"Bratislava? Where is that? And can it offer something to the startup scene?" The answer: it is a beautiful city in the heart of Europe, and we proudly have so much to offer! Our city now adds Startup Grind to the list of incredible events and resources to entrepreneurs, and we're excited to invite you to our first event on Tuesday, August 25th 2015. We will be meeting in Bratislava (at the Residence of the British ambassador - Pažického 1, 811 06 Bratislava) to interview the undoubtable supporter of young entrepreneurs: Director of Google Slovakia, Rasto Kulich. We would love to see you there!
Bratislava's entrepreneurial community has been rapidly expanding in the last 4 years. We have seen many new co-working places and accelerator programs rise. The best part is that even though the ecosystem is getting more and more competitive, everybody acts more as one family and tries to be supportive towards each other, which makes Bratislava ecosystem truly special. Before we explore what is to come in Bratislava, let’s have a little look in history of Slovak startup scene.
The year of 2010 was the start for forming startups and entrepreneurial community in Bratislava, the heart of Europe, with Startupcamps followed by the first Startup Weekend Bratislava. 2012 was the year when things moved the right direction. the Slovak government sent eight startup teams to Silicon Valley for acceleration; the first creative space for startups to network, educate, work and mingle called The Spot opened doors; followed by Connect, the first co-working space, in the fall of that year. In 2013 big startup venture capital fund called Neulogy Ventures opened its door with first funded startup.
Slovakia does not lack the world-class businesses success stories either. The biggest success story is ESET, a major antivirus software that made it big some ten years ago when Anton Zajac opened its US sales offices and the team started selling worldwide. The company is still privately held, employing thousands and going strong. Slovakia is also strong in game development, and the founders of Pixel Federation are a great example. WebSupport is also crushing it: not only they are the biggest web hosting company in Slovakia, but they won at the Startup Awards 2011 with Nicereply.com and again in 2013 with their other spinoff inHiro.com. The list continues with M.Dot, Datamonilo, Sli.do or the Slovak flying car Aeromobil.
One of the newest tech incubator and co-working place is RubixLab, which opened its doors in March this year. This colorful space full of innovation and entrepreneurial spirit is through its events aiming to connect Slovak and foreign ecosystem to create opportunities abroad and form broader network to help Slovak startups expand. Startup Grind is one of the examples of bringing world class notion to Bratislava and aims to connect successful entrepreneurs and their stories with Slovak startups, create networking opportunities and place for ideas sharing.
Make sure to join our Bratislava community here and please reserve your ticket for our kickoff event on Eventbrite.