Three early-stage startups – one Estonian, one Finnish, one Lithuanian – have walked away with a combined €450,000 in investment after winning this year’s pitch competition at Latitude59, the flagship startup and technology conference held annually in Tallinn.
The competition drew 465 applicants from 53 countries, with seven teams advancing to the final on the main stage. Finnish deep-tech company Granarium Technologies will receive up to €200,000, Estonian AI startup DogBase up to €100,000, and Lithuanian startup Backoffice €150,000.
Defining the trends
Granarium and DogBase share a syndicated investment from a joint angel network comprising Estonia’s EstBAN, Latvia’s LatBAN and Finland’s FiBAN – an alliance that has become a recurring feature of the competition in recent years. The lead investors behind that joint bet are Jana Budkovskaja and David Clark. Granarium Technologies is a Finnish deep-tech startup developing 100% renewable supercapacitors made from nanocellulose and activated carbon, designed to stabilise electricity grids and manage power fluctuations.
The investment rationale, Budkovskaja said, reflects a structural shift in how energy storage is understood: “A key structural shift is that storage is no longer just a ‘backup power’ – it is becoming core grid infrastructure. Granarium is the perfect addition to our angel investment portfolio because the company is solving a massive global challenge in a safe and scalable way.”
DogBase, meanwhile, is building a training platform for working and rescue dogs, replacing paper logs and spreadsheets with mobile-friendly tools for tracking training progress, certifications and health data. Budkovskaja cited the team’s domain expertise and commercial traction as deciding factors: “We were convinced by the team’s deep domain expertise as well as clear market validation, with a strong share of users converting into paying customers.”
Emīls Kraģis, Managing Director of LatBAN, added that both winning teams demonstrated the kind of founder conviction investors look for. “DogBase addresses genuine market demand and Granarium, as a deep tech company, stood out for its thorough understanding of the technology founders are building and a clear, convincing vision of where the market is heading,” he said.
The third winner, Backoffice, is a Lithuanian startup developing a workforce management platform for the restaurant sector, with ambitions to consolidate the multiple disparate systems that hospitality businesses typically rely on. Its €150,000 investment comes from Lithuanian venture capital fund FIRSTPICK. General Partner Andra Bagdonaite framed the bet around pace of execution: “Strong progress made in a relatively short time – that’s what we value most: the ability to move fast and learn from the market. Today the average hospitality business uses five or more different systems, and Backoffice aims to bring that together into one platform.”
Latitude59 CEO Liisi Org described this year’s finalists as a strong vintage. “I believe our investors have found new superstars for their portfolios, while the founders will gain not only investment, but also professional and committed partners,” she said.
The competition’s prize pool was additionally supported by SEB, TalentHub, Knowzilla, Widen Legal, Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud.
A track record worth noting
The 2026 results continue a strong run for the Latitude59 pitch competition. In 2025, a total of €675,000 was invested through the competition, with Estonian green energy solutions developer MarkeDroid, Latvian construction startup Adventum Tech and Lithuanian defence tech company Luna Robotics each securing between €175,000 and €250,000.
All three have remained active since their wins – Luna Robotics building defence-market traction, Adventum Tech deploying its infrastructure technology in public-sector pilots, and MarkeDroid expanding across Europe in step with the growth of distributed energy systems.
The longer-term numbers are equally compelling. Over the past three years, Latitude59 Pitch Competition winners have collectively raised more than €20 million in investments. Earlier cohorts include AskToSell, Flowstep and ÄIO, whose investments from the 2023 and 2024 competitions totalled over €2 million. Tallinn-based fintech startup Cino, which participated in the competition, went on to close a €3.5 million seed round.
This year’s conference brought together more than 3,000 participants from 70 countries, with 140 speakers and over 600 investors in attendance. The next Latitude59 in Estonia will take place on 19–21 May 2027 at Kultuurikatel.
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