Vilnius, Lithuanian capital, has been steadily taking measures to ensure a welcoming ecosystem for startups for a while now. The city鈥檚 efforts have been recognised both globally and by the local startups.
For instance, Financial Times鈥� fDi Intelligence Division聽named聽Vilnius one of the leaders for attracting tech startups in 2019. Vilnius was also聽ranked聽as the leading city to have attracted the most greenfield Foreign Direct Investment聽projects of tech startups in the same year. Moreover, it has been reported that Vilnius鈥� startup scene was聽valued聽at approximately 鈧�140 million in 2019.
Even the World Bank聽recognised聽Vilnius鈥� efforts and ranked it 14迟丑听听in terms of advantageous conditions for starting a business.
This year was also special for Vilnius鈥� startup ecosystem鈥擥lobal Cities of the Future ranking聽placed Vilnius among the top 25 cities and ranked 2苍诲听globally in the Business Friendliness category.
Global recognitions aside, Vilnius is hard at work to create a favourable environment for the startups to thrive. The capital has set up a legal basis that facilitates hiring new talents: startups are able generate funding through stock giveaways to employees. Furthermore, Vilnius makes it easier for startups to connect with the investors, who see the booming potential of the emerging businesses, and want to help to implement their ideas.
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The capital is also located in a convenient place geographically, with short distances to other European cities. What is more, Vilnius offers several co-working聽spaces that allow new entrepreneurs to get to work without searching for facilities: Vilnius Tech Park, Uma Ozas, Workland, Talent Garden Lithuania, etc.
For instance, Turing College, data science and AI training startup, has used the benefits of co-working and has thought up their business model, which was later funded by Silicon Valley accelerator Y Combinator, in Vilnius Tech Park co-working space.
Speaking of Vilnius鈥� startups, several of them have already implemented ground-breaking ideas. For example,聽Ligence, a health-tech startup, has developed machine algorithms that use ultrasound images for automatically detecting a heart鈥檚 functional and anatomical features. The entire team is composed of medical聽professionals.
Mindletic聽is an app which allows people to talk with certified mental health聽professionals and improve their self-care聽practices. The startup also won 2nd聽place in the online hackathon聽鈥淗ack the Crisis.鈥�听笔颈虫别惫颈补, an AI-driven startup, has opened the first fully automatic store in Vilnius, which received the award of Emerging Technology Startup.
Vilnius has also been noticed by global investors. Silicon Valley Bank, Leta Capital and TMT Investments, Evli Growth Partners have taken up to fund the most聽prominent startups such as TransferGo, Affise, CGTrader.
So strategic actions that were taken by the capital鈥攃reation of innovation hubs and accelerators, organisation of conferences such as 鈥淪tartup Fair鈥�, 鈥淔intech Inn鈥�, 鈥淟ogin,鈥� etc.鈥� have resulted in Vilnius being one of the leading startup hubs for Eastern Europe. Watch this space!
