Alan
Paris, France · StartupModern health insurance platform streamlining getting care for European employees.
StartupGrowthHealthSoftware
Accelerator
GP Bullhound
Founded 2006. Growth equity investor in digital services and software.
SwedenStockholmGrowthDigital ServicesSoftware
Details
Location
Stockholm, Sweden
Category
Accelerator
Stage
Growth
Profile
/sweden/accelerator/gp-bullhound
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Startups with overlapping focusCelonis
Munich, Germany · StartupCelonis is a Munich and New York-based enterprise software company that pioneered the field of process mining – technology that analyzes a company’s IT event logs to visualize and optimize its business processes. Founded in 2011 by three friends (Alexander Rinke, Bastian Nominacher, and Martin Klenk) out of university in Munich, Celonis bootstrapped in its early years and landed Siemens as a key pilot customer for its process analytics tool. The software proved invaluable in identifying inefficiencies in processes like order-to-cash, procurement, and inventory management. By 2015 Celonis was the leader in this niche, and it partnered with SAP which resold Celonis as SAP Process Mining by Celonis. Venture capital soon followed: Celonis raised $27.5M in 2016 (Series A) then $50M in 2018 (Series B). Its growth was massive – from €1M ARR in 2012 to well over €100M by late 2010s. In 2019, Celonis raised $290M at a $2.5B valuation, making it a unicorn. It wasn’t done: by June 2021, Celonis announced a $1B Series D round valuing it at $11 billion, one of Europe’s largest software funding rounds. And in 2022, Celonis reportedly reached a $13B+ valuation, firmly cementing it among Europe’s most valuable private tech companies. The company’s product evolved into the Celonis Execution Management System (EMS), which not only discovers processes but also suggests and implements improvements (sometimes via RPA bots or triggering workflows). Celonis counts thousands of enterprise customers – including Siemens, BMW, Coca-Cola, Uber – and its software helps them save billions by cutting throughput times, reducing errors, and optimizing resource use. With dual HQs in Munich and New York, Celonis has aggressively expanded in the U.S., competing with companies like IBM’s process mining. The firm is also eyeing an IPO; CEO Rinke has mentioned that Celonis is positioning itself for a public listing when market conditions are right. In the meantime, Celonis keeps growing (estimated $400M+ ARR in 2023) and acquiring smaller tech startups to bolster its platform. Celonis epitomizes the success of enterprise software from Europe – deeply technical, essentially creating a new category, and achieving decacorn status within a decade.
StartupGrowthSoftwareData
DeepL
Cologne, Germany · StartupDeepL is a Cologne-based AI translation company founded in 2017 by CEO Jarosław Kutylowski. Renowned for its neural machine translation quality, DeepL quickly surpassed competitors in accuracy and nuance. The company’s cloud platform serves over 100,000 business and government customers worldwide, including enterprises like Zendesk and Deutsche Bahn. DeepL achieved unicorn status in 2023 with a €1 billion valuation and continued to grow explosively – by early 2025 it had raised $410 million (led by investors like Index Ventures and Atomico) and reached a $2 billion valuation. In late 2025, reports emerged that DeepL is considering an IPO amid surging revenue, which doubled year-on-year to $185 million in 2024. DeepL’s core product is an AI-driven translator supporting 30+ languages, used for real-time document and content translation. The firm also launched DeepL Write to improve monolingual writing and an AI Agent to automate business tasks. As of 2025, DeepL is recognized as one of Europe’s premier AI startups, combining cutting-edge NLP research with a fast-growing SaaS business. The company’s success – valued at $2 billion and poised for a public offering – underscores Europe’s strength in deep-tech innovation.
StartupGrowthAISoftware
Einride
Stockholm, Sweden · StartupAutonomous electric freight company operating driverless Pods and software to decarbonize logistics.
StartupGrowthMobilityLogistics
Hopin
London, United Kingdom · StartupVirtual and hybrid event platform enabling immersive conferences, expos, and town halls.
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Klarna
Stockholm, Sweden · StartupKlarna is a Swedish fintech company that pioneered the “buy now, pay later” (BNPL) model globally. Founded in 2005 by Sebastian Siemiatkowski, Niklas Adalberth, and Victor Jacobsson, Klarna started by offering online shoppers in Sweden a way to purchase goods on invoice (pay after delivery). Over the next decade, the company expanded across Europe and beyond, becoming a dominant online payments provider. As of 2021, Klarna was Europe’s highest-valued private tech company at $45.6 billion, reflecting meteoric growth fueled by consumers’ appetite for installment payments. Klarna’s app and services allow users to split purchases into interest-free installments or pay later, and it partners with over 450,000 retailers worldwide, including global brands like H&M, IKEA, and Nike. The company has over 150 million users across 45 countries and handled $80 billion in transaction volume in 2021. Klarna’s journey, however, has seen dramatic swings: after reaching a $45B valuation in mid-2021, a combination of rising interest rates and tech market downturn led to a downround in 2022, cutting its valuation to $6.7 billion (an 85% drop). The company restructured, laying off 10% of its staff, and refocused on profitability. By 2023, Klarna returned to profit and saw renewed growth, aided by expanding beyond BNPL into a full shopping app with price comparison, loyalty features, and banking services (Klarna obtained a banking license in Europe in 2017). In 2025, Klarna reportedly delayed an IPO amid market volatility but ultimately went public in September 2025, raising $1.37 billion. Despite valuation fluctuations, Klarna remains the global leader in BNPL, with a strong brand among Gen Z and millennial shoppers. Its journey from a small Stockholm startup to a financial giant serving 65 million customers (2025) at one point valued at $75 billion exemplifies the rise (and resiliency) of Europe’s fintech sector.
StartupLate StageFintechPayments