INTRODUCTION JUDGES
The Nordic 100 is an annual list recognising the 100 most impactful and influential figures in the Nordic tech scene each year.
Individuals at the forefront of shaping and positioning the region as one of the world’s most important innovation hubs.
We recognise founders, operators, investors and community builders that are playing important roles in the region and are influencing what tomorrow looks like in the Nordics, and indeed the world.
After three successful editions in 2016, 2017 and 2018, The Nordic 100 was on an indefinite hiatus, until Avnit (CEO of TechBBQ) reached out to Neil earlier this year to propose a partnership to bring it back for 2024.
Our ambition is now for The Nordic 100 to (re)establish itself as the main resource for engaging with who’s who in the Nordic ecosystem all year round.
It’s refreshing to see a strong mix of backgrounds, occupations, genders, and locations represented in the 2024 version, a big thank you to our judging panel for the time and effort in determing this year’s list.
And thank you for reading...
Neil S W Murray (Founder of The Nordic Web) and Avnit Singh (CEO of TechBBQ)
After an open nomination process that ran for six weeks, the judging panel (with one representative from each Nordic country) came together to decide who should make The Nordic 100 2024.
While the judges were ineligible for the final list, it should be noted that they were asked to be on the selection panel not only because they are individuals who have their finger on the pulse of what’s happening in the ecosystem, but have also made significant contributions themselves.
So, it’s fair to say The Nordic 100 is more like The Nordic 105 this year!
A big thank you to our judges:
Stine Mølgaard Sørensen is currently serving as a Partner at Alliance VC investing in Nordic founders, additionally, she is a member of the investment panel for Innovation Fund Denmark and is elected to the Innovation Council at Rigshospitalet. Stine Mølgaard Sørensen is also an accomplished entrepreneur and holds positions on various boards.
Pauliina Martikainen is a Partner at Maki.vc, a Nordic VC firm focused on seed investments in deep tech and brand-driven companies. Pauliina joined the firm in 2019 and made partner in summer 2022 at the age of 28, becoming one of the youngest female partners in European VC.
Pauliina has actively aimed at improving access to the VC scene. Prior to joining Maki.vc, she co-founded a micro VC fund Wave Ventures, which is managed by students and designed to back young Nordic entrepreneurs.
Kjetil Holmefjord is a general partner at Oslo-based seed fund Sondo, and is also the author of Norway’s go-to newsletter on startups called “On Norwegian Tech”.
Helga Valfells has been working with start-ups and technology companies for the last 20 years. Helga is a Founding Partner of Crowberry Capital, which she founded with her two partners Jenny and Hekla in mid-2017.
Prior to co-founding Crowberry, Helga was CEO of NSA Ventures and for 8 years where she managed a total of 41 start-up companies, three Venture funds and negotiated a total of 14 exits. She was also Chairman of the board of Frumtak where she was responsible for a total of 13 growth companies.
Joseph Michael has a long background in the Nordic startup ecosystem. Today he leads Venture Capital Partnerships at Google in the Nordics. Before Google, Joseph led the City of Stockholm’s work with startups, headed up startup partnerships in the Nordics for Stripe, and was a Nordic scout for Tiger Global.
AINO BERGIUS
Newly appointed Slush CEO, Aino Bergius, has an impressive history with Slush dating back to her volunteer days a decade ago.
With a total of 7 Slush events under her belt, Aino returned as CEO in January of this year.
Aino hopes to continue cultivating a culture of learning and opportunity for Slush employees and volunteers, as she, herself, has experienced it firsthand.
Alen is the co-founder & CEO of Tola, an AP & AR solution to help businesses manage their cash flow.
Before starting Tola, Alen was one of the earliest employees at Pleo and spent 6 and half years leading the company’s growth to unicorn status.
Alen also invests in startups across Europe as a Sequoia Scout.
ALONDRA SILVA MUÑOZ
Alondra Silva Muñoz is a seasoned technology marketing executive currently serving as Chief Marketing Officer at the International Carbon Registry (ICR), where she leads global marketing and strategic initiatives for their innovative digital platform focused on carbon credit management.
Previously, Alondra was the Head of Marketing at Kaptio, a TravelTech SaaS platform built on Salesforce, where she played a crucial role in achieving the company’s most successful sales year and led investor communications during Series B funding. Before that, at the EdTech company Beedle, she led strategic marketing efforts that resulted in a tenfold increase in user growth through a key partnership with Microsoft Education. Alondra is originally from Chile and has become a prominent advocate for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) in the Nordics .
ANA ANDONOVSKA
Ana is the Founder of Even Founders. An organization on a mission to increase the number of women founders and funding opportunities to them.
They do this with practical tools, for example their “Startup School” prepares women to become founders and go from idea to business in 8 weeks. It’s fully online and designed to fit schedules - even if you have a full-time job.
Ana has also been recognised on Forbes 30 under 30 and is an active Angel and VC Scout.
ANDERS MJÅSET
Anders is the founder and CEO of Mesh Community with startup hubs in Oslo, Copenhagen and Trondheim.
Mesh also owns the Nordic recruitment platform The Hub and Anders has also started a network to connect the proptech scene (PropTech Norway) and NAST - Norwegian Alliance for Startup & Tech, in Norway.
With Mesh and The Hub Anders aims to build fundamental infrastructure for the startup scene in the Nordics together with a team of 100+ startup ecosystem builders.
Andreas is the co-founder and CEO of Corti.
Corti is a Danish company which has developed an audio-enabled AI software for diagnostics and documentation in the health care industry.
Corti’s mission is to be the premier AI tool for medical professionals.
They announced a $60M Series B at the end of 2023, co-led by Prosus Ventures and Atomico, with participation from existing investors Eurazeo, EIFO, and Chr. Augustinus Fabrikker.
ANDREAS SAARI
Andreas is the co-founder and co-CEO of Paebbl, turning captured CO2 into industrial raw materials.
Previously Andreas was the CEO of Slush in 2018 and 2019, as well as being the CEO and co-founder of Wave Ventures, the first student-run VC fund in the Nordics & largest in Europe, where he still sits on the board today,
Andreas, a former Counter-Strike world champion and founder of SK Gaming, launched GOALS in 2021 to create the football game he felt the genre needed.
With over 70 team members and $39M in funding, the studio focuses on gameplay and esports readiness.
ANDRI HEIÐAR KRISTINSSON
Andri Heiðar Kristinsson is an entrepreneur at heart and an operator turned VC. As a general partner at Frumtak Ventures, a leading early-stage venture capital firm in Iceland, Andri backs local entrepreneurs with global potential.
He has been an ecosystem champion and angel investor in the Icelandic tech scene for nearly two decades during his time as the CEO of Digital Iceland, product lead at LinkedIn in Silicon Valley, founder and CEO of Travelade and Klak Icelandic Startups.
ANNA BRCHISKY
Anna is the Founder and CEO of Bamla, a Nordic PR and communications agency for tech, finance and industry.
Before founding Bamla, Anna led communications and PR for several teams, including Slush, the Finnish Venture Capital Association, and the Finnish Startup Community.
Anne Lise is a passionate and result-driven tech entrepreneur with 20+ years in the SaaS and gaming industry as operator, executive, tech strategist, board member and angel investor. Helping companies across startup and growth phases execute at their top potential.
Having been in the CEO, COO and CTO roles across a 10 year span at Attensi, Anne Lise recently founded Tech Tiger to provide independent consulting and interim CPO/CTO/COO services.
Ann-Christine is Founding Partner of Ethan Partners a global executive search company focused on the digital space. Ethan Partners has supported over 250 successful Internet companies and placed more than 2000 high profile candidates.
Clients include among others Uber, Zalando, Deliveroo, and Goldman Sachs. Ann-Christine has supported some of the largest VC’s and PE’s globally with talent acquisition.
Ann-Christine is also Co-Founder of InTech Founders a growth accelerator for diverse tech startups looking to scale internationally and attract investors, to promote diversity and inclusion in tech.
Annu Nieminen is the founder and CEO of Upright, a data company introducing a new level of rigour, integrity and automation in sustainability data.
Upright’s proprietary net impact model uses natural language processing (NLP) technologies to collect findings from a large corpus of scientific papers, statistics, and company reports and map them against companies and funds.
Driven by a strong ethos of open data, Upright hosts a public database of impact profiles for 10k companies and 35k funds, and serves customers such as APG, Pictet, Nordea, EQT, and European Investment Bank.
After helping make AI startups succeed for 7 years (Founding Engineer at Sana and Co-founder of Depict.AI) Anton set out on the ultimate mission in tech: building the last piece of software.
As CEO of Lovable, Anton is leading a small team of serial founders, product engineers, physicists, competitive programmers to be the first to make autonomous code generation work.
AVNIT SINGH
Avnit has been the CEO of TechBBQ since 2019, guiding it through the COVID pandemic and coming out the other side having grown it into one of the biggest and leading startup events in the Nordics, and Europe.
Avnit is also the Founder and Chairman of Startup Borgen, a four-day event at the Danish Parliament where 100 students and entrepreneurs solve problems for Danish growth over 54 hours.
BERNT ØIVIND BØRNICH
Bernt Børnich is the Founder & CEO of 1X, a US-Norwegian AI robotics company specializing in humanoid robots. As a lifelong science enthusiast and roboticist, Bernt founded 1X in 2015 with the mission of creating an abundant supply of labor using safe, intelligent humanoids.
Bernt’s deep passion for electromechanics, computers, and innovation has driven 1X to become pioneers in the industry of humanoids. Their first robot, EVE, initially deployed in security and logistics roles, now serves as a research and development platform collecting data doing domestic tasks in 1X AI Studio.
Bjarke is one of the most active angel investors in the Nordics, with 50+ investments in companies including Mimo, Monta, Light, Spektr and Medusa.
Previously, Bjarke was at Creandum where he worked on their investments in Pleo, Bolt and Trade Republic.
Bjarke is also an ex-founder and operator.
Casper Rasmussen is CEO and Co-founder of Monta.
Monta is founded by a small team of dedicated engineers and tech-minded professionals that have grown tired of the fragmented EV market.
Previously Casper worked as Chief Technology Officer at Monstar Lab Group. Before joining the Monstar Lab Group management in 2019, he served as CTO and Partner at Nodes, a company he joined in 2011 as an Android Developer.
CECILIE HVIDBERG JAKOBSEN
Cecilie is the CEO & Founder of wawa fertility.
wawa fertility is a modern clinic and patient management solution designed to revolutionise clinic performance and enhance patient engagement. Their comprehensive solution seamlessly integrates with clinics existing EHR system, empowering their doctors and nurses to focus on what matters most: the patients.
Previously Cecilie sold her old company to KMD (The main supplier of tech solutions for public healthcare in Denmark) and found her passion for healthcare.
Christian is Partner and Owner in SOHO and NOHO.
SOHO is a community with over 1500 members and with locations in Kødbyen and in the center of Copenhagen.
DAN MCCORMICK
With a background in product & tech, Dan now runs Greens Ventures.
Founded by 50 Spotify alumni to support and invest in top Nordic operators turned founders.
Daniel Ek is the Founder and CEO of Spotify, the world’s most popular audio streaming subscription service with 626 million users, including 246 million paying subscribers across more than 180 markets.
In 2021, founded Prima Materia, a European investment company and most recently, co-founded Neko Health in Sweden.
DAVID HELGASON
David is a Founding Partner of Transition.
Transition partners with Seed and Series A founders to make the climate transition a reality.
Previously David founded Unity and served as CEO for 12 years and still serves on the Board of Directors to this day.
David’s background is in programming, university dabbling, creating companies, and helping entrepreneurs.
Elsa Hyland is a distinguished Angel Investor, ex-VC, Startup Advisor and Mentor, who boasts a proven track record in the dynamic world of startups, previously contributing operationally to two Swedish-founded Unicorns.
Actively engaged in the early-stage startup landscape, Elsa guides entrepreneurs in investment readiness, fundraising strategy, and network expansion.
Elsa’s influence extends to her recognition among the top 100 Angel Investors and Impact Angel Investors in Sweden.
EMMA LEHIKOINEN
Emma currently serves as the Chief Operating Officer at Swappie, a leading European online platform for refurbished smartphones.
Before joining Swappie, Emma held various roles at Slush, a student-driven not-for-profit movement focused on supporting founders.
Emma served as the President of Slush, overseeing the Helsinki event, global presence, and the startup media platform, Soaked by Slush.
Emma also worked as the Head of Program and Program Curator at Slush.
EVELINA ANTTILA
Evelina Anttila is CEO at Swedish early stage venture capital fund Wellstreet.
Evelina was previously part of building up AI company Peltarion (acquired) and has a background as an M&A lawyer.
She is also co-founder of legal tech company Justic, angel investor, advisor to AI Sweden and holds board positions. Evelina serves as a Dragon on the Swedish Dragons’ Den (Draknästet).
GERTRUDE
CHILUFYA WESTRIN
Gertrude is a Developer Advocate at Qlik, host of The Tech Girl Podcast and Developer Relations Consultant. She is an experienced technical content creator, speaker, and moderator who enjoys building and maintaining developer communities.
HAMPUS JAKOBSSON, JOEL LARSSON, HEIDI LINDVALL
Hampus (right), Joel (left) and Heidi (centre) founded Pale Blue Dot in 2020 as three former entrepreneurs, who wanted to build a better venture capital fund: one that understood entrepreneurs, and one that channelled capital into founders solving one of the biggest problems facing humanity: climate change.
Gertrude is also passionate about making the tech industry more diverse and inclusive thus encouraging, inspiring and supporting more people with diverse backgrounds to take up Tech-related careers.
All three have previously built software startups in Europe and the US, and have invested in hundreds of startups as well as built programmes to support entrepreneurs and their growth.
HEINI KAIHU
Heini Kaihu has extensive experience in the gaming industry.
Heini is currently the Chief Sustainability Officer at Rovio Entertainment Corporation, leading sustainability initiatives.
Heini also held the position of VP and Head of HR at Rovio, leading organizational design and leadership development.
Previously, Heini served as the Director of Habbo Product & Concept, overseeing the global product and as a Producer, leading digital marketing and design projects.
Henrik is the CEO & Co-founder of Mimo.
Mimo is a end-to-end platform for effortless business payments with credit built-in. Built for SMEs, accountants and bookkeepers, money-in and money-out is effortless with Mimo.
Founded in 2023, Mimo is based between London and Stockholm and backed with £15.5m (€18m) from leading fintech investors like Northzone, Fost, Cocoa, Upfin and Seedcamp.
Previously Henrik was GM Europe at Capchase and a venture investor with Northzone.
Henrik Torstensson is a Partner at Alliance VC, a Nordic venture capital firm investing in early-stage tech startups from Sweden, Norway, Finland and Denmark.
Henrik is a board member and investor in Mjuk (Finland) and analytics company Steep (Sweden) and investor in Gilion (formerly Ark Kapital, Sweden).
Previously Henrik was the CEO and co-founder of Lifesum, as well as being an early team member at Spotify, Stardoll and TradeDoubler.
Hjalmar is the CEO of Neko Health a Swedish health-tech company co-founded in 2018 by Daniel Ek and himself.
Neko’s vision is to create a healthcare system that can help people stay healthy through preventive measures and early detection.
Previously Hjalmar was the CEO and co-founder of Watty, founded to connect energy users and energy producers in a way that would dramatically reduce CO2 emissions, lower prices and enable more solar and wind on the grid.
ILKKA KIVIMÄKI
After 20+ years of founding growth stories and backing some of the most prominent startups like Wolt and Beddit, Ilkka Kivimäki remains a strong supporter of emerging startups.
He is passionate about developing the Nordic startup ecosystem, and has been involved in student-led and for-student organizations from Slush and Startup Sauna to VC Wave Ventures and Junction.
Currently, he sits on the Aalto University Board.
Ilkka is the founding partner at Maki.vc, which is a Nordic seed-stage fund backing the most daring founders, focusing on deep-tech and brand-driven companies.
ILKKA PAANANEN
Ilkka is the CEO and co-founder of Supercell, the Finnish games company behind hit games such as Clash of Clans, Clash Royale, and Brawl Stars. Supercell was the first European tech startup to reach a valuation of $10 billion.
In addition to his role at Supercell, Ilkka helps other entrepreneurs as both an investor and as a mentor through his founder office called Illusian.
He has also co-founded We Foundation, which builds social impact measurement platform and tools for organizations working with children and families; and Wondershop, a new kind of game studio that develops games that teach kids valuable skills they need in life.
INDRA SHARMA
Indra is a Managing Partner at Peak, a pan-European early-stage venture capital fund investing in b2b Saas, platforms, and marketplaces. Indra is based out of Stockholm and has invested in companies such as Lassie, Blidz, DREM, Einride and Natural Cycles.
Indra has an engineering background, starting her career as a quant and a developer and later moving on to focus on product and go-to-market.
Indra has an extensive background as an operator and was part of scaling Swedish payment house Bambora Group (acquired by Ingenico in 2017 for €1.5bn) across Europe. In addition, Indra is a published author of ‘Role models - the women who shape our future’
JAN ERIK SOLEM
Jan Erik Solem is currently Director of Maps at Meta, after Meta acquired Mapillary, the company he co-founded and led as CEO.
Prior to co-founding Mapillary in 2013, he founded Polar Rose, a face recognition software for mobile and web which Apple bought in 2010.
Wherafter he worked as a computer vision team leader and researcher at Apple’s headquarters in Cupertino, CA.
Jan Erik is a former professor, a WEF Technology Pioneer (twice), and the author of a best selling computer vision book.
JENS INGELSTEDT
Jens is a startup enthusiast, super connector and angel investor.
He has worked with international expansion and Go To Market, invested for global VCs (including Superangel, Techstars and SoftBank) and built innovation and accelerator programs for investors, banks, research and enterprises.
Jens also ran International Investor Relations for Techarenan, the largest tech event in Sweden.
As the co-founder and CEO of Pleo, Jeppe has been building a company that solves a pain point he experienced as a former CFO (at Tradeshift): the hassle of centralised spending, procurement teams, and outdated tools.
Pleo offers smart company credit cards that automate expense reports for businesses across most of Europe, enabling them to delegate, track, and manage their spending with ease and efficiency.
In the past eight years, Jeppe has led Pleo to a hyper growth stage, with around 900 employees, 60+ nationalities, and distributed teams across 20 markets.
JESPER BRØNDUM
Jesper Brøndum is the CTO and co-founder of Boozt, which has become the leading online Nordic department store and one of the most profitable e-commerce cases in the world.
He leads a tech team of over 200 developers across five locations and four countries, a team he has gradually built from the ground up.
Jessica has spent her career building businesses and forging strong networks in the startup and scale-up communities.
Jessica’s experience includes being co-founder & CEO for the startup hub SUP46 (Start-Up People of Sweden), CEO for StyrelseAkademien Stockholm (a board directors forum, working with board services and education of board members) and Marketing Director for the startup accelerator Sting.
Today, Jessica is part of the Alumni Global team - the leading executive search and leadership consulting firm in the Nordics
JIMMY FUSSING NIELSEN
Jimmy is a Partner and co-founder of Heartcore Capital.
Heartcore Capital is an early stage venture capital fund with offices in Copenhagen, Stockholm, Berlin and Paris.
Since 2007, they have backed some of Europe’s biggest category-defining companies, such as Tink, Neo4j, Boozt, Peakon, Seriously and TravelPerk.
JIRI HEINONEN
Jiri is a co-founder of Swappie.
Swappie is a Finnish circular economy hyper-growth company whose mission is “making refurbished consumer mainstream”.
The company is Europe’s largest iPhone refurbisher and an online platform for buying and selling refurbished iPhones. Its goal is to provide high-quality, affordable, and eco-friendly phone upgrades.
Operating in countries like Finland, Sweden, Italy, and Germany, Swappie’s yearly annual revenue is around €200M.
JOEL HELLERMARK
Joel Hellermark is the Founder and CEO of Sana, an AI knowledge and assistant platform. Sana has raised over $80 million from NEA, Menlo, and EQT to date.
An enterprising child, Joel taught himself programming in C at age 13 and founded his first company, a video recommendation engine, at 16.
Recently, Sana was listed by Forbes as one of the top 50 AI companies in the world.
For his work during the COVID-19 pandemic, The Guardian named Joel among the top 10 under-35s changing the world for the better.
JOHAN BRAND
Johan co-founded Kahoot!, one of the world’s dominating learning brands. He was CEO & Board Director of Kahoot!, where after leading the Series B from Microsoft (M12) and Disney, left day to day operations and became a strategic advisor. Under his leadership Kahoot! grew from a research project to a company that captures half of US classrooms each month and millions of business users.
As a Founding Partner at We Are Human he creates & invests in purpose driven organisations striving for sustainable social and commercial impact.
As an investor with We Are Human, Wesmann Hawkins and the Atomico Angel Program done 60+ direct investments into startups and has invested as an LP in 12 funds globally.
Jon is the CEO and co-founder of Reel, a next-generation electricity provider.
With a background as an environmental engineer and experienced CEO, Jon co-founded Reel based on his research at the Technical University of Denmark, where he developed a new framework to measure the climate impacts of electricity.
Under Jon’s leadership, Reel has pioneered a unique approach to electricity supply, ensuring that corporate energy purchases directly drive the construction of new renewable projects, helping businesses accelerate the energy transition while achieving financial stability.
JONATHAN SANDERS
Jonathan is a serial entrepreneur that has worked at and started companies in the spend management space, like Pleo and Juni.
Jonathan is the founder and CEO of Light, a smart financial platform for multinationals, offering an end-to-end solutions to handle AR, AP and consolidated reporting for fast-growing scale-ups
KASPER HULTHIN
Kasper is currently co-founder and General Partner at Future Five, building and investing in global ideas alongside people with an ambition to refresh the approach to climate, food & education.
As an entreprenuer Kasper has successfully co-founded and exited two companies. As a co-founder of Podio, an online collaboration software, he led the company’s early sales growth before becoming overall director of the Podio product line after its acquisition by Citrix in 2012.
In 2015 he started Peakon, which was acquired by Workday in 2021.
Katja Toropainen is the founder and CEO at Inklusiiv, a global DEI consultancy helping organizations to build more diverse, equitable and inclusive workplaces.
Serving 200+ clients worldwide, Inklusiiv provides the knowledge, tools and strategic support to build better workplaces where people can thrive.
With a background in the startup and technology sectors, Katja and her team have worked extensively with tech companies and venture capital funds and supported data-driven conversations on the importance of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in the industry.
Previously, Katja served as an Atomico Angel Programme Investor (20202022) and as Chief Curator at Slush startup conference.
KEN VILLUM KLAUSEN
Ken Villum Klausen is Founder and CEO at Danish FinTech unicorn Lunar Way, a free banking app that wants to change the banking industry.
Ken began his career in retail where he quickly rose in the ranks before diving into entrepreneurial life.
Ken founded several startups among them Wallmob a digital solution that turns your mobile devices into a payment terminal before founding Lunar Way in 2015.
KLAS JOHANSSON
Klas Johansson is a trained pilot turned technology expert with a background in payments, electric cars, and risk operations.
Originally set to fly planes, he now leads innovations in software for energy assets, revolutionizing power grids and pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in the energy sector as CEO and co-founder of Fever.
KRISTINE LEERBECK
Kristine is the Founder of Angella Invest, an education- community platform targeted at women and nextgens and is the largest community of women angel investors in Denmark.
Kristine is passionate about promoting gender diversity, ESG startups and impact investment funds and is driven by making a difference, constant learning and working with people who share the same passion and drive.
LASSE CHOR
Lasse is a community builder, entrepreneur and investor who has helped put Aarhus on the map as a startup city.
Through various initiatives including Startup Aarhus, #AARSOME and The Link, no one has done more than Lasse in terms of pushing Aarhus’ tech ecosytem forward.
Magne Uppman is co-founder and General Partner at SNÖ Ventures, which has made investments in over 20 technology startups, including PortalOne, Ignite and Sky Mavis.
Before SNÖ, Magne founded Qualité, a digital marketing firm that quickly gained prominence before it was acquired by Dentsu. He has also served as the CEO of iProspect and was a key member of the global marketing teams at Adevinta and Schibsted.
Magnus is the CEO and co-founder of Sanity.
Sanity.io is the next-generation platform for content. Treating content as data and data as content, combined with an amazing developer experience, shaping the content processes around as the editors, marketers and content managers need them to be.
Before Sanity, Magnus was working in finance and private equity, and served as a Director at EQT for 7 years.
MARCUS KRYLBORN
Marcus has 10+ years of operating experience from companies such as Google, Microsoft, and now Snap Inc, where he serves as a Senior Client Partner responsible for the mid-market advertising business for Snap in Sweden and Denmark.
He’s also an active angel investor and a Scout for Sequoia Capital.
MARIA FLYVBJERG BO
Maria is a Director at HSBC Innovation Banking where she is heading up the Danish presence. She is an experienced entrepreneur and founded her first company in 2006.
Since then she has co-founded a B2B SaaS and a fintech company, and has worked with new technology for more than 15 years.
Maria joined HSBC Innovation Banking (then: Silicon Valley Bank) in 2021 to establish and grow its presence in the Nordics.
MARIA WASASTJERNA
Maria Wasastjerna is Founding Partner of Kvanted Ventures, a Helsinki-based early-stage investor focusing on industrial technology.
With a mission of accelerating the industrial transformation, Kvanted invests across Northern Europe in software, hardware, and service solutions.
Before transitioning into venture capital, Maria worked as a business lawyer for 15 years with M&A, technology and digital markets. Her versatile experience spans across the corporate, regulatory and startup space alike, and she is particularly interested in data-driven ventures and climate tech.
Marianne is the COO of Wolt overseeing the operations and strategy of one of the fastest-growing local commerce platforms in Europe.
She also serves as a board member of Marimekko, a global design house rooted in Finland.
In addition, Marianne is the chair of Slush, having also served as CEO in 2016 and 2017.
MARIT RØDEVAND
Marit is the co-founder and CEO of Strise, an anti-money laundering automation company. The AI-powered platform offers a 90 percent reduction in diligence time with KYC automation.
Strise announced a $10.8 million Series A funding round in September 2023 which was led by Atomico.
Marit is also the host of The Laundry, a podcast connecting anti-money laundering, compliance and financial crime to the real world.
Martin is the founder and curator of Swedish Tech News.
A paid daily newsletter with the latest from Sweden’s startup & tech secto – ideal for investors, market analysts and other industry professionals who want an information advantage.
MAX JUNESTRAND
Max is CEO and co-founder of Leya.
Leya exists to empower lawyers with software and trustworthy AI. Their mission is to be the most powerful and reliable way for lawyers to create, share, and harness knowledge.
Earlier this year, they raised a $10.5m seed round led by Benchmark, with participation from SV Angel, Hummingbird and Y Combinator.
In the last two years Melinda and Nino have invested in and supported 28 startups across the Nordics and Europe through Fast Track Malmö.
They also organise Mashup, a key matchmaking and networking event connecting top startups and investors, and publish the Karaoke Club newsletter, guiding founders on fundraising and product-market fit.
METTE LYKKE
As CEO of Too Good To Go, Mette is dedicated to leading their global efforts to fight food waste.
Too Good To Go is a social impact company behind the world’s largest B2C marketplace for surplus food, connecting consumers with food manufacturers and retailers like restaurants, bakeries, supermarkets, hotels, etc. to save food that would otherwise go to waste.
Before this, Mette was the co-founder of Endomondo, a fitness app and community with more than 35 million users across the world.
Miika is the co-founder of Realm Technologies, a conversational search engine that gives teams perfect memory.
A former CEO of Slush, leading the team through the COVID pandemic, Miika is still an active Board Member.
MIKI KUUSI
Miki is the CEO of Wolt and the head of International at DoorDash.
Founded in 2014 in Helsinki, Wolt is a market-leading restaurant, grocery and general merchandise delivery platform with over 36 million registered users across Europe.
In 2022, Wolt joined forces with DoorDash and now operates in 29 countries. Prior to Wolt, Miki was CEO of Slush, one of the world’s leading technology and investor events.
Monika Liikamaa, Co-CEO and Co-Founder of Enfuce, is a disruptive leader in the payment industry, advocating for social inclusion and climate action. With nearly two decades of expertise at institutions like Crosskey and Aktia Bank, she is a dynamic and straight-talking leader, bringing this approach to the delivery of Enfuce’s products and services.
Beyond fintech, Monika leads ESG-focused initiatives, challenges business leaders through her advocacy programme ‘Everyone should give a damn’, and champions sustainability both within Enfuce and externally. From promoting social inclusion to empowering women in tech, Monika leads by example, urging others to join the cause and make a positive impact.
NIKLAS ZENNSTRÖM
Zennström is Founder and CEO at Atomico.
Niklas is a globally renowned technology investor and entrepreneur, having previously co-founded and managed Skype, Kazaa and Joltid. He launched Atomico in 2006 with the belief that entrepreneurs are the ultimate gamechangers for positive transformation across the most critical aspects of our society and economy. He works daily with founders and sits on the boards of Lilium and Neko Health.
In 2007, Niklas co-founded Zennström Philanthropies with his wife, Catherine. They focus their efforts in two areas: human rights and the environment. Niklas also founded the Race for the Baltic, a foundation for a well-managed and sustainable Baltic Sea; and sits on the international advisory board of the Stockholm Resilience Centre.
Nima is the CEO and co-founder of Magic Feedback, enabling you to get actionable insights from customer feedback with AI-powered collection and analysis.
Formerly Nima was a principal Product Manager at Humio (aqcuired by CrowdStrike) and an ex-Product Lead at Google.
OSCAR SEHLBERG WESTERGÅRD
Oscar Westergård is an entrepreneur, investor and business leader with 15 years experience in building ventures across Africa, Europe, Middle East and Latin America.
Since 2018 Oscar is GP at Antler in Stockholm and has led Antler’s expansion across the Nordics, invested in over 200 startups and put Antler on the map as an integral part of the Nordic tech ecosystem.
Prior to Antler, Oscar co-founded BIMA, a global leader in mobile insurance and has led regional expansion at Spotify and business development initiatives within the Kinnevik Group
PÄR-JÖRGEN PÄRSON
Pär-Jörgen Pärson has been a Partner at Northzone since 2004.
At Northzone, his primary areas of focus are disruptive businesses in consumer internet, health and fintech.
His portfolio includes multi-billion dollar exits in market-defining companies such as Spotify, iZettle and Avito, as well as Pricerunner, Jasper, Videoplaza, and current companies like fuboTV, Hopin, Spring Health, Stockeld Dreamery and others. He has appeared several times in Forbes’ Midas List.
Patrik is the co-founder and CEO of Validio, who are on a mission to eliminate bad dat.
He also serves as the Chairman of Stockholm AI and as an AI-advisor for the startup generator Antler.
Patrik is an active angel investor and has made investments in companies like Lovable and Tandem Health.
PAULA PETCU
Paula is the CEO and co-founder of Interhuman AI, on a mission to help people better understand themselves and each other.
Prior to this Paula founded a company called Healthy Mind Tech, an award winning company developing digital solutions for helping people live a better life.
Petra has also had s stint at Brain+ as their CTO, leading the tech strategy and the tech team. After successfully launching the product to market, Paula left to start Interhuman AI.
Peter Carlsson is the founder and CEO of Northvolt, a company building Europe’s largest battery manufacturing plant, and part of several advisory boards for global supply chain and procurement organisations.
Having worked in executive roles for more than 20 years in Automotive, Cleantech, Telecommunications, Consumer Electronics and Semiconductor industries, in global organizations in Europe, US and Asia, he’s known as an entrepreneur, angel investor and advisor.
With Northvolt, he’s made it his personal mission to build the greenest battery in the world with a minimal carbon footprint and the highest ambitions for recycling to enable the European transition to renewable energy.
Peter Sarlin is the CEO and Co-Founder of Silo.AI, the largest private artificial intelligence lab in the Nordics (recently acquired by AMD).
He is also a Professor of Practice specializing in machine learning and artificial intelligence at Hanken School of Economics (Helsinki, Finland).
PETRI RAJAHALME
Petri is General Partner at FOV Ventures, the European early stage VC fund investing in founders building with frontier technologies such as spatial computing/XR, robotics, real-time 3D, GenAI and gaming infra.
Petri has been investing in these technologies for the past 8 years as an angel investor and through previous investment vehicles.
FOV Ventures currently has a portfolio of 28 companies since its launch in Q1 2022.
RAGNHEIÐUR H. MAGNÚSDÓTTIR
Ragnheidur is the co-founder of Nordic Ignite.
Nordic Ignite dedicate themselves to supporting early-stage companies at the pre-seed level with solid teams, clarity of purpose, and addressing large markets poised for growth or change.
Prioritising sustainability in all their decisions, focusing on advancing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and following Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) principals.
Nordic Ignite aims for total gender equality regarding the composition of management team, shareholders, and partner companies.
REBECKA STORM
Rebecka is co-founder & CPO at Twirl, an opinionated orchestrator for building data products.
She started as a data scientist and machine learning engineer, passionate about using data and algorithms to solve real-world problems, but has most recently led data teams of varying sizes at iZettle and Tink.
Rebecka founded Twirl in 2022 out of frustration over the amount of time data teams have to spend on basic infrastructure and tooling, before they can create real value. She is also co-founder of Women in Data Science Sweden, a non-profit organisation promoting diversity among data practitioners by organizing conferences, meetups, a mentorship program and a speaker database.
Robin is the Co-founder and COO of Reveel, and formerly one of the early employees at the Helsinki-based food delivery service, Wolt.
Reveel is a platform that helps destinations digitize their paper maps and brochures.
RUNE CHRISTENSEN
Rune Christensen is a well-known figure in the cryptocurrency world.
He is best known as the co-founder and CEO of MakerDAO, a platform that plays a big role in decentralized finance (DeFi).
MakerDAO is famous for creating Dai, a stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar.
Rune has been instrumental in shaping how people see stablecoins and their potential to bring stability to the volatile world of cryptocurrencies.
SAM ESHRATI
Sam is the COO and Chief Engagement Officer at TechBBQ.
He oversees the organisation’s strategic partnerships, stakeholder relations, and community engagement, ensuring its alignment with its mission and values.
Sam is passionate about promoting diversity, inclusion, and sustainability in the startup scene and actively advocates for the LGBTQ+ community.
He is also a Board Member at Danish Startup Group (DSG) and is a scout and angel investor for Ada Ventures.
Samir El-Sabini is the co-founder and CEO at Juni.
Prior to Juni Samir co-founded two companies in e-commerce and performance marketing, the first a failure and the second a lifestyle success.
While working as COO for a fintech company, he realized it was possible to build something better for the eCommerce industry and decided to start Juni.
With over two decades of commercial experience in B2B high-tech industries, Sara Sande is a seasoned leader driving the green transition.
As a Partner at EIFO, she spearheads the Green Transition team within Direct Investments, where her forward-thinking approach redefines traditional investment strategies.
Sara integrates rigorous financial discipline with a vision for change, championing sustainable energy and eco-friendly innovation. Passionate about leveraging capital to drive transformation, Sara is dedicated to making a lasting impact on both the planet and the bottom line.
SEBASTIAN SIEMIATOWSKI
Sebastian is the CEO and co-founder of Klarna, a company now ubiquitous in the payments processing industry for e-commerce, and a pioneer in Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) payments technology.
Today, Klarna has more than 150 million active customers and partnerships with more than 500,000 merchants across the globe.
Stefan is a full time business angel and advisor with 25 years of experience from the startup ecosystem, ranging from corporate M&A, VC partner and co-funding startups.
Focusing on early stage tech startups with ‘Further than Capital’ together with business partner Per Björklund.
SUSANNE NAJAFI AND SARA WIMMERCRANZ
Susanne Najafi is a Swedish investor and serial entrepreneur. She has founded more than ten companies and carried out multiple exits.
In 2016, Susanne founded the venture capital firm BackingMinds to increase diversity in the European startup scene by investing in the blind spots of Venture Capital.
Entrepreneur, investor, and former dragon in SVTs Draknästet, Sara Wimmercranz co-founded Footway, the largest digital shoe retailer in Nordics, before co-founding BackingMinds.
Tatiana joined Kinnevik in 2022 and leads Kinnevik’s early-stage strategy.
Prior to Kinnevik, Tatiana spent four years working at the VC fund Inventure, focusing on pre-seed and seed stage businesses in the Nordic region.
She started her career as a crisis management consultant and then went on to spend numerous years in different commercial roles at early and scale-up stage tech companies before moving to the investor side.
Tatiana sits on the board of Agreena, Aira and Safetywing.
DR. TERHI (TJ) VAPOLA
Terhi is a result-oriented venture capitalist with the focus on greentech, digitalization, internationalization, and business growth. She is Managing Partner & Founder of Greencode Ventures, a digital green transition fund focusing on the most impactful early-phase European startups.
Most recently before this, she founded Helen Ventures, the investment arm of a leading Nordic energy company Helen, where she led its creation from the initiation to a strong portfolio across Europe all the way to its first portfolio exit. She has also co-founded multiple startups, acted as an angel investor, and contributed to the rapid global business growth of Nokia in multiple operative roles ranging from R&D and product management to sales and acquiring startups.
Unconventional Ventures was founded in Denmark 2018 and is run by General Partners Thea Messel (right) and Nora Bavey (left).
Its first fund, UVFI, is considered the first European impact fund focused on underrepresented founders. UVFI is designed with the clear intention to unlock the potential in underrepresented founders building scalable impact tech companies with high growth potential. Tapping into the $4.5T market opportunity that investing in impact is forecasted by 2030.
THÉRÈSE MANNHEIMER
Therese is the Swedish Lead for People Ventures.
Before joining People Ventures, practically everything she has ever done in her career revolved around business development, service design and solving real and scalable problems in a global arena in everything from agencies, scale-ups and startups.
Therese recently built and sold her startup Grace Health - the first fully digital women’s health clinic for emerging markets.
THOMAS MADSEN-MYGDAL
Thomas wears many hats:
Founder, CEO, angel investor, ecosystem builder, event organiser and much more...
However, the easiest way to describe Thomas is as a Pioneer.
Always willing to zig while others zag, Thomas has consistently been ahead of the curve when it comes to how to think about and build companies and ecosystems in a responsible and sustainable manner.
Currently as co-founder and CEO of TwentyThree, Thomas is showing that there is more than one way to build a successful company out of Europe, having bootstrapped TwentyThree to become a global category winner.
THOR CHRISTENSEN
Thor is CEO & Co-founder of Rig.dev and has previously worked in consulting and another tech start-up where he built teams, opened new markets, and led their Nasdaq IPO
Timo is the Founding Partner of Lifeline Ventures.
Timo has worked in several industries ranging from biotech to mobile apps and from digital media to industrial process technology.
As the founding CEO of CRF Health, he grew the company into the industry leadership in electronic patient diaries in clinical R&D by 2007. In 2018, CRF Health became Finland’s fourth tech unicorn with an exit to Genstar at €1.1bn.
Timo is a highly connected member of the startup community and serves as the Chairman of the Board at Slush. At Lifeline Ventures, he has worked with Moves, Enevo, Oncos Therapeutics, TrademarkNow, Curious AI, ZenRobotics, Ductor and Oura.
TOMMY ANDERSEN AND ERIC LAGIER
Tommy Andersen and Eric Lagier are the Founding Partners of byFounders.
Before ByFounders, Tommy successfully co-founded and exited three companies, including Libratone and Embedit, and built an extensive portfolio of angel investments individually and as part of the angel collective, Nordic Makers.
Eric is a tech entrepreneur with more than 20 years of operational experience from Silicon Valley and Scandinavia. He was part of the early team at Skype and Tradeshift and co-founded Memolane, which was acquired by HP.
ULLA BROCKENHUUS-SCHACK
Ulla Brockenhuus-Schack is Founder and General Partner at Seed Capital.
With over 20 years of venture capital experience, Ulla has led Seed Capital through five funds, making impactful investments and securing key exits in the Danish startup ecosystem.
She began her career at McKinsey & Co., later driving innovation at Egmont and Nordisk Film, where she helped launch IO Interactive, the creators of Hitman.
She co-founded the venture-backed webshop Harburi before founding Seed Capital in 2004.
URHO KONTTORI
Urho is the CEO and co-founder of Distance Technologies.
Distance Technologies have created the world’s first glasses-free mixed reality solution, fundamentally changing how people see and interact with the world around them.
This is not Urho’s first rodeo in augmented/mixed/virtual reality.
In 2016 he founded Varjo, building hardware and software for groundbreaking VR/AR/MR computing devices, merging the real and digital worlds seamlessly together in cinematic quality.
VENLA VÄKEVÄINEN
Venla is a Founding Partner of Bou, a European brand agency with studios in Helsinki, Finland and London UK.
Bou works with trendsetting brands in Europe & the US, leveraging its global network of thousands of creatives via its in-house freelancer platform, Bou&Co.
The company has been listed among Adweek’s Fastest Growing Agencies 2023 and on the Financial Times’ 2024 ranking of Europe’s Fastest Growing Companies.
Verna Vuoripuro develops the strategy, brand, communications, and community of Illusian, the Founder Office of entrepreneurs who have founded companies like Supercell, Zalando, and Wolt.
Verna operates at the intersection of venture capital and philanthropy, bringing together brilliant makers from every corner of the ecosystem.
Her background is in tech and journalism. She used to run the news desk of Helsingin Sanomat, the biggest subscription daily in the Nordics, and worked as the CCO of Reaktor, a global tech consultancy. Splitting her time between Helsinki and New York City, her greatest passions lie in food, music, and hosting, cultivating meaningful connections with friends and family.
Victor is the CEO and co-founder of Synthesia, the world’s number one AI video creation platform.
With Synthesia you can create professional instructional AI videos from text in 50+ languages. Trusted by Reuters, Nike, BBC, Amazon and more.
Synthesia has raised $66m in funding from top-tier investors including: Kleiner Perkins, Google Ventures, Mark Cuban, FirstMark Capital, LDV Capital, Seedcamp and the founders of Stripe.
VILLE LEPPÄLÄ
Ville is the CEO and co-founder of Huuva.
Huuva operates delivery-first food halls serving the most popular restaurant brands for underserved neighborhoods.
Their aim is to be the primary destination for at-home dining across the globe, by building a unique technology enabled kitchen operation that enables chefs to focus on the most important thing in the kitchen - the quality and joy for making the best dishes.
General Catalyst led their seed round in 2022.
Virginia is the founder and CEO of Fronttier.
Fronttier provides private venture expertise, guiding individuals and firms through the process of investing in private companies with tailored strategies, frameworks, and support.
Previously Virginia was the Managing Director of Venture Challenge, working with emerging managers in the Nordics in a hands-on educational programme.
