A thriving startup ecosystem in Central and Eastern Europe can provide you with many diverse sources of capital needed to fund and scale your business. Today we would like to delve deeper into the topic of Business Angels, as angel investing can become an excellent opportunity for you to secure the necessary capital for your innovative startup and access business networks, industry connections, and mentorship. These are only a few of the many advantages of Business Angel funding, so if you are looking for support in accelerating your startup through a Business Angel Network, we have prepared a roundup of leading networks in the CEE region.
So without further ado, let’s have a closer look at these active Business Angel Networks and learn more about their activities and investment strategies.
Estonian Business Angels Network
EstBAN is an organization very active in the angel investing landscape in the CEE region, with more than 10 years of experience in growing the local startup ecosystem. They aim to expand the quantity and quality of seed-stage investments in Estonia and its neighboring countries. In this mission, they are supported by a big network of partners - from local and international business angel organizations to venture capitalists, startup ecosystem key players, and advisory services providers. Their interest lies mostly in seed and early-stage startups from sectors such as Fintech, Business Software & HR, HealthTech, CleanTech, DeepTech or SpaceTech, that are in need of investment capital between 20k€ to 500k€. They are on the lookout for passionate teams with disruptive new ideas, excellent growth potential and a clearly articulated exit strategy. In 2021, EstBAN members invested a total of 29.8M EUR over 725 deals, mostly located in Estonia, Nordics and Balkan countries.
Lithuanian Business Angels Network
LitBAN is an organization set in Vilnius, with an impact that reaches way beyond the Lithuanian border. In 2022 it was recognized by European Business Angel Network as its best performing member. LitBAN’s mission is to connect angel investors and their corporate members with early-stage companies that exhibit exceptional growth potential. They organize a variety of activities dedicated to both startups and investors such as monthly events that facilitate networking and improve startup deal flow. They also represent private investors in a dialogue with government officials and share educational tools with entrepreneurs on their journey to angel investing. LitBAN investors are actively contributing to the emergence of a powerful startup ecosystem in Lithuania, dedicating financial resources and business expertise to up-and-coming startups. The size of their total investment exceeded 15M EUR and is substantially growing year by year with 10.4M EUR invested in 2021. They mostly cooperate with companies located in Lithuania and Northern Europe.
Latvian Business Angels Network
With its headquarters in Riga, Latvian Business Angel Network aims to extend and develop the community of investors in Latvia and support them in their future projects. They gather around 50 members that have invested so far more than 11M EUR in developing start-up projects, across 163 investments. They provide not only funding opportunities but also mentorship and knowledge exchange to up-and-coming entrepreneurs in the region. Their key activities include monthly Investment Sessions, which serve as platforms for business angels and startups to connect. Startups developing cutting-edge solutions are encouraged to submit online applications, after which they are assessed and evaluated during pitch events and personal sessions, which often culminate in substantial investments from many LatBAN members.
TechAngels Romania
TechAngels Romania is a group of experienced investors with a proven track record as corporate experts or founders of successful Romanian startups. They have been developing tech businesses in Romania and South-Eastern Europe since 2013, connecting early-stage tech startups with business angels seeking profitable investment opportunities. They aim to not only fund but also to educate and support young entrepreneurs from the region and provide them with access to acceleration programs and other tools essential for growing businesses in increasingly competitive environments. They facilitate investments in tech projects that have either a ready product, a prototype or have reached a market fit stage in web, mobile, embedded software, hardware, or meditech. Their average size of investments varies between 10.000 and 200.000 EUR. So far, in the aggregate portfolio of TechAngels Investors, there are 220 startups.
Business Angels of Slovenia
Business Angels of Slovenia connect ambitious startups with qualified angel investors from Slovenia and Europe through a series of different ventures. They evaluate entrepreneurs’ product or service propositions as well as their market strategies and either support startups on their journey to secure funding or help them become investment-ready through a mentorship program called Startup Clinic. Early-stage companies with the best prospects can be fueled not only by capital but also by business connections and expertise. Business Angels of Slovenia have been operating in the field for 14 years, investing more than 8M$ across 41 investments. Moreover, they are actively advising and preparing startups for obtaining future funding - in 2021 they helped more than 30 startups through the Startup Clinic.
Women Business Angels
This professional business non-profit organization, based in Budapest, has a mission to support female participation in innovative decision-making in the CEE region. In Hungary, this area of economic activity is still dominated by men and Women Business Angels are empowering female investors to become business angels and to improve their competitiveness as entrepreneurs in the international market. They provide training, tools, networking and mentoring resources to expand innovation capacity in the region, foster a culture of inclusiveness and to ensure active engagement both from men and women. Most of their activities revolve around educating and sharing the business experience with prospective business angels - both men and women - through different courses, meetings and programs. They also provide connections between co-working offices and women's business networks both on the local and the international markets.
Hungarian Business Angel Network
Another organization with the mission to develop a regional startup ecosystem is HunBAN, formed in 2017 and located in Budapest. They aim to integrate Hungary as a major player in the international network of business angels and ensure the quantitative and qualitative development of startup investments. They organize regular pitching sessions for early-stage companies with strong growth potential and a strategy clearly formulated for international markets. HunBAN anticipates investing between €50k to €500k.
DEPO Angels Network
DEPO Angels Network is a part of Czech association DEPO Ventures, which builds a comprehensive and extensive investment ecosystem through a variety of activities, that include an international syndicate of more than 70 angel investors; Angel Fund “Grouport” and Seed Fund. This angel network mostly focuses on cross-border investment deals and comprises of experienced business executives and successful entrepreneurs. They cooperate only with pre-seed and seed-stage startups from the CEE region, providing them with seed capital, advisory services and many special perks and offers from their corporate partners.
CEO Angels Club
CEO Angels Club is the largest network of business angels in Bulgaria. It comprises of active investors and senior executives who are selecting, screening and eventually investing in companies with high growth potential. They conduct due diligence, organize pitching sessions and help investors to alleviate risks of their investments by locating their funds in a variety of companies. They have many companies in their portfolio and are constantly on the lookout for early-stage (post-accelerator) startups, with high scalability and potential to break even or on the clear path to get to a meaningful milestone such as seed or series A funding. They are mostly interested in products that are already in the market or in their beta version and which are poised for fast growth and they can offer a capital between 10,000 EUR and 200,000 EUR.
Transylvania Angels Network
Transylvania Angels Network (T.A.N) is a project created by Cluj Startups - a Romanian NGO that supports the growth of the startup ecosystem in Romania. It comprises of business specialists that are interested in angel investing and mentoring tech startups. The organisation addresses the needs of both startups and investors - they are not only providing access to capital but also conducting analyses of companies' profitability and scalability. The focal points of their activities are national, early-stage companies.
Sterling Angels
This polish-based network of Business Angels aims to promote the idea of angel investing in the region, by establishing connections between private investors and startup founders looking for capital. They present the most promising and innovative ideas to their members at regular meetings, supporting their investment activities by providing them with resources, tools, connections, and access to companies with high-growth potential. They foster an exchange of experiences as well as provide assistance in substantive and legal matters.
Cobin Angels
Cobin Angels is a Polish association of business angels, that supports private investors in their process of investing in budding technology startups from Poland and the CEE region. They are facilitating not only the transfer of capital but also of knowledge, educational resources and business network opportunities. Since their incorporation in 2015, they have closed 23 rounds of funding and gathered more than 50 club members. They are interested in early-stage, fast-growing startups, with the aim to invest between 100K PLN to 2M PLN per company. Every month Cobin angels members are screening around 50 companies in the process that leads to final negotiations with the top 3 ones.
Growceanu
Growceanu mission is to catalyze early-stage investment in high-tech startups and to provide investors and entrepreneurs with a set of essential tools, processes, and educational resources. Growceanu works with 50 business angels and targets cutting-edge technological startups from the fields such as Proptech, EdTech, Marketplaces, FinTech or MedTech. They analyze startups based on their value proposition and its validity on the market simplifying the investment decisions for their angel investors. In 2021, Growceanu investors finalized 7 investment rounds worth 465.000 EUR.
CEEBAN
CEEBAN is an international network of business angels affiliated with Next Road Ventures - a co-investment fund for business angels. Their main area of interest are European early-stage companies raising up to 1M EUR seed rounds. The CEE Business Angel Network is sector agnostic with a sweet spot on SaaS, marketplaces, e-commerce, proptech, martech, fintech, salestech and B2B tools digitalizing various industries.
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