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Whether you are building a business, running a team or just starting out in your career we are here to bring you scrappy and actionable insights to help you become more productive.
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Dmitry Gurski founded Flo Health in 2015, turning it into the leading women’s health app globally with over 420 million downloads and 80 million monthly active users. From bootstrapped beginnings to a $200M Series C from General Atlantic in 2024 (valuing Flo at $1B+), Dmitry has scaled the company to profitability, with offices in Lithuania and the UK. 🎓 Expect to Learn: - How Flo became a $1B+ company without a clear playbook — and why long-term planning is mostly fiction - What 20 yea...
Lieutenant General Ben Hodges is a retired U.S. Army officer who served as Commanding General of United States Army Europe from 2014 to 2017. With a 38-year career spanning infantry roles, combat deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan, and leadership in NATO exercises, he is renowned for his expertise in military strategy, alliance building, and deterrence. Post-retirement, Hodges has become a prominent analyst on European security, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and transatlantic relations, advi...
Jānis Stirna is the co-founder and CEO of Handwave. The company’s palm-scanning tech enables cardless, phoneless payments and identity verification, emphasizing security (two-factor biometrics) and affordability to outpace rivals like Amazon One. With $5M raised—including a $4.2M seed from Practica Capital in August 2025—Handwave partners with Visa and targets retail pilots in Europe, the U.S. and beyond. On this episode we talk about: How fintech innovations like Apple Pay inspired HandwaveN...
Atis Hermanis is the co-founder of HackMotion. With a Ph.D. in electronics, sensor systems, and signal processing, Atis brings a research background to the company’s wrist-worn tech for golf swing analysis. HackMotion has bootstrapped to profitability, hitting €7.3M revenue in 2024 (160% growth) and 476% profit increase, while pioneering paying €30K in dividends to employees in H1 2025. Winners of the Baltic E-Commerce Star award, they’ve scaled globally, partnering with PGA Tour pros and foc...
Mariana Hagström is the Founder and CEO of Avokaado. Based in Estonia, Avokaado’s cloud-based contract lifecycle management (CLM) platform automates drafting, oversight and workflows. With over €2M raised from Tera Ventures, ParticleX and others, Mariana’s scaled a legal tech tool that is used not only by law firms, but also companies of various sizes across the globe. A 2020 European Woman of Legal Tech, she’s a vocal advocate for AI in legal teams, ethical innovation, and empowering women i...
Ilya Malkin is the co-founder of Sort-A-Brick, a Vilnius-based startup that raised over €1 million in pre-seed funding at the end of 2024. Sort-A-Brick leverages AI-powered computer vision to analyze and sort mixed Lego bricks sent in by customers, identifying which complete sets can be rebuilt from them—breathing new life into unused collections and promoting a circular economy in toys. With a background in management consulting, Ilya spotted an opportunity in the massive Lego market while d...
Dennis Just and Miks Mikelsons are the co-founders of Emmi AI, a deep-tech startup revolutionizing industrial engineering through cutting-edge AI simulation technology. Based in Austria and founded in 2024, Emmi is already making waves with a €15 million seed round led by top-tier investors like Speedinvest, 3VC, and Serena. With a team heavy on researchers and a foundation in serious academic publishing, Emmi is tackling complex, unsolved physics-based simulation problems across industries l...
Martins Sulte is the co-founder and CEO of Mintos, the largest investment platform of its kind in Europe, with over 700 million euros in assets under administration and more than half a million users. Since launching in 2014, Martins has led the company from a peer-to-peer lending marketplace to a full-scale multi-asset platform, offering access to loans, ETFs, bonds, real estate, and soon—crypto and stocks. With a background in finance and management consulting, Martins brings a disciplined ...
Welcome to the Pursuit of Scrappiness Tech Brief. A monthly discussion on topics we find relevant to highlight, discuss and share with you to help you become a scrappier and better version of yourself. On this episode we talk about: 🇱🇹🇱🇻🇪🇪 BALTICS • Wise founders on UK Rich List – Kristo Käärmann and Taavet Hinrikus rank among UK’s wealthiest. • Lithuanian startup salaries – Average tech salary at €4.6k/month, possibly more favorable than Berlin after tax and cost-of-living adjustments....
Janis Taukacs is a seasoned tax advisor and partner at Sorainen law firm, where he leads the tax and customs practice. He has nearly 30 years of experience across the Baltics and internationally. Known for his deep expertise in corporate taxation, international structuring, and tax dispute resolution, Janis is also a passionate content creator, running the “Tax Stories” blog and podcast. Through his work, he bridges complex legal frameworks with practical insights for founders, investors, and...
Zoltan Vardy is a seasoned sales strategist, startup mentor, and now also a published author whose career spans over 30 years, more than $2 billion in closed deals and more than 200 startups assisted in building their sales function. From leading multinational sales teams to advising early-stage B2B startups, Zoltan has dedicated his work to helping founders build scalable, recurring revenue engines. His signature methodology, “The Launch Code,” is now also the title of his debut book—a pract...
Welcome to the 200th episode of the Pursuit of Scrappiness podcast! We celebrate this major milestone by flipping the script. Having interviewed top founders, VCs, and operators across Europe and beyond, we turn the mic on ourselves this time—reflecting on four years of podcasting, lessons learned, and what it truly means to stay “scrappy.” Fueled by thoughtful questions submitted by past guests, this episode is a candid and insightful deep-dive into what it takes to consistently create...
Rando Rannus is a general partner at Siena Secondary Fund, the first and only dedicated secondary VC fund in the Baltics. With a unique background as both a company founder and operator—having built and sold an advertising business to MTG Group, and held leadership roles at Bolt and Viveo Health—Rando brings an operator’s mindset to venture investing. His fund specializes in providing liquidity to founders, employees, and early investors in high-growth scaleups, with a focus on the CEE and No...
Welcome to a new type of episode of the Pursuit of Scrappiness podcast. A monthly analysis of topics we find relevant to highlight, discuss and share with you to help you become a scrappier and better version of yourself. We will be looking at events and developments in business, politics and technology from a European and particularly Baltic perspective. On this episode we talk about: Baltic funding newsEnefit Green going privateHow Europe strikes back in space and rocket techHarry St...
Ada Mockutė Jaime is the Chief Marketing Officer at Nordcurrent, the largest game developer and publisher from the Baltics. With over 800 million game downloads worldwide and a portfolio of hit mobile titles like Cooking Fever and Airplane Chefs, Nordcurrent has become a global gaming powerhouse—all while remaining completely bootstrapped. On this episode we talk about: How Nordcurrent scaled into a global gaming giant without any external funding, driven by adaptability and long-term t...
Marija Rucevska is the founding partner of Outlast Fund, a newly launched venture capital firm focused on early-stage investments in the Baltics and Nordics. With over a decade of experience in the startup ecosystem, Marija has played a key role in shaping the regional tech landscape, contributing with brands like TechChill, Practica, Helve, Techhub and others. On this episode we talk about: The Rise of Early-Stage VC in the Baltics Outlast Fund’s Investment PhilosophyThe Future of...
Welcome to a new type of episode of the Pursuit of Scrappiness podcast. A monthly discussion format on topics we find relevant to highlight, discuss and share with you to help you become a scrappier and better version of yourself. We will be looking at events and developments in business, politics and technology from a European and particularly Baltic perspective. On this episode we talk about: A deep dive into whether Europe’s free speech restrictions are justified, how Germany polices...
Peter Garraghan is the CEO and co-founder of Mindgard, a cybersecurity startup focused on protecting businesses from AI-driven threats. With a background as a professor of computer science and an internationally recognized expert in security, Peter has dedicated his career to understanding and mitigating risks associated with AI systems. Having raised over $8 million in funding, he leads efforts in tackling emerging AI vulnerabilities, ensuring that companies can integrate AI safely into thei...
Artur Schaback is the co-founder of Paxful, a peer-to-peer Bitcoin marketplace and one of the most well-known brands in the crypto industry. Having built Paxful into a major force in the crypto industry, Artur has witnessed the ups and downs of the Bitcoin ecosystem firsthand. He recently left his full-time role at Paxful and is now working on Clip Finance, a DeFi yield optimization protocol, where he is a core contributor. On this episode we talk about: The rise of Paxful and the early days ...
Welcome to a new type of episode of the Pursuit of Scrappiness podcast. A monthly discussion format on topics we find relevant to highlight, discuss and share with you to help you become a scrappier and better version of yourself. We will be looking at events and developments in business, politics and technology from a European and particularly Baltic perspective. On this episode we talk about: The impact of Trump’s return on Europe and startups.The EU’s plan to unify business regulatio...
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