FUTURE CITY ESG INNOVATION INDEX
We thank our partners and contributors who have made this publication possible by their thirst for answers on such an important topic as well as through data contributions of data that is not widely available and allowed to create a more complete and geographically balanced sample, reaching from Seville to Moscow, and from Rome to Helsinki.
An analysis into the readiness of European cities to foster ESG innovation & startups
A big thank you to the individuals who contributed greatly to this publication: Valentina Forrer Dr. Erica Santini Paul Rösler Thomas Kösters
The research team of DEEP partners with ecosystem builders and innovation managers worldwide to help surface the underlying dynamics of ecosystem development. Many partners have put the topic of ESG and the question on how to win the race to become the future "Sustainability Valley" of Europe to us. This publication is our answer to this call for an in-depth analysis needed by professionals to benchmark their efforts.
On this Publication
Where will be the "Sustainability Valley?"
On the Author
About DEEP Ecosystems
DEEP Ecosystems is a world-wide community of tech ecosystem builders who collaborate to build more trans- national, inclusive, entrepreneur- driven and impactful innovation systems. The main activities of DEEP are the Startup Heatmap Europe, an unparalleled database on ecosystem development metrics, the DEEP Ecosystem Conference, which brings together a community of more than 400 professional ecosystem leaders twice a year. Finally, DEEP organizes the DEEP Startup Ecosystem Accelerator which directly supports the growth of local ecosystems. DEEP regularly organizes peer- knowledge exchanges and educational formats for ecosystem builders ranging from Ecosystem Hacks, Data Trainings and Full-Scale Educational Programs.
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1. Introduction: Are we ready to build ESG solutions? 1.1 The Methodology 1.2 The Indicator List 2. Results 2.1 Sub-Index 1: Community of ESG Entrepreneurs 2.1.1 Case Study: London 2.1.2 Case Study: Moscow 2.2 Sub-Index 2: Entrepreneurship Support Network for ESG 2.2.1 Case Study: Berlin 2.2.2 Case Study: Tel Aviv 2.3 Sub-Index 3: Societal Backing for ESG 2.3.1 Case Study: Paris 2.3.2 Case Study: Stockholm 2.4 Sub-Index 4: ESG Governance 2.4.1 Case Study: Copenhagen 2.4.2 Case Study: Madrid 3. Final Ranking 3.1 Top 3 3.2 Top 4-20 3.3 The Full List of Ranked Cities 4. The Top 70 ESG Startups
Table of Contents
Dr. Erica Santini, Head of Research DEEP & Professor University of Trento
ARE WE READY TO BUILD ESG SOLUTIONS?
There is an increasing debate around the need for business to implement responsible practices respecting human rights and reducing negative environmental impacts (Cillo et al., 2019). In 2017, the International Labour Organization (ILO) underlined that around 25 million of people were victims of forced labour in different sectors such as agriculture, domestic work, manufacturing, and construction. In 2019, associated welfare costs of premature deaths due to air pollution represented on average about 5.8% GDP worldwide (OECD, 2021). We are indeed facing many global environmental and societal challenges, such as climate change, biodiversity loss, air pollution, land degradation, world hunger, pandemics, etc., and it is essential that governments, communities, and business mobilise resources in order to support a transition towards a more sustainable economy. In such a context, business and policy makers are putting in place responsible practices, rules and incentives in order to contribute and accelerate the transition through a more sustainable economy. In April 2021, environmental related measures, such as tax reductions for renewed energy and sustainable transports, subsidies and trainings for green jobs, and green technologies, have increased from $336bn to $677 bn (OECD, 2021). The huge increase of funding allocated to these intervention measures underlines the importance of the topic in the contemporary economy. Moreover, several analyses made clear that any improvements towards the sustainability transition assure not only a more sustainable lifestyle but a positive impact on economic growth of countries and societies (Navarra, 2020). Sustainability and ESG Several pressures, such as the increased stakeholders’ demand for greener products, the importance in the optimization of the usage of natural resources, the attention toward the organizational carbon footprint, and the changing preferences of social-oriented markets, have contributed to an increase in the role of sustainability in organizations. Despite sustainability being a well-known and used concept, it covers a wide range of individual and community-based aspects. Indeed, the sustainable transition that we are experiencing does not just refer to environmental issues, but it relates to a shared value (Porter and Kramer, 2011). Moreover, many authors at the end of the last century started highlighting the positive relationships between responsibility and productivity, observing the increasing performance of business taking into account responsible practices (Lee et al., 2013; Vogel, 2005). This transition is indeed multi-dimensional, and it takes into account different spheres of our daily life. Following McWilliams et al. (2006), in being economically sustainable, organizations should also engage in ‘‘actions that appear to further some social good, beyond the interests of the firm and that which is required by law’’ (ibidem, p. 1). The most recent contributions in the field have defined a turning point in the understanding of sustainable capitalism, and many indexes connecting economic and social outcomes have been developed (Scherer and Palazzo, 2011; Matten et al., 2003). In such a debate, sustainability, corporate social responsibility, socio-environmental governance and environmental, social and governance (ESG), corporate governance, have been used as synonyms by many authors. Some documents bring CSR and ESG literature together under the label of "sustainability" (Clark et al., 2015) by arguing that the sum of positive externalities in the environmental, social and governance sphere is generally treated as an organization’s quality of responsibility. Companies adopting specific standards related to environmental, social and governance issues (ESG) are labelled as more sustainable and able to take part in the global transition. As suggested by Muff and Dyllick (2016), there is not just one meaning of sustainability. The authors enlarged the debated by introducing three different degrees of business sustainability ranging from 1.0 to 3.0. This last approach describes a business that can be considered truly sustainable. It seems crucial here to adopt an outside-in perspective and define organizations as potential contributors to solving societal and environmental challenges. Nowadays, it is not yet clear how environmental, social and governance issues are taken into account at different levels and investment practices aiming at finding solutions to the global challenges that are spreading at an individual, organizational and ecosystemic level. In academic literature, it is possible to identify several indexes and conceptualization on the level of CSR and ESG in business organizations, especially in the case of multinational enterprises (OECD, 2011). In this debate, a quite clear definition of “due diligence” related to the three ESG dimensions has been developed: “the process enterprises should carry out to identify, prevent, mitigate and account for how they address their actual and potential adverse impacts as an integral part of business decision-making and risk management systems” (OECD, 2011, p.23). But what about the responsibility of ecosystems in supporting the global transition through sustainability 3.0 by taking into consideration standards related to environmental, social and governance issues (ESG). How can ecosystems be potential contributors for solving societal and environmental challenges? Why the Future City ESG Innovation Index To provide an effective contribution to the sustainability challenges, organizations should review established approaches, by developing a strategy that concentrates on effective contributions to sustainable development (Dyllick and Muff, 2016). Today, these strategies are supported by digital technologies, that are not an organization-centric tool but rather, global phenomena that trigger changes in the industry and society as a whole (Köhler et al., 2019). Digital technologies have indeed leveraged organizations to reach more sustainable performance (Delgosha et al., 2020). In this scenario it seems important to investigate the potential of digital technologies over the recalled sustainability transformation. Digital technologies can foster resilient organizational architectures, triggering an effective implementation of sustainability strategies. Let’s think for example about the role of digital technologies in enabling remote working and sustainable tourism, and promoting workers’ health safety and wellbeing. In this regard, business employed several digital tools for sustainable purposes such as: enhancing resource use efficiency, developing greener production processes, reducing the environmental impact of firms, mapping their environmental footprint, or improve social welfare. However, sustainability represents a global challenge that calls for wider collaboration as the needed changes exceed the capacity of individual entities, needing a multi-stakeholder collaborative perspective (Wagner and Svensson, 2014). Ecosystems are experiencing both an opportunity and a responsibility in solving global sustainability challenges, having the potential to contribute to the solution of both societal and planetary issues by serving the shared value. What is the magnitude of an ecosystem promoting the sustainable transition taking care and increasing the shared value (Porter and Kramer, 2011)? Scholars dealing with the exploration of the plethora of investment practices integrating ‘environmental, social and governance’ (ESG) responsibility label these practices in many ways. Generally, ESG practices have been linked to Sustainability/Sustainable Investment (Koellner et al., 2007); Ethical Investment (Schwartz et al., 2007); and Responsible Investment (Dembinski et al., 2003; Thamotheram and Wildsmith, 2007). An ecosystem is not just defined by the sum of the organizations localised in the area. Therefore the ESG potential of an ecosystem is not the sum of the ESG degrees of the local business. An ecosystem is characterised by the connections and interdependencies among individuals, groups, organizations, and institutions that are responsible in running their activities. The Future City ESG Innovation Index can give an answer to the touched upon questions and it can inform about the capabilities of ecosystems to produce innovation (e.g., startups) in fields related to ESG, to produce solutions to the global challenges, to support inclusivity and growth by applying a responsible approach. The need to have an index able to track and compare ecosystems under an ESG perspective is urgent because the general demand for ESG solutions will increase and will grow massively in the future. In this regard, ecosystems have to be ready to give answers to their population of people and enterprises that are ready to perform this transition. The main goal of the research is therefore to build up an index assessing the capability of local ecosystems to support and nurture ESG related innovation. Or in short: Understand which cities are capable to create thriving ESG innovation ecosytems and capture the immense economic potential coming with the global transition to a greener and more socially responsible economy as demanded by governments, people and pure necessity as for example due to the ongoing climate change. The Future City ESG Innovation Index is a guideline to understand how far cities and their innovation economies have advanced in this transition and whether they are already able to harvest returns on their investment in ESG innovation. On the other side, policy makers and practitioners find a useful tool to benchmark their progress and re-adjust their strategies towards the creation of a more robust ESG strategy. In what follows we will explore the methodology at the core of the Future Value City ESG Index.
The Future City ESG Innovation Index asks in which European cities will we most likely see new global firms emerge as ESG champions tackling the challenges of the transition to a greener and more sustainable society?
An Introduction
Starting Point
Opportunity
Dependent Variable: High Growth Startups
Independent Variables: Success Factors in the Ecosystem
Technology can advance society’s efforts to build a more environmentally sustainable, socially just and well-governed future (ESG)
Hypothesis-driven Investors aim at high-growth ventures addressing core issues of ESG and bet on steep future growth curves
Startups can capture the market opportunities in ESG either by providing solutions to the end customer or helping existing firms improve their ESG ratings
Local ecosystems present the prime breeding ground and testing bed for new ESG solutions of startups. Only with a healthy ecosystem supporting them, startups can succeed in bringing innovative solutions to life.
Growing Demand for ESG solutions
Investors see growth potential and bet on sustainability startups
Startups address ESG directly or indirectly
New ESG ecosystems emerge, challenging the old tech ecosystems
ESG criteria on firm level: -Shareholder Rights -Compensation Policy -Resource Reduction -Human Rights -Business Ethics -Health & Safety -Training and Development
Focus on Growth Capital Focus on solutions to advance the transition to a more sustainable (ESG conform) economy
Sector Definitions: Environment: -Environment -Clean Energy Social: -Health & Wellbeing -Education Governance: -RegTech & E-Government -Smart Cities & Transportation
Measures of Ecosystem Support Functions: -Diversity & Inclusion -Knowledge Base & Talent Pool -Community & Network Density -Startup Support Programs -Investment Levels & Specializations -Government Actions -Innovation Culture in Corporates -International Connectivity
Ranking of “Potential” based on Ecosystem
Index assessing the capacity of local ecosystems to support and nurture ESG related innovation through startups
A new race starts to become the “Sustainability Valley”
ESG Potential Measured by 4 sub indeces: -Community of ESG Entrepreneurs -Entrepreneurship Support Network for ESG -Societal Backing for ESG Capital -ESG Governance
The Logical Framework
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The Methodology
The multidimensional nature of ESG Firstly, as highlighted in the introduction, sustainability is a multidimensional concept. It relies on the implementation of responsible actions related to environmental, social and governance issues (ESG). Following this reasoning, the potential of local ecosystems to support ESG solutions can be traced by looking at the sum of E, S, G information. E - The environmental information refers to actions related to emission reduction processes or policies aiming at reducing the environmental impact of our daily life. Solutions that will be needed in the future will help to consider fossil fuel divestment policies, resource efficiency actions, such as in the case of water or energies. Moreover, environmental actions have to target waste and processes or policies aiming at reducing waste or increase circularity in a responsible organization. S – The social ESG sector describes the potential of an organization aiming at acting in a responsible way under a social point of view. Specifically, new solutions should be related to the increase of opportunities for minorities; the support of diversity. Other important aspects refer to solutions empowering organizations to take into account individual level needs and rights, such as human rights protection, policy on freedom of association, health & safety of people, skills training and education. G – The last dimension of ESG is governance. In this case, we look at new solutions increasing the value of responsibility of an organization or the transparency and efficiency of governance. This can refer to e-government as well as participatory platforms but also to public transport, parks and infrastructures both physical and digital that increase the efficiency and accountability of delivery of public goods. The ESG index is not therefore identified by one of the three dimensions, but it is a combination of information referring to all of them. However, following Delgosha et al. (2020), one of the components of being sustainable is related to the capability of an organization to innovate and leverage on digital technologies. It is central to consider information related to a general dimension referring to the innovation potential of the ecosystems. Often analysis on ESG underestimates the role of innovation and economic sustainability. A more general dimension has to be taken into account as well. Structures able to support knowledge sharing and recombination of new ideas can enable actions in ESG as well. As suggested by Cillo et al. (2019), sustainability can be accomplished only with open innovation practices and collaboration among various partners. Therefore, in the Future City ESG Innovation Index, we integrate the multidimensional nature of measuring sustainability, considering these four dimensions: Environment, Social, Governance, and General. Specifically, the index will be made of several sub-indexes measuring the potential of an ecosystem to produce innovative solutions that can scale beyond its immediate geographical borders and create a global impact. The multilevel nature of an ecosystem Since the ecosystem is a complex unit of analysis, the just recalled information has to be collected at different levels. In this regard, we propose a gradual fragmentation of the ecosystem’s components allowing the definition of three meso-levels that are measurable and comparable over time. By following the Ecosystem Health Check approach (DEEP 2020), we identify two structures that define the ecosystem’s performance and the functioning of an ecosystem: • the COMMUNITY of entre- preneurs, individuals and firms who make up the population of an ecosystem in a specific region; • the ENVIRONMENT in which these individuals interact. It is defined by the underlying set of rules, institutions, limitations, and opportunities which rule the relations of the individuals and their collaboration. Depending on the nature of the set of organizations, actors, and intangibles, it is possible to understand if an ecosystem is characterised by a favourable systemic structure allowing the implementation of successful ESG practices, as well as the creation and adoption of new solutions by developing new technologies. However, the responsibility of the community can be mapped by taking ESG and general information in relation to two different dimensions: a. the entrepreneurial system; and b. the entrepreneurship support network. A. Community of ESG Entrepreneurs Entrepreneurial success strongly depends on the availability of talented entrepreneurs and the diversity of knowledge embedded in people and firms. There are two main aspects here to be considered: the density of specialised knowledge making available a critical mass of talents needed to support innovation over time (i.e., knowledge and talent); and the diversity of both people and their organizations. Specifically, Diversity & In- clusivity are central to a community of people because this allows to recombine their knowledge and experiences, and to create more successful solutions than if a group of engineers working for 20 years for the same corporate tries to develop a new idea. Diversity of knowledge bases, competences, and experiences makes an ecosystem able to capture new opportunities embedded in the system (Asheim et al., 2011). In some cases these opportunities can be strongly related to shared values, such as the conservation of the natural resources and the increase of health and safety (Kramer & Pfitzer, 2016). Different proxies can capture ESG and general information for diversity in the community of entrepreneurs. As for Knowledge & Talent, literature agrees on the fact that the density of the talent pool triggers network effects and increases the innovative potential of the local environment. Moreover, the increasing of the innovative potential fosters a virtuous cycle attracting more talented individuals inclined to become entrepreneurs, which in turn makes the area even more valuable and attractive. This circle can relate to ESG and support responsible actions at an ecosystemic level. What is important here is to keep information on the different dimension of sustainability at this level of fragmentation of the ecosystem. B.Entrepreneurship Support Network for ESG Solutions At the core of a healthy entre- preneurial ecosystem is a rich set of support infrastructures helping to match actors across sectors and institutions. Their job is to break up traditional silos and increase connectivity among the community. To measure the quality of the entrepreneurship support network, we must look at the Start-up Support Orga- nizations as well as the Specialization and Diversification of the support network. The Start-up Support might take several forms: from the establishment of incubators and accelerators to measurements aiming at attracting international venture capital and external resources. This support can refer to different dimensions making up a sustainable ecosystem and might target different topics related to responsible actions. Specialization and diver- sification as important metrics investigating the innovation and sustainability capacity of an ecosystem. Think for example about the specialized support that a cluster of biotechnology companies can offer to new- comers in the field versus an ecosystem that has few or no local champions in their sector. Moreover, a diverse set of industries and therefore lateral support formats allow the cross-fertilization between various knowledge domains. This kind of local dynamics can support solutions to global challenges and potentially foster a faster transition to a more sustainable path of development. How to capture ESG and general information at this level of fragmentation of an ecosystem components is fundamental, but it is easy to find proxies able to measure this information. Focussing on the potential of the environment of an ecosystem to support sustainability, the fragmentation of the different components of an ecosystem leads to the identification of two main dimensions describing the path and transition of the ecosystem: c. social capital; and d. governance. C.Societal Backing for ESG In entrepreneurial ecosystems, trust and connectivity are crucial for the definition of a healthy structure. A high level of social capital encourages new entrepreneurial initiatives allowing an easier access to information or resources from other entrepreneurs or other actors of the ecosystem. To measure Societal Backing for ESG is not easy but we can disaggregate this dimension in two metrics: Network Density and Innovation culture. As for Network Density, it is important to remember that the existence of the right set of individuals and firms in the ecosystem does not assure that they are connected and their willingness to collaborate. In particular, we do not know if they are collaborating for supporting ESG solutions or not. Information related to this metric, allowing to understand the ESG status of an ecosystem, can be mapped by using several proxies. Regarding Innovation culture, there are several risks connected to open innovation, including moral hazard and the opportunity for one of the partners (often the bigger one) to steal ideas. If the environment of entrepreneurial ecosystem is healthy, there are soft rules in place that prevent such behaviours and in contrast incentivize also larger players to engage in an open innovation culture. The performance of an ecosystem in term of reaching sustainable goals can be traced by using several proxies. D.Governance Ecosystems do not work without a governance describing the sum of rules and arrangements allowing ‘the pursuit of collective interests and the steering and coordination of society’ (Peters & Pierre, 2006, 209). These include but are not limited to laws and regulations but can also relate to public spending and initiatives. In order to understand the health of governance in an Ecosystem, we can measure the Policies in place and the International Connectivity in supporting a sustainable growth. Specifically, policy makers can support the transition to a more sustainable future with policies or programs aimed at modifying regulations, such as easing business environment constraints, expanding the use of electric buses, or promoting a reduction of waste. Specifically, to collect information able to map the capability of a government to be responsible, we can use different proxies related to ESG actions. As for International Connect- ivity, the ability to connect internationally is limited by regulations and international treaties as it is by infrastructure, like the existence of an airport. However, even more powerful is the brand of a nation or region, as it is the basis on which external stakeholders decide they will explore collaboration with an ecosystem. The 4 Sub - ESG Indexes of an ecosystem Information related to ESG and the magnitude of an ecosystem in supporting the transformation through a more sustainable future can be traced by the four dimensions: o Community of ESG Entre- preneurs; o Entrepreneurship Support Net- work for ESG solutions; o Societal Backing for ESG; o ESG related Governance. The four levels of fragmentation of an ecosystem allow the generation of four different indexes tracking the status of an ecosystem over the multi- dimensional nature of sustain- ability.
Sub-Index 1: Community of ESG Entrepreneurs
International Connectivity
Diversity & Inclusivitiy
Sub-Index 4: ESG Governance
Sub-Index 3: Societal Backing for ESG
Environment
Investment Levels & Specialization
Knowledge Base & Talent Pool
Corporate Innovation Culture
Startup Support Programs
General
Community & Network Density
Sub-Index 2: Entrepreneurship Support for ESG solutions
Governance
Government Actions
The Indicator List
Social
Indicator
Description
Source
Index
Environment Acquisitions
Number of startups from environment related sectors, companies from a city have acquired between 2018 and mid-2021.
Crunchbase, Startup Blink, Manual Research
Corporate Innovation Culture, Sub-Index 3
Environmental Investments (USD)
Sum of investments in startups from environment related sectors have raised between 2018 and mid-2021.
Investment Levels & Specialization, Sub-Index 2
Average Seed Environment Investments (USD)
Average of seed investments in startups from environment related sectors have raised between 2018 and mid-2021.
Startup Support Programs, Sub-Index 2
Environment Crowdfunding projects
Number of crowdfunding projects in environment related topics.
Kickstarter, planeta.ru, boomstarter
Community & Network Density, Sub-Index 3
Number Electric Hybrid Busses
Number of Electric and Hybrid Busses.
Manual Research
Government Action, Sub-Index 4
Social Startups
Number of startups which were founded between 2018 and mid-2021 in social related sectors.
Knowledge Base & Talent Pool, Sub-Index 1
Social Acquisitions
Number of startups from social related sectors, companies from a city have acquired between 2018 and mid-2021.
Industry Categories: Clean Energy, Ecology: Green Consumer Goods, Environmental Consulting, Recycling, Waste Management, Water Purification, Battery, Clean Energy, Energy Efficiency, Power Grid, Renewable Energy
Industry Categories: Health, Education, Social: Assisted Living, Elder Care, Electronic Health Record (EHR), Health Diagnostics, Emergency Medicine, Journalism, Music Education, STEM Education, Social Entrepreneurship, Non Profit
Industry Categories: Government, Smart Cities: Sharing Economy, Coworking, Green Building, Public Transportation, Ride Sharing, CivicTech
Social Investments (USD)
Sum of investments in startups from social related sectors which were founded between 2018 and mid-2021.
Average seed social investments (USD)
Average of seed investments in startupsfrom social related sectors which were founded between 2018 and mid-2021.
Social crowdfunding projects
Number of crowdfunding projects in social related topic.
Health & Education Crowdfunding Projects
Number of crowdfunding projects in health and education related topics.
Sharing Cars 2020
Number of car-sharing vehicles.
Metro Network Length (km)
Length of the metro network.
World Metro Database
Government Startups
Number of startups which were founded between 2018 and mid-2021 in governance related sectors.
Government Acquisitions
Number of startups from governance related sectors, companies from a city have acquired between 2018 and mid-2021.
Government
Government Investments (USD)
Sum of investments in startups from government related sectors were founded between 2018 and mid-2021.
Average Seed Government Investments (USD)
Average of seed investments in startups from government related sectors have received between 2018 and mid-2021.
Governance Crowdfunding Projects
Number of crowdfunding projects in governance related topics.
E-Government Rank
Rank of a city in the United Nations E-Governance Index per city or country.
UN E-Government Survey 2018 and 2020, United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs
STEM Students
Number of university students inscribed in STEM subjects.
ETER, manual research on missing cities
Number of stackoverflow Developers
Number of registered members on stackoverflow.
stackoverflow
R&D Expenditures Government (Mio. Euro)
Governmental expenditures from the regional government.
Eurostat, General and Regional Statistics (RD_E_ GERDREG)
R&D exp business (Mio. Euro)
Governmental expenditures from the regional businesses.
ESG Herfindahl Index (% points Distance Distance)
Distance to either 0 or 1 to measure specialization or generalization in ESG as strength.
Crunchbase, own calculation
Number of Accelerators
Number of startup accelerators.
Startup Heatmap
Tourist Arrivals
Arrivals at tourist accommodation establishments.
Eurostat, General and Regional Statistics (TOUR_OCC_ ARN2)
International Connectivity, Sub-Index 4
Air Passengers
Number of air passengers flying in or out of a city per year.
Eurostat, General and Regional Statistics (TRAN_R_ AVPA_NM)
General Crowdfunding Projects
Number of crowdfunding projects.
Number of Meetup members
Number of registered Meetup members.
Meetup.com
Sub-Index 1:
Community of ESG Entrepreneurs
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPERS IDENTIFIED IN 113 CITIES
OF ENVIRONMENTAL FOUNDERS ARE FEMALE
350k
>1,700
Entrepreneurial minds have always been at the heart of societal change. While history books draw the trajectory of human development along the lines of the emergence of nation states or technological progress, there is an important observation to be made: Entrepreneurs are the ones that create the previously unthinkable. Entrepreneurs see the potential of a man like Otto Lilienthal in the mid 1800s snapping on artificial wings and flying for the first time. The entrepreneur takes the vision from the inventor and builds an airline - the instrument that allows us to harvest the full potential of such an invention. Entrepreneurs are ahead of their time - they see the future they set out to create. Therefore, often they seem out of place and do not fit in the established categories of society. However, today we understand the potential of entrepreneurship for improving human life on earth and if we bet on entrepreneurs to solve the large disparities prevalent in our societies in terms of social cohesion, education, consequences of climate change or in the access to basic health. Entrepreneurs are not driven only by the accumulation of wealth, but are trying out new ways to solve major challenges of society. In fact in our analysis of >100 cities in Europe, we identified more than 1,762 startups started since 2018 to work on one of the sectors in ESG. How can we know this? In fact there is no clear denomination of an impact-driven or ESG-focused startup. It is - admittedly - also a very subjective and qualitative assessment whether a startup is truely working for a societal good. Therefore, we do not claim that we have a definite answer on what startup should be included, we however put forward an assumption, that there is certain solutions needed to empower the transition to a more environment-friendly, socially just and fair and transparently governed society. This includes for example the development of energy-storage solutions in the environmental space, but it also includes smart city and e-government solutions in the governance space. The sub-index of Community of ESG entrepreneurs measures the capability of a city to bring together a sizable group of creative and forward-thinking entrepreneurs to work on such solutions. The question is not, whether their solutions are yet implemented and successful, but in the first place if there is the knowledge base and level of creative diversity that would allow for the development of new solutions. Factors that are decisive here are for example the quantity and quality of the talent pool. Without highly-educated engineers in the environmental space or professional coders, there is no basis for innovation. At the same time, we must ask if the community of entrepreneurs is able to think outside of the box. A common measurement for inclusivity is the presence of female entrepreneurs. In fact, the environmental space is showing an overall higher percentage of women, who make up 21% of startup founders in this area, compared to only 15.5% overall.
STARTUPS IN >100 CITIES FOCUS ON ESG
Highlights
21%
Number of ESG Startups
Governance, 19.8%
Environment, 17.6%
Female Entrepreneurs per City With only 15.5% on average, female founders remain a minority in the startup scene. However, especially in the ESG sectors, women entrepreneurs have proven to be particularly innovative. Across our sample 21% of environment-focused founders were women. The hubs with overall the highest number of female entrepreneurs are Vienna and Lisbon with 34% and 21% respectively. If we look at the distribution of the 1,762 startups across the three areas of Environment, that is defined as Ecology and Clean Energy, Social, defined as Health and Education, and Government as Smart Cities and e-Government, we see a strong overweight of the social sphere. 62.6% of ESG startups focus on the provision of innovative health and education solutions. But clearly, the health sector is the one driving this overrepresentation. This is the case in almost all individual cities as well, for example in London where 269 startups were created since 2018 in the Social sphere as opposed to only 105 in the Governance and Environment space combined. This shows of course also a great potential of the smaller sectors, who are less established and still have potential to make it easier for entrepreneurs to enter these fields. Imagine for example a PhD student with a revolutionary technology in the hydrogen area - would he dare to create a company and bet his career on a startup? You must answer this question for your city and understand what are the conditions that allow us to drastically increase the creation of new startups on ESG?
Social, 62.6%
PARIS
MOSCOW
59
10
7
76
MADRID
Diversity & Inclusivity
3
14
15
5
4
9
Top 10 Community of ESG Entrepreneurs
67
6
29
12
80
AMSTERDAM
MILAN
LONDON
8
17
STOCKHOLM
34
13
23
24
66
52
1
26
44
BERLIN
MUNICH
HAMBURG
11
2
Historically, London has competed with New York for the title of the financial capital of the world. While that is reflected in the preponderance of finance and fintech startups, Edtech, HR tech, AI and Cleantech are fast making their way on to the list. The startup ecosystem in London is valued at $47bn. Out of 11,770 investors in the UK, 2,489 are located in London. Cleantech After the Bay Area, London has the second biggest climate tech ecosystem in the world. Valued at $28bn. London hosts 416 climate tech companies, the largest cluster in Europe. Together, they have raised over $3.3bn since 2016. 60% of VC investment in climate tech is channelled into energy solutions. A net zero carbon city by 2030 is the target set by the Mayor of London for the city, backed by clear strategies: A transport strategy to achieve 80% of journeys as walking, cycling or public transport by 2041. The city now has more than 7,700 EV chargepoints, more than 30% of the UK market share. All new London buses will be zero emission, with a commitment to deliver a 100% zero-emission bus fleet in London by 2034. The London Plan 2021 requires new buildings to be constructed to zero-carbon standards and larger schemes to be developed in line with circular economy principles. Hosting inspirational events such as London Climate Action Week and the ClimateTech summit. Digital health MedCity was set up in 2014 for a world-leading health and life sciences sector in London and the Greater South East of England. It aims to drive growth and investment in the sector for the health and wealth of the population. Along with London’s three academic health science networks and supported by the NHS, MedCity launched DigitalHealth.London to put London at the center of the global revoltion in digital health. Smart City As recently as 2018, the Mayor launched the Smarter London Together initiative, a roadmap to make London ‘the smartest city in the world,’ that builds on the Smart London Plan in 2013. It calls for the city's 33 local authorities and public services to work and collaborate better with data and digital technologies, and helps to realise the seven statutory Mayoral strategies in transport, environment, health, housing, culture, and economic development. With such success stories it is not surprising that London came out as an overall leader in the Future City ESG Innovation Index, setting a high benchmark for all other cities. Strong results for London are driven by a strong community of ESG entrepreneurs, the supportive entrepreneurial net- work, and the general strong backing of ESG in the society. In all these three fields London is on first place in the sub-rankings by a good margin. Especially in the area of Entrepreneurship Support Network London reaches a remarkable score of 64, outperforming the runner-up Berlin by 16 points. This is due to the exceptional results in the investment levels and specialization, which shows that across the board London based ESG startups were able to raise the most funds. To break it down, London based startups since 2018 raised $6.79bn in the Social field, $3.38bn in the Government field and a almost surprisingly low $1.92bn in the Environment space. The average seed investment is highest in the government space with $2.4mn raised on average. Startups in general and ESG innovation in particular seem to have a very strong backing in society in London. The innovation culture score is the highest in the sample with 69 points and also the bottom-up initiatives measured by community & network activities, for example like crowdfunding is one of the highest with 60 points. London is potentially the first place in Europe to develop a strong technological platform. Looking at the number of companies younger than 30 years, that have grown fast enough to be able to acquire a serious number of other startups (>20) and form a platform in their sector, we see London leading by a large margin. With 15 "ecosystemic" players, London is one of the few places in Europe where we can observe a behavior of acquiring competitors and collaborators in their field. This strategy of platform building is however the basis for long-term growth in the digital world, where new technologies and trends can swiftly render existing business models outdated. American startups like Google, Apple and Facebook have for a long time followed a strategy of mergers & acquisitions to make sure to be on top of new developments and cement their market positions. It is absolutely necessary for Europe to build up own Ecosystem Platforms, especially if the continent wants to take on a leadership role in the ESG innovation field. Next to London, the beginnings of such a development can be observed in Paris, Stockholm and Moscow with 6,5 and 4 ecosystemic players who have acquired >20 companies in their first 30 years of existence respectively.
Historically, London has competed with New York for the title of the financial capital of the world. While that is reflected in the preponderance of finance and fintech startups, Edtech, HR tech, AI and Cleantech are fast making their way on to the list.
A ROARING COMMUNITY OF ESG ENTREPRENEURS
London's Results
Google, Apple, Facebook, and Microsoft cement their leadership by acquiring growing tech firms - in Europe, there is still few ecosystem platforms who follow that strategy
Rising Ecosystem Platforms: London boasts 15 firms who bought >20 startups
MBO
A FAST GROWING & SMART CITY
With a tremendously effective public transport system and innovative solutions across the city, Moscow is a front-runner in transforming into a modern, data-driven community improving its citizens' lives in incredible speed.
Higher Education With 257 of the 741 universities in Russia located in Moscow, it is by far the largest hub of higher education in the country and the highest ranking Russian university, the Lomonosov Moscow State University, is located in Moscow. Of the approximately 722,489 students enrolled in Moscow, women account for 52%. 57% of university teachers across Russia are women, higher than most developed nations. 37% of women have higher education, as opposed to only 29% for men. Excellence of Computer Engineers Russia is a recognized leader in the training of mathematicians, physicists, chemists, engineers, and programmers. Approximately 34% of higher education enrolments have been in STEM fields in Moscow with far greater gender balance than in many other countries. In fact STEM are the preferred subjects by the girls in Russia. Innovation During a turbulent period, Moscow improved its position in the European Cities and Regions of the Future rating by fDi Intelligence, taking 9th place among the major European cities. More than 130,000 technology companies operate in Moscow, and there are roughly 3,300 active startups in Moscow. Out of which 356 focus directly on solutions relevant to ESG. The city has been actively pursuing a smart city strategy, establishing "green bonds" to finance emissions reduction, introducing Europe's largest fleet of 800 electric busses today and reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 25% compared to 1990 (the EU average is 23%). With one of the largest metro systems in the world, public transportation in Moscow is a formidable testbed for the city of the future - for example, the Moscow metro is currently piloting a facial recognition based ticketing. And all of this happens with the active participation of Moscow's citizens - in the 2018 United Nations e-government survey, Moscow was ranked first among 40 cities worldwide and its citizen participation portal reached the absolute highest participation score. New Funds for Startups Moscow has a strong foundation for startup funding. It is home to 63 accelerator programs like Sberbank and 500 Startups, giving $150k for 6% or the MTS Startup Hub. More are coming in. Like the AI1 venture fund of Perspective Projects, launched together with one of Russia’s most important and valuable research centres, the AI cluster from Novosibirsk Akademgorodok. Officially registered in Luxembourg, the fund has over $100mn in assets under management, and will focus investments on artificial intelligence, machine learning, cybersecurity, and data science technologies.
An overall exceptional score puts Moscow on the 2nd place in the Future City ESG Innovation Index with its strongest performance in the area of Governance. The high-rating for the potential for ESG solutions is for example justified in the efforts the government puts in the public transport system which is not only the 2nd largest but also the most efficient public transport ecosystem (McKinsey, 2018) in Europe. The innovation potential for solutions to be developed based such a vast network comprising metro rails but also electric busses and shared bikes or scooters is immense. Moscow is the biggest European city and has the 2nd largest community of ESG entrepreneurs in terms of numbers behind London and ranges far above the levels of the third placed (66 points vs. 34 in Paris). This is due to the great Knowledge Base (80), a metric where Moscow leads the sample of all cities as well as in the Diversity and Inclusivity (2nd rank). Finally, Moscow shows strong societal backing of ESG (53 points) with a particularly strong bottom-up support based on a dense community and network (68 points and 1st rank in the sample). In the corporate innovation culture, Moscow lands the 3rd place as well with 36 points, just behind Paris (55 points) and London (69 points).
Moscow's Results
Moscow demonstrates a steady remarkable performance in the global UN e-Government Survey
Electric Busses by City Moscow speeds ahead with the roll-out of its electric bus fleet with a goal to reach 1,000 electric busses by the end of 2021 and to electrify its bus fleet completely by 2025. It reached 800 by the date of publication of this report. This is almost double than the runner-ups London and Milan (485 and 375 respectively). This adds to an efficient and environment-friendly transportation system comprised of 346 km of metro lines, 6511 shared bikes, 26,000 shared cars and 6,000 electric scooters already today.
EdTech Startups are Booming in Moscow Moscow has an outstanding Edtech market with 109 companies out of 452 ESG focused startups (30%, including also older than 3 years). Across all the other cities, Edtech only makes up for about 14%. A Popular & Efficient E-Government Platform Among 40 cities the UN e-government survey ranked Moscow the best performing government platform in 2018. In 2020 it stayed in Europe's top 5.
Number of Startups per ESG Sector
Entrepreneurship Support Network for ESG
Sub-Index 2:
$15.5bn
TOTAL INVESTMENT TRACKED IN ESG STARTUPS SINCE 2018
AVERAGE SEED INVESTMENT FOR ESG RELATED COMPANIES
$60bn
$1.46mn
USD INVESTED ALONE IN LONDON
The potential of finding solutions for the challenges posed in the ESG sectors is depending on the capability of cities to transform entrepreneurial activity into viable companies that scale and deploy their solution worldwide. Looking at the investment sums of startups in the ESG sectors we see a high level of maturity for various sectors: Health, Government and Clean Energy as well as Smart Cities. All of these 4 sectors have raised more than $10bn. While the other sectors are not equal in absolute size, like the Ecology sector ($3.4bn), that would for example include waste management or social impact oriented startups ($ 2.2bn), we can see from the average seed rounds raised by startups across all sectors, that they reach similar amounts. The lowest average seed funding is raised by education startups, who reach $1.1mn per round followed by social impact startups with $1.2mn. The highest rounds are seen in the Smart City space with $1.8mn and then the Health sector with $1.7mn. This shows that the startup support in place in Europe is functioning relatively well. With a total of 805 accelerator programs identified in Europe, the support structures for early-stage startups certainly reach across the continent and in most cities we would see an offering for entrepreneurs to get started. Here again the sky seems the limit, as London boasts an incredible 203 accelerators while most of the top 20 cities have between 10-30 accelerators. Also funding is concentrated to a large extent in few locations - alone London captures $12bn of all VC money for ESG startups in Europe (20%). London is followed by Stockholm ($7.4bn) with 12% and Berlin ($5.2bn) as well as Paris ($4.2bn) who both do not reach more than 10%. On 5th and 6th rank we see Munich ($2.5bn) and Barcelona ($1.8bn). Looking at the distribution of the funding across cities, it becomes clear that there is a certain degree of specialization evolving. While some cities have a relatively even distribution among the three ESG sectors, like for example Berlin, others see a strong concentration. For the competitive European market it makes a lot of sense to increase specialization where it proves to be successful. In the end, synergies between local firms through the exchange of personnel, ideas and the closing of collaboration agreements offers an advantage in innovation potential and can secure a long-term success. Of course a focus on one area alone is not healthy neither, but for our research we can assume that next to the ESG sectors there is more areas that drive innovation, e.g. Fintech or eCommerce. For this analysis we assume the more specialized in one ESG sector a city is, the better. Based on the Hirschmann-Herfindahl Index we see that the city of Vienna reaches the highest specialization across all the cities who had more than $100mn investments in total. It's focus lies in the Social field of ESG and here in particular the Health sector ($560mn). Vienna is followed by Lausanne and Manchester (both also focused on the Social ESG ector).
Despite making up for only 5.3% of all ESG focused startups in the sample, Clean Energy focused startups reach the 2nd rank in terms of total investments raised by ESG startups in the past 3 years with almost $12bn. The undisputed largest ESG sector in terms of investment remains Health with more than $21bn invested. On third rank we see the Smart Cities sector, that includes as its largest sector the public transportation and micro-mobility field. The combined funding across our sample of >100 cities in the Smart City area reaches $10bn. Somewhat smaller sectors are Education with $5.6bn - despite the increased attention to this area during the COVID-19 pandemic - and Ecology and Social Impact, which focus on topics like waste collection, poverty reduction or gender equality. The graph below showcases the distribution of startup accelerator programs across European cities, highlighting the density of support networks in top startup locations like London, Berlin and Moscow, where we find over 60 startup programs, while other cities like Munich or Zurich offer only around 15 programs.
Number of Startups per ESG Sector Across the sample of >100 cities we see a clear distribution of startups in sectors. Health Tech startups make up for 44% of all startups in the sample, while the other sectors range between 5-14%. The second largest sector is Education with 14.43% followed by Ecology with 12.13%.
DUBLIN*
45
48
32
31
49
33
Investments & Specialization
TEL AVIV
51
53
40
COPENHAGEN
* Dublin was not included in the final index due to lack of data in some sub-indexes. However in this Sub-Index all data was available, if included it would have reached 8th rank. The points are lower than 9th rank due to the separate calculation
60
27
64
36
28
LYON
Top 10 Entrepreneurship Support for ESG
55
37
72
46
MALMÖ
22
With Europe's largest micro-mobility startup TIER and Tesla's new Gigafactory in the outskirts, Berlin is a leading hub for e-mobility and the city of the future. Not to forget that Berlin is one of the largest investment hubs too.
Strong Startup Ecosystem The German capital is home to super active VCs like Project A, Rocket Internet and Point Nine; hubs and organisations like Betahaus and Factory Berlin; globally-facing accelerators like Techstars; and popular events like Tech Open Air (TOA). Success stories like Soundcloud, Babbel, and Zalando make it one of the world’s most attractive cities to build a fast-growing tech company. Tesla Tesla’s Gigafactory Berlin- Brandenburg is a good example of Berlin’s attractiveness for business as well as what it stands for in terms of ESG. Tesla’s first manufacturing location in Europe is their most advanced, sustainable and efficient facility yet. It awaits environmental clearance after the process of consultations enabling local citizens to express objections is completed. Big Players Investing in Berlin The Berlin-based World Fund just launched Europe’s biggest climate tech venture capital fund. The €350mn fund is targeting startups building technology that can help decarbonize the planet. World Fund has been incubated by global search engine Ecosia and will be the largest climate tech fund on the continent, focused on the tech that can reduce carbon emissions across sectors including energy, transport, food and agriculture, manufacturing and buildings. ESMT Berlin, Germany’s top-ranked business school, has launched the Sustainable Business Transformation Initiative. The goal of this initiative is to increase its academic footprint in research and education on critical areas with impact for business and society and to provide innovative solutions to global environmental and social challenges. Berlin will serve as a testing ground for a European project backed by online retailer Amazon.com to work out how best to revive and expand city green spaces, which can help protect residents from rising heat and floods. Environmental charity The Nature Conservancy (TNC) will work with the west Berlin district of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf to map its surface and put together a plan to plant more trees, grass and flowers, and restore wetland areas over five years. Startup Success Stories TIER announced the closing of its €172mn Series D funding round, consolidating its position as the best funded micro-mobility company in Europe. To date, the German startup deployed 135,000 e-scooters, e-bikes and e-mopeds across 150 cities in 16 countries. If Vay has its way, from next year, you’ll be able to ride in a driverless car in Europe. It won’t be driven by a lidar-equipped computer, however, but piloted remotely by a human ‘teledriver’ sitting in a control room somewhere. Planetly is on a mission to help build a carbon-neutral economy. Their software helps companies to introduce and automate carbon management, from data collection to reduction strategies and offsetting measures. Founded in 2019, the team has raised €4.8mn to build the tools for the carbon-neutral economy.
WHERE E-MOBILITY SOARS
Since the surge of Rocket Internet and Berlin's thriving startup scene, Berlin is on top of all startup city rankings. But is the city also a great place for the green transformation? With $5.2bn in ESG investments Berlin is the 3rd largest hub for funding in this space. In particular the transportation and micro-mobility contribute with around $2bn to this sum. But also the Environmental field has gained traction with more and more deep tech startups focusing on ecology and clean energy open up shop in Berlin. The Entrepreneurship Support Network for ESG reaches 42 points for Berlin, putting it on the 2nd rank in this sub-index. Another strong point for Berlin is the societal backing for ESG, where the city scores 19 points and reaches 4th rank. This is mainly driven by the positive attitude of investors and corporates who are based in Berlin and actively acquire startups in the ESG field. This lands Berlin 22 points in the Innovation Culture metric (5th rank). In the Governance Sub-Index, Berlin reaches 30 points due to its good international connectivity (27 points) and government actions for ESG (33 points). However in this category other European capitals reach higher results.
Berlin's Results
Berlin-based accelerators start to look towards ESG startups To understand whether the many startup support programs based in Berlin have turned towards the ESG topics, we analyzed their portfolios since 2018 to identify how many of their participants focus on ESG related fields. The findings show a diverse picture with overall 31% of the startups in Berlins 7 top accelerators being active in one of the ESG sectors. In total these accelerators have supported 364 companies that we could identify, with hub:raum and APX leading with 98 and 81 startups respectively. By the absolute highest number of ESG startups, Startupbootcamp is leading, however. They have supported 34 ESG focused companies, which is 74% of their portfolio. Plug and Play and ProSiebenSat.1 focus their programs on other verticals and only see 14% of their participants from the ESG sectors.
Berlin has overall 2nd largest Urban Transportation Network
180 150 140 120 100 80 60 40 20 10 0
3rd rank for Berlin by Investments Raised in ESG Sector
Jan Feb Mar
Total jobs created in the startup sector by city per month
Copenhagen
Berlin shows a strong commitment to green means of transportation, as it has 1,697km of bike lanes, which is the largest network in Europe, and the second largest fleet of sharing cars with 7,900 shared cars available on Berlin's streets. The startup scene mirrors in a way this focus on mobility and green transportation with Berlin based startups in the Government ESG-sector that includes mobility reaching $2.37bn in investments in the years since 2018. This is the 2nd rank just behind London.
Israel's leading innovation hub Tel Aviv-Yafo shows how government and innovation can go hand in hand. The strong interchange between the two has not harmed the city, but made it a top spot for innovation in the world.
A SYMBIOSIS OF GOVERNMENT AND STARTUPS
Startups in Israel With 6,000 actuive startups and counting, Israel certainly earns its sobrquet of “The Startup Nation.“ It is a hotbed of entrepreneurial activity and breakthrough technologies that global corporations are seeking out for their innovation centers. Its mandatory military service is credited with instilling not only discipline, but also technical knowhow in youngsters. Israel also boasts of the highest number of engineers per capita and the second largest R&D expenditure (>4% of GDP) in the world. Focus on Tel Aviv Located on the Mediterranean coast, Tel Aviv, as the economic center of the country, is the beating heart of the startup activity as well. With over 2,750 startups, it has one for every 154 residents, the highest ratio in the world. Over a hundred global corporations have R&D centers in the city. $6.8 billion found its way to various startups in the city during 2020, 25% more than 2019, despite the pandemic. It hosts a wide variety of events such as Cybertech Global, Axis Tel Aviv and Fintech Week to foster the ecosystem and operates municipal entrepreneurship and innovation centers that provide accelerator programs, support, and mentoring from the earliest stages. Examples include the Ratzif Innovation Center in the southern neighborhood of Neve Sha’anan, and CityZone in Kiryat Atidim, which specializes in technologies that address urban and smart city challenges. Cybersecurity Leads the Way Cybersecurity companies drew the largest investments in 2021 so far, bringing in over $4.5bn in funding. One of the most prominent IPOs in Q3 was by fraud prevention company Riskified, which went public on the New York Stock Exchange at a $3.3bn valuation. Israel exports $6.5bn in cybersecurity products and services every year. The cybersecurity market continues to draw the confidence of investors, who appear to recognize its heightened importance during times of crisis. Some people are more excited by emerging areas like artificial intelligence, which has been a focus of the country’s military for years, and like cybersecurity is now producing many fresh teams of founders. Israel ranks third in the world by number of AI and machine learning startups. Tel Aviv is seventh in the world by the number of AI startups. H2O.ai raises $100mn at a $1.6bn pre-money valuation for tools to make AI usable by any kind of enterprise. Prominent Accelerators FutuRx – Dedicated to supporting pharma and biotech startups. iLog Accelerator – Conducts an intensive 10-week accelerator programme brings together foreign and local entrepreneurs MindCET Accelerator – Guides early-stage edtech startups from the product development stage through to market launch. SigmaLabs Accelerator – Tel Aviv’s ‘for founders, by founders’ three-month programme boasts an alum network of 80 startups with more than $110mn raised in funding.
While Tel Aviv does not make the final Top 10 of the Future City ESG Innovation Index, it deserves a notable mention for it's superb results in Entrepreneurship Support for ESG startups as well as Community of ESG Entrepreneurs. In the sub-index for ESG Entrepreneurship Support, the Israeli powerhouse reaches the 4th rank, while having the 3rd highest score in the Startup Support Programs indicator with 53 points, just 2 points shy of the second ranked London. This result is driven by the outstanding investment climate in Israel as well as the high number of support programs. The total investments in Tel Aviv based ESG solutions reached $1.6bn since 2018 and therefore the 7th rank in our sample. Particularly strong is the government sector, where seed startups raise an astonishing $4.2mn on average, which is the highest seed investment average in the sample. This is surely connected to the well established connection of the startup world with the government and the military. Finally, Tel Aviv also shows a respectable position in the societal backing for ESG index (15th), with a particular strong performance in the bottom-up support as the Community & Network indicator shows (9th rank).
Tel Aviv's Results
With the extreme strong performance of Tel Aviv's startups addressing the Governance ESG sector drives the quarterly numbers upwards. All together we have an average of $134mn raised by Tel Aviv based startups each quarter since 2018. During peaks, the seed investments reach levels of $25mn and more, like in Q3 2018, Q4 2019 and Q2 2021. On average ESG focused startups raise $14.2mn in Tel Aviv each quarter. The total sum of investments is driven by waves of investments and large rounds, driving quarterly sums up to $200mn and more around Q3 and Q4 every year. Some of the larger rounds during the past three years include: - Enlight Renewable Energy, a startup created in 2008 and currently listed on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange had riased the largest round in 2018 with $144mn - Softwheel Technologies, inventor of an innovative in-wheel suspension system for wheelchairs and other personal mobility solutions raised $120mn in 2019 - In 2020 Health-startup Sight Diagnostics raised $71mn - In 2021, optibus already raised the bar with $107mn for its smart transportation solution.
Smart Transport OPTIBUS $107mn raised in 2021
Health SIGHT DIAGNOSTICS $71mn raised in 2020
On average ESG focused startups in Tel Aviv raise $134mn per quarter
Social SOFTWHEEL TECHNOLOGIES (Wheelchairs) $120mn raised in 2019
Environment ENLIGHT RENEWABLE ENERGY $ 144mn raised in 2018
SOCIETAL BACKING FOR ESG
Sub-Index 3:
ACQUISITIONS OF ESG STARTOPS SINCE 2018
286
As much the transition to a more balanced, fair and green economy and society according to the ESG criteria is a technological challenge it is a societal one. Without a common belief throughout all parts of society that change is not only necessary but also possible, any technological advancement will likely fail. Therefore the sub-index societal backing for ESG measures the potential for a society to embrace and speed up innovation in the ESG sectors. Starting from the maybe most difficult part to change, we look at the capacity of corporate actors in each city to change and adapt to the new challenges of a changed environment and also more political and societal demand for ESG adjustments. Across the sample of >100 cities we found 286 acquisitions of corporates in the ESG sectors in the past 3 years, showing a growing exit market for innovative firms in the ESG fields. However, when looking at the distribution across cities, we observe a clustering of >50% of all corporate acquisitions in the Top 5 cities. Even worse, more than half of the cities in the sample saw not a single acquisition of an ESG startup since 2018. This means there is a stark divide between the forerunners in the Top 20 with an average of 20 and a Median of 7 acquisitions per city. In terms of ESG sectors, we see again the Social sector with Health and Education as its subsectors leading. The total number of acquisitions in the Social field stands at 182 or 64% of the sample. Again in this sector, we see London leading with 61 Social acquisitions. On second place is Paris with 14 acquisitions and Dublin on the third (11) in this area. The second largest sector in terms of corporate acquisitions is Government with 59 counts. This time Paris takes the lead with 14 acquisitions, followed by Moscow (9) and Berlin (7). The Environment ESG sector follows suite with 45 acquisitions and again London leading with 10 acquisitions. Another important driver for change is the build-up of fast-growing platforms being able to accumulate capital at a large scale and acquire innovative firms to form a powerful force of change that is competitive on a global scale. We defined such "ecosystemic" players as firms younger than 30 years who have acquired more than 20 companies already. Across Europe we identified 45 such ecosystemic players. However only 15 out of >100 cities have such a fast growing platform and London makes up a third of all. Finally, the societal backing of ESG must also be measured by bottom-up initiatives. The analysis identified 2,694 crowdfunding campaigns across the >100 cities focusing on ESG topics. Surprisingly, here the clustering is similarly strong as with acquisitions, as only 4 cities make up for >50% of the ESG focused crowdfunding. The median across the sample is 10 campaigns per city. London and Moscow are the leading hubs with 33% and 15% respectively.
PLATFORM PLAYERS WITH >20 ACQUISITIONS
ESG FOCUSED CROWDFUNDING CAMPAIGNS
>2,600
Moscow has the largest Sharing Car Fleet in Europe One of the most impactful transformation of urban mobility in the past decade was the emergence of car sharing services. To understand the extent to which European cities and its citizen have adopted this new form of mobility, we had to manually combine various data sources and make an estimate of the current size of the fleet for every city. Moscow is the largest fleet with 26,000 cars, followed by Paris with 13,138 cars and then Berlin with 7,914 sharing cars. In total we identified >100,000 sharing cars in 72 cities, with an average of 1,400 cars and a median of 384 per city. Most ESG Crowdfunding Campaigns target the Social Sector Health and Education are by far the most important sectors in Crowdfunding with >2,500 campaigns focusing on these two topics. Environmental and Governance topics only play a marginal role for the bottom up initiatives.
London-based Corporates acquire most ESG startups With 76 acquisitions in the past 3 years, London-based companies have closed 27% of all 280 acquisitions in our sample. Paris follows on 2nd rank with 34 and Moscow on 3rd with 17. There is 41 cities with at least one recorded acquisition ranging from Dublin (12) to Alicante (1).
Crowdfunding Campaigns by ESG Sector
Innovation Culture
68
18
25
Top 10 Societal Backing for ESG
Community & Network
OSLO*
69
165
19
BARCELONA
16
* Oslo was not included in the final index due to lack of data in some sub-indexes. However in this Sub-Index all data was available, if included it would have reached 7th rank.
Paris on way to becoming a 15-minute city The 15-minute city, a concept that seeks to provide all, or at least most, of their needs within a 15 minutes’ walk, not drive, is the utopia that urban planners now seek around the world. And Paris is showing them the way. Mixed-use neighborhoods and a community-friendly approach are taking Paris back to the period before automobiles started defining city life. New trees and permanent cycle lanes are sprouting out, taking over spaces used by cars and motorways. Mobility & Car Sharing Road transport is by far the biggest emitter accounting for more than 70% of all GHG emissions. Reduction of pollution caused by road transportation is a big part of Paris‘ efforts to go greener. Like shared cars. Though the city-run Autolib car sharing scheme ended in 2018, it has done enough to demonstrate its usefulness as well as popularity with residents. As a result, private operators have jumped in to fill the gap, especially with the city promoting shared resources. It is estimated that one shared car replaces ten private ones. Moreover, the actual driving reduces substantially if you don‘t have a personal car. Talent Availability The demanding French educational system is producing graduates ready to hit the ground running. The University of Paris Saclay, established in 2014, has become one of the world's largest innovation, scientific and educational centers. Four of the best business programs are run by schools in France. Immigration rules have been eased and a Technology Visa introduced to enable startup founders and investors choose France as their startup location. Venture Funds VC activity is at a record high in France, with $3.9bn in VC money in Q3 of 2021, close to the annual amounts raised till 2018. It closes the gap with Germany, which raised $4.4bn. UK still leads. History might also conspire to favor France, with financiers trying to reduce dependence on the UK post Brexit. They are supported by angel investors and investor clubs in Paris, which are increasing all the time. Ecosystem Station F is now an integral part of the Paris startup ecosystem. Dubbed as the world’s largest startup center, it is housed in a building of 34,000 square metres and can accommodate 3,000 desktops which may be equivalent to 1,000 ‘small‘ startups of 3 people each or 500 ‘large‘ startups of 6 people each. Paris hosts a number of events across the year to bring participants together, facilitate sharing of knowledge and promote deal-making, for example: IT Partner 2021 E-Marketing Paris 2021 Viva Technology Paris 2021 Hello Tomorrow Global Summit 2021 Deep Tech Week 2021.
THE 15 MINUTE CITY
With the vision to turn the city of Paris in a walk and bike friendly place, where everything is only a 15-min trip away, Mayor Anne Hidalgo has made headlines. But it is not only show, Paris leads in many ESG sectors.
Paris' Results
Paris overall 3rd rank is driven by its strong performances in the sub-index of societal backing for ESG, where it is almost on equal footing with 2nd placed Moscow as well as in the Entrepreneurship Support for ESG, where it is head to head with Berlin. The strongest point for Paris is probably its performance in the innovation culture indicator, that is driven by the strong innovation orientation of its corporate players who actively acquire startups fro m around the world. With 53 points Paris is only beat by London in this indicator, putting the 3rd place over 12 points behind itself. The highest score of all cities in Startup Support Programs goes to Paris with 60 points, leaving London and Berlin behind 5 and 9 points respectively. Nowhere in Europe do ESG startups find such a strong early-stage support than in Paris. This is not only due to the high number of support programs (52 and 4th rank), but especially due to the good funding climate for ESG in Paris. The average seed investments for ESG startups in Paris range from $1.9mn in the Social to $5.4mn in the environment ESG sector. The latter is the absolute highest average seed investment level reached by any city in the sample. All in all Paris presents itself as a strong 3rd rank in the Future City ESG Innovation Index.
2020 PSA Group + B-Parts.com Only 7 years after starting out, Lisbon-founded B-parts.com gets acquired by PSA
2019 Engie + ChargePoint Services UK-based ChargePoint Services Ltd. was acquired 9 years after its founding.
2021 Naxicap Partners + Stromer Swiss e-bike manufacturer Stromer gets acquired by the private equity firm in 2021 to raise further capital.
2018 BlaBlaCar + Less BlaBlaCar acquired the French urban carpooling app Less 2 years after its creation in 2016.
With 34 acquisitions Paris is the second strongest Exit market for ESG startups in Europe
As a founder of a startup the potential of your idea stands and falls with the possibility to exit your company after some time. This is due to the simple fact that most technology companies have high initial costs, that cannot be financed by the low level or even no revenues coming in in the first years. Therefore, startups turn to investors who are betting on the founder team, their technology, the market opportunity and - again - a potential buy-out at the end of the startup journey. Therefore founders in the ESG sectors are well advised to be on the lookout for corporates who in 5-10 years could be interested to buy their venture from them. Paris is one of the places in Europe, where an exit for ESG startups are more likely. Since 2018 Paris-based corporates like PSA Group, Engie, Société Generale or also BlaBlaCar have acquired emerging startups from all around the world. For example in 2018 BlaBlaCar acquired the French urban carpooling app Less, only 2 years after its inception. In 2019 Engie acquired ChargePoint Services Ltd. from the UK and in 220 PSA Group went to Lisbon to buy out the 7-year-old replacement parts platform B-Parts.com. In 2021 the Swiss e-bike manufacturer Stromer was acquired by the Paris-based PE firm Naxicap Partners proving a vivid and healthy exit market in France.
Citizen participation drives the climate agenda Every three years a survey is conducted by the Environment and Health Administration, looking at the environment and environmental habits of Stockholmers. What emerges is that: ·Stockhomers have good knowledge of, and are commited to environmental issues ·Over 75% feel the city should impose tougher demands on citizens to live in an eco-friendly way ·Nine out of ten feel it is important, as individuals, to save energy. ·Citizens are prepared to be better at separating and recycling their waste, reducing power and water consumption, travelling more by public transport and picking up litter. Greta Thunberg Youngsters around the world are captivated by Stockholm raised climate activist Great Thunberg, for the stand she has taken against climate inaction by world leaders. Catalysed by her dynamism, many school students got together to organize a school climate strike known as as Fridays for Future. It is perhaps reasonable to say that Greta is a product of the climate friendly environment in Stockholm that she grew up in, where 99% of solid waste is recycled and around 90% of residents use public transport on a daily basis. The entire underground system runs on green electricity, and since 2017 all buses have been running on renewable fuels, which was actually the target for 2025. The Climate Action Plan seeks to make Stockholm fossil free and climate positive city by 2040, while reducing greenhouse gas emissions to a maximum of 1.5 tonnes of CO2e per inhabitant by 2023. Startup ecosystem Stockholm is known by many names, one of them being Europe’s Silicon Valley. Stockholm is a hotbed of creativity and tech innovation accompanied by an extremely successful startup culture. In the “State of European Tech 2020“ published by Atomico, “Stockholm is positioned in the top three hubs in 2020, pushing out Berlin for the first time, though this has largely been driven by two of the year's largest rounds of investment raised by Klarna ($650M) and Northvolt ($600M).“ Impact investing and business Norrsken VC is a 123mn €, for-profit, impact VC fund, born out of Norrsken Foundation – a non-profit foundation founded in 2016 by Niklas Adalberth, co-founder of Klarna, with the belief that entrepreneurs building rapidly scalable businesses are our best bet to solving the hardest and biggest problems, such as poverty, famine, environmental issues, mental health, and integration. We want to enable the next impact unicorn – a company that has a positive effect on one billion lives.
If you name a European unicorn, it is likely that it is located in the Swedish Capital. Stockholm has shown tremendous success in producing successful startups and now is turning to attack climate change and sustainability.
THE CAPITAL OF UNICORNS
With northvolt Stockholm has produced the largest Clean Tech unicorn in Europe to date. With over $6bn in investment raised, this alone catapults Stockholm to the 1st rank in environmental investments and solidly puts Stockholm on the 2nd rank after London in overall ESG investments raised since 2018. in the Entrepreneurship Support for ESG, Stockholm makes a strong 5th rank overall with the indicators of investments & specializations reaching 49 points (2nd rank) and the startup programs 24 points (11th). Stockholm also enters the Top 5 in the community of entrepreneurs, having the 7th largest Knowledge Base for ESG with 15 points and making the 8th rank for Diversity & Inclusivity with 11 points. Societal Backing for ESG is the 6th strongest in Europe for Stockholm. Stockholm-based corporates are the 6th most innovative in Europe and the bottom-up Community and Network of ESG entrepreneurs gains Stockholm the 7th rank (8 points). For Governance Stockholm misses the Top 10 and lands on 11th place. While in Government Action it reaches the 7th rank, for International Connectivity the Swedish Capital drops to 16th position.
Stockholm's Results
Environment BUDBEE $30mn raised in 2020
With >$6bn raised Swedish northvolt is the single most successful cleantech unicorn in Europe
Environment EXEGER SWEDEN $10mn raised in 2019
Drawing Stockholm's ESG funding history is challenging, as the multi-billion dollar rounds occurring throughout the past 3 years break through the ceiling of every graph. On average ESG startups in Stockholm raised $452mn every quarter, but if you look at the timeline below, you see that a normal quarter rather saw $20-60mn of investments, while the mega rounds of northvolt drove the results of some quarters high above that level. Its first set of larger rounds happened in February 2018 with a total of $75mn and then saw a jump to $1bn invested in June 2019. In 2020 it raised $1.6bn in debt financing and $600mn VC money, in 2021 then finally $2.8bn in additional VC funding. This puts northvolt far ahead of the other ESG success stories in Stockholm like EXEGER which raised $10mn in 2019, budbee with $30mn in 2020 and CorPower Ocean with $10.8mn in 2021. What is promising is the increased seed funding going towards ESG focused startups in Stockholm since Q3 2019, showing a constant increase with an initial peak. The levels of 2019 are already 500% over the level of 2018 and in 2021 seed investments in ESG startups are on a good way to double that amount with Q1 and Q2 alone adding up to the total of 2019.
Environment NORTHVOLT $75mn in 2018 >$6bn raised in total
Environment CorPower Ocean $10.8mn raised in 2021
ESG GOVERNANCE
Sub-Index 4:
The role of the government is crucial in the transformation process to a more sustainable economy. By setting the right framework conditions and incentives for firms to innovate and citizens to adopt to new environment-friendly and socially just ways of mobility, consumption or food production, the political cast is a pillar to the success of the ESG sectors. To understand the capacity of European cities to create opportunities for ESG solutions we looked at a variety of indicators, for example the public transportation system, which allows a city to experiment with new solutions, pilot and procure innovative tools and feed back data and insights into the market for startups and other players to improve their solutions. For this effect to happen the size of the metro system is an important factor. Only cities with a sizeable public transportation network will have the experience with the complexities of mass mobility and the means to initiate experiments that can yield results that are transferrable to other systems. Let alone the needed resources from man power and capital needed to implement and monitor projects with 3rd party solution providers. A too small network would generally not have the bandwith to allow startups in. In Europe the density of metro networks is unparalleld, across 57 cities we found a combined network of 3,554 km of metro lines, which presents an immense playground for innovative solutions and a vast source of data on individual mobility in the city space. On top of this, we found data in 41 cities which manage a network of 22,000 km of protected bike lanes presenting another large potential for enacting innovative mobility solutions in the urban space. One of the newest trends is the electrification of urban public transportation and in particular bus fleets. As this is a new development, we saw only 24 cities with data on their electric bus fleets, comprising a total of 3,541 electric busses. The front-runners of this development are Moscow (800 electric busses), London (485) and Milan (375). The average size of the electric bus fleet in the 24 cities stands at 154 today. Finally, we also look at the participation of citizen in the decision making and the digitization of government services as an important pre-requisite for the growth of ESG-related innovation. Only if cities embrace digitalization and increase the availability of open data, we will see cities emerge as platforms for scalable startup ideas. The analysis of local e-government solutions is still difficult, as there is a lack of common standards and comparability. However the United Nations e-government survey has since 2018 also included an analysis of the sub-national level, investigating city-level solutions. In the 2018 pilot worldwide 40 cities have participated in the study and 12 of them came from Europe. 10 of the European cities reached a rating of >75%, while only 5 cities from other regions managed to reach such a high rating.
EUROPEAN CITIES IN THE UN LOCAL E-GOVERNMENT RANKING
22k
ELECTRIC BUSSES IN EUROPEAN CITIES
KM OF BIKE LANES
4,314
Air Passengers by City
London has Europe's largest Metro Network 3,554km of metro lines make Europe an ideal place for experimentation for the future of urban mobility and public transport. From tracking passenger streams, smart ticketing to modal transportation - the extensive and well managed public transportation networks in European cities, can offer a playground for innovators and are increasingly opened to function as platforms of mobility.
Size of Urban Mobility Networks in Europe
A Modern Urban Mobility offers Great Growth Potential Europe is expanding its public transportation network with more sharing cars and electric busses as well as an extension of its bike lanes. Also becaue there is over 22,100 km of protected bike lanes, the market for e-bikes is roaring in Europe. Sharing cars are long established and add to a modern and efficient transportation system. The electrification of busses reduces not only carbon emissions and contributes to cleaner city air, but also creates demand for batteries, another growth sector of European deep tech startups. Paris is the largest airport hub in Europe with >100mn passengers While London Heathrow was the busiest single airport in Europe in 2019, the three Parisian airports Charles de Gaulle, Orly and Beauvis together, reach a higher number than the 6 London airports. The second largest city in terms of air passengers is Moscow, which has 4 international airports. The reference line here is 2019 to measure the long-term position unaffected by the pandemic.
Government Action
86
ROME
43
75
35
42
77
SEVILLE
21
57
50
Top 10 ESG Governance
100
84
94
WHERE THEY BIKE INTO THE FUTURE
Governance in Denmark Denmark jumped to the first place in the Digital Government Ranking 2018, done by Waseda University and IAC, for the first time ever, excelling in areas such as online services, digital government promotion, open government and use of emerging ICT. Denmark also comes out on top in the E-Government Survey by the UN, done every two years, which ranks 193 countries in terms of their digital government readiness and implementation. The surveyors were appreciative of the fact that Denmark appears to have found a good balance between achieving e-governance efficiency and helping individuals. Denmark is praised for its “holistic approach to digital government” that puts people first and revolves around the needs of individuals, including those left furthest behind. To accelerate digital transformation and government innovation, Denmark is experimenting with developing digital public solutions in collaboration with the private sector and Danish tech SMEs. Denmark’s Digitization Strategy focuses on creating a centralised ICT infrastructure that links the national government agencies, local government and municipalities to common services and a range of initiatives, projects and solutions such as digital infrastructure, data reuse, data security, digital welfare and digital business solutions. Copenhagen Continuously rated among the most livable cities in the world, Copenhagen has ambitious goals for the city’s social, economic and environmental development. It aims to be the first global capital to be carbon neutral by 2025, even as Denmark sets itself on the path to freedom from fossil fuels by 2050. To pursue that goal the City Council adopted the ambitious CPH 2025 climate Plan in 2012. It aims to implement smart city solutions within mobility, water- & waste management, intelligent lighting, and energy efficiency. By bringing all stakeholders together, Copenhagen seeks to facilitate the development of solutions that address the built environment as well as climate. Through innovative business models, it seeks to transition into a circular economy. The plan includes a transition of energy supply, building retrofits, waste management, public infrastructure and mobility, as well as other key initiatives on both a short-term and long-term basis. Cycling is the favoured means of transport, and the city boasts large recreational areas. Copenhageners cycle a total of 1.2km every day along 340km of cycle lanes. Citizen Participation Improving mobility, involves multi-stakeholder discussions to consider all views. Thus, it could result in not merely implementing a new traffic light system, but one where the driver of a bus running late can influence the system to enable it to move faster. Similarly, climate adaptation initiatives, such as new infrastructures for storm water management, are developed in a multilevel governance framework that balances cross-sectoral approaches with participation mechanisms.
The term "Copenhagenization" describes the idea of a cycling friendly city and shows the success of how personal mobility was re-invented in the Danish Capital in the past decade, making it ready for a succesful future.
Copenhagen's Results
Copenhagen is world famous for its bike culture and love for the environment. This shows also in the good result of the Danish capital in the Future City ESG Innovation Index, where it reaches an overall 11th rank. The highest sub-rank position is reached in the local Entrepreneurship Support Network for ESG, where Copenhagen reaches 9th place, thanks to a remarkable 7th rank in the Startup Support programs indicator where Copenhagen outperforms cites like Stockholm and Amsterdam with 33 points. Also remarkable is the fact that Copenhagen has the 2nd largest share of female entrepreneurs in the sample with 20% just beaten by Vienna with 34%. The societal cohesion and support for ESG in general puts Copenhagen on the 16th spot in the Societal Backing for ESG sub-index. Finally, the indicator for Government Action is to be mentioned, where Copenhagen competes for the highest ranks with a very good 36 points and a 8th position. However, the low rank in International Connectivity (20th) pulls the Danish Capital back down to 14th rank in the ESG Governance sub-index.
Local E-Government Rank
Renewing your passport, reporting a pothole in the street or voting on the architectural design of a new kindergarten building online - citizen are longing for digital services to participate in the governance of their local administration. Which cities are on the forefront of this development and are transferring their administrative procedures into the digital age? The UN e-Government Survey has long measured the national level and shown which countries do best in digitalization. However, only since 2018 it also covers the municipal level. However it does not cover all cities. To create comparability, we have aligned the country results with the city-level results to create a ranking of all the cities in our sample. It shows that the nordic countries are generally more prone to introduce e-government solutions and participatory platforms for citizen. With Copenhagen, Tallinn and Stockholm three of the Top 6 are in the Northern European countries. The first rank is shared between Moscow, which came out on top of the UN city-level ranking 2018 and Copenhagen, which reached first place as Denmark in the country-level ranking. Just behind are London and Paris who share 3rd rank.
GREEN ROOFTOPS AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE
Madrid Going Green As one of the southernmost European capitals, sunny Madrid is perhaps more at risk from rising temperatures than any other. The local authorities seem to understand that they need to be at the forefront of conservation efforts. It has a strategic plan that goes beyond the expected and proposes the greenification of every possible space. Green roofs on top of buildings and plant beds in paved squares will reduce heat absorption and increase rainwater collection. No diesel cars in the city center are allowed. 58,000 square feet of car lanes to be pedestrianised. According to the city, people, and not the internal combustion engine, needs to be at the heart of the city. Bikeshare vehicles will continue to increase. Electric buses already ferry a large number of riders. Municipal buildings will only run on renewable energy. A 75 kilometre urban forest is being developed around Madrid, in the form of a ‘green wall’ or a protective ‘moat.‘ Welcoming Startups Though it has lacked active government sponsorship in the past, the winds of change are blowing through the city which also acts as a bridge to Spanish speaking Latin America, apart from their obvious connect with the US. While Arganzuela, with its mix of creativity and a variety of industries, may have come to the forefront as a hub for startups through natural selection, there are many other fertile breeding grounds that have mushroomed, like La Nave – home to the Innovation Campus, Mercado de Toledo, Google Campus (located in Arganzuela), Matadero, Impact Hub, The Cube and Utopius. Among the more prominent VCs in the city, with their focus areas, are: K Fund – Early stage Kibo Ventures – Mobile and Intennet Bonsai Venture Partners – lnternet investments Samaipata Ventures – Early stage marketplaces and e-commerce They are supported by networks of angel investors. The city also has its share of events and co-working spaces that seek to bring like-minded people together to make things happen. Impact Startups Climate tech startups that address one or more of the UN SDGs are finding their way onto the lists of startups getting traction and attention, such as: Ecommunia Planet – a social entrepreneurship project special- ised in the ECO-Agri-food sector. Vortex Bladeles – Environment friendly aerogenerator that needs no blades. Soto Solar – Develops, finances and manages large scale PV plants. Kendai.com – Marketplace for sustainable and ethocally produced goods, meant for people with matching values. Green Eagle Sol – Autonomous software for the operation of wind turbines. Ossby – Folding and urban bikes.
Madrid is one of the most affected cities by Climate Change in Europe and therefore has not only a strong interest, but also a joint societal mission to come up with innovative solutions to keep the Spanish capital liveable.
Madrid's performance is characterized by a mixed picture across the 4 sub-indeces. In some the Spanish Capital competes with the European leaders for the top ranks in others, it falls down to the midfield. Its highest position is the 5th rank in the ESG Governance sub-index, where it excels in the Government Action indicator with 48 points and 44 points for International Connectivity. The other strong performing sub-index for Madrid is the Community of ESG Entrepreneurs, where it reaches the Top 10 and the 9th position. In particular the high numbers of STEM graduates (>80,000) and developers (>10,000) push Madrid to become the 5th largest Knowledge Base in Europe. On Diversity & Inclusivity the performance is weaker, reaching only the 16th rank. Finally, the sub-index of Societal Backing for ESG ranks Madrid 7th with the points for Community & Network and Innovation Culture putting it at 14th and 7th position respectively. The least potential Madrid shows in the Entrepreneurship Support Network for ESG where it only lands on the 23th position with mainly Investments & Specializations being comparatively low.
Madrid's Results
Startup Investments in Madrid per ESG sectors
Madrid boasts the 6th highest R&D Expenditure by Local Government in Europe The level of R&D expenses by local governments tell us about the local innovation climate and the abilities of researchers at universities and private institutes to access funding for experimentational solutions in an easy and swift manner. Madrid's local government spends $930mn annually on R&D and surpasses for example Paris by roughly $50mn. 82,497 STEM Graduates out of Madrid's Universities every Year The lack of talented engineers and software developers in Europe is a great chance for graduates of Madrid's universities as large numbers of them are ready to take open positions in technology fields. Over 82,000 graduates in the STEM subjects put Madrid on 3rd rank for the engineering talent pool in Europe.
$740mn invested in ESG startups in Madrid Madrid is not known to be one of the leading investment hubs in Europe, but in the ESG sectors it is punching above its weight. With $740mn invested since 2018, Madrid reaches a good 11th rank just above Moscow and behind Copenhagen. The strongest sector for Madrid are the Social areas of Health and Education with $350mn, followed by the Environmental sector with $272mn.
Future City ESG Innovation Index
Final Ranking:
The undisputed investment capital of Europe, London can also leave the competition behind when it comes to ESG innovation readiness. In 3 out of 4 sub-indeces London ranks first showing the strongest Community of ESG entrepreneurs with the largest number of entrepreneurs, the largest number of ESG investments, as well as the most societal backing for ESG with an unparalleled amount of bottom-up initiatives as well as corporate investments and acquisitions in the ESG sectors. Only in the ESG Governance sector London gives way to Moscow.
55 points
The Top 3
French President Emmanuel Macron as well as Paris' Mayor Anne Hidalgo have made innovation one of their priorities. They receive strong support by the private industry like Xavier Niel, who backed Station F, or BPI France. This strong will to invest in change shows also in the results of the Future City ESG Innovation Index. Paris is the city with the 3rd largest potential to grow ESG solutions and reap the benefits of the transition to a sustainable and green economy. The strongest points for Paris are an unmatched startup support as well as its corporate innovation culture and international connectivity.
68 points
48 points
Europe's largest metropolis with 11.9mn people is often not included in European rankings due to the difficulties in data collection and comparability. Putting an effort to gather the data on Moscow proved to be worthwhile for this Index, as the Russian capital competes on eye-level with London and the other European hotspots in 3 out of 4 sub-indeces, even taking the lead in ESG Governance due to the strong push by government and Russian corporates for ESG innovation. Only in the Entrepreneurship Support for ESG sub-index Moscow suffers from a underdeveloped Venture Capital market for ESG startups.
9th
Barcelona The Catalonian capital Barcelona belongs to the top 5 only when it comes to sustainable startups in Europe. It excels particularly in the areas of Governance and International Connectivity (Score 50 and 57) which is partly due to the city's good transport infrastructure. The per capita length of the metro line clearly exceeds the values of the first-placed London and Moscow.
Stockholm In terms of Investment Levels and Specialization, the Swedish capital Stockholm can even boast a score of 40 points, the second highest score in total. This has mainly to do with the green orientation of the Scandinavian city. With a total investment of approx. 5 billion Euro in environmentally oriented startups, Stockholm is even by far on the first place.
TOP 4-20 CITIES
6th
Berlin Berlin has not made it into the top 3 this time, but scores very well with a total score of 29. The German capital gets its highest scores in Entrepreneurship Support with 42 points, thanks to the second highest number of accelerators in Europe after London and high amounts of seed investments for ESG startups ranging between $2 and 3mn on average.
7th
5th
Madrid As the Spanish capital, Madrid excels in the areas of Government Action, Governance and Knowledge Base. The strong per capita expansion of the metro seen in Barcelona is also evident here and 10,000 programmers registered on stackoverflow as well as 82,000 stem students in the city reflect the impression of high-quality education very well.
8th
Amsterdam With almost 19 tourist arrivals per inhabitant, Amsterdam is right at the top in Europe. The city's modern and international orientation can be shown with its 5th place in International Connectivity and Community & Network with the most acceleration programs per capita. The many visitors will notice the high number of bicycles, which is also reflected in a low per capita rate of cars.
4th
Munich The second city from Germany in the top 10 is the Bavarian state capital Munich. Like Berlin, the city can also stand out in the Innovation Culture category where it achieved a strong 4th place. The business R&D expenses are the highest in the field and companies headquartering in Munich acquired 13 ESG startups in since 2016.
Vienna The Austrian capital Vienna shows itself strongly in Diversity & Inclusion and Knowledge Base. With over 50,000 the city has many STEM students and the universities have one of the most balanced proportions of female students in Europe.
14th
Rome The ancient Italian capital Rome is particularly convincing in the areas of Diversity & Inclusivity and Governance scoring 36 for latter one. Rome has a strongly growing car sharing market and equal distribution among male and female students at its universities.
Tel Aviv The Israelian city Tel Aviv has been on the map for startup insiders for a long time and confirms this also in this competitive field. In the important category of Entrepreneurship Support Programs it ranks third place outperforming most large European cities. It presents the highest per capital number of ESG startups and second highest seed investment average with almost 3 million Euro.
Milan The first place in Italy and number ten in Europe is occupied by Milan. The city stands out for its Diversity & Inclusivity and strong Community of Entrepreneurs. About 55% of the students at the universities are female in city of fashion and design, which additionally is among the best in Europe in terms of per capita creation of startups in the social sector.
15th
12th
Lyon This placement is quite a success for the French Lyon because it is the first of the rather smaller cities. With an outstandingly strong score of 46, it performs particularly well in the Startup Support Programs category. With an average social seed investment of 2.8 million Euro, it is only narrowly relegated to third place.
10th
13th
Copenhagen Denmark’s capital Copenhagen scores particularly well with its Startup Support programs and Government Action (33 and 36). The city has the second most acceleration programs in terms of population, and the United Nations E-Government Index ranks Denmark as the world's number one.
11th
Hamburg The northern German city of Hamburg can stand out in the category Diversity & Inclusivity ranking on 5thplace with almost perfect university gender equality leading amongst other to the 8thplace in the corresponding higher level sub index of Community of Entrepreneurs.
19th
20th
16th
Prague The capital of the Czech Republic, Prague is particularly convincing in the areas of Investment Levels & Specialization as well as Entrepreneur Support Network. With all investments spent in social related start-ups, the Herfindahl Index of 1 is mirroring the high specialization and the 10 accelerator programs represent a vibrant startup scene.
17h
Seville Like the other Spanish cities analyzed so far, Seville scores high on Governance and is able to score in International Connectivity being on 10th place in both categories. With over 24 million tourists-arrivals the Andalusian city is one of the top 5 in Europe.
Malmö Malmö is the smallest city so far and can also score in the area of Entrepreneur Support as well as in the area of Governmental Action. Like the other Scandinavian cities, the state's digital infrastructure is outstanding, and in average social seed investments, no other city scores better than the small city in the south of Sweden (4.8 million euros).
18th
Manchester The English city of Manchester, known for its big football clubs, does not have to hide in the ESG startup environment either.The city is particularly convincing in matters of crowdfunding, with 65 successful ESG-related projects, 46 of which had a social connection. With about 5,000 stackoverflow members, it is also strongly represented in the programming space.
City
Knowledge Base
Community of Entre- preneurs
London
Moscow
Paris
Berlin
30
Barcelona
Stockholm
Munich
Amsterdam
Madrid
Milan
Vienna
Rome
Tel Aviv
Lyon
Hamburg
20
Malmö
Seville
0
Manchester
Prague
Valencia
Frankfurt
Lausanne
Rotterdam
Stuttgart
Cologne
Investment Levels & Special- izations
Entre- preneur- ship Support Network
Govern- ment Action
Intern- ational Connect- ivity
Govern- ance
Social Capital
Total
The Full List of Ranked Cities
Cities not ranked due to missing data: Dublin, Bristol, Tallinn, Helsinki, Oslo, Vilnius, Marseille, Istanbul, Edinburgh, Luxembourg, Warsaw, Brussels, Gothenburg, Glasgow, Nice, Budapest, Lisbon, Aarhus, Athens, Sofia, Málaga, Bratislava, Porto, Bucharest, Poznan, Kiev, Zagreb, Riga, Trento, Bari, Genoa, Murcia, Szczecin, Minsk, Belgrade, Alicante, Sarajevo, Malta, Cluj-Napoca, Palma de Mallorca, Ljubliana, Duesseldorf, Las Palmas, Catania, Plovdiv, Essen, Nicosia, Wrocław, Thessaloniki, Brno, Bielefeld, Łódź, Reykjavik, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Timișoara, Varna
Birmingham
Leeds
Geneva
Newcastle
Belfast
Zurich
Duisburg
Coventry
Krakow
Eindhoven
Leicester
The Hague
Wakefield
Utrecht
Nuremberg
Dortmund
Hanover
Bochum
Bilbao
Palermo
Dresden
Turin
Leipzig
Toulouse
Cardiff
Liverpool
Bologna
Gdansk
Florence
Naples
Antwerp
STARTUPS TOP70
Environment Company:Northvolt Location:Stockholm Funding Raised since 2018:$2.750.000.000,00 Description:Northvolt is a lithium-ion battery manufacturing company that focuses on providing eco-friendly batteries. Website:www.northvolt.com Government Company:FlixBus Location:Munich Funding Raised since 2018:$650.000.000,00 Description:FlixBus is a unique combination of tech-startup, e-commerce platform, and transportation company. Website:www.flixbus.com Social Company:Babylon Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$550.000.000,00 Description:Babylon aims to provide accessible, affordable healthcare by combining AI with doctors. Website:www.babylonhealth.com Government Company:Glovo Location:Barcelona Funding Raised since 2018:$527.731.096,00 Description:Glovo is a courier service that purchases, picks up, and delivers products ordered through its mobile application. Website:www.glovoapp.com Government Company:Frontier Car Group Location:Berlin Funding Raised since 2018:$400.000.000,00 Description:Frontier Car Group develops, launches, and operates used-automotive marketplaces within emerging market economies. Website:www.frontiercargroup.com/ Social Company:Karma Kitchen Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$316.307.933,00 Description:Karma Kitchen is a provider of shared and private kitchen spaces used for businesses to grow and scale. Website:www.karmakitchen.co/ Government Company:Cazoo Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$309.240.094,00 Description:Cazoo is an online used car marketplace designed to transform the way people buy, finance, or rent used cars. Website:www.cazoo.co.uk Government Company:TIER Mobility Location:Berlin Funding Raised since 2018:$250.000.000,00 Description:TIER Mobility is a micro-mobility company that provides sustainable ride-sharing solutions to its customers. Website:www.tier.app Government Company:Forto Location:Berlin Funding Raised since 2018:$240.383.183,00 Description:Forto is an online platform for freight forwarding. Website:forto.com Government Company:EcoVadis Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$200.000.000,00 Description:EcoVadis offers a collaborative platform that allows companies to assess the environmental and social performance of their suppliers. Website:www.ecovadis.com Environment Company:Zenobe Energy Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$198.299.908,00 Description:Zenobe Energy is the largest independent owner and operator of battery storage in the UK. Website:www.zenobe.com Government Company:Bolt Location:Tallinn Funding Raised since 2018:$182.942.892,00 Description:Bolt is a transportation platform providing ride-hailing, micromobility, and food delivery services. Website:bolt.eu Environment Company:GreenYellow Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$173.470.567,00 Description:GreenYellow allows anyone to produce and manage energy through solar photovoltaics, efficiency, and energy optimization. Website:fr.greenyellow.com Social Company:Doctolib Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$170.316.550,00 Description:Doctolib is an online and mobile booking platform that helps to find a specialist doctor nearby and make an appointment. Website:www.doctolib.fr Environment Company:Infarm Location:Berlin Funding Raised since 2018:$170.000.000,00 Description:Infarm builds and distributes efficient vertical farms throughout cities. Website:infarm.com Government Company:Cabify Location:Madrid Funding Raised since 2018:$160.000.000,00 Description:Cabify is a ride-sharing company that operates in Latin America, Spain, and Portugal. Website:cabify.com/es Government Company:Voi Location:Stockholm Funding Raised since 2018:$160.000.000,00 Description:Voi is a micro-mobility startup that provides electric scooters for last-mile transportation. Website:www.voiscooters.com Government Company:sennder Location:Berlin Funding Raised since 2018:$160.000.000,00 Description:Sennder is a digital freight-forwarding company that connects large commercial shippers with small freight carriers. Website:www.sennder.com Social Company:Orchard Therapeutics Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$150.000.000,00 Description:Orchard Therapeutics is a biotechnology company dedicated to transforming the lives of patients through innovative gene therapies. Website:www.orchard-tx.com/ Government Company:Selina Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$150.000.000,00 Description:Selina is a fast-growing hospitality brand built for today’s nomadic traveler to help them live, work, and explore anywhere in the world. Website:www.selina.com Environment Company:Arctic Green Energy Location:Reykjavík Funding Raised since 2018:$150.000.000,00 Description:A renewable energy company focusing on creating zero-emission cities. Website:arcticgreencorp.com/ Environment Company:Ynsect Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$148.000.000,00 Description:Ynsect provides products and services that operate in the agro-food and environmental biotech industries. Website:www.ynsect.com/ Environment Company:Enlight Renewable Energy Location:Tel Aviv Funding Raised since 2018:$144.646.030,00 Description:Enlight Renewable Energy specializes in the initiation, development, financing, construction, management, and operation of projects. Website:www.enlightenergy.co.il Social Company:Achilles Therapeutics Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$120.909.042,00 Description:Achilles Therapeutics is a developer of immunotherapies intended to offer next-generation, patient-specific therapies to treat cancer. Website:achillestx.com/ Government Company:Gett Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$120.000.000,00 Description:Gett is a technology platform focused on corporate Ground Transportation Management (GTM), for spend estimated to exceed $100b globally Website:www.gett.com Government Company:SoftWheel Location:Tel Aviv Funding Raised since 2018:$120.000.000,00 Description:SoftWheel is a technology company that develops advanced in-wheel suspension technology to enhance personal mobility. Website:softwheel.technology/ Government Company:Arrival Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$118.000.000,00 Description:Arrival is a developer and manufacturer of zero-emission, public transportation vehicles. Website:arrival.com Government Company:BlaBlaCar Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$115.000.000,00 Description:BlaBlaCar is a long distance carpooling platform that connects drivers with empty seats and passengers to share travel costs. Website:www.blablacar.com Government Company:Einride Location:Stockholm Funding Raised since 2018:$110.000.000,00 Description:Einride is an electric and autonomous freight tech company that designs and develops technologies for transportation systems. Website:www.einride.tech Social Company:Mainstay Medical Location:Dublin Funding Raised since 2018:$108.000.000,00 Description:Mainstay Medical is a global medical device company that is developing devices to deliver innovative therapies. Website:www.mainstay-medical.com Government Company:Optibus Location:Tel Aviv Funding Raised since 2018:$107.000.000,00 Description:Optibus is a developer of an AI-enabled SaaS platform for planning and running mass transportation. Website:www.optibus.com Social Company:Pulmocide Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$92.000.000,00 Description:Pulmocide is focused on the development of inhaled medicines for the treatment of viral and fungal infections of the respiratory tract. Website:www.pulmocide.com Social Company:Ada Health Location:Berlin Funding Raised since 2018:$90.227.617,00 Description:Ada Health is a digital health company that helps to diagnose symptoms and offer treatment advice using an AI-enabled platform. Website:ada.com/ Social Company:Galecto Location:Copenhagen Funding Raised since 2018:$90.151.774,00 Description:Galecto is a clinical stage biotechnology company focused on the development of novel treatments for fibrosis and cancer. Website:galecto.com/ Government Company:dott Location:Amsterdam Funding Raised since 2018:$84.227.549,00 Description:Dott offers dock-less, shared electrical scooters and bikes as alternatives for short-distance travel. Website:ridedott.com/ Social Company:Impulse Dynamics Location:Stuttgart Funding Raised since 2018:$80.250.000,00 Description:Impulse Dynamics is a medical device company dedicated to offering innovative solutions for treatment of Chronic Heart Failure (CHF). Website:www.impulse-dynamics.com Government Company:WayRay Location:Moscow Funding Raised since 2018:$80.000.000,00 Description:A developer of holographic AR technologies for connected cars. Website:wayray.com/ Social Company:Brainly Location:Kraków Funding Raised since 2018:$80.000.000,00 Description:Brainly is an online learning platform where students and parents get homework and study help from peers and experts. Website:brainly.com Social Company:ADC Therapeutics Location:Lausanne Funding Raised since 2018:$76.392.274,00 Description:ADC Therapeutics develops antibody drug conjugates and non-antibody drug conjugate products. Website:www.adctherapeutics.com Government Company:Delimobil Location:Moscow Funding Raised since 2018:$75.000.000,00 Description:A car sharing service provider Website:delimobil.ru Social Company:ottonova Location:Munich Funding Raised since 2018:$66.135.233,00 Description:ottonova is Germany's newest and purely digital health insurance Website:www.ottonova.de Social Company:Kry Location:Stockholm Funding Raised since 2018:$66.000.000,00 Description:Kry helps patients to make active choices about their health in partnership with public and private healthcare professionals. Website:www.kry.se Environment Company:InVivo Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$61.438.647,00 Description:InVivo helps agriculture cooperation regain their rightful place in the global food value chain. Website:www.invivo-group.com Social Company:OpenClassrooms Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$60.000.000,00 Description:OpenClassrooms is a European online education platform with more than 2 million members and fully online degrees. Website:openclassrooms.com/ Environment Company:Zola Electric Location:Amsterdam Funding Raised since 2018:$55.000.000,00 Description:Zola Electric provides customers with in-depth reporting on system statuses, and performance and analysis of power consumption behavior. Website:zolaelectric.com Social Company:Uchi.ru Location:Moscow Funding Raised since 2018:$50.637.150,38 Description:An interactive online educational platform for children. The platform automatically adjust assignments based on the speed and correctness of responses. Website:uchi.ru/ Environment Company:BBOXX Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$50.000.000,00 Description:BBOXX designs, manufactures, and distributes plug and play solar systems. Website:www.bboxx.com Environment Company:tado° Location:Munich Funding Raised since 2018:$50.000.000,00 Description:Tado° offers smart thermostats and apps that adjusts to the real-time behavior of residents in private homes and small businesses. Website:www.tado.com Social Company:TISSIUM Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$43.204.009,00 Description:TISSIUM develops biodegradable sealants and adhesives for wound closure in the field of minimally-invasive surgery. Website:tissium.com/ Social Company:Inotrem Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$43.119.699,00 Description:Inotrem is a biotechnology company specialized in immunotherapy for acute inflammatory syndromes, such as septic shock. Website:inotrem.com Government Company:VanMoof Location:Amsterdam Funding Raised since 2018:$40.000.000,00 Description:VanMoof is a developer and designer of urban e-bikes to help commuters get to work without breaking a sweat. Website:www.vanmoof.com Social Company:Ornikar Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$40.000.000,00 Description:Ornikar is an online driving school that offers radically cheaper, uncomplicated and faster offer to obtain a driving license. Website:www.ornikar.com Social Company:Minute Media Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$40.000.000,00 Description:Minute Media is a media and technology brand focused on two main pillars—platform and content. Website:www.minutemedia.com Environment Company:Wallbox Location:Barcelona Funding Raised since 2018:$39.824.050,00 Description:Wallbox designs, develops, and manufactures intelligent energy solutions. Website:www.wallbox.com/ Social Company:HiFiBiO Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$37.500.000,00 Description:HiFiBiO provides proprietary single cell technologies for applications in drug and biomarker discovery and development. Website:www.hifibio.com Social Company:Hookipa Pharma Location:Vienna Funding Raised since 2018:$37.400.000,00 Description:Hookipa is a clinical stage biotech company developing best-in-class active immunization therapies for infectious diseases and oncology. Website:www.hookipapharma.com/ Government Company:Citymobil Location:Moscow Funding Raised since 2018:$35.000.000,00 Description:An online service and mobile app for booking and providing taxi services. Website:city-mobil.ru/ Social Company:Agendia Location:Amsterdam Funding Raised since 2018:$35.000.000,00 Description:Agendia provides molecular diagnostics and personalized treatment plans for cancer patients. Website:www.agendia.com Environment Company:Agilyx AS Location:Oslo Funding Raised since 2018:$33.192.266,00 Description:Leading the way to make plastics circular. Website:www.agilyx.com Social Company:BIMA Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$30.000.000,00 Description:BIMA provides digital health and insurtech services in emerging markets. Website:bimamobile.com Social Company:Alan Location:Paris Funding Raised since 2018:$28.434.624,00 Description:Alan is a digital health insurance platform that offers insurance services by focusing on a price-quality ratio health plan. Website:alan.com Social Company:Huma Therapeutics Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$28.000.000,00 Description:Huma provides a digital health platform used for predictive care and research. Website:huma.com/ Government Company:Whoosh Location:Moscow Funding Raised since 2018:$25.000.000,00 Description:A kick scooter rental provider. Website:whoosh.bike/ Social Company:EGYM Location:Munich Funding Raised since 2018:$20.000.000,00 Description:EGYM develops and manufactures the most advanced smart connected strength training equipment using high-tech software designed. Website:egym.com Government Company:Dostavista Location:Moscow Funding Raised since 2018:$17.000.000,00 Description:An express delivery service. Website:dostavista.ru/ Social Company:Kahoot! Location:Oslo Funding Raised since 2018:$17.000.000,00 Description:Kahoot! is a game-based learning platform that makes it easy to create, share, and play fun learning games and trivia quizzes. Website:kahoot.com Social Company:Klinika Fomina Location:Moscow Funding Raised since 2018:$16.129.661,00 Description:A network of evidence-based healthcare clinics focused on women’s health. The organization plans to enhance its operations with a number of tech solutions (AI-based clinical decision support systems, chipping for biomaterials). Website:fomin-clinic.ru/ Social Company:Multiverse Location:London Funding Raised since 2018:$16.000.000,00 Description:Multiverse is a tech startup that matches talent who have not graduated from college with apprenticeship opportunities. Website:www.multiverse.io/ Government Company:NtechLab Location:Moscow Funding Raised since 2018:$15.216.656,69 Description:A developer of AI-based face recognition algorithms. Its flagship product FindFace Security detects faces in live video streams, checks them against monitoring databases and sends out notifications to relevant agencies when a match is identified. Website:ntechlab.ru/ Government Company:Wheely Location:Moscow Funding Raised since 2018:$15.000.000,00 Description:A multinational vehicle for hire company which allows users to book chauffeur-driven journeys in a luxury vehicle either on-demand or in advance as reservations. Its services are accessed through its mobile apps on the Android and iOS operating systems. Website:wheely.com/ru Social Company:Ice Storm Location:Moscow Funding Raised since 2018:$15.000.000,00 Description:Cybersports arenas Website: n/a Social Company:Doktor.se Location:Stockholm Funding Raised since 2018:$14.700.000,00 Description:Doktor.se is a digital healthcare provider that helps with counseling, booking doctors, distance care, recipes, referrals, and more. Website:doktor.se Environment Company:Enpal Location:Berlin Funding Raised since 2018:$12.065.302,00 Description:Enpal is a photovoltaics leasing firm that provides solar power systems for homeowners with no money upfront. Website:www.enpal.de Social Company:Themis Bioscience Location:Vienna Funding Raised since 2018:$12.011.478,00 Description:Themis Bioscience is a start-up biotechnology company. Website:www.themisbio.com/ Social Company:GoStudent Location:Vienna Funding Raised since 2018:$9.389.501,00 Description:GoStudent is a platform for online teaching and is the future of tutoring. Website:gostudent.org Social Company:Vivense Home & Living Location:Istanbul Funding Raised since 2018:$4.575.000,00 Description:Vivense is a Turkish online furniture store that connects customers with furniture manufacturers. Website:www.vivense.com
Top 70 ESG Startups
