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- Population 1.3 million
- Size 219.3km2
- Global cities index ranking 8
Amsterdam's international outlook means that its startups aspire to grow at home and abroad. With an above-average gross national income, an English-speaking community and 58 million passengers travelling through its airport every year, the city is a magnet for early-stage founders.
"There's more attention for startups now," says Amsterdam-based Patrick de Zeeuw, co-founder of the Startupbootcamp network of accelerators. "It's not difficult for them to get their first €500,000 funded, but going into a series A is challenging." From here, de Zeeuw says, the companies use the city's reputation to find funding from the UK, US or Germany. "The earlier rounds have become less challenging - and that's a good thing to get the teams going," he says.
insided.comSingel 118, 1015 AE
InSided helps companies build online communities for their brands: forums; news publishing; reviews; and customer questions. After raising €6m in a series A round led by Ventech, with Fortino Capital and henQ, inSided is now adding up to 100 new staff members to its roster and has opened more offices across Europe: it now also has a presence in Berlin, Madrid and London.
Frederiksplein 1, 1017XK, Amsterdam
Impraise CEO Bas Kohnke says employees should be given more feedback by their superiors. The 24-person company, which raised $1.6 million in seed funding in April, helps companies provide real-time feedback. With its mobile apps, Kohnke says: "We help companies with the transition process from once-a-year appraisals towards employee-driven praise and peer coaching."
Kleine-Gartman-Plantsoen 21, 1017 RP
PastBook lets its customers create photo albums from their social-media posts. Founder and CEO Stefano Cutello claimes its users can curate photos in its accompanying app within 60 seconds, before having them printed or downloaded as a PDF file. Vortex Capital Partners invested €350,000 in December 2015. Next up: creating albums from a phone's inbuilt camera roll.
Ambonstraat 79, 1094 PW
Founded by Frank Derks and Jeroen Arts, Deskbookers allows companies to book workspaces and meeting rooms. Already in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany, it's expanding to five further countries, including the UK. It banked €1.6m in seed funding in December 2015.
Spuistraat 114-b, 1012 VA
BUX wants to make everyone a stock trader. Released in 2014, its app combines "virtual-money trading, real-money trading and a community," according to CEO Nick Bortot. It allows potential investors to practise with digital currency before they spend real-world funds, with alerts sent when prices start to rapidly drop. Bortot claims the app has 450,000 registered users and is available in the Netherlands, Germany, Austria and the UK. Further European expansion is planned for the 31-person team.
Oostelijke Handel-skade 751, 1019 BW
Allowing free file transfers up to 2GB, WeTransfer has grown to have 85 million users per month and sent one billion transfers in 2015. The company is now joining Spotify and Apple Music in the music streaming market-place; it will allow major artists to offer downloads of exclusive songs and videos.
Vijzelstraat 68, 1017 HL
Selling 30,000 items a week in 300 auctions across 80 categories, Catawiki is taking on eBay by allowing the trading of specialist items such as antiques, cars and books. In 2015, the company, which has 12 million monthly users, raised $82 million from Lead Edge Capital, and previous investors Accel and Project A Ventures in series C funding.
James Wattstraat 100, 1097 DM
Tiqets works directly with museums and public attractions to sell tickets to individuals and travel companies. Chief marketing officer Daniel Scheijen says the company, which operates in 16 countries, has found success by changing its business model from an "API aggregator" selling to businesses to a customer-facing ticket seller - a move, Tiqets claims, that led to growth in 2015 of more than 3,500 per cent.
Jan Evertsenstraat 761, 1061 XZ Founded in 2013, wercker helps developers automate the process of testing, then deploying, code. The startup, under founder and CEO Micha Hernandez van Leuffen, open-sourced its command line interface, allowing developers to build using its code. In January 2016, it raised $4.5 million in series A funding from Inkef Capital, with backing from existing investor Notion Capital.
Helmholtzstraat, 61c, 1098 LE
Launched in 2014, and now with 60 employees, Bloomon grows flowers and ships them to subscribers within 36 hours of their being picked. The company recently expanded its delivery from the Netherlands to Belgium, Germany, Denmark and the UK. Within eight months of its launch, Bloomon raised €3.5m; 2017 will involve becoming "industry ready", says co-founder Patrick Hurenkamp.
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
