Next Batch of Europe’s Brightest Startups Visited Gävle – Starting Their International Growth Journey

On May 18–19, Gävle became the meeting point for some of the most ambitious startups in the Central Baltic region. Fourteen carefully selected startups from Sweden, Finland and Estonia gathered for Sprint 1 of the second batch of Growth and Scaling Through AI (GSAI) – the successful international growth program designed for startups ready to scale faster, smarter and beyond their home markets.

The first batch of GSAI delivered strong results across the region. Several participating startups achieved scaleup status, expanded into new international markets and strengthened both their AI capabilities and business models. Nearly all participating companies established themselves in new European markets, and several startups successfully secured new investment capital during or after the program.

Now, a new generation of startups has entered the program with the ambition to follow the same trajectory.

During the two-day sprint, participating founders and teams focused on some of the most critical aspects of international growth: reviewing and strengthening their business models and value propositions, identifying the right international markets for expansion, understanding the art and science of scaling, and diagnosing how scalable their companies truly are.

The participating startups represented a wide range of industries, from AI-powered healthcare and education to forestry tech, travel tech and digital learning – but they all shared one thing in common: the ambition to grow internationally.

Among the participating companies were Finnish travel tech startup Dandelier, helping travel businesses automate complex B2B workflows through AI-powered solutions, Estonian forestry tech company MS Forest, building next-generation forest management systems, and Swedish startup Mochi Digital, developing tools that help publishers and creators distribute content more effectively across digital platforms.

One of the key contributors during the sprint was Professor Davide Sola from ESCP Business School, ranked among the world’s leading business schools, who challenged participants to rethink how scalable their businesses truly are. Together with Richard Hainsworth, international business coach at Movexum, the startups explored what separates companies that grow steadily from those capable of scaling globally.

For many founders, this process led to significant strategic insights. One participant from the first batch described the experience as transformative:

– “This really gave us a lot to think about, because our old ICPs were based on inaccurate assumptions from more than two years ago. We truly needed to reassess our customer profile based on where we are today, which turned out to be incredibly valuable.”

For startups originating from relatively small home markets such as Sweden, Finland and Estonia, internationalization is often not a future option – but an early necessity. The GSAI program is designed to help founders navigate that journey with greater precision, founder-to-founder learning, stronger networks and focused strategies.

The participating startups also gained access to international student teams from ESCP Business School, giving them the opportunity to work alongside the companies to identify scalability opportunities and support future market expansion efforts.

The startups participating in Sprint 1 Batch 2 are:

Sweden: Atjoo, Careifai, Mochi Digital and Noxit
Finland: Aurafleet, Dandelier, Dokport, TeachersPRO and Sportribe
Estonia: Beyondcode, Grainflow, KULG, MS Forest and PocoBit

Growth and Scaling Through AI (GSAI) is a collaboration between Movexum, AI Sweden, Tehnopol in Estonia and Yrityssalo in Finland, and is financed by the Interreg Central Baltic Programme and Region Gävleborg.