CEE Valley

Current, past and future CEE unicorns as seen by @dealroomco & @atomico #CEEValley

Warsaw-based investment firm Montis VC has launched a new #venture capital fund, securing €50 million at first close to back Europe’s next generation of energy and IndustrialTech startups. 🇵🇱 🤖 ⚡ eu-startups.com/2026/03/warsaw…

Congratulations to my good friend Serhii Kuprienko and our partners at Swarmer on this historic IPO! The first IPO for a Ukrainian tech startup — and the first for a defense company. A landmark moment, and it’s unfolding very successfully: the valuation has grown by +600% within just a few hours of opening, and the company is now valued at $430M! finance.yahoo.com/quote/SWMR/

⚡ Investment Announcement⚡ Vilnius-based @saltz_app, a digital food supply marketplace, raised €20 million Series A roudn @EBRD, @inovo, @LifeLine Ventures, and @changeventures, and Angels. More here 👉 startupkitchen.community/ex-shopify-tea…

Eastern Europe is the most exploitable talent arbitrage on the planet right now and almost nobody in the Western business world is paying attention because they're too busy overpaying for mid work from the Philippines and India… Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Poland, Ukraine, Croatia. Average salaries $500-1,000/month. But the talent coming out of these countries isn't $500/month talent. It's $5,000-8,000/month talent priced at a tenth of what you'd pay in the US because the local economy hasn't caught up to the skill level yet That gap is the exploit Every other "hire cheap overseas" conversation defaults to Southeast Asia or South Asia. And sure, the prices are low. But anyone who's actually tried to scale operations in those regions knows the pattern. Language barriers. Cultural disconnect. Equipment issues. Endless training loops. You spend more time managing output than you save in cost. The $4/hour rate sounds nice until you're on revision 14 and the work still isn't usable Eastern Europe skips all of that These countries have legitimate university systems. Strong STEM education. English fluency across the entire 18-30 demographic, sometimes better than native speakers in the US (not even joking). They grew up on the same internet, same memes, same cultural references. Zero cultural gap when working with Western businesses. You don't need to explain context. You don't need to translate intent. They just get it And they have real infrastructure. Laptops. Fast wifi. Proper software. Modern tools. You're not onboarding someone who needs you to walk them through basic setup. You're hiring someone who's already operating at a professional level but happens to live in a country where $1,000/month is a great salary The applications go way beyond content. Developers in Bucharest building full-stack apps for $1,500/month that would cost you $8-12k from a US agency. Designers in Belgrade producing brand assets at agency quality for $800/month. Sales closers in Sofia running calls in perfect English for $1,000/month plus commission. Media buyers in Warsaw managing $50k+/month ad accounts for $1,200/month. Copywriters, project managers, data analysts, customer support, operations managers. Every single role in your business can be filled from Eastern Europe at 80-90% cost reduction with zero quality drop The training speed is the real cheat code though. Hand someone in Bucharest a brief on Monday and you get back usable output by Wednesday. Not "needs 6 rounds of feedback" output. Actually usable, deploy-immediately output. The baseline competency is just different when the talent pool is educated, tech-native, and hungry It's common now for operators running lean businesses to have their entire team in Eastern Europe except themselves. 4-8 people. Total payroll $5-8k/month. Output equivalent to a $40-60k/month US team. The business runs 24/7 because the time zone overlap with the US is actually perfect for async work (btw it doesn't hurt that Eastern Europe has the baddest bitches on the planet. If you need on-camera talent for any kind of brand content targeting Western audiences, a girl in Sofia or Bucharest is visually indistinguishable from a girl in LA but costs a fraction. The talent pool for that specific use case is bottomless and nobody's tapped it properly yet) The freelance platforms are the worst place to find these people. The best ones are in local Facebook groups, Telegram channels, and Eastern European Twitter. You DM 50 people, 40 respond within hours because an $800/month retainer is life-changing money and they actually take pride in the work. The talent density is absurd once you know where to look

200+ active angels investing in Central & Eastern Europe. Not “members”. Active investors. @mamstartup interviewed me about how @smok_angels works and why it’s scaling. Key facts: 🔸 200+ active investors in the network (we verify people’s portfolios — we optimize for active, not many). 🔸 4 pitching sessions so far → 20 founders presented → 17 raised funding from SMOK Angels. 🔸 In the last year: 17 investments — I don’t know another CEE angel network with a higher number of closed angel transactions. 🔸 Speed: the fastest deal happened same day (via a SAFE). Typical: a few days after the pitch. Why we can move fast: 🔸 We don’t run syndicates. Each angel invests individually. 🔸 Clear rule: an angel can share a deal only if they invest in that round. No “dumping” dying portfolio companies on others. 🔸 Dealflow is decentralized: 200+ independent pipelines → 1 place, with a built-in quality filter (someone already committed). Sourcing numbers: 🔸 250+ startups applied via smokangels.com 🔸 50 more came via angel referrals 🔸 20 pitched, 17 got funded Incentives for angeks: 🔸 No membership fees. 🔸 No % from the deal. 🔸 No carry charged to angels. We're running our 5th pitch session on March 6th. Share your one sentence pitch in replies if you'd like to present your startup and get funded!

Lithuanian RegTech startup Copla has raised €6M in Series A. The round was led by Iron Wolf Capital, with participation from Operator Stack Fund, Specialist VC, Superhero Capital, NGL Ventures, Loggerhead Partners, FIRSTPICK. Read more: #more" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">balticvc.com/2026/02/lithua… #Lithuania #VC

We just raised a $2M pre-seed! @getrizon is a dollar banking alternative for the global population. Most people outside the U.S. don’t have access to real dollar banking. We think it should work more like Netflix did for entertainment: One global service, accessible anywhere, with a smartphone. That’s exactly what we’re building. Rizon solves very real problems: • Saving in dollars - to avoid inflation • Spending dollars - to access global commerce • Sending dollars - to move money cross-border • Investing dollars - to access dollar financial products In just five months, Rizon is live in 122 countries, with 100,000+ users, strong retention, and fast-growing usage, a strong signal that this need is global and deeply underserved. Huge thanks to Market One Capital and @jumbojacek for backing our vision, and to everyone already using Rizon. And of course, to partners who put so much effort into this @Laurynas_Jo, @MatasOlendra, and others! Great early signal. But as one friend said, let’s celebrate income, not funding. 🚀

From repression to relocation: How Belarusian founders are powering Poland’s next tech boom tech.eu/2026/02/18/fro…

We're invested in 17 startups across CEE since launching the network in July 2025. Namely: Lysk, @BioCamAI, @IntoDNA, Proximity, Skyline, Petsy, Proteine Resources, @TasteRay, @ShenAI_tech, Kocia Szamka, @inStreamly, SmartGuest, Fusiomica, Aleet, Pupilmed, Fresh32 & @Reason8ai

⚡ Investment Announcement ⚡ Polish transport technology startup Aleet, founded by @Kasia_Marczuk, raises €1M from a group of angel investors led by LUMUS Investment, to accelerate the development of its next-generation fleet intelligence platform. startupkitchen.community/polish-aleet-r…

🇱🇻 A Latvian-founded sports tech startup Tournated has become the official technology platform for all padel tournaments in the United States and Canada, following a partnership with World Padel Rating 👏 labsoflatvia.com/en/news/latvia…

🧵 The perfect pre-seed pitch deck should be 8 slides. Most founders overcomplicate pre-seed decks. At this stage, investors are not buying numbers but: Clarity, Narrative, Founder conviction & Momentum Here’s the structure that works for me at @smokvc👇

1/ SF isn’t a city, it’s a mindset. 🧠 For many CEE founders, the Valley feels like the "final boss" - expensive, intimidating, and worlds away. But the truth? It’s just a high-density neighborhood where your next "yes" is a coffee walk away. 🧵👇

@luca_stirbat @Reaktor_X 5/ smokvc.notion.site/SF-Playbook-fo…

⚡Investment Announcement⚡ Occam Industries, focused on autonomous drone operations, has been assessed by UKR cluster @BRAVE1ua. Also raised a €3M Pre-Seed from @PrestoVC, backed by @CSG_HOLDING, and @AntlerGlobal, @Freedom_Fund, T|Y|R_vc. More here 👉 startupkitchen.community/field-tested-a…

🇱🇻 Space technology startup Deep Space Energy has raised €350,000 in pre-seed funding. This Latvian space technology startup is developing a new electricity generator for space: labsoflatvia.com/en/news/deep-s…

⚡Investment Announcement⚡ Vilnius-based #Tingit | You Live, We Fix., raised €1.5M from @CoinvestVC, FIRSTPICK, @purposetechvc, @badideas_fund, HEARTFELT_, and NGL Ventures to accelerate its mission to modernize maintenance and repair. startupkitchen.community/tingit-raises-…

Space startup Deep Space Energy has raised €350K in pre-seed funding from Latvia's Outlast Fund and Lithuanian space startup NanoAvionics. Read more: balticvc.com/2026/02/latvia… #Latvia #startup #startups #tech #technology #TechNews #VentureCapital #VC

OpenAI and Hugging face angels back "highest-ever" Hungarian pre-seed funding round tech.eu/2026/02/10/ope…

Real-time World Models x Multi-agent reality simulator with @odysseyml