This was our first full year of activity and we were able to witness some interesting developments on our startup ecosystem. It’s time to wrap-up and review some highlights of 2015.
JANUARY
- Portugal Ventures announced investment in MoodOptic, Invine and FollowPrice.
- Portuguese Flipside was acquired by a company from the USA.
- Ignidata gets into Collider’s 2015 class.
- Portuguese Social Entrepreneurship was mapped.
FEBRUARY
- Coacher raised more than £100,000 on Seedrs.
- Lisbon City Hall was transformed into a massive incubator.
- MARE STARTUP was brought to the public.
- A patent from FEUP and EFACEC was sold for 5 million euros.
- PepFeed closed a first round from Portugal Ventures.
- MagniFinance won Caixa Empreende Award.
- NearUs and Surfstoke were among the finalists of the EU Mobile Challenge.
- TAP Creative Launch took off.
- TOP Docs, now TOP Dox, raised a new round led by Portugal Ventures.
MARCH
- The Portuguese Ecosystem was part of the SXSW program.
- Tradiio raised $975,000.
- Farfetch, the Unicorn – A $1Billion Milestone for the Portuguese Startup Scene.
- Portugal didn’t miss the CeBIT’s boat.
- JOBBOX.io, now Landing.Jobs, raised €750.000 in seed investment.
- Microsoft brought the Portuguese startup ecosystem together with Ativar Portugal Startups program.
APRIL
- Go Youth Conference took place.
- Bica Studios closed seed round.
- MusicYou raised 300.000€ in seed investment.
- B-Guest and MyGon were invested by Portugal Ventures.
- Portuguese BestTables was acquired by TripAdvisor.
- Startup Accelerator ASA was launched.
- Immunethep, StoryTrail and Indie Campers joined Portugal Ventures portfolio.
- SWORD Health received 1 million euros.
MAY
- Feedzai raised $17,5M in Series B.
- Farfetch acquired Browns Fashion Boutique.
- Coimbra Genomics was awarded as a promise on eHealth.
- Startup Lisboa opened a third building.
- GuestU raised $1.1M in seed investment from Portugal Ventures.
JUNE
- Lisbon Investment Summit took place.
- Talkdesk announced $15 Million Series A.
- WAYNABOX won TAP Creative Launch.
- Portugal Ventures expanded to Berlin.
- Several international investors joined Portuguese companies.
- doDOC became the first Portuguese startup on Techstars Boston.
- Portugal Ventures strikes again by investing in Following Inspiration, BeyonDevices, Possible Answer, eSolidar, Easy Easy Apps and boomApp.
JULY
- Caixa Capital invested in Asian e-commerce platform.
- A house for entrepreneurs opened in Lisbon.
- Sticket.in got 100k from Caixa Capital at Startup Braga Demo Day.
- Parkables from Cascais got into Startupbootcamp.
- Startup Lisboa Momentum was launched.
- New startup program was launched: START-UP DEFESA.
- Seedrs raised €14M in funding.
- Streamline, a project led by NMusic, got €3.3M.
- Clickly left a mark on Shopify.
AUGUST
- A new law to shake Crowdfunding in Portugal.
- Chic by Choice announced acquisition of the German competitor LAREMIA.
SEPTEMBER
- The UP AWARDS were launched.
- London-based Yieldify opened office in Porto and Zomato settled in Lisbon.
- Exogenus Therapeutics closed seed round from Caixa Capital.
- Caixa Capital successfully exited its investment in Nonius.
- New accelerator on the block: Deloitte Digital Disruptors.
- The Web Summit revealed it will be coming to Lisbon.
- Portugal Ventures invested in Graphenest and CUBO.
- doDOC joined the portfolio of Caixa Capital.
- We did a national Roadshow to discover regional entrepreneurial ecosystems.
OCTOBER
- Talkdesk announced $21M in Series A.
- Lapa was a big achiever on Indiegogo.
- Pathena invested in ebankIT.
- Healthium closed first investment round with Primavera Bss.
- Stuk.io was invested by Portugal Ventures.
- A bridge was created between Portugal and Silicon Valley with West to West.
- Pro-Drone won best pitch at The Business Booster in Berlin.
- Loqr raised a pre-seed investment round.
- 9 Portuguese Startups were at Digital Tech Summit.
- Google acquired Portuguese Digisfera.
- Codacy raised €1M in a seed extension round.
- New accelerator launched: Protechting.
NOVEMBER
- Uniplaces announced a Series A of $24M.
- Hype Labs announced as a WARP4 Finalist.
- Startup Next coming to Lisbon.
- Wizdee announced it would be joining Salesforce World Tour New York.
- Line Health welcomed Bolt as an Investor.
- BeON Energy was the winner of the KIC InnoEnergy Award
- 3 prizes for Portugal at CBC and EBAN in Copenhagen.
- Chic by Choice raised €1.5M.
- Portugal Ventures invested in Josefinas and MICE.
- First study on Portuguese scale-ups was launched by SEP and Microsoft.
- The 2015 UP AWARDS winners were revealed.
DECEMBER
- EIT Digital named Sensefinity as the best IoT startup in Europe.
- Portugal Ventures invested in Petable, VideObserver, Musikki and Peekmed.
- Scraim secured a €50k investment after inRes Program.
- ATTENTIVE.US won Lisbon Challenge and secured a €100k investment.
- Exogenus Therapeutics closed a €800K seed round.
- The city of Porto launched ScaleUp Porto. and announced ScaleUp for Europe.