The Slush 2018 post-event report details the key highlights from the event held from December 4th to 5th, attracting 20,000 participants including startups, investors, and journalists. Notable discussions included trends in mobility, cybersecurity, and blockchain, along with initiatives like Slush Academy aimed at nurturing entrepreneurship. The report also covered awards for standout startups, emphasizing the evolution and diversity of the European tech landscape.

1. SLUSH18: POST-EVENT REPORT

2. TABLE OF CONTENTS
• Introduction - 1/2
• Introduction - 2/2
• Slush’s Uniqueness
• Participants
• Takeaways & Announcements
• State Of European Tech
• Slush Academy
• Trending Themes
• Mobility - Day 1
• Mobility - Day 1 & 2
• Diversity in Tech - Day 1
• Diversity in Tech - Day 1 & 2
• Cybersecurity & Blockchain - Day 1
• Cybersecurity & Blockchain - Day 1 & 2
• Impact & Sustainability
• Gaming
• Slush 100 - Semifinalists
• Slush 100 - Final 3 startups
• Slush 100 - Winner
• Slush GIA - Top 10 Startups
• The Nordic Mixer
• Finding Fintech
• Global Impact Community
• Climate Impact Battle
• Mobility of the Future
• Future Transportation - Topics
• Future Transportation - 1/2
• Future Transportation - 2/2
• Credits
• Photo Credits
• Contact

3. Introduction
From December 4th to 5th 2018, 20,000 Tech heads
flew out to Helsinki to attend one of the hottest events
of the year: Slush! In this report, you will find
everything that happened during Startup Sesame's
annual trip to the North, from the latest trends in
mobility, cybersecurity and gaming to what's hot in
the booming blockchain industry.
During Slush 2018, we successfully launched
Sesamers, a service helping corporates better
navigate Tech events. In a nutshell, here is what you
can expect with Sesamers:
• Save 25+ hours of planning with pre-arranged
meetings, RSVPs to networking events and
post-event debriefing
• Inspiration and insight from international experts
during the 2-day conference
• Connections to a selection of top-notch startups,
investors, journalists and senior executives from
your field

4. Introduction
Wondering what it’s like to work with us during
events? Ask our clients Bpifrance, Dynamics VC or
Wayra, for whom we identified 120 relevant startups
and booked 48 meetings during Slush 2018.
“Startup Sesame's team helped us get the most of our
presence at Slush this year. Thanks to their knowledge, we
attended the right conferences, side events and met the
right people.” - Simon Robert, Head of Bpifrance Le
Hub Corporate
“Using their expansive knowledge of conferences and
their insider experience of Tech events, Startup Sesame
gave us unparalleled access to great side events.” -
Borislav Tadic, Deutsche Telekom
Go visit sesamers.com

5. Slush is a student-driven, non-profit
movement originally founded to change
attitudes toward entrepreneurship.
Over the past 7 years Slush has grown
from a 300 person assembly to a
world-renowned event, now spreading
globally.
The philosophy behind Slush remains
the same: to help the next generation of
great, world-conquering companies.
Slush’s Uniqueness

6. Organized by
Supported globally by
&

7. 20,000 attendees, including
founders, innovators, investors
and media.
● 3,100 startups
● 1,800 investors
● 650 journalists
● 130 countries
Participants

8. ● Diversity in Tech & the State of
European Tech reports released
● School for coders “Hive
Helsinki” opened
● Global education program for
entrepreneurs “Slush Academy”
announced
Takeaways
&
Announcements

9. Together with Atomico and Orrick,
Slush proudly presented the 2018
edition of the State of European Tech
(SOET) report. Ever since its first edition
in 2015, the SOET report continues to be
the most-comprehensive, data-driven
story of European technology today.
This year’s report highlights promising
growth in the middle of an economic
slump, while acknowledging persistent
deep-seated issues in the areas of
diversity and inclusion.
Link to the report
Annual State of
European Tech

10. On December 4th, Slush’s CEO
Andreas Saari announced the launch
of a new global education initiative for
entrepreneurs called Slush Academy,
which will begin accepting applications
in the spring of 2019.
This forward-thinking program aims to
offer students from around the world
unique training for high-growth
entrepreneurship via internships with
top VCs and growth companies in
addition to receiving top-notch
mentoring from some of the
most-established founders of our time.
Slush Academy

11. ● Mobility & Transportation
● Diversity in Tech
● Gaming
● Crypto & Blockchain
● Cybersecurity
● Impact & Sustainability
Trending Themes

12. Mobility
Day 1.
The Fundamental Reshape of Transporting
More alternatives are needed for consumers when talking
about sharing a car or a vehicle. Bodil Eriksson and Rajil
Kapoor discussed the shifting trends from ownership to
access including the role autonomous driving will play in
this process.
The Story of Taxify & Europe’s Youngest Unicorn
Founder
“We’ve always been used to heavy competition, but what
we’ve noticed is - if you manage to localise and build the best
product for the customers, then that platform is going to win
out regardless of how much capital the other one has.” -
Markus Villig, Co-Founder and CEO of Taxify
From the constant struggle of leveraging regulation to the
realization that embracing it can actually lead to finding a
competitive advantage - Financial Times Editor Maija
Palmer interviewed Markus Villig, on the Founders
Stage.

13. Day 1.
Electric Cars of China: Founder Story of NIO
Andreas Saari, CEO of Slush interviewed William Li -
Founder & CEO of NIO - known as the Elon Musk of
China. During his talk at Slush, William shared some of
the pain points electric cars are still facing and how
the industry is developing in China.
"Similar to what power banks are for mobile phones,
solutions like Power Mobile and Power Swap are a
significant improvement in the user experience of electric
vehicles.” - William Li, Founder, Chairman & CEO of NIO
Day 2.
Deeptech Showcase
VP of Marketing at Lilium, Arnd Mueller took the
stage at the Showcase to present the Lilium Jet, the
world’s first electric vertical take-⁠off and landing jet
and shared the company’s goal to revolutionize how
we see taxi cabs.
Mobility

14. Day 1.
Fairness in Tech – Keynote by Margrethe Vestager
That’s why in the beginning of 2019, the EU will gather
people from different fields of expertise to Brussels to
discuss how to keep the market open for those who
innovate. This gives new possibilities to smaller
startups who can react to the new regulations faster
and more efficiently than big companies.
“The more we realize, the more concerned we become”
- Margrethe Vestager, EU Competition Commissioner
Arlan Hamilton: Founder Story of the Most Talked
About VC of 2018
Josh Constine, Editor-At-Large at TechCrunch chatting
with Arlan Hamilton on how she became the founder
of Backstage Capital, a VC firm dedicated to
minimizing funding disparities in tech by investing in
high-potential founders who are people of color,
women, and/or LGBT.
Diversity in Tech

15. Day 1.
Europe’s Entrepreneurial Ecosystem – Looking to the
Future by Understanding the Past
Beezer Clarkson and Colette Ballou addressed issues
like diversity, availability of funding, the rise of
entrepreneurship, the role technology is now playing in
the ecosystem as well as the specific roles venture
investors and LPs who back them have to play.
Day 2.
Start Today: Building an Inclusive Tech Industry
Diversity VC’s Co-Founder and CEO Francesca Warner
joined Atomico’s CEO Niklas Zennström to discuss
positive change and empowering the tech industry to
take control of issues around diversity and inclusion.
“Technology have tackled some of the world’s biggest
problems .. together we can tackle the lack of diversity and
inclusion in our companies.” - F. Warner
Diversity in Tech

16. Cybersecurity & Blockchain
Day 1.
The Implications of Cryptofinance. Moderated by Soona
Amhaz, Co-Founder & CEO of TokenDaily.
Lily Liu, Rune Christensen & Eli-Shaoul Khedouri debated
the possibilities of creating better, technologically-improved
versions of systems via blockchain and assuring accessibility
and financial inclusion in markets in South America and
across the world.
“Crypto is going to look pretty different in different economies
[...] blockchain is so foundationally interesting because [...] it’s
taking economic and political systems and enabling that to
come to life in a digital form.” - Lily Liu
First Demo of HTC Exodus – Building a Foundation of
Trust and Security
Phil Chen, Decentralized Chief Officer at HTC, described the
journey from web 2.0 to web 3.0 and together with Charlie
Lee, Managing Director of the Litecoin Foundation,
discussed how this new crypto-based smartphone will be the
key to allowing users take back control of their own data.

17. Day 2.
The Cyber Security Survival Guide for Startups
CEO at HackerOne Mårten Mickos, Jesse Kinser, the
Director of Product Security at LifeOmic and Frans Rosén,
Security Advisor at Detectify shared their insights into
operating a hack-free startup: from how to get started to
operating a fast-scaling business.
“Nowadays security comes as an argument or a question. [...]
Customers tend to be more and more interested in how you
are actually supposed to be working with security” - Frans
Rosén
Keeping our Voices Private – The Future of Voice
Technology
Rand Hindi shared ways to disambiguate voice assistants
with a special focus on trust and security issues.
“Privacy has nothing to do with hiding things. [...] Every time
you’re giving data to a company, you’re making your digital
profile more accurate. And algorithms are optimising for to
reinforcing your own universe bubble.” - Rand Hindi
Cybersecurity & Blockchain

18. Day 1.
Blockchain to Support and Protect the LGBT Community
Blockchain as the engine for inclusion. Christof Wittig, the
President at LGBT Foundation and Founder/CEO of Hornet
discussed how blockchain can be harnessed to improve the
lives of the global LGBT community.
Driving Forces of the Impact Scene
Crash course on impact investing on Slush’s most green
Evergreen Stage with Zachariah George, Anna Ryott and
Andre Heinz.
Day 2.
The Tomorrow of Growing and Eating Food
Daan Luining and Nasir Yammama discussed how
foodtech companies are tackling some of the most-pressing
challenges and remodeling the way we think about eating
with Grace Donnelly of Fortune Magazine.
Impact & Sustainability

19. Day 1.
Creativity vs. Science: The Right Balance for Building
Successful Games
Mattias Ljugman, Partner at Atomico, led the discussion
where Kathy Gong from Wafa Games, Roberta Lucca
from Bossa Studios and Martial Valery from Oh Bibi were
debating whether the success of games can be best
attributed to creativity or data science.
Day 2.
Dan Brody – Macro View of the Gaming Industry
Dan Brody, MD of Tencent Investments, shared his
unique insights into the gaming scene with Jason Yeh, Early
Stage Investor at Leaf Ventures.
“To this point this idea of people playing games is becoming
not necessarily something they do in their time off or behind
closed doors but something that becomes part of people’s
identity and extends way beyond just the game”. - Jason Yeh
Gaming

20. FROM 100 TO 15 TO 3 TO 1 STARTUP
PITCHES AT SLUSH

21. SLUSH 100 - 15 SEMIFINALISTS

22. SLUSH 100 - FINAL 3 STARTUPS

23. SLUSH 100 - WINNER
Meeshkan is developing a framework for
interactive machine learning. The main
purpose is to help teams train machine
learning models faster. All of this is possible
through a reactive interface powered by
Slack.

24. SLUSH GLOBAL IMPACT ACCELERATOR (GIA)

25. SLUSH GIA - TOP 10 STARTUPS
WINNERS

26. SOME NOTABLE SIDE EVENTS

27. This evening meetup included an
announcement of the 3rd edition of The
Nordic 100 - an annual list recognising the
100 most-impactful and influential actors in
the Nordic tech scene as well as launching
Startup Guide Nordics.
Organized in collaboration with Slush,
StartupGuide, +Impact, The Hub, and The
Nordic Web, this year’s Nordic Mixer
celebrated the Nordic ecosystem and its
active community.
The Nordic Mixer: Launch
of Startup Guide Nordics
& The Nordic 100

28. Finding Fintech was the official Fintech event
of Slush, organized by one of Slush’s global
partners - Mastercard.
Executives from leading banks shared their
work with fintech companies while
entrepreneurs highlighted their best success
stories. The winner of the Mastercard’s
Lighthouse Development Program this year
was Enfuce.
Finding Fintech

29. Co-hosted with Demos Helsinki, the leading Nordic
think tank working towards building a sustainable
society, the Global Impact Community event was
where Slush guests interested in sustainable
development and impact ventures came together to
turn their thoughts into action.
The focus of the night was on measuring impact,
supporting sustainable ventures and growing
through corporate collaborations.
Global Impact Community

30. In partnership with ABB, EIT Climate-KIC
presented what they believed to be “the
cream of the crop of European cleantech
and greentech startups,” each holding a
piece of the puzzle that is our shared
sustainable future. It was a small gathering of
entrepreneurs with the potential to become
leaders in addressing climate change in
innovative and profitable ways.
The 30 selected startups came from the EIT
Climate-KIC delegation, which is recognized
as the world’s largest cleantech startup
accelerator.
Climate Impact Battle

31. Mobility of the Future:
#SwitchtoEQ
● Video recap
● Press article

32. Main Topics:
1. Data Driven Transportation Networks
Interacting services and value chains supersede
isolated products and applications.
2. Urban Mobility and Infrastructure
Limited resources and environmental issues
demand new solutions for the cities of tomorrow.
3. Advanced Materials for Future Vehicles
Innovative vehicles are developed from new
technical solutions, materials and forms.
4. Which Technology will Win the Mobility Race?
E-Mobility, hybrid, self-driving cars, drones and
decentralized ledger…. which technologies are ready
to shape the future of transportation?
Future Transportation

33. We are entering the era of mobility. Some, like the
keynote speakers, interviewees and panelists at
Future Transportation side event at Slush18 already
entered the new era.
From Chris Shieldrick’s introduction to what3words
- the address system of tomorrow, through Poh Shin,
Michael Hurwitz, Maxim Nohroudi, Clare Jones,
and Elaine Tan designing urban infrastructures,
learning from each other, and planning strategic
timeframes to prepare London, Singapore, Munich,
Lisbon, and other cities for the future of mobility.
Raj Kapoor, as usual makes it impossible for the
audience to remain on the sidelines, idle for the
incoming exciting future where Lyft’s self-driving
vision is blazing the path forward. Speaking of
passion, MaaS Global’s CEO Sampo Hietanen
inspired the audience with his story of building the
world’s first mobility-as-a-service provider.
Future Transportation

34. Christian Knörle of Porsche shared a sneak peak
into his 70-year plan for shaping the future of sports
cars with use of WayRay, cutting-edge holographic
AR tech for future-focused vehicles founded by
Vitaly Ponomarev.
Vlado Koljibabic explained how Mercedes-Benz is
building a tech stack for seamless transportation.
In addition to reviewing the landscape of the current
mobility revolution, the conference looked into
what’s next on the radar such as Hyperloop, air
taxis or something even more disruptive that we
haven’t yet imagined could be possible!
www.futuretransportation.io
Future Transportation

35. CREDITS
Author: Ana Wolsztajn
Editors: Ben Costantini & Maxime Guibbert

36. PHOTO CREDITS
● Slides 1-4: Kristopher Pepper
● Slides 5, 7, 8, 9: Startup Sesame
● Slide 10: Kristopher Pepper
● Slide 12: Ana Wolsztajn
● Slide 13: https://twitter.com/AnttiMerilehto/status/1069915685566996480
● Slide 14: Ana Wolsztajn, Startup Sesame
● Slide 15: Ana Wolsztajn, Kristopher Pepper
● Slide 16: Ana Wolsztajn
● Slide 17: Startup Sesame
● Slide 18: Slush [https://www.slush.org/news/the-tomorrow-of-growing-and-eating-food/]
● Slide 19: Slush [https://www.facebook.com/events/367675300468194/]
● Slides 20, 23, 24: Kristopher Pepper
● Slide 26: Ana Wolsztajn
● Slide 27: https://twitter.com/colraftery/status/1069683239378477058
● Slide 28: https://twitter.com/NFTVentures/status/1070353315010101248
● Slides 20, 30, 32, 34: Ana Wolsztajn
● Slides 31, 33: Ana Wolsztajn, Kristopher Pepper
● Slides 35-37: Kristopher Pepper

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Ben Costantini
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