Invest in Estonia reports that ten Estonian startups made the 2026 Baltic watchlist of the venture capital firm FIRSTPICK. For the list, 15 investors and angel networks working in the Baltics each named early-stage companies they have not invested in themselves. Estonia has ten of the 30 names.
The figures behind the list are FIRSTPICK's: Estonian startups raised EUR 135 million in the first half of the year, which it puts at 62% of Baltic startup capital, and 17 Estonian pre-seed deals raised EUR 14 million.
Six of the ten build software, most of it around AI agents. Zobi, an applied AI lab in Tallinn, handles sales conversations for brands and, according to FIRSTPICK, raised a EUR 5 million pre-seed round in August. Creem, which provides billing, payments and tax compliance for AI-native software companies, closed a EUR 5 million seed round in September. Bilt, ApexMake, Leio and display.dev complete the software group.
The other four are in defence, hydrogen and robotics: Wayren, which FIRSTPICK says closed a EUR 7.9 million seed round for communication systems that work during jamming; KrattWorks with jamming-resistant reconnaissance drones; Spiral Hydrogen with a centrifugal electrolyser piloted at the Port of Rotterdam; and the security-robot company 1ROLLO.
Tim Vaino, investment manager at Practica Capital, pointed to the next step in the FIRSTPICK article: "The task now is turning it into seed and Series A rounds.
"
Source: Invest in Estonia, . The text above is our own summary; the words in quotation marks are the source's.
What this means for an Estonian entrepreneur
Investors are looking at very early companies — pre-seed rounds of a few million euros are on the list. For an Estonian founder, the step from founders' money to investors' money changes the company: new shareholders join, and the rights of each — votes, transfer of shares, exit — have to be agreed in writing before the money arrives. The articles of association and a shareholders' agreement are where that is set down.
When investors join an Estonian company, we draft the shareholders' agreement that sets out decision-making, transfer restrictions, pre-emption, drag-along and tag-along, deadlock and exit. Shareholders' agreement
New tools change what a company needs and what it pays for: the Business Navigator helps you review your company's needs and optimise its costs.