of ideas how to do it.’ The Art Residency is a place that brings together architects, designers, thinkers and artists across disciplines, including local inhabitants, to find new pathways and thought processes regarding Narva.

Modern industry is rediscovering Narva In spite of the public image of postindustrial decline, positive development is actually happening in Narva’s business world, first and foremost thanks to the persistent and steady work of Ida-Viru County Industrial Areas Development Foundation (IVIA). Set up nearly a decade ago, the foundation has invested 5 million euros in infrastructure and succeeded to attract considerable amount of private investments into Narva Industrial Park – 65 million euros so far, that have already created more than 500 high-skilled jobs. There are more contracts sealed (worth 300 million euros) that will add another 1000 jobs within the next few years. Of the 34 plots in Narva only four are still available, so the former wasteland will soon be built up with high tech factories, currently in different stages of planning.

‘It’s worth attracting talent from St Petersburg to a freer environment’ Ragnar Sass, founder of Pipedrive and LIFT99

Teet Kuusmik

Teet Kuusmik, the head of IVIA explains the unique selling point of Narva Industrial Park: ‘Our target group in Narva are companies that do cross-border business. We don’t just sell land plots but rather a business model. For Western companies the location and local know-how offer access to Russian markets just across the border. For Russian companies the location is crucial in opening European markets as their products gain the ‘made in EU’ label. Also attractive is a chance to slip the complicated and expensive tax and customs procedures for companies that use EU-originated materials and sell their products within the EU after processing. Some of the companies operating at Narva Industrial Park have their headquarters or research departments in St Petersburg, thus benefitting from the close proximity and easy commute for staff. Another benefit for high tech companies is the chance to operate within EU legislation that offers a safe legislative situation and a better environment for intellectual property rights. Narva is also an excellent location for e-commerce in Russia where the applicable regulations are much more complicated.’ Kuusmik is hopeful to open up yet another new business strand and attract large data centers in the second phase of the development to the 39 completed plots with full infrastructure: ‘Due to high energy prices, Estonia so far has not been competitive in this sector. However, with the new regulation passed just this summer, we will finally be able to offer energy prices that are competitive even compared to Sweden and Finland, as the industrial users will be able to draw electricity directly from the nearby power plant, thus avoiding the high grid costs that currently exceed the price of electricity itself. So, we can move into a completely new sector of data centers, blockchain companies and cryptomining.’

Economist, April 2018: ‘THE grey Stalinist blocks, potholed roads and intimidating communist-era plazas hardly suggest a hipster hotspot. But Narva, an Estonian town on Russia’s border, is suddenly all the rage. … Estonia is changing. A new globally-minded generation born in the 1980s and 1990s is coming of age. With no memory of the Soviet Union, young people from both communities are often more interested in the future than the grudges of the past.’

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Photo by Atko Januson

Kaidi-Kerli Kärner

International House of Estonia welcomes new talent Starting from November, international specialists arriving in Estonia and foreign employers will be able to find information about life in Estonia in one place – the International House of Estonia. It will be a unique place where all of the public bodies that people might need when moving to Estonia will offer information about their services.

These days, quality of life and ease of relocation are the main points considered when foreign specialist choose a new place to live. This is more and more the case with the younger generation who do not tolerate unreasonable and bureaucratic state systems – they expect digital documents and fast replies to their inquiries. Therefore, public bodies can no longer afford to have people traipse from one institution to another and spend weeks waiting for written replies to their questions. It is pivotal to make access to public services easy for the talents different countries or cities compete for; people who will often make their final decision based on how comfortable it is to deal with various issues and relocate. The Moroccan-born photographer Tarik Labrighli, who lives in Estonia, likes it here especially because the state is small and user-friendly: ‘I feel like Estonia chose me, the fact that Estonia is a young country and it still developing, I feel a responsibility in being part of that development rather than being in a developed country where everything is done already. Also, the fact that Estonian population

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is small and everybody kind of knows each other opens a great opportunity to be known easily, so basically if you are doing something good, people will definitely notice you.’ In order to make relocation as easy as possible and enable people to find necessary contacts, Enterprise of Estonia will open the International House of Estonia in early November. The institution will simplify people’s understanding of how things work in Estonia and which public bodies deal with which issues. Programme Manager Kaidi-Kerli Kärner is responsible for the opening of the International House in Enterprise Estonia: ‘When you move to a foreign country, it is difficult to find a good overview of how everything functions. Often foreigners moving to a new country have to reinvent the wheel – how to find a GP, where to look for an apartment, who is offering language learning services. Often people find help from other foreigners through social media, but this information may already be old or flawed. The International House will provide correct and thorough information on all services which one needs when relocating to Estonia and adjusting to life here.’

Tarik Labrighli

What does the International House offer? The International House of Estonia will for the first time bring together the services offered by several ministries, which foreigners locating to Estonia use. It also organises events, training sessions and networking opportunities to those foreign specialists who have already lived in Estonia for some time. One can book a consultation time to find answers to all the main issues to do with relocation. In addition to consultations, one can also get their required documents in order. For example, foreigners who stay more than a few months in Estonia need to register their address. Until now, this was done in city district councils. Now each foreigner can book a time at the International House and together with registering their residency, create their ID code. In addition, they can consult the migration counsellor of the Police and Boarder Guard Board on living permits. Once this has been done, foreigners can consult with the Integration Foundation or officials of the City of Tallinn on kindergarten and school sites, the system of GPs and on finding a place to live. Counsellors can provide an overview of all the main services one needs when relocating to Estonia. In addition, they have know-how on private services (such as opening a bank account, getting insurance or finding a phone operator). Once foreigners have adapted to life in Estonia a bit more, they can attend various events at the International House: professional networking events, different cultural evenings, Estonian language study cafes and fun events

for children of all ages. ‘One of the most difficult things when moving to a new country is finding new friends. We want the International House to be a place where both foreigners and Estonians come together to find new contacts whether friendships or professional ones,’ explains Kaidi-Kerli. Tarik, who has lived in Estonia for six years already, has dealt with the first issues of moving to the country, but he considers the networking function of the International House very important, especially if the events have a diverse profile. ‘Networking events will definitely help, if you are a foreigner in country where you don’t have many contacts and you don’t know from where to start. But I think people are different and we can’t expect them to find their interests easily, otherwise the events will be targeting only certain people, so in my opinion what would really help as a foreigner is to create more cultural events with a networking background to attract different kinds of people and keep it more interesting.’

The International House set to help employers too In addition to foreign specialists, it is important to make the employment process as simple as possible for employers as well. Therefore, employers can book a time with a migration consultant in order to better grasp which documents they need in order to recruit foreign specialist and how long the process is likely to

take. In addition, they can find assistance with helping foreigners to adjust better to life in Estonia and to their specific jobs. Many experienced companies who recruit from abroad will start to share their experiences – which channels work in marketing, how to find recruitment partners and how to help people from other cultures to adjust in the Estonian working environment.

Experiences of other countries Similar international houses are created in cities all around Europe. Not all of them have the same structure as the International House in Tallinn. ‘Similar international houses exist in Helsinki, Copenhagen and Berlin, for example. But many of them just offer state services and do not pay attention to networking events or the other way around – they organize a lot of events, but offer no information about the services of the city or the state. We have gathered all these vital lessons and understood that foreigners want to find answers to all their questions in one place and to have one reliable partner who is always able to offer advice and useful contacts,’ explains Kaidi-Kerli Kärner. The International House of Estonia will be opened in early November as part of the Work in Estonia programme of Enterprise Estonia, and it will be located at Valukoja 8 in Ülemiste City. The International House is funded by the ICT Development Programme of the Estonian Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communication. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

What would you do with a foreign friend who has just become an e-resident and is visiting Estonia for the very first time? Our family decided to take our Japanese friends to the remotest corner of the country and introduce them to the wonders of our cuisine and steam sauna.

Welcome to the country 2.0! Photos by Ott-Erik Eendra

By Ede Schank Tamkivi

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The eggs are teaching the hen? We had already greeted some of our Sloan friends here in Estonia, so when the officials from the Estonia 100 committee approached us with an offer to invite guests to Estonia as part of the centennial celebrations, it did not take us long to think who we should invite: Satoshi and Naoko with Emi, whom we had never met before. Big Satoshi and Small Satoshi also hadn’t met yet. They happily accepted the invitation. Satoshi is probably seen as quite a rebel in the otherwise very traditional Japanese society. After graduating from Stanford he returned to his job at a big corporation but then quit to join a startup called Life is Tech! The 2011 founded edutech company helps teenagers get a cutting-edge programming education. Curiously enough, after returning from the US, I started running the Eesti 2.0 education non-profit that gets the next generation excited about tech. Recently, I’ve started seeing groups and delegations of Japanese people arriving in Estonia, eager to see how we perform the ‘education miracle’ in our tiny country. Although Japan actually ranks ahead of Estonia in the much-applauded PISA-test scores, apparently there is something in the air the tech-savvy Japanese are sensing from afar.

At the end of April, we had the pleasure of welcoming our friends Satoshi and Naoko Miyagawa and their 2-year-old daughter Emi to visit us in Estonia. We had first met them in California 6 years ago when Satoshi and my husband Sten started their studies at Stanford University’s Graduate Business School (GSB) Sloan Program. I worked side-by-side with Satoshi for three months as a social chair in charge of organizing social events for the class of a very diverse group of 80 Sloans from very different backgrounds. The Spring Quarter was busy with cultural evenings: there was the traditional Belgian Beer Night, Chinese New Year, Brazilian Party, Japanese Night, and then something completely different… ‘Estonia and the rest of Europe Night’! It wasn’t just the fact that both of our families were far away from our home countries and trying hard to fit in to the American lifestyle, somehow we just clicked very well. Although the geography and the history of the two countries is very different, it seems to me that Estonians and the Japanese have a lot in common. Maybe there is some truth to the mystic stories that the two ethnic groups actually share similar roots: Finno-Ugric people started their journey from somewhere across the Ural Mountains, a vast area in Asia, where the roots of the Ainu people apparently also lie, now indigenous to the northernmost Japanese island Hokkaido. When our youngest son was born four years ago in the US, his middle name was there before his first one: it’s Satoshi. Some people would make the connection to the smallest unit of the bitcoin cryptocurrency but it also means ‘smart’ in Japanese. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Wild garlic pesto aka Ramson Pesto (a Nami-Nami Recipe)

Photos by Ott-Erik Eendra

a good bunch of wild garlic (about 125 g), rinsed and drained 50 g Parmesan cheese, roughly chopped 50 g whole almonds 75 ml (5 tbsps.) extra virgin olive oil sea salt and freshly ground black pepper Place almonds and cheese into a food processor and blitz into fine crumbs. Add wild garlic, process again until you’ve got a coarse pesto. Now add the oil little by little, with the machine still running. Season with salt and pepper. If you want to keep your pesto for a few weeks, then place into cool sterilized jars and pour a layer of olive oil on top. Keep in the fridge.

Source: http://nami-nami.blogspot.com/2011/04/wildgarlic-pesto-aka-ramson-pesto.html

Many firsts ‘The first time I heard about e-residency I was shocked – you can become an e-resident and create your own company online! That is super-super new!’ Satoshi gushed. ‘When I heard the story, I decided to create my own company here. I want to create a platform for the global nomads, which means that you can work from anywhere and through that experience learn many new things.’ So, the first stop for Satoshi after landing in Tallinn was picking up his e-residency card from the Police and Border Guard Board office, which was a surprisingly smooth operation. Then he had to activate the card. In order to prove (or bust?) the myths about Estonia – that there is free Wi-Fi everywhere – we took them to our summer house on the island of Saaremaa, the 19th century farm in the middle of the remotest location you can find. Satoshi and Naoko could not believe their eyes that there were no other people besides us in sight. Just endless fields and forests everywhere. We walked to the very end of the peninsula, a place you cannot even go in the summer, because of the loose wild cattle roaming the pristine coastline, which is dotted by some concrete military fortifications dating back to the previous century that are probably infested by vipers. But in late April there were only the swans, the global nomads, who had just arrived from their intercontinental trip and were getting their nests in order; the clear waters and the blue skies. Believe it or not but the internet worked! Satoshi, a Japanese citizen, got his long-time dream fulfilled and registered his new company in the EU. ‘This is the Estonian way of Country 2.0!’ Satoshi happily exclaimed. The next morning, we decided to try out something more traditional in Estonian terms: we made wild garlic (also known as bear leek) pesto for

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the very first time. The most difficult part was chopping the almonds since we did not have a blender in the summer house. But the outcome was very much worth all the hard work – when you spread the pesto on the fresh Muhu rye bread (and if it’s to your taste, add a tiny Baltic herring to top off your ultra-hipster sandwich), it just melts in your mouth.

An Estonian and Japanese person go to a Russian sauna… During the day, the kids got to play together and with Täpi, our neighbour’s dog. Emi was picking up words in Estonian very quickly and Eik Satoshi kept repeating that he’s ‘the small Toshi who likes the big Toshi’. By the evening we had heated up our Russian-type sauna which, unlike the Finnish sauna, can be used after the fire has burned out so the hot steam comes from the rocks piled up inside the big stove. Although it was the very first time visiting this type of sauna for both Naoko and Satoshi, we found many similarities between our sauna cultures. For both countries, the sauna is not just a place to purify your body but also a place for certain rituals, quite often for medical purposes. Fast forward several months, after the unusually long and hot Estonian summer – probably more like the Japanese one – was just about to end and our family was having our traditional Sunday evening sauna, my husband came out of the steam room and said: ‘You know, the Japanese Sa-do style that Satoshi taught me is really effective – if you hold your hands up in front of you while you sit in the sauna, the heat really gets to you much more efficiently!’ If you are a global nomad, you just learn something new every day.

Photo by Laura Meybaum

Building products of the future By Ede Schank Tamkivi

How to get teenagers hooked on building something with their own hands? Eesti 2.0, a non-profit organization empowers 14-19-year-old inventors with the courage to use the latest technology to solve problems and come up with completely new solutions while working in teams under the supervision of world-class mentors.

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What is Eesti 2.0? Eesti 2.0 is a non-profit organization that aims to inspire Estonian school children to choose technology as a career for the future. As a pilot project, Eesti 2.0 distributed Makerbot Replicator 3D printers to about 50 schools in Estonia in May 2015. In 2016, schools received littleBits electronics kits and were introduced to developing on the Bitcoin platform.

‘Our test demo was a perfect example of Murphy’s Law: as the rotating parts were moving, the whole mechanism shifted from its base,’ concluded Kadri Muuga, now an 11th grader in Tallinn Secondary School of Science, while describing the process of building a product called CurtainWise. ‘Now we know how to fix that problem: we will have to use a stronger material than the cardboard we initially used for the test.’ Kadri was completely right: more solid 3D printed plastic rings enabled the rotating parts to open and close the curtain much more precisely and they completely rocked the stage of the final demo of the Eesti 2.0 summer school Springboard that was held in Telliskivi Creative City. On a scorching hot Friday afternoon in late July, ten teams from 24 schools across Estonia, and some also studying abroad, presented the products they had built over the week. Among other things, the teams built mobile apps that help you find your lost possessions or organize lunch dates with new colleagues in a big company, or a solution that enables work meetings in a virtual reality (VR) setting.

Think out of the box The problem the CurtainWise team faced proved the main point of the rapid prototyping cycle that the Springboard event was supposed to test: when one part fails – and something always does! –, you just need to try a different solution until it does work. Kadri’s teammate Andrius Matšenas, who is now back to his high school studies in the UK, explains how their team came up with the

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smart, hassle-free curtains that would merge into their everyday lives: ‘We started thinking of the curtains that would close automatically when you turn on the light in the evening. It took us a lot of time and intense thinking to get all the components to work just right.’ CurtainWise, a team of six students, was not alone in their pursuit to find the best solution to make the curtain open smoothly. They were assisted by Ronald Tammepõld, who has extensive knowledge in electronics and robotics since he works as a developer of the charging stations for the carrier robots of the internationally acclaimed Estonian startup Starship Robotics. It was already the second year for him to mentor the teams of the summer school; last year he worked closely with the team that built Safe Sack, a smart backpack containing solar panels, GPS, Bluetooth and a fingerprint-controlled lock. Kaarel Reinvars and Sander Tammer, who came up with the Safe Sack idea last year, also returned to building new products in the summer school. This year their team Powerbox was working on a solution to build a fingerprint-proof charging station for phones that could be used at schools or supermarkets. Their solution would solve several problems instantaneously: your phone charges while you have to attend classes or buy groceries and kids will spend less time on their smartphones. ‘Springboard has proven that technology enables us to build cool things and create solutions that might one day help change the world,’ Kaarel and Sander sum up their enthusiasm. The 17-year-olds are already working on mobile puzzle games they plan to launch later this year. They have already registered their company, have found investors and hired people to help them develop the games.

Photos by Laura Meybaum

Inspiration for the future founders Taavet Hinrikus, cofounder of TransferWise: ‘At TransferWise we believe it’s really important for us to give back to the Estonian as well as the global ecosystem. It’s our role to help future Estonian programmers, developers and product managers to grow. Eesti 2.0 is a great example of an initiative focusing on the very early stage of the careers of these people, to help them think about how to create products. This is very important as lots of these people will be creating their own companies in the future or will be working at TransferWise or other Estonian tech firms. So it is important for us to support this initiative, financially but also, even more importantly, to have our people here as mentors, to show them how we have done things and help future founders learn from our experience.’

‘Springboard has proven that technology enables us to build cool things and create solutions that might one day help change the world’

Kristel Kruustük, cofounder of Testlio: ‘As I was going from one team to another, listening to their short pitches of their ideas, I realized how cool this is that they have all gathered here for a full week just to build products. My own experience has proven that it is possible to create a working prototype over a weekend and even get your first customers. We should really be working towards the understanding that it’s ok to fail and the kids should really seize the opportunity to take part in events like these in order to overcome the fear of not succeeding and helping the Estonian startup culture to keep growing.’

Virtual classroom complements the classical one Magnus Tohver, a student of Tallinn European School, was also back for the second year along with his teammates Grete, Kaur and Markus, to build VReaction, a virtual reality (VR) solution that will make learning chemistry much more fun than the old way of just memorizing different formulas. ‘Our team of five had 60 minutes of combined experience on VR,’ Magnus starts with a joke to explain how they started from a template to build a virtual classroom where the student can mix different elements to create new substances and then take a closer look at the molecules and the atoms of each one of the elements. Curiously enough, the team spent a considerable time getting water to look as realistic as possible as that is one of the most difficult substances to design in 3D after humans, claims Magnus. He stresses that his team sees VReaction as a complementary playful solution that will not replace real-life experiments with actual substances in the school labs. PocketID team had an even more ambitious idea: ‘Based on personal experience, we were thinking of replacing plastic cards with a mobile solution in order to avoid situations where one might not be carrying or has lost his/her physical ID-card,’ explained Mirko Nõmmsalu from the team. ‘For example, if you are entering a crowded event, the security guard can scan the QR-code generated by PocketID to identify your identity and age.’ LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Photo by Laura Meybaum

Supporting the budding talent ‘The youngsters had very ambitious ideas and they really deserve recognition for being able to complete these ideas by the end of the week,’ said Hardi Meybaum, the founder of Eesti 2.0 who has previously founded GrabCAD, the largest online community of CAD-engineers, and after selling the company became the partner of a Boston-based venture capital firm Matrix Partners. For the second year running, he also took a week off of his summer vacation to be the main mentor at the summer school. ‘Learning from last year’s experience, we added some practical workshops on product design as well as on building software and hardware products to help the teams be more successful in their pursuit of building cool products.’ To support the summer school project, Eesti 2.0 recently launched a new online learning platform www.eesti2.ee that will help students interested in technology to communicate, learn and share materials. The platform is open to share educational videos for online learning, start discussions on new technologies and get an overview of the latest projects the youngsters are currently working on. In addition to Meybaum, several mentors from leading Estonian startups like TransferWise, Taxify, Starship and GrabCAD supervised the kids during the week’s program. TransferWise was also the largest supporter of Springboard, contributing all the service fees from transactions made in Estonia in February as a present to the 100th birthday of the Republic to Estonia and Eesti 2.0 summer school.

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‘Our team really got a lot of help from 3 mentors,’ recounted Magnus. “Madis was our main mentor with VR and gave us some much needed psychological support in team-building. Mikk helped us a lot with design and UX, creating and correcting flows and flowcharts. Mikko helped us with posing the right questions that helped us to improve the product. I really enjoyed the design workshop, that opened many new perspectives for our team, and the talk on MVP (minimum viable product) was really useful.’ Magnus also added that he would always love to hear more of the latest scientific achievements as he did in the presentation of Allan-Hermann Pool, an Estonian neuroscientist, currently completing his post-doc studies at Caltech in Southern California. ‘Springboard changed my view of what is possible for me to do and achieve,’ Magnus concluded. ‘I made new friends and it opened up new doors. Before, I didn’t even know what making a startup entails, but now, my mind is full of new ideas.’

‘The best way to predict the future is to invent it!’ Photo by Annika Haas

By Ede Schank Tamkivi

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Photo by Takeshi Kojima

Having invested in hundreds of startups, the Japanese/Singaporean entrepreneurturned-VC Taizo Son now wants to revolutionize the education system. Wearing his trademark fedora, Taizo Son enters the room almost running, while holding up his phone and filming. ‘I’m a video person,’ he explains on the go. It’s the second day of the Latitude 59 conference in Tallinn and he’s come to see how the kids’ area operates. It’s the first time in the history of this event that ‘future founders’ have their own designated area where they can build anything they want. The area is hosted by two non-profits, Estonian found Eesti 2.0, and Taizo’s own VIVITA, a kids’ creativity environment model created in Japan that he now wants to import to Europe, starting in Tallinn. All of a sudden, the already crowded kids’ area becomes busy with startup founders. People line up to talk to Taizo Son. Everyone wants to pitch their ideas, hoping to impress him. He’s known as a person who does not say ‘No’, at least not straight to someone’s face. He speaks in a very soft and low-pitch voice, as if insisting that the listener lean in and pay more attention. Everyone is eager for his advice, and his money.

(all in all, there were four brothers in their family), whose net worth has been estimated to be $21.9 billion. Masayoshi Son founded and runs SoftBank, a mobile telecom and investment firm. Taizo’s own fortune comes from the online gaming company GungHo which he started in 1998, developing Puzzle & Dragons, once the world’s bestselling application for mobile phones. In 2009, he founded the seed accelerator Movida and four years later launched the venture capital firm Mistletoe. One of its first investments was Life is Tech!, a program that aims to teach the ‘art of making’ and ‘power to create’ to high school students. Since then, he’s put $150 million into some 80 startups, backing entrepreneurs in more than ten countries. Companies in his portfolio are working on wearable monitoring devices, drones for medical emergencies and other high-tech advances. So far, Mistletoe has one exit, SEA, an online and mobile entertainment provider in Southeast Asia, that went public in 2017. Mistletoe backed its Series D round with a group of notable Asian investors in 2016 for an undisclosed amount. In its angel round in 2008, SEA’s predecessor Garena was also backed by an Estonian investor, Toivo Annus.

Shaking up the education system Game developer becomes a VC No wonder people want to talk to him. In 2014, Forbes magazine placed Taizo Son at #30 among the most affluent people in Asia and more recently estimated his fortune to be $275 million. For many years in a row, the list has been topped by Masayoshi Son, Taizo’s elder brother

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Born and raised in Japan but holding a Korean passport, he recently moved to Singapore with his family. ‘I have a 4-year-old son and as a parent I’m thinking of his future education and to be honest, I don’t want to send my boy to a traditional educational institution because the world has been changing dramatically but the traditional education system has not been updated.’

Karoli Hindriks, founder of Jobbatical: Last year, I was speaking at Slush Tokyo when Atsushi Taira-san, who is the Managing Director of Taizo Son’s fund, came to listen to my speech. It turned out that our view on knowledge distribution and the world are closely aligned and I was invited to meet their team. That meeting led to a lunch with Taizo and Atsushi in Tallinn. During our lunch discussion, Taizo-san suddenly turned to Atsushi and said something in Japanese. I was very puzzled about what was going on. The next thing I was told was that they would like to help me build Jobbatical and invest in us. We had not even talked about money, so all I could say was, ‘Ehm, let me think about it and discuss with our Board!’ My first impression of Taizo-san was of someone who sees far beyond the horizon. Someone who is crazy enough to think he can change the world. I think that this is where we connect well. He is also positively surprising. We share an office in Singapore and a few months ago I went to the office and saw Taizo-san near the coffee machine and he said, ‘Karoli, I went to a small town in Japan where a Michelin star chef makes amazing cookies for one month a year. I brought you some.’ Then he gave this beautiful package and left. I was quite speechless. And those cookies redefined my understanding of cookies – they were so good!

Taizo praises the Singaporean education system as compared to the Japanese system – it offers more various options – there are a large variety of international schools as well as local state and private schools.

‘Singapore ranks 1st, Japan 2nd and Estonia 3rd in OECD's PISA-test scores. At the same time, Singapore ranks 34th, Japan 54th and Estonia 63rd in the UN's World Happiness Index’

Mistletoe’s investments in Estonia: Jobbatical In September 2017, it was announced that Mistletoe is a lead investor in a $4 million series A round of Jobbatical, a platform that helps companies and individuals throughout the recruiting and hiring process. Jobbatical is the solution for the people who want to find new jobs abroad, and also assists with immigration to countries such as Spain, Germany, Finland, Estonia and more.

Funderbeam It is appropriate to point out that Singapore ranks 1st, Japan 2nd and Estonia 3rd in OECD’s PISA-test scores and, obviously, all of the countries are very proud of their high rankings. At the same time, the countries tend not to advertise that Singapore ranks 34th, Japan 54th and Estonia 63rd in the UN’s World Happiness Index. As to what might be the reason that the countries with the best education systems create stressed and unhappy people, Taizo points out that the current education system has been designed to teach many kids efficiently at the same time. ‘The contents of this type of education are memory-centric: the definition of being smart equals the ability to memorize many things and being able to share that knowledge at the right time. It suits well for the kids who like this type of education, but makes others really miserable. They are bored, sad and don’t want to go to school any more. There is a topdown approach in the traditional education system and there are many kids who cannot keep up and drop out of this system.’ At the same time, there is a rightful concern that artificial intelligence (AI) is coming in and the machines are much more efficient in memorizing big chunks of data. Taizo believes that teachers’ roles should be shifted to become mentors or facilitators. Instead of teaching the old, existing knowledge, the teachers should also be enjoying learning new things with the kids. The world will get more and more diverse, people will live longer and we have to embrace new things and be able to constantly learn new things. ‘We cannot teach creativity by using a top-down approach. In order to foster creativity and collaboration skills, which are essential skills in the 21st century, we should instead go for a bottom-up approach – the curiosity in these kids.’

In 2017, Mistletoe announced a $2 million investment in Funderbeam, a 2013-founded marketplace for early-stage investments. Funderbeam offers the opportunity for startups to raise growth capital, thereby providing immediate liquidity to investors worldwide. In essence, it is a stock exchange for pre-IPO growth companies, and anyone can invest and trade through the platform.

Lift99 In May 2018, it was announced that Mistletoe was among a round of $2.3 million investors in LIFT99 Skillsharing Platform, which aims to transform the way startup founders share their expertise and experiences.

VIVITA In June 2018, Mistletoe set up VIVITA International in Estonia to create a global network of creativity accelerators for children. Currently, VIVITA operates a VIVISTOP in Kashiwanoha in Japan. The second VIVISTOP will open in Tallinn in autumn 2018.

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Photo by Takeshi Kojima

‘Teachers’ roles should be shifted to become mentors or facilitators’ Ede Schank Tamkivi interviewing Taizo Son at Latitude59

Landing in Tallinn To solve this problem, a year ago Mistletoe launched an environment to empower creativity in kids in Kashiwanoha, on the outskirts on Tokyo. ‘At VIVITA we want to provide kids of any type of background with a sense of no limit, that anybody can create anything,’ Taizo sums up his idea. VIVISTOP, the physical space of VIVITA, is a learning center that has no curriculum and no teachers but offers the kids an environment to test their ideas. This fall, another VIVISTOP will open in the heart of Telliskivi Creative City in central Tallinn. ‘It was Kaidi Ruusalepp, the founder of Funderbeam, who introduced me to Taizo,’ says Mari-Liis Lind, who runs VIVITA’s operations in Tallinn. Kaidi visited VIVISTOP in Kashiwanoha with her sons last November and they were all fascinated by the concept, so she suggested that similar activities be set up in Estonia. For the past 5 years, Mari-Liis has been running the DigiGirls projects to get teenage girls excited about technology, so the topic of encouraging youngsters to try out new things and fostering 21st century skills is close to her heart. ’Initially, my plan was to visit Kashiwanoha just to get some inspiration for setting up a similar space in Tallinn,’ she says, ’but after a number of meetings and wholehearted discussions with Taizo and the VIVITA team in Kashiwanoha, we decided to develop this into a global movement and brand. I believe that Estonia, being one of the world’s most digitally advanced countries, is an ideal location to setup the second VIVISTOP.’ Taizo insists that he does not want to be a disruptor in the field of education but to provide a new environment on top of the existing one so that kids can get experience interacting with diverse people. ’Therefore, I’m very excited to see that we are creating VIVITA Tallinn with a local partner and creating an interaction with VIVITA Tokyo, VIVITA Singapore,

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VIVITA Taipei or VIVITA Rwanda (the last three have not been created yet – author) using video conferencing so that kids can interact with each other to create new things. The best way to predict the future is to invent it! I strongly believe that we have to provide the latest technology and the latest thinking to children as in 10-20 years they will be the main actors in society.’

Not just for the kids The world knows far too many stories of the founders who did not exactly excel at school or even dropped out of universities to start their companies. While studying at the University of Tokyo, Taizo was not exactly a top student either but unlike some VCs who would insist that young founders drop their studies, he does not necessarily speak against obtaining higher degrees. As a matter of fact, his latest venture Mistletoe Foundation will join forces with Y Combinator and Singularity Institute in Silicon Valley to launch the WaveMaker Project this fall. The project will provide $10 000 grants for PhD-students who want to create new projects with startups in the area of mobility and sustainability. ‘We are looking for the Elon Musks of tomorrow,’ says Naoko Okumoto, who runs Mistletoe operations in the United States. Taizo makes it clear he does not like any rankings nor cares about the success rates of his investments. He insists that sticking with one’s passion is far more important. And to him, making an impact on the education system, is an obvious passion. ‘I’ve met many entrepreneurs all around the world and the common characteristic of them is that they are not afraid of the risk or danger. I believe that the failure or success do not matter but what matters is my mission; to make the world a little bit better.’

Photo by Atko Januson

World-famous entrepreneur wants to change the global education system starting with Estonia By Heelia Sillamaa

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Vishen Lakhiani is one of the brave ones who quit his day job to do something more fulfilling. The risk paid off: 15 years later, he’s a successful entrepreneur, writer and speaker. His company Mindvalley is working to change the global education system. Despite his busy schedule, Lakhiani found half an hour to share his thoughts and ambitious ideas with our readers.

There may be readers who have never heard of Mindvalley before. How would you describe it to them? When we ask people: ‘What did you think of education systems you got in school and universities?’ most people feel it was incomplete, because it places a lot of focus on grades and skills, so that you can get a good career and make a lot of money, but life is so much more than career and money. Our lives as human beings are much wider than just getting a job and earning a pay check. It has to do with becoming the best parents we can be, with being able to deal with our own emotions on those days when we get out of the bed and we feel sad or worried or anxious. It’s about being able to be in a healthy relationship, both with others and with ourselves. It’s about learning to quiet our mind and go within. It’s about learning healthy eating, learning exercising, learning to live in a way where we contribute to the rest of the world – and modern education doesn’t teach us a lot of this. Now there’s a category of education called transformational education that focuses on these areas. This is what Mindvalley university is about: we focus on transformational education, on bringing together the best teachers in the world that teach these areas of wisdom and taking this to as wide an audience as we can, and making it accessible to everyone whether they’re a teenager or they’re 90 years old.

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Photo by Atko Januson

‘Our lives as human beings are much wider than just getting a job and earning a pay check’

How did you come up with the idea of Mindvalley? I was working in Silicon Valley 15 years ago and back then the dotcom bubble had just burst so there were not a lot of jobs available. The Valley was kind of depressed and I was very unhappy with my job so, in a moment of sadness, I was googling for answers and I discovered a class on meditation. I took that class and it so transformed me that in four months at my little job in San Francisco, I ended up getting promoted three times in four months. I was shocked at the powers and abilities within you that meditation could unlock. So I stayed with that company, I became the very senior person at that company, but 18 months later I decided that I wanted to do something more fulfilling. I wanted to do something where I could impact the world. And I remember Nelson Mandela said: ‘If you want to change the world, change education’ and it occurred to me – the biggest thing about education that I wish had changed for me is that someone had taught me meditation earlier. Why didn’t I learn this at school? It would have helped me deal with so many sad days, with low self-esteem, it would have helped me to become better at my career and so I thought, I want to build a company that would help take this area of education and take it to billions of people globally – and that’s how Mindvalley was born.

How big is the company now? Right now we have 300 people around the world. In our headquarters in Kuala Lumpur we have over 50 people and in Tallinn we’re opening up a new office at Rotermanni that will hold 20 people starting this year.

Vishen Lakhiani Born: 14.01.1976 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia Family: Kristina Mänd Lakhiani (wife); Eve Lakhiani (daughter), Hayden Lakhiani (son) Education: University of Michigan; Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Places lived: United States (1995-2004); Malaysia (2004-present) Work: a non-profit AISEC; Microsoft; Mindvalley Books: Author of ‘The Code of the Extraordinary Mind’

Why did you choose to open up a new office here in Tallinn? Because my wife is Estonian and my children are Estonian and because I truly love Estonia. I think Tallinn is my favourite city in the world and I think Estonian people are truly special. Of course I’m biased since my children are Estonian, but I have noticed that there’s a quality about Estonians that truly makes them incredible thinkers. People who are very conscious about food and lifestyle and creativity and I have never seen this kind of people in any other country. I would say Tallinn is probably one of the best places you can start a company in. The talent is amazing, the food is amazing, the city is amazing, the culture is mind-blowing and most importantly the government is very sophisticated, very advanced, very pro-business, so I’d say definitely go for it.

How much time do you spend in Estonia yourself? I’ve been in Estonia now for two months. Our main home is in Estonia. In Malaysia we have an apartment, but in Estonia we have a big home that is here in the old town and I like to spend as much time as I can in that home. But because I have to travel a lot – cause I’m a writer and an entrepreneur – typically three months a year, I’m in Tallinn.

Mindvalley Founded: 2003 Offices: Kuala Lumpur; Tallinn Employees: 200+ Students, subscribers and followers: 3 million A-fests: 2010 – Costa Rica 2011 – Hawaii 2012 – Mayan Riviera, Mexico 2013 – Bali, Indonesia & Punta Cana, Dominican Republic 2014 – Phuket, Thailand & Puerto Vallarta, Mexico 2015 – Dubrovnik, Croatia & Guanacaste, Costa Rica 2016 – Mykonos, Greece & Mayan Riviera, Mexico 2017 – Ibiza, Spain & Montego Bay, Jamaica 2018 – Sardinia, Italy & Bali

Now that you look back at all the work you have done, what was the hardest part of creating Mindvalley? The first five years, because the first five years we were thinking small. You know, we were educating maybe a couple of thousand people a year. And when we started out, a lot of this stuff that we were talking about, people laughed at it. 15 years ago people didn’t believe in meditation, but if you look at today, there are close to 20 000 studies that have been conducted on the benefits of meditation. 15 years ago, if you tried to introduce meditation to a company in Silicon Valley, you’ll get laughed off. Today the majority of companies in Silicon Valley including Google and Facebook introduce meditation to their employees. So the hardest part was going to these topics when the world was laughing at you, but I have never been concerned about people laughing at this and I know even the way I’m talking about a vision for the world right now, a lot of people would be sceptical and that’s fine, that’s how I know I’m on the right track.

What are your future plans here? One of the things we would really love to do is work with the Estonian government to bring transformational education to the Estonian schooling system. We think if we can do this in a relatively short amount of time, we can transform parenting, teaching and education in Estonia and help Estonia attain the number one educational system on the planet.

But what about Mindvalley in general? Our goal over the next 20 years is very simple. We want to bring transformational education to the schooling systems of at least 100 countries and to every company in the Fortune 500. We’re already spreading very rapidly with many of the top companies. In just this summer alone two top 100 American companies have reached out to us to train their employees and we’re now launching in schools in Finland, which is the number one education country in the world – so we’re really excited about this growth. Our goal is to go global, to be everywhere, to make Mindvalley as much a part of people’s lives as Apple.

In your opinion, what should entrepreneurs do to become truly successful? The most important thing to be successful in business is to not make your life about business. You must make your life about your personal growth. Your business simply becomes the vehicle of your growth. If your business fails, it doesn’t matter, did you grow? If your business succeeds, it doesn’t matter, did you grow? The number one thing in your life as an entrepreneur that you got to place your full importance on is your personal growth, and you have to look at it from all dimensions – your health, your relationships, your self-esteem, your practises of meditation and fitness and healthy eating. A business will always grow in accordance with how it’s founder is growing. So the more you take care of yourself the more you grow, the better off your business will be. Many entrepreneurs don’t get that, so what they do is that they sacrifice themselves and put all their energy into business not realizing that it is the surest way to fail. If you look at all the greatest entrepreneurs in the world that are really doing incredible things, they are all actively focused on their growth. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Veriff – an online identity verification system, backed by actor Ashton Kutcher Photo by Meeli Küttim

By Ronald Liive

Kaarel Kotkas

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Photo by Annika Haas

You probably have never considered how identity verification on online platforms such as Airbnb, Uber and others works. There is a company out there thinking hard about it and in the process they managed to attract the attention of the world famous actor Ashton Kutcher, who invested in the company. Veriff was founded in 2015 when CEO Kaarel Kotkas was 20 years old. He saw that the same problem he faced six years earlier was still there. At the age of only 14, Kotkas was looking for a way to buy biodegradable rope for hay bales to be used in the farm he grew up on. Due to his age, eBay didn’t allow him to sign up for the service. He quickly photoshopped the picture of his ID to state that he was born 10 years earlier and could order the rope he needed. Seeing the same systems at work later sparked a thought in his mind. Now Kotkas is running a multimillion euro company. Back in June the company announced a series A investment in the sum of 6.6 million euros. By the end of this year, Veriff will have around 50 employees.

In an interview with Life in Estonia, Kotkas described why and how he illegally used eBay, how his young age affected his work and how he attracted the attention of a Hollywood actor. How did Veriff get started? I have been in the technology scene for quite a while. I lived in Hiiumaa (the second largest island in Estonia – ed.) for the first 15 years of my life. To be connected with the world I needed to know how computer processes worked. After moving to Tallinn I started to work on different IT projects. When TransferWise was in its fast growth phase in 2015, its recruiter contacted me while I was studying in the 12th grade. We decided we have an opportunity to work together. I was presented with a case study to test different identification solutions. After the test my work at TransferWise didn’t continue but I understood that the sector needs improvements and solutions. The problem was still unsolved back then. The most value can be given if you are independent. I didn’t have a calling for the identification sector from a young age, but I have a story about it. When I was living on Hiiumaa we rolled hay bales, which meant that in the spring I needed to collect the rope that had held the bales together. It was non-biodegradable so I started to look for other options. There was no seller in Estonia but I found one from eBay. I was 14 and while trying to buy the product I needed to upload a picture of my ID and in two days I got an answer saying that I can’t use the service due to my age. I took the same picture and opened Photoshop. I changed the birth date from 1994 to 1984 and uploaded the same image. Back then I didn’t realize I had done something illegal. I managed to buy the biodegradable rope for the hay bales. At one point I noticed the problem was still there. That’s why I decided to plunge into it.

‘Our mission is to win the trust of the internet; to be the trustworthy tool in the identification sector’ It’s popular in Estonia for high school graduates to work abroad for a while, e.g. in Australian farms, why didn’t you do that? I think life on Hiiumaa gave me a taste of work. Farm with 60 acres of land. I was an exchange student in Germany after the 10th grade. I didn’t feel I needed to go to Australia as many of my peers do after high-school.

Has your young age been a drawback? I’m 23 at the moment. In retrospect I don’t think it has been a factor. Maybe in the old school marketplace, in the banks, it took a bit longer because when you don’t have a name you have to have actions to back you up.

What is the median age of Veriff workers? Can the employees respect you when you are about 20 years younger? Interesting question, I have not thought about it. Our work is to look at users passports but for us age is not a factor. Many of our employees are over 40 but we have not made a statistic about it. We haven’t had any problems due to my age. Looking at how the company has evolved I don’t want to be the only face of the company in the future. I think our work culture has not been a problem. If everybody is out for the same task and are fighting for the same things then everything should be ok. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Veriff raised 6.6 million euros back in June, the lead investor being Mosaic Ventures. Taavet Hinrikus, Ashton Kutcher, Paul Buchheit, Elad Gil, Y-Combinator, SV Angel, ACE Ventures, LIFT99 and Superangel were the other investors. In total, Veriff has raised 7.2 million euros. Veriff customers include but are not limited to Uber, LHV, TFBank and InBank.

You photoshopped a document about 10 years ago. How do you ensure you don’t let someone with a photoshopped ID through? We have lots of things in the works. We don’t allow the customer to upload pictures of the ID’s. We see that the cameras on smartphones and computers are of high quality. When we see the ID in real time and can read the data we check it with different databases. For us, identification is not just comparing two pictures to one another. To ensure security, Veriff has built a complicated system. I can’t reveal all of the systems at work.

How did you end up getting Ashton Kutcher as an investor? Where will Veriff take you? We still are in the early stages. I think of Veriff as Hyperloop. When the [Hyperloop] idea was presented it was said it will revolutionize the transportation sector. Looking at it, magnet levitation and vacuum chambers are not something new. By connecting the two, people in the field could make a revolution in the sector. Veriff is something similar. Face detection has been used for a while now. Internet and computers are also not new. Now we need to connect all of the parts and create know-how that brings innovation. If you knew the minute details how Veriff works you’d know that in three months’ time we will be even more sophisticated. A lot of businesses are moving to online platforms. If you’ve got an exchange of virtues you need to know who is on the other side of the line. Our mission is to win the trust of the internet; to be the trustworthy tool in the identification sector. We want to give the end user the trust that when he or she sees the company using our product they know that their data is protected and ‘no one can steal my ID’. Our clients, the companies, can be assured that they know who their customers are. Banks and Fintech were the first to embrace the internet but many more companies are striving towards it. Veriff can save banks 2000 euros per scam case.

We took part of Y Combinator (California based seed accelerator). While looking into potential investors we were contacted by Sound Ventures. They wanted to meet us and we had breakfast with Ashton. We presented our idea, explained our technology and our big idea – how the sector is growing. He said he would like to start a collaboration with us. Without Y Combinator I am not sure we would have had the opportunity to get the investors we got.

Have you had young entrepreneurs asking you to invest into their ideas? Yes, I have been contacted by various people. I have yet to invest in any of the ideas. I give back in the form of advice, as I got it when I started out. Young entrepreneurs are mostly in the need of advice not money.

‘Veriff can save banks 2000 euros per scam case’

I would like to give an example using care.com. It’s a marketplace where you can hire a babysitter. Verified identification is even more essential in that use case than in the banks. We have shops without clerks, car rentals and many other fields that need to have a system to verify the identity of customers.

How many customers do you have? We have lots of small customers but we are focusing on enterprises at the moment. Right now we’ve got 65 enterprise clients. Most of which are not from Estonia; mostly from London and California.

A company that specializes in the field has more know-how of how scams work. We have an overview of how the bad guys work. If you’ve got the same system working at Uber, Airbnb, Coinbase and other services, you can stop a fraudulent account when you detect something suspicious. We are always a few steps ahead of the bad guys and our competitors as well.

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Kaarel Kotkas and Janer Gorohhov

Photo by Meeli Küttim

Why should they use Veriff, not develop their own solution?

Photo by Toomas Tikenberg

Estonian-made device is monitoring the life of astronauts By Ronald Liive

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The International Space Station (ISS) got an addition this spring with a new groundbreaking device – MyotonPRO. The device was transported to the ISS with the help of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and the spacecraft Dragon CRS-14.

MyotonPRO is meant to better understand muscle physiology by measuring muscle tissues in space. Due to lack of suitable devices, the measurements in question had never been tried in space before. MyotonPRO is produced by the Estonian company Myoton. It took the company over ten years to take the device into space.

Road to space, test after test The beginnings of the device can be traced back to 1976. Many years and iterations later, the formal road to space began for Myoton in 1999 when the company was founded as a spin-off from the University of Tartu. The founder of the company, Arved Vain, saw solutions for the assessment of tone and biomechanical properties of skeletal muscles. Vain and his business partners came up with a way to measure muscles in a non-invasive way. After Vain left the company, it has been run by CEO Aleko Peipsi. MyotonPRO has passed several validation and feasibility studies in a variety of medical applications in leading clinics and scientific institutions around the world. Before knocking on the door of the European Space Agency (ESA), the muscle tone meter was successfully tested on Earth with the help of athletes. In 2011 and 2013, the device was tested in parabolic flights in cooperation with the ESA. By 2015, the ESA, Roscosmos, NASA and other space agencies green-lit the idea to test it out in the ISS. To get the go-ahead from the agencies, the device went through rigorous testing with two groups of twelve people. All of the participants were strapped to beds for sixty days at a 6-degree angle with the toes tiltered higher than the head. One of the groups was allowed to do minimal physical exercise, while the others were nearly immobile. After such a long period of not moving, the muscles tend to be in a state of relaxation, which means the participants had to learn to walk again. The groups were monitored for fourteen days after the test. The test in question was initiated by the German Aerospace Center. All throughout the test, MyotonPRO was used to monitor the state of the participants’ muscles. After the test, the device still needed to go through different committees and commissions that deliberate on thousands of ideas. During the last hurdle, MyotonPRO was stripped to its guts, all of its interior was examined to assess the safety of the device for the astronauts. Even after all of that there was still one last obstacle left. MyotonPRO had to be approved by the astronauts who were going to use the device in the ISS. Fortunately for the company, and for Estonia in general, the device got the go-ahead.

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Historic moment for Estonia Getting the MyotonPRO up to the ISS has been a historic moment for Estonia. It is the first Estonian-made hardware device in the ISS. For that we can thank the ESA, which was established in 1975, a time when Estonia was still occupied by the Soviet Union. Estonia joined the ESA, headquartered in Paris, on the 4th of February 2015; there are 22 member states in total.

‘MyotonPRO was invented and designed by Estonians. The company is funded by Estonians, the trademark is registered in Estonia and the device itself is produced in Estonia’ Even though space is a place for big business, the ESA has opened doors for small companies and states just like Myoton and Estonia. The ESA has multiple programmes and initiatives to encourage small companies and universities to participate in the advancement of Europe in space. One of those is the ESA Business Incubation Center (BIC) Estonia which is looking for startup companies interested in 50 000 euro worth of development support. ESA BIC Estonia was founded in the autumn of 2017 and now it is on its fourth campaign, due to close on the 8th of November 2018. With previous campaigns, they helped out companies working with drones, satellites, miniature portable wireless vacuum chamber cameras and even a service to make access to space more affordable.

MyotonPRO is a unique device The smartphone sized device is being used by ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst and NASA astronaut Jeanette Epps, Gerst being the test subject and Epps the one taking the measurements. Our muscles are always slightly contracted. This is how we can move, maintain posture and respond to sudden movements. Our muscles maintain themselves by constantly changing in tension and stiffness so that when they are suddenly stretched or pulled they can establish balance and reduce damage. As humans evolved on Earth, our muscles adapted to the conditions here. It’s a whole different story in space, or more accurately in weightlessness, where muscles lose functionality and mass. To maintain good health and prevent muscles wasting away, the astronauts exercise for at least two hours a day. The described phenomenon has been well studied, but the studies have not focused on resting muscle tone. Thanks to MyotonPRO, researchers can get a better understanding of these complicated machines that we run 24 hours and 7 days a week, even in conditions they are not meant by nature to inhabit. To get the readings, MyotonPRO emits a painless pressure pulse and records how the tissue responds. The results will be compared to the ones taken earlier on Earth. The device will stay in the ISS for several years, it will be tested with twelve different astronauts and on ten different muscles three to four times a day. MyotonPRO is not only meant for astronauts. It can be used on patients diagnosed with muscle degeneration and on athletes, load-carrying workers, the bed-ridden and the elderly. In a brief interview, Myoton CEO Peipsi told Life in Estonia that the first results will be published five years from the start of the test. He reassured that there have not been any anomalies with the device in space. According to him there is no other company in the world developing the same sort of device.

Elon Musk has nothing on us, we too will rock our stereos in space Estonians are no strangers to space and space technology. Two of the most known projects in the works right now are TTÜ100 and ESTCube-2 satellites, the latter having run a successful crowdfunding campaign to raise money for the project in the sum of 38 743 euros. ESTCube’s aim is to test out the interplanetary propulsion system electric solar wind sail (E-sail), advanced satellite subsystem solutions, and to demonstrate plasma brakes. As a result of its predecessor the ESTCube-1, over 30 Bachelor theses and over 20 Masters theses were defended, 50 presentations made, 14 scientific articles published and 4 spin-off companies created. In addition, the satellite managed to capture 300 photographs from space. To celebrate 100 years of the Republic of Estonia and 100 years from the founding of Tallinn University of Technology, the university has been developing its own small satellite called TTÜ100. Along with all of the scientific and technological advancements, TTÜ100 will join Elon Musk’s Tesla Roadster car in space, which was famously programmed to continuously loop the David Bowie song ‘Space Oddity’. Through a public vote it was decided that the TTÜ100 satellite will play the composer Peep Sarapik’s famous choral piece “It flies to the hive” (orig. “Ta lendab mesipuu poole”– ed). The song to be sent into space was recorded at the XII Youth Song Celebration in 2017. It will be recorded into the memory of the satellites EstCube-2 and TTÜ100 and flown into space in 2018 and 2019. Because there is no vacuum in space, soundwaves can’t travel there, which means no human or alien can ever hear these songs. To combat that, Tallinn University of Technology is building satellite receivers in schools all around Estonia so the students can listen to the song that is being transmitted from space. Hopefully, some of the students will get a creative calling for space and end up being the first humans on Mars. TTÜ100 is slated for launch this year and ESTCube-2 for 2019. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

By Ann-Marii Nergi

Sven JĂźrisoo

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Photo by Jaanar Nikker

Nanotech pillows are changing the world of healthcare

‘Considering that our technology is being used in the hospitals of Tokyo, Toronto and Switzerland, we seem to be on the right track of really changing something in healthcare’

Sleep Angel selected among top 10 innovations The Canadian Center of Excellence for Infection Prevention and Control (IPC) selected Sleep Angel’s Pneuma Pure filter technology among the top 10 innovations in 2017. The IPC stated that the technology should be not just recommended for adoption, but mandated. This is huge recognition for Sleep Angel. ‘Just as handwashing, door handles and the equipment associated with patient environments have all been addressed from the IPC perspective, now a greater locus of healthcare associated infections (HAl) risk can be resolved. The threat to patient, caregiver, and visitor safety from contaminated bedding interiors is so apparent that it could be argued that Pneuma Pure filter technology should not just be recommended for adoption, but mandated. In hotels, there are significant benefits from a room hygiene and guest safety perspective; in the home, there is a clear benefit from the significant reduction in exposure to asthma and allergy triggers,’ said the IPC.

Irish scientists and Estonian entrepreneurs have joined forces to manufacture high-tech bedding solutions. Just imagine staying the night at a hotel or a spa and loving the pillow so much that you decide to buy one to take home. This is quite a likely scenario, if you happen to be tucked into a bed with bedding made by Sleep Angel.

There is not a sewing machine in sight at the bedding factory in this suburb of Pärnu because the mattresses, blankets and pillows produced here are not sewn but welded together. Traditional sewing machines cannot be found here because the company’s products are just as innovative as the way they are made. Just as the main purpose of Pneuma Pure filter technology is to fight against healthcare associated infections (HAI), this bedding blocks the colonization of different bacteria, dust mites and other allergens that are commonly found in blankets and pillows. Therefore, in addition to using high-tech materials, it is important that the ‘baddies’ don’t access the bedding through the seams. For example, the pillow cover is hermetically closed but a special nanoporous filter enables the product to breathe. The pores are so tiny that the filter functions as a mechanical barrier that does not allow bacteria, fungi or pathogens to enter. Sven Jürisoo, CEO and one of the owners of Gabriel Scientific plc, which was founded in 2014, claims that his company is bringing about innovation in the textile industry – a historically boring branch of industry that tends to absorb new solutions from other areas rather than innovate itself. Sleep Angel brand has already accessed the healthcare systems of forty countries and found its place in the high-tech league of the textile industry.

‘Currently nothing remotely similar exists on the market,’ says Jürisoo. ‘But upon hearing about our products, many hospitals have understood their relevance and said – “where have you been until now!” Considering that our technology is being used in the hospitals of Tokyo, Toronto and Switzerland, we seem to be on the right track of really changing something in healthcare.’ Jürisoo explains that the relatively young company is currently looking for adopters all around the world who would come along with the innovation, use their products and set an example to others. As Sleep Angel products are registered ‘class one medical devices’ and healthcare systems are overly regulated and very conservative, the introduction of products is always done through re-sellers. ‘It is unthinkable to reach all forty countries and their hospitals on our own, hence we need distributors. They have various profiles – for example, in Poland there is one person working on promoting our products and in Holland it is a company with a 400 million turn-over. For us the greatest value and criteria for selecting a distributor is that they see the enormous potential of our product. ‘As is common for medical devices, Sleep Angel products have special maintenance instructions that have been developed and tested together with the successful Estonian company Chemi-Pharm, which produces disinfectants.’ LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

‘Sleep Angel brand has already accessed the healthcare systems of forty countries and found its place in the high-tech league of the textile industry’

It is possible for anyone to buy Sleep Angel bedding for their home and the company promises that the quality of sleep will change instantly even if a person does not suffer from asthma or allergies. The first hotel to introduce Sleep Angel pillows was Estonia Resort Hotel & Spa, which is based in the company’s home town of Pärnu. The hotel has long experience in offering sanatorium and spa services. ‘The guests loved the pillows so much that Estonia Spa now sells them to visitors. This proves that people already notice the quality difference in a couple of nights,’ confirms Sleep Angel Product Manager Aile Pilberg. In the longer term the company aims to solve a larger problem that exists in the healthcare system of every country – healthcare associated infections (HAI) that patients paradoxically pick up in hospitals and clinics where they have gone to be treated. Unfortunately, it is common knowledge that whereas the floors, toilets and other hard surfaces including door knobs are disinfected properly and often, the beds (both in hospitals and hotels and other accommodation providers) are often not seen as sources of danger that can be prevented. ‘The European Union spends 7 billion a year fighting HAI. Every year 40 000 people die in Europe from such infections; the situation in America is even worse, not to mention the rest of the world,’ says Sven Jürisoo whose company’s products are meant to decrease such awful figures. Each year there are about 100 million HAI cases in the world. This is where the world’s cleanest pillows and blankets can help. They are incredibly simple to use

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as the products do not need to be washed. Instead, their non-porous textile cover can be cleaned quickly. The higher price in comparison with normal pillows comes from the fact that the pillows last much longer. After all, washing regular pillows does not allow them to keep their shape for a long time. Yet even the washing of pillows is something to be happy about as Jürisoo claims to have seen hospitals where this is not done in order to save money or where bedding as a source of infections is not even part of the consciousness. As it often happens, innovative products are born out of a series of coincidences and contacts between people. Before founding Sleep Angel, Sven Jürisoo and Lyane Lind, the co-founder and Head of R&D, worked together in one of the largest textile producers in Europe – Wendre, which also has its main office in Pärnu. The developers of Pneuma Pure technology are Jürisoo’s friends from Ireland who offered him the patent license so that Estonians could start to produce the innovative technology and market it globally. Gabriel Scientific plc has now purchased all the patents and trademarks from Ireland. However, the company still has international ownership – in addition to Jürisoo and his wife Külli Jürisoo, the shareholders include people from Ireland, Russia and Finland. Has the constant travelling and staying in hotels around the world made Jürisoo look at hotel beds differently? ‘I do take my own pillow with,’ he says modestly.

Looking to buy an electric car? Nobe 100 could be the solution for you Photo by Ilmar Saabas

By Ronald Liive

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Photo by Ilmar Saabas

There is a new electric car company on the rise! No, it’s not Tesla, it’s Nobe.

Roman Muljar It’s a company hoping to produce a three-wheeled electric car by 2020 called the Nobe 100. Nobe’s CEO Roman Muljar wants the car to become a modern classic. The brand name Nobe actually has a meaning in Estonian: quick, nimble and agile. And that they have been. During the summer, the company has managed to attract the attention of crowdfunders through the platform FundedByMe, raising over 260% of the desired investment.

That’s why Nobe decided to use a crowdfunding platform where investors can back the project. To be able to pre-order a vehicle you had to invest at least 4700 euros. For the really eager ones there was an opportunity to invest 9500 euros, which ensured that you could be one of the first 10 owners of a Nobe 100.

A car that you can upgrade

As of the writing of this article, the company has managed to exceed the initial goal by 260% and the campaign is still active with just under two weeks to go.

The idea for the car came three years ago when Muljar’s friend built a three-wheeled scooter. After completion they decided it should be electric, have seats and have a classic design. New generations of the car will have updated motors, batteries and electronics but the design is intended to stay the same and be in production for 50 years. Everything is ready right now, at least on paper. Design has been the most difficult part but after finding the right person the CEO was thrilled. Muljar has said that, when not considering the design, the most difficult part has been financing the idea. According to the CEO, investors are eager to invest in startups developing tech products and apps but an electric car company does not excite them as much.

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The price of the final production car is intended to be around 30 000 euros. As stated earlier, the customer can upgrade the internals of the car whenever he or she decides to do so. After the lifetime of older parts has ended they can be recycled at the Nobe production facility. Nobe 100’s maximum speed is expected to be around 110km/h and the range of the battery is 220 km. The car will be sold at various retail outlets including electronics stores. Production is expected to take place in Tallinn, Estonia.

Photos by Ints Kalnins

The team consists of engineers, software developers and a Russian language teacher The team behind Nobe consists mainly of people that have graduated or are studying at Tallinn University of Technology. Not to underestimate other members, the most interesting being the CEO Roman Muljar himself, co-founder Meelis Merilo and an un-named designer. Muljar is one of the few at Nobe without an engineering degree, by profession he is a Russian language teacher.

Finnish tech investor Peter Vesterbacka joined Nobe

Co-founder Merilo has the most knowledge in building electric cars, the Nobe 100 is based on his ZEV Elve three-wheeled, car-looking scooter. He got into electric cars by converting an old Soviet era GAZ-M20 Pobeda into an electric car back in 2006. With the same Pobeda he managed to finish second in an all-electric car rally from Tallinn to Monaco a few years back. Merilo himself has been toying with the idea of a world class electric sports car – the ZEV 581C.

A sign of recognition for the company came from over the Gulf of Finland. Former brand ambassador to Angry Birds, or Mighty Eagle as they called him, Peter Vesterbacka announced he will be joining the company as a marketing and brand advisor. Vesterbacka praised the design of the car stating that electric cars don’t need to be dull.

Muljar is most secretive of the designer. He has yet to mention the name of the person but he has been heard saying that the designer is an Estonian that has worked in the car industry in central Europe for many years.

In addition, Vesterbacka sees the possibility to upgrade parts of the car as a big opportunity. Joining Nobe has been one of the most modest and down to earth decisions he has made. Vesterbacka is known in the area as a guy with really ambitious ideas.

By description the designer could be Björn Koop – he assured that he has had no involvement with Nobe but knows the person in question. After graduating from the Estonian Academy of Arts, Koop joined the Korean carmaker KIA as a designer. Due to this he has great knowledge of how the industry works but states that he can’t disclose the designers name without the permission of both of parties.

This January he announced his plan to dig a tunnel between Tallinn and Helsinki. The idea is not new and both governments have been flirting with it for a long time. Vesterbacka said he can’t wait any longer and wanted to crack on with the idea. According to him, the tunnel will be ready by the 24th of December 2024, so just four years shy of the first Nobe 100 cars.

Koop also couldn’t answer any questions regarding his work at KIA. Asked if we can see any KIA cars he has designed on the roads today, Koop said he has signed legal contracts stating that the lead designer of KIA has designed the cars he has worked on and according to those documents he has no legal rights to the designs – all industry standards. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Photos by Ints Kalnins

Self-driving bus, e-formula, the world’s fastest car and an electric carriage – made by Estonians There are not a lot of Estonian companies that are vital to the car industry. For most of the companies, even for Nobe, the roots can be traced back to Formula Student Team Tallinn (FS Team Tallinn), run by students from Tallinn Technical University and the University of Applied Sciences. Every year, the students are tasked to form teams to engineer, develop, market, build and race a formula race car. Right now, the team is working on a self-driving version of the car. A large number of FS Team Tallinn alumni have ended up working in the car industry or related companies. One of the prominent examples is Swedish high-performance sports car brand Koenigsegg. Throughout the years there have been many Estonians working at Koenigsegg, the first were hired back in 2012. Most famously, a group of six Estonians had an integral role in the development of the Koenigsegg Regera. The cars price tag sits around 2 million euros and only 80 units will be built. The limited production car is a plug-in hybrid sports car or rather a hypercar. If you happen to drive one of the rare Regeras you can thank the guys who built the chassis, the seats, composite details, aerodynamics,

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suspension and engineering – all of which were at least in part built by former FS Team Tallinn members. At one point, the Regera held the title for the world fastest car, only to be beaten by the sportier Koenigsegg Agera RS. Coming back to Tallinn Technical University, we find ourselves in a garage where yet another vehicle has been made, this time it’s an electric self-driving bus. Unlike the Nobe, the bus is ready and has been shown to the public, the first public demonstration will take place in early September on the university’s campus. Swedish telecom Telia has had an interest in the bus and is testing out it’s 5G network solutions, which could later be deployed in commercial self-driving cars. Swiss-Swedish high-tech engineering corporation ABB is testing its new battery charging technologies on the bus. Unusual, uncommon and unconventional are the words that describe these electrical car-bus combination vehicles. A few years ago, entrepreneur Jüri Tamm introduced Synchronous to the world. It looks like a horse-drawn carriage sans horses. His vision was to have the vehicles roaming around Monaco as a form of public transportation. His vision has yet to be fulfilled. Tamm’s fairytale-looking vehicle is built in the Ukraine where he has lived for about 20 years now. He is the Honorary Consul of Monaco in Estonia.

Kris Lemsalu Portfolio

Car2go, 2016 car doors, bricks, umbrellas, textile, porcelain, metal

Treasure box violence, 2016 ceramics, fur, textile, metal, chairs

Father is in town, 2012 ceramics, lamb fur, wild pig fur, foam

3 of life, 2017 porcelain, wood, metal, textile, rubber, plastic

Old friends, 2017 rubber, porcelain, metal, hay, hair

Wisdom and eggs, 2011 ceramics, mixed media

So let us melt and make no noise, 2017 boat, porcelain, rope, balloons, metal

In my bathtub I`m the captain, 2012 ceramics, textile, metal

Photo by Jan Moszumanski

Kris Lemsalu will represent Estonia at the next Venice Biennale. She is one of those young artists who helps tell the success stories of the Estonian arts. At the same time, her captivating, genuine, humorous and sufficiently strange creations are also appreciated by arts audiences in Estonia.

Kris Lemsalu Life as a performance By Kaarin KivirĂ¤hk

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Immaterial material love, 2013-2018 ceramics

Star, 2016 porcelain, textile, cd-s,plastic mirror, foam, silicone

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My first encounter with Kris Lemsalu was a few years ago at a birthday party of my colleague. As usual, Kris was dressed as some perverse character from Alice in Wonderland, turned upside down, turned into an art performance. ‘Estonian artist Kris Lemsalu, who is a shaman and a show-woman indeed,’ wrote Los Angeles art critic Andrew Berardini, a few months back in the art journal Mousse. Shaman and show-woman – those two words should be on her business card. And it’s true, Lemsalu is like an old school rock‘n’roll dream come true – but in the best possible way. She’s ultimately free, starting with her choice of wardrobe to the ‘no-compromises in her work’ attitude. Her life meets her works and her works wouldn’t exist without her life experience. It’s a life of endless travelling, meeting unexpected people, visiting the coolest and weirdest parties and finally – working – as working and doing ceramics is the ultimate medium for Kris to tell her wildest and most heart-breaking life stories. In the project she is now preparing for the Venice Biennale, Kris says she would like to approach it with lighter colours as there has been too much death in her works lately. Death wears a carnival mask in Venice anyway.

Cool girls without hands, 2016 skateboards, wood, fur, porcelain, plastic, textile

Kris’s gallery representative Olga Temnikova remarked on the TV show ‘The Art of Our Time’ that the expressiveness of Kris’ art will never cease to amaze her. ‘It is fascinating how she is liked by all kinds of people – art collectors, professionals, ordinary audiences. You just can’t take your eyes off it!’. Estonian audiences fell in love with Lemsalu at the Tallinn Arts Hall exhibitions some years back, where the curator Tamara Luuk had joined Kris’s works with the legendary Estonian painter Tiit Pääsuke. The exhibition was a real success and demonstrated that Kris is not just some talented trend artist, but can relate in interesting ways to Estonian arts history. In this sense, Kris is an old-school artist – her life and creations are absolutely inseparable. The characters of Lemsalu’s works, for example the little skeleton head named Erik and the sad, tampon-dress wearing Maria in her “Erik und Maria”, may at first glance seem strangely funny, but often their background has a personal story. For example, the little monkey head skeleton sent to Kris by her former boyfriend from a Sierra Leone street market that Kris named Erik.

But there is also death and melancholy in her works; the grieving for lost friends. Art critic Rebeka Põldsam has beautifully captured the birth stories of Kris’ works for the 13th Baltic Triennale catalogue: ‘As a full-time nomad, she appropriates to her work pop-music, sometimes obscure religious cults and traditions concerning death, scenes from dazzling parties she attends, relationships with friends and lost lovers.’ Lemsalu also lends her life to her art in a more direct sense, using her body as a detail. In one of her most well-known works “Whole alone 2” Lemsalu lied down for several 8-hour days, wearing a ceramic turtle costume in the Temnikova & Kasela box at the sleek arts fair in Frieze. How did she manage that? Lemsalu has said that she listened to music on her iPod the whole time – Kris has even said she enjoys music more than art. In some interviews, Lemsalu has joked around, saying that some of her creations need her body as a blessing – in order for them to be able to continue their independent life and stay up late like grown-up kids. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Whole Alone 2, 2015 porcelain, eggs and egg crates, waterbed, metal, hair

Lemsalu started to create costumes while still in high school in order to get into parties she was too young to get into. She changed her appearance beyond recognition, creating the wildest possible costumes. ‘Kris Lemsalu can go to Mutant Disco with fifteen eggs hanging from her crotch and a head full of inflated rubber gloves,’ the journalist and friend of Kris, Kadri Karro, wrote some years ago. The artist herself has said that playing different characters at parties is like a game and a test for her: who is up for playing with a guest wearing such crazy stuff? It was pure chance that Kris Lemsalu did not become a fashion designer. In 2004, she actually won the younger category of the Supernoova fashion design competition with her collection “Women in war”, which astounded the jury with her characteristic use of felt, mirrors, metal braces, leather strips and other seemingly inappropriate materials. Nevertheless, Lemsalu decided to go study ceramics. Perhaps she had already grown bored with fashion creating her own party costumes? Kris Lemsalu first studied ceramics at the Estonian Academy of Arts and later at the Vienna Arts Academy. She has said that, for her, school was mostly a place for learning technical skills. Lemsalu’s goal was to learn

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ceramics until she mastered the medium – which is an interesting contrast considering the rest of her bohemian lifestyle. Lemsalu creates her refined handicrafts at her Tallinn-based studio from where they travel to the world’s largest art fairs and exhibitions. Her goal is always to tell her own story without artistic compromise. Regardless of her uncompromising nature, or perhaps because of it, Kris has many fans. She likes to work with friends because it allows the freedom to spend time with them. In the era of smartphones, influencers and social media managers, Kris did not have a smartphone for a long time, not to mention Instagram or Facebook accounts. Regardless of this, she has an active social life and always knows where the coolest parties take place. She interacts equally freely with Swiss millionaires and Tallinn bohemians. She has friends among both – it is totally normal for her to hang out at a secret Viennese high society party one night, then miss her flight to New York the next day because she decides to go with some friends to Hiiumaa (an island in Estonia – ed.). Perhaps such stories are just legends – how else can we recognise a great artist than by the legends that accompany her?

Paavo Järvi – a missionary of classical music Photo by Kaupo Kikkas

By Priit Hõbemägi

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Photos by Kaupo Kikkas

Paavo Järvi (born 1962) is a world-renowned Estonian conductor. A Grammy winner who has conducted many leading orchestras in most of the famous concert halls around the world. His father, Neeme Järvi, is also a worldfamous conductor. In August, the Estonian Festival Orchestra, conducted by Paavo Järvi, participated in the most important classical music event – BBC Proms – in London.

The Järvi family plays a central role in the Estonian music scene with dozens of highly recognised musicians who also often perform together. Paavo Järvi’s father Neeme Järvi studied orchestra conducting in St Petersburg (then Leningrad) under the tutelage of the famous Jevgeni Mravinski and won fame during the era of the Soviet Union. In 1980, the Järvi family moved to the USA due to the oppressive artistic environment in Soviet Estonia. Neeme Järvi became a world-renowned conductor. In the States, Paavo studied in Los Angeles under the famous Leonard Bernstein. Today he has also become a top conductor in the world. Paavo’s brother Kristjan Järvi is also an acknowledged conductor. How is a musician’s professional life influenced by his father belonging to the top of his field in the world? Paavo Järvi says that first and foremost this situation provides you with an aim and a target which you have to start filling with content yourself. ‘In the end it is your own talent that counts. That already as a little boy I listened to music at home, was active and accompanied by my father… of course, it helps. But perhaps not because I studied a lot, albeit I did of course, but listening to music and talking about it went hand in hand. It gave a direction and a fanaticism. Much depends on how hard you work and sometimes you just have to have luck,’ says Paavo Järvi.

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Paavo has been hardworking and he has also had luck. In the early 2000s, he worked for a decade as the musical director of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra in the USA. For over ten years, Paavo Järvi also conducted the reputable Orchestra de Paris in France. As the main conductor of the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra he performed all around the world. At the moment, Paavo Järvi has two home orchestras and a third from next year. ‘I am starting my fourth season in Tokyo with the NHK Orchestra, a fantastic orchestra. For fourteen years, I have been the main conductor of the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, although I have actually collaborated with them for twenty years already. It is a touring orchestra. And from next year, I will also be the main conductor of Tonhalle Orchester Zürich,’ explains Paavo. As the artistic director of Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen he has performed the complete cycle of Beethoven’s symphonies all over the world and is now set to continue with a Schumann project. He is an awaited visiting conductor in front of many famous orchestras including the Berlin Philharmonics, Munich Philharmonics and the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

Kristjan, Neeme and Paavo Järvi

Family music festival in Pärnu In 2013, the Pärnu Music Festival was created together with the Järvi Academy. The Järvi Summer Festival had already taken place for two years. Pärnu has been the beloved holiday spot for the Järvi family for a long time. The peaceful rhythm and fondness for culture in the resort make it an ideal location for organizing a music festival. The Järvi family was well-acquainted with former Russian leading musicians and composers, for example the Oistrahhs, the conductor and pianist Gennadi Rozhdestvenski, cellist Mstislav Rostropovitsh and others. ‘They all used to visit us in Pärnu,’ says Paavo Järvi. ‘Even the composer Dmitri Shostakovitch has been over to our place. There is a photograph taken by Gustav Ernesaks where I am together Shostakovitch; I was seven years old,’ Paavo recalls his meeting with the legendary composer. Therefore, Pärnu was a natural choice when it came to choosing a location for a music festival. The entire Järvi family, which includes many top musicians in Estonia, both conductors and performers, has always considered the musical education of young Estonians to be very important. The aim of the

Pärnu Music Festival is to help young musicians meet leading musicians of the world, to learn from them and to perform together. This is what Paavo Järvi considers pivotal when it comes to musical education. The entire festival atmosphere is very important: ‘Chamber music is played, which is quite rare for most orchestra players. And in the evenings they sit together in cafes, get to know each other, talk, drink wine and enjoy the beautiful summer nights. They do what they love with all their soul – make music – but at the same time the environment is new, a bit exotic and filled with energy.’ The concerts of the Pärnu Music Festival are always popular and sell out quickly. Järvi Academy, an inseparable part of the festival, takes place at the same time as the Pärnu Music Festival. Järvi Academy or the masterclasses, which are organised in Pärnu, can be divided into three parts: the conducting course that was taught last summer by Neeme and Paavo Järvi and Leonid Grin, and courses for players of string or wind instruments. The conducting courses last for two weeks, young musicians take masterclasses from acknowledged musicians and pedagogues from Estonia and abroad. For example, the last string instruments course was taught by the famous Russian violinist Viktor Tretjakov. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Estonian Festival Orchestra

Estonian Festival Orchestra educates young people In order to facilitate closer connections between young Estonian musicians and their colleagues abroad, Paavo Järvi founded the Estonian Festival Orchestra (EFO). He explains: ‘If you invite an orchestra from somewhere to come and perform at our festival, it doesn’t really contribute much to our young musicians. My idea was to create an orchestra that brings together the most talented young Estonians but they sit side by side with really experienced stars. It is the kind of masterclass you cannot buy for money. Already after one or two rehearsals, the young Estonians started to feel that, ok, if the person next to me plays like that, then I can as well. It helps and inspires!’ In August this year, the Estonian Festival Orchestra, conducted by Paavo Järvi, performed at the most reputable classical music festival in the world – BBC Proms. BBC Proms is a two-month summer concert series in London, created more than a hundred years ago, in which the best orchestras in the world want to perform. ‘I know how many big orchestras in the world want to get into BBC Proms and fail to do so and now suddenly the Estonian Festival Orchestra, which is not really known! But the people who attended the festival in Pärnu had been excited and some of them were English journalists,’ says Paavo Järvi. ‘What also really helped was the recent EFO album because critics in the UK were really positive about it,’ he contin-

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ues. The fact that the Republic of Estonia celebrates its 100th anniversary this year probably also supported the invitation of EFO. At BBC Proms, they performed Arvo Pärt’s 3rd symphony, Jean Sibelius’ 5th symphony and Edvard Grieg’s piano concert.

The comeback of vinyl for classical music Paavo Järvi’s success as an orchestra conductor is also noteworthy because classical music taste tends to differ from one large European country to another. What is popular in England need not be popular in Germany or France. But conductor Paavo Järvi is beloved everywhere. The British like his dedication to Jean Sibelius and the Germans like his thorough work with the Beethoven symphonies. The streaming of music and other new technologies have created the feeling that it no longer makes sense to produce CDs or vinyl records like in the old days. ‘Nowadays everyone says there is no point in producing records, that “records are dead”,’ says Järvi. But it is necessary to produce records because orchestras will always need something to physically give their sponsors. The global music journalism is a big business and one big reason for releasing records is the fact that reputable music critics, whose words carry weight in the world of classical music, do not write about streaming. Similarly, to the world of pop music, where vinyl records are making a comeback, this enthusiasm for vinyl has now

Photos by Kaupo Kikkas

reached the world of classical music. ‘Even my Beethoven symphonies were put onto a new set of vinyl and it sold out in three days,’ says Järvi. Also Paavo Järvi’s father, conductor Neeme Järvi, still listens to vinyl records because he prefers the sound.

Worried about the future of culture Although the world of classical music may seem elitist and functioning well, world events and especially changes in culture have an impact on musicians. Paavo Järvi said in his interview to the Japanese TV station NHK: ‘We, musicians, must also be the ones to advance the important message of arts and education. The value of arts, the deeper value, what it has to say. It is a battle we are destined to lose, yet it is a battle we still have to fight.’ Paavo Järvi worries that even very educated people are no longer linked with culture in the way it used to be. People read new books, go to exhibitions and the theatre, but their contact with classical music remains superficial. ‘If we look at it from a very long perspective, our activities are destined to perish. Not because it is a very exclusive field of arts, but because when you read about historical characters, about kings and noblemen, they knew languages, they knew music, literature and poetry. They all created music or knew how to sing, play the piano, write poetry. Today we experience the paradox that even very highly educated people are often not cultured... which is really strange because

‘Will we really soon be in the situation where classical music is no longer played – no Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Bruckner or Mahler? That would make our world a much poorer place!’

we have been told that education is important… but culture is no longer an inseparable part of education. People from older generations, for example scientists, always had a close relationship with culture – with music, arts, theatre and opera. This is no longer the case. These days young educated people visit modern art exhibitions, read new books and perhaps even go to theatre. But everything which happens in the field of classical music is completely alien to them. Music is more about pop music, hip hop or rap. Classical music no longer has such importance in society,’ says Järvi. He does not underplay the importance of pop and rock music. If the show business is well done, it is top. But he is convinced that high culture cannot function on the principles of market economy. Throughout time high culture has needed supporters and patrons. ‘When you discuss this with businessmen they say, if it does not support itself, then it is not necessary. But this has never been the case with arts! Such art is Guns N’ Roses. But it is not art, it is show business. And I have nothing against it. Will we really soon be in the situation where classical music is no longer played – no Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Bruckner or Mahler? That would make our world a much poorer place!’ The Pärnu Music Festival and all other activities of Paavo Järvi are focused on promoting classical music, making it flourish. In order to prove that there are many young people in Estonia who want and know how to appreciate that which is valuable. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Photos by Atko Januson

Arvo Pärt Centre – a unique individual archive in a pine forest By Kirke Ert

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Estonian composer Born on the 11th of September 1935 in Paide

Photos by Kaupo Kikkas

Arvo Pärt Pärt is one of those composers whose works have had a real impact on our understanding of music. Today Pärt is first and foremost known for his original tintinnabuli-style. His earlier modernist works are perhaps less known by the wider audience, but he has broadened our understanding of music with his entire musical contribution.

Tintinnabuli (ld tintinnabulum – a bell, chime) is a unique musical style and compositional technique, created by Pärt, which melds together two single-voice structural lines – melody and the sound of the triad – into a whole. As a result, one main tonic triad can be heard and sensed throughout the music which is rich in overtones. The timeless beauty and deep spiritual message in Arvo Pärt’s music has touched and influenced many listeners regardless of their nationality, cultural background or age. Pärt’s compositions are not only played in concert halls but have been widely used in films, dance- and theatre performances and multimedia texts in the recent decades. For the seventh year running, Arvo Pärt is the most performed living composer in the world.

Laulasmaa is a village located forty kilometres from Tallinn, by the Lahepere Bay. Its name calls to mind the sand of that area, so white and clean that it seems to sing when you walk on it. It borders a village called Heliküla (village of sounds – ed.), where summer cottages were built in the 1950s and 1960s for Estonian composers and other members of the cultural elite. Back in the day, this area, beloved by Estonian composer Heino Eller, used to attract regular visitors – his students and colleagues, including Arvo Pärt. The picturesque sandy beach and tranquil pine forest have since offered inspiration to Pärt, who is the most performed living composer in the world for the seventh year running. As a young man, Pärt used to ride there on his motorbike. Together with his tutor Heino Eller, they hiked through the forest, sat on the large stones at the beach and exchanged views on life. Now that the composer has reached the age of his beloved professor, he still goes for walks in the area and ponders about another cycle coming to an end. No wonder then that this beautiful setting, away from the hustle and bustle of the city, in the natural environment that supports his music, was chosen as the site for the Arvo Pärt Centre – a personal archive containing the entire creative heritage of the composer. It was Arvo Pärt himself who laid the cornerstone more than a year ago. The ‘flowing’ house, without any right angles, will be opened to visitors on the 17th of October, 2018. LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Photos by Atko Januson

Kristina Kõrver, Anu Kivilo and Michael Pärt

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Arvo Pärt Centre Laulasmaa, Kellasalu tee Open from the 17th of October 2018 Founded in 2010 by Arvo Pärt and his family. Aims to create the conditions and opportunities for the preservation and research of the composer’s creative heritage in Estonia in the native language environment. Archive at the heart of the Centre brings together the composer’s musical heritage and related information and documents in physical and digital form. In the future, the Centre will bring together various activities related to the music of Arvo Pärt as an informational and musical centre, but first and foremost as a research and study centre with the archive at its heart. The new Centre is 2348 m2. It houses the archive, library, a 140-seat hall, exhibition area, film room, classrooms and staff area. Cost 8.5 million euro.

The birth story Fifteen years ago, Arvo Pärt and his family asked what would happen to the composer’s substantial musical heritage in the future. Something needed to be done. The first and the easiest solution would have been to give the collection to the Akademie der Künste in Berlin, which has hundreds of years of experience in archival work. ‘They would have collected all the existing material themselves and systematised it later. But this did not seem like the right solution to my parents,’ recalls the composer’s son Michael Pärt, who is Chairman of the Council of the Arvo Pärt Centre, adding ‘hence the decision to do something ourselves, although we had no clue about archiving.’ The family rented a small room at Laulasmaa Spa and work began. The priority was to systematize and digitize the archive. Arvo Pärt’s wife Nora Pärt was the first archiver who collected material according to years and themes; this was later taken over by professionals more or less intact. ‘The first major step was to organise Arvo Pärt’s music diaries which, in addition to notation, also included texts that had inspired the composer that he had either copied from books or noted down based on ideas he had thought or heard,’ explains Michael Pärt.

Some years later the archive was moved to the house in Laulasmaa, which was named Aliina. Until then the activities were funded by private supporters, but in 2011 the state stepped in with support. This enabled a larger team to be put together. A lot of preparatory work was necessary in order to clarify the direction. The archive needed to be made public but the location – the small house – did not facilitate that. They researched what had been done in other countries, archives and larger music centres. ‘At this point only a few years remained until the 100th birthday of the state of Estonia and everyone agreed that by then the Centre should have a public function,’ explains Anu Kivilo, Managing Director of the Arvo Pärt Centre. The people involved had to take a risk and answer the question of whether they were on the right path and whether it would still be so in five years’ time. ‘The physical side of the house is one thing – we can hire help from architects, designers and various organisations. But the content is much more complex and this is what we needed to decide upon ourselves,’ adds Kivilo. ‘We received credit; otherwise we would not have been so bold in the beginning.’

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Inspired by ‘tabula rasa’ Both Tallinn and Tartu were considered potential locations for the future centre, but it became clear quite quickly that the right location had already been found – Laulasmaa. The public architecture competition was won by Fuensanta Nieto and Enrique Sobejano from the Spanish architectural bureau Nieto Sobejano Arquitectos with their work ‘Tabula’. Both Michael Pärt and Anu Kivilo agree that the solution by the Spaniards was the best and the simplest. Their space solution – that centre staff have the opportunity to interact but that the office is not an open space with huge corridors – was the most suitable. Whereas at first there were concerns that a building with windows from the floor to the ceiling would create a greenhouse effect, cooperation with the architecture bureau Luhse & Tuhal adapted the project to the Estonian climate. ‘As construction work began I was afraid that Dad would come here and start to meddle,’ laughs Michael Pärt. ‘That’s exactly what happened, but in the best sense of the word. He was very interested in what we were doing and how he could be of assistance.’ People involved also recall the humour of the moment when the composer whilst walking in the forest had the idea to move the building by ten metres. A simple idea indeed, but a nightmare for architects. But the creative environment made it possible.

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‘The pine forest was like a miracle for the architects and this is perhaps why the building has a very sensitive relationship with the surrounding nature – the house reaches the forest and the forest reaches the house and the light penetrates it,’ explains music researcher Kristina Kõrver who works at the Centre. ‘The building is also in a strong relationship with Arvo Pärt’s music. Before designing the building, the architects were already admirers of Pärt’s music and the building was designed whilst listening to his music. The project in its patterns and pillars was inspired by “Tabula rasa”.’ Strangely enough, even the building designs fit the manuscript of the piece. ‘The pillars are like bar lines and rhythmical images, but of course this is more of a feeling than based on analysis,’ adds Kõrver. According to the architects, the tower located next to the building has also been inspired by the rhythm and structure of ‘Tabula rasa’. ‘The tower was something that made Arvo Pärt’s heart beat faster. Inspired by the wish to rise up towards the sky, to be up there and to see the sea. This thinking tower or viewing tower really does offer a magnificent view,’ says Kõrver. ‘In addition, the house has another “idiosyncrasy” – the chapel, a clearly sacral building that is not common for a modern music centre. However, considering Pärt’s music, the chapel, which was a real challenge for the builders, is not strange or surprising. It offers the joy of discovery for our visitors.’

At the heart of the Arvo Pärt Centre is the archive, which brings together the composer’s musical heritage and related information and documents both in physical and digital form. It is a truly unique enterprise in the world as the composer’s fingerprints are all over the place. He is creating, his music is being performed daily and therefore the archive is always changing and growing rapidly. Pärt himself is an active user of the archive.

Photos by Atko Januson

The archive as the heart

‘For example, he will want to see a music diary, to improve something or to change manuscripts, which then of course means that our latest item is not really the latest one,’ smiles Michael Pärt and adds: ‘Arvo may just rip out a page from a manuscript and, of course, he is the only one who is allowed to do so. But just imagine what our archiver has to say…’ Kõrver brings out Arvo Pärt’s ability to become enthused, to be infected with an idea, to go deep and not to focus on problems. ‘Children have such skills and, unfortunately, at a certain age they disappear. But Arvo Pärt has retained these qualities and his enthusiasm sets an example for us all.’ One of the important tasks and opportunities of the Centre is to collaborate with Arvo and Nora Pärt. Those two are able to answer the many questions of the Centre staff; in collaboration, the content develops and context is created. After all, such an archive has never been created in the world before and it is therefore a special challenge and a daily learning process for everyone involved. ‘At first you need to know generally about archiving, only then can you learn why it doesn’t work,’ says Michael Pärt. “You cannot just follow rules; you have to adjust them.”

Doors open wide Arvo Pärt is a world-famous composer whose music brings forth serious themes that require concentration, yet it would be hard to find a warmer and simpler human being. The Centre too is not an elitist establishment, but meant for everyone. One has to want to come here. In order to come here and to spend time here you need to take time. There are activities for everyone. The activities are not restricted – each visitor decides for themselves what they want to do. The Centre has a 140-seat chamber hall, which will serve as the venue for concerts and film evenings, talks and discussions on various subjects. It is possible to book a guided tour in the building or to investigate on one’s own. One can rent earphones and go listen to the music in the forest or find a spot inside the building to enjoy the music. The Centre welcomes visitors who want to find out more about Arvo Pärt’s music and have never heard it, as well as those who know and love it already. The house also includes a flowing and dispersing exhibition space. It was not an easy task to create the exhibit, because Arvo Pärt has no desire to be in the centre of attention. Therefore, the terms of reference for the exhibit were a challenge artistically, visually and in terms of content, and putting the exhibition together was a very time-consuming task. ‘It quickly became clear that we cannot tell the story of Arvo Pärt as a living legend. This is why there is no traditional approach to his life story and his creations. Also, we did not want to act as curators commenting

on Pärt’s music and his nature,’ explains Kõrver. ‘In the end we realised we have to give the word to Arvo Pärt as we presume that the visitors to the centre want to meet him. Through the music diaries of the composer one is kind of able to talk to Arvo Pärt, to listen to his ponderings and to become nearer to the music through his own words. Sometimes it can help to tune one into his music, sometimes they give answers to questions that a person might have whilst listening to the music.’ What exactly Kõrver means by that can be discovered by visitors to the Centre themselves. The Centre also contracted filmmakers Jaak Kilmi and Jaan Tootsen whose new short documentary about Arvo Pärt can be seen. The exhibit includes a photograph wall of musicians – the composer’s tribute to his closest musicians, without whom he says his own music would not exist. Even children have been catered for. In the play area, it is possible to watch cartoons with music Arvo Pärt has composed; to participate in a quiz or just to play. The Arvo Pärt Centre also places emphasis on education and wishes to reach school children of all ages as well as adults. Of course, visitors and researches can access the digital archive of the composer. According to initial estimations, the Arvo Pärt Centre will be able to receive 20 000 visitors annually. ‘This figure is linked to the location and the size of the Centre. We hope it is in balance with the soul and activities of our building,’ explains Michael Pärt. ‘If we grow too large, we lose the main idea. The Centre is sufficiently small and compact to be preserved as a whole.’ ‘We are now taking our first steps and learning and growing together with the building. We are able to offer many interesting things but we want to trust our visitors that they will come here wanting to discover and to give their own input,’ says Kõrver. ‘The creative aesthetic of Arvo Pärt has no place for being forced. It leaves space, just like our Centre does. Ideally, we will be a space where one has the space to meet oneself and not just Arvo Pärt.’ LI F E I N ESTON IA N o 49

Estonia for international meetings and events Increasingly, many organisations are turning their attention to Northern Europe, searching for undiscovered and inspiring conference destinations with which to wow their delegates. With the number of its international association conferences having increased by nearly 100% between 2013 and 2017, Estonia is fast becoming the contemporary conference event location of choice. If youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve yet to consider Estonia for your next event destination, here are the top reasons this ideal location should leap to the top of your list.

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Positively surprising, fresh destination Most frequent conference delegates have already travelled the well-worn conference circuit and seen the same old sights. Impress them with a novel destination that’s still mostly undiscovered – a country that’s edgy and exotic, yet attractive, affordable and safe! Estonia is full of positive surprises and will definitely exceed your guests’ expectations.

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Estonian National Museum ERM

Unforgettable venues

TV tower

No matter what kind of event you haveplanned, youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll find a venue in Estonia that suits it to a tee. Historic or ultra-modern, a city-centre conference hotel or an unforgettable, one-of-a-kind meeting space. Imagine holding your event in a spectacular, Renaissance-style guild hall or a cutting-edge, award-winning museum. Additional choices include a former power station turned into fantastic industrial style venue, an opera house, an amazing maritime museum or even a TV tower.

Maritime museum Sealplane hangars

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Medieval and modern – a blend of old and new First-time visitors are amazed by Estonia´s historic ambience. Imagine strolling past Medieval walls and gates, Gothic churches, curious little lanes lit with old-fashioned lamps. At the same time, Estonia´s cities are surprisingly modern, with the latest high-tech conveniences always at hand. It’s the combination of old and new, Medieval and Modern, that gives Estonia its unique flavour.

Cosy and compact Estonia is small and hassle-free. In fact, Estonia´s main conference towns are so compact that most hotels, venues, restaurants and sights are within easy walking distance of one another. Travelling from the city to a nature site can take 15 minutes. In Tallinn, for instance, the city centre is just a 10-minute drive from the airport.

Rotermann Quarter

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High quality hotels Thanks to Estonia´s rapid development as a travel destination, it´s now home to dozens of new, top-quality, business-class hotels. Their conference facilities offer the latest in comfort and technical capability. A good mix of 3 to 5-star hotels can be found in downtown areas, providing excellent access to the larger, city-centre conference venues.

Value for money Most planners find it cheaper to organise a meeting in Estonia than in Central Europe and ‘excellent value for money’ is often quoted by planners. Even Lonely Planet named Estonia´s capital, Tallinn, the ‘Best Value Destination’ for 2018.

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Conferences in Estonia 2018-2019 24th FECAVA Eurocongress June 2018, 1200 delegates European Group for Organisational Studies Colloquium, July 2018, 2000 delegates The 51st Annual Meeting of the Societas Linguistica Europaea August 2018, 500 delegates

Unforgettable activities and experiences If you are looking for unique activities available only in Estonia, we do have plenty. Top choices include bog-shoe walking, orienteering with retro jeeps, a sculpture making workshop with a famous artist, a marzipan painting workshop, design studio visits, and adventure games in Tallinn’s Old Town.

European School Heads Association Biennial Conference, October 2018, 600 delegates The 49th Nordic Lung Congress 2019, June 2019, 600 delegates 33rd Congress of IUSTI-Europe on Sexually Transmitted Infections 2019, September 2019, 600 delegates JCI World Congress 2019, November 2019, 5000 delegates For the full list of international conferences in Estonia please see: www.ecb.ee/en/calender

Local help The Estonian Convention Bureau, the umbrella body of the Estonian meeting industry, offers free impartial advice on venues, conference hotels, team-building and social activities.

For further information please visit www.visitestonia.com and Estonian Convention Bureau´s web site www.ecb.ee

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Events calendar: Highlights from September to December Life in Estonia recommends

Walks of Light 19 - 21 September @ Tallinn

Seto Culture Week 3 - 9 October @ Setomaa

The city will be filled with millions of colours from 19 to 21 September. The three-day festival of light, colours, and music will end the festival season of the 300th jubilee of Kadriorg Park. During the festival, the mystical city space will be filled with various light, video, fire, and sound installations. The festival focuses on peaceful games of light and colours.

Every municipality in Setomaa will be hosting cultural events during the week, with people of all ages welcome to take part, from kindergarten children to adults. There will be a range of workshops, competitions, quizzes and dance clubs, as well as celebrations of Peko Day and a conference. The programme for the week is yet to be finalised.

www.visitestonia.com/en/light-walks valguskonnib.ee/en

www.visitestonia.com/en/ seto-culture-week

Exhibition “Self-made Estonia” 5 October - 20 August 2019 @ Tartu Estonian National Museum ERM The Estonian National Museum presents a decade that was, in many ways, confusing. The exhibition will take you on a journey through the 1990s – the arrival of the market economy, the opening of borders and the expansion of the information space. Through the prism of the modern day, you can take a look back and understand the changes that brought Estonia to the present. www.erm.ee/en

Konrad Mägi exhibition @ KUMU Art Museum Open until March 2019 Konrad Mägi (1878-1925) was one of the most signifant modernists of Northern Europe. ‘I am a son of the North, and everything I am is but a fraction of its population and wilderness. Wherever I am, the North will always be my homeland,' he wrote in his youth in Paris. His works are not decorative landscape scenes but paintings filled with energy, drama and mysticism. The oeuvre of Mägi, who only painted for 17 years, has recently been discovered in the rest of Europe: a large monographic exhibition

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of Mägi’s works was organized at the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea in Rome, and a selection of Mägi’s works was also included in an exhibition at the world-famous Musée d’Orsay in Paris.

kumu.ekm.ee

Pärnu Cafe Week 6 - 14 October @ Pärnu

Saaremaa Rally 12 - 13 October @ Saaremaa

Tallinn Restaurant Week 01 - 07 November 2018

Pärnu Café Week will include the cafés that present the best tea and coffee culture in Pärnu. During Café Week, meals consisting of salad, dessert and a cup of tea/coffee are offered at extra cost.

The most famous rally in Estonia, the Saaremaa Rally, was first held in 1974 and has since gained international recognition. This year, as in previous years, the race is going to be exciting and adrenaline-filled – a guaranteed spectacle for all!

One of the most anticipated autumn events in Estonia is the Tallinn Restaurant Week, during which almost all the best-known restaurants offer great foot at unbelievable prices. Restaurant Week allows you to visit many different restaurants that you might not have had the chance to visit before. It is also a good way to treat yourself to captivating taste experiences and food that you do not necessarily eat on daily basis. Make your reservation in advance because these hot deals will run out fast.

www.visitestonia.com/en/ parnu-cafe-week

www.saaremaarally.eu

www.tallinnrestautantweek.ee/2018

100 ships and more @ the Seaplane Harbour At the historic seaplane hangar you can witness a real parade of ships! At the exhibition in honour of the 100th anniversary of the Republic of Estonia '100 years on water. The ships of Estonia 1918-2018' each year tells a story of a ship that is meaningful for Estonia. There are adventurous, but also tragic stories of sailboats, steamers, warships and motorships. You can step on board a genuine submarine, Lembit, and other museum ships in the harbour, starting with the icebreaker Suur Tõll. www.lennusadam.eu

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Events calendar

Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival (PÖFF) 16 November - 2 December @ Tallinn The Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival is one of the largest and most distinctive film events in Northern Europe and among the 15 leading film festivals in the world. The festival embraces a cluster of events, accommodating three full-blown sub-festivals as well as international industry events, bringing together filmmakers from all over the world.

Christmas Jazz 28 November - 15 December @ Tallinn

Tallinn Christmas Market 24 November - 5 January @ Tallinn

Christmas Jazz is a two-week international, intimate and serene-sounding festival taking place during the holidays at the end of November and beginning of December. The concerts are held in churches, clubs and concert halls.

The Tallinn Christmas Market, with a touch of a fairy tale, will be held at the Town Hall Square in Tallinn. Anything is possible at the Christmas Market! The star of the market is the Christmas tree, which is the most important Christmas tree in Estonia and has been set up in Town Hall Square since 1441, making it the first Christmas tree ever to be put on display in Europe.

www.visitestonia.com/en/ christmas-jazz-1

www.visitestonia.com/en/ black-nights-film-festival-poff

The Christmas land is decorated with trees, Christmas decorations, and Christmas lights. Local merchants will offer Estonian Christmas cuisine, from black pudding and sour cabbage to gingerbread and hot Christmas drinks, as well as various handicrafts. Our younger guests can enjoy merry-go-rounds as well as a diverse Christmas programme. The real gem of the Christmas Market is Santa Claus, who will greet children in his own home and arrive by reindeer sleigh!

2018.poff.ee

IDeeJazz 2018 9- 12 November @ Narva and Tartu The god vibe festival, IDeeJazz, will once again bring energy, joy and inspiration to the Estonian autumn. The festival which is taking place in Tartu for the seventh time and for the first time in Narva, invites all visitors to load themselevs with positive energy. A total of 17 selected concerts take place in two cities, with top artists from nine countries.

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www.visitestonia.com/en/ tallinn-christmas-market

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