Belgium is a startup country where quality overcomes quantity. With a relatively small population of 11 Million compared to some European countries, it still places 22nd globally as a startup ecosystem. Belgian startups also benefit from the unique position of being at the nerve centre of the European Union, which allows them to be close to major initiatives and benefit from an influx of talent due relaxations on border and visa restrictions, allowing other European entrepreneurs to settle easier.
Startups in Belgium benefit greatly from a well developed support network that works for Belgian startups at all stages of development. For instance, in the beginning, entrepreneurs in Belgium can take advantage of funding, mentorship and networking opportunities from one of 71 accelerators and incubators. These organisations have a portfolio of nearly 2000 companies in Belgium. Once a Belgian startup grows and requires more robust investment, it can get growth funding from one of Belgium's 172 active Venture Capital Funds.
The Belgian government has taken steps to support its startup ecosystem, whilst it does not yet have a startup Visa program, it does have a Immigrant Entrepreneur programme. This allows business people outside of Belgium to invest in Belgian businesses, or establish them. Additionally it offers a select few grants to new innovative startups in Belgium, as well as having access to EU funding as previously mentioned.
1. Voxel Sensors
Year Founded: 2020
HQ: Brussels, Belgium
Size: 11-50
Founders: Johannes Peeters, Ward van der Tempel
Voxel Sensors is a Belgian startup that is revolutionizing the market for 3D computer perception. This is achieved through laser beam scanning to identify and scan various points or structures in space. This allows you to complete your sensory scanning with more energy efficiency and ultra low latency. This gives you an all-seeing eye for any level of lighting, meaning you can always see everything and it is immune to current systems.
The technology behind Voxel Sensor's products would have been expensive to develop and grow the team to facilitate growth into new markets also requires a lot of funding. Voxel Sensors has also stated that it wants to continue developing new facets for its products, which was the reason why it elected to run a funding round in May 2023, raising 5 Million Euros in investment to fund product development.
2. Greenomy
Year Founded: 2020
HQ: Brussels, Belgium
Size: 1-10
Founders: Alexander Stevens
Greenomy is a startup in Belgium that provides a CleanTech, AI driven platform that allows you to collect and manage data about your company's sustainability initiatives. This gives you clear indicators of current performance and will also give you insights on what needs to change in order for you to meet your sustainability goals. This is powered with an easy and quick data collection process and Greenomy has a wealth of expertise in securing ESG compliance for businesses like yours.
Greenomy has had to make strategic use of startup funding in its earliest development stages so it could build the AI platform behind its reporting dashboard. It took part in a pair of rounds, in February 2020 and January 2021 respectively, With Euroclear leading the letter round. The total amount invested has not been disclosed.
3. Unbox
Year Founded: 2020
HQ: Antwerp, Belgium
Size: 51-100
Founders: Erik Saelens, Lotte Van Dijck
Unbox is a Belgian startup that was founded in 2020 and is currently headquartered in Antwerp. Unbox is making it easier for your customers to be able to transparently and efficiently distribute funds through closed loop nextworks. This allows you to distribute purchasing power flexibly, create financial incentives for doing good things, make sure funds that are being distributed are only ending up in the intended destination and much more.
Widely regarded as one of the hottest startups in Belgium, Unbox's high-tech funding direction solution has attracted significant attention from investors. Recently, in January 2024 it benefited from support from HSBC Asset Management and a subsidiary of the Belgian Sovereign Wealth Fund. This support entailed an investment totalling 12 Million Euros.
4. Vertuoza
Year Founded: 2021
HQ: Nivelles, Belgium
Size: 51-100
Founders: Antoni Filippo, Dominique Pellegrino, Kevin Vermeulen
Vertuoza is a Belgian startup that is creating the number one software platform for construction companies. It allows you to maintain a dashboard containing information about your business and all of your ongoing projects, who is working on them and how they are currently going. You can also track and monitor your project financials, such as your profit margin in real-time, giving you an instant idea of how valuable and profitable a project has been. This allows you to reduce your administrative workload, cut down on costs and increase your margins.
Following the successful launch of the product in Belgium and the Netherlands, Vertuoza has required additional funding to facilitate the platform's launch in other European countries. As a result of this, Vertuoza raised 10 Million Euros during its Series A funding round in November 2023. Specifically, the funding will fuel localisation of the product as well as allowing for new hires to facilitate future expansion.
5. Aikido Security
Year Founded: 2022
HQ: Ghent, Belgium
Size: 11-50
Founders: Amber Rucker, Felix Garriau, Roeland Delrue, Willem Delbare
Aikido Security is a Belgian startup that was founded in 2022 and operates in the cybersecurity market. It is the premier solution for securing your web applications, giving you an instant overview of all of your code and the potential vulnerabilities contained within it. This allows you to quickly establish a triage process for the vulnerabilities and facilitates rapid elimination of potential threats. This allows you to make sure that your systems and customers are kept safe.
Aikido Security has experienced good growth since being founded, rapidly establishing a positive brand reputation and headcount growth. Despite this, the team is not satisfied and have recently sought and secured 5 Million Euros in funding to facilitate the expansion of its internal team and market presence, creating a brand reputation that spans across the globe.
6. Henchman
Year Founded: 2020
HQ: Ghent, Belgium
Size: 11-50
Founders: Jorn Vanysacker, Gilles Mattelin, Wouter Van Respaille
Henchman is a startup in Belgium that was founded in 2020 and is currently making itself at home in Ghent. It allows you to create the fastest contract drafting experience for your legal teams, making the creation of sales agreements and other key documents fast, easier and much cheaper for you. It is currently being trusted by some of the world's biggest companies such as ISS, JPM, Deloitte. This shows that your contract arrangements are in the safest possible hands.
Developing a software that can actually effectively draft legal documents based on your specific input is a cost-intensive exercise to ensure the software works without putting clients in jeopardy. It has sought and secured further funding worth $7 Million to further develop the platform and build in new functionalities for clause searching within its contracts. Furthermore, the money will be used partially to fuel company expansion.
7. Lets Build
Year Founded: 2019
HQ: Brussels, Belgium
Size: 51-100
Founders: Gari Nickson, Klaus Nyengaard
Lets Build is a Belgian startup that was founded in 2019 and helps construction companies with the finer points of site management. For example, you can get a real-time site diary which logs all happenings on site, giving you full visibility about project progress. Additionally, there are built-in features to support you with safety and regulatory requirements, ensuring that there are no issues during the build stage and company policy is being adhered to. Finally, you are able to collaborate with team members in-platform through the distribution of scheduled communications across all projects.
Creating the underlying platform and ensuring it can be built around compliance with the latest construction laws, requires a lot of input from industry experts. Lets Build has expanded rapidly within Belgium and it is now poised to expand further afield into different countries. Its most recent funding round in 2022, netted Lets Build 6.3 Million Euros to tweak its existing solution and build products into the platform.
8. Protealis
Year Founded: 2021
HQ: Ghent, Belgium
Size: 11-50
Founders: Benjamin Laga
Protealis is a startup in Belgium that is aiming to address the problem of sustainability within food supply chains. This is achieved through its development of sustainable plant-based proteins, derived from superior quality seeds that can produce better yields and healthier foods. This allows you, as a European farmer, to overcome the European climate, which can be difficult to manage when growing a variety of crops. Your crops will be better able to cope and you will have more of it.
Protealis is addressing one of the biggest upcoming issues for society, food scarcity and this mission is one that resonates with investors and government agencies alike. As a result of this, Protealis has been able to leverage its position to secure funding so that it can improve its technology and create better results for farmers. Its most recent investment took place in January 2024, when it raised 22 Million Euros.
9. Vaultspeed
Year Founded: 2017
HQ: Leuven, Belgium
Size: 101-250
Founders: Piet De Windt, Dirk Vermeiren
VaultSpeed is one of Belgium's most exciting startups, the Big Data company provides you with the opportunity to automate every step of the process when operating your cloud data warehouse, lakehouse or mesh. This allows you to set up these data infrastructure points incredibly easily and also makes the process of maintaining your data less time consuming and simpler for your team.
Big Data is one of the most investment-friendly startup markets globally and Vaultspeed is providing a lifeline solution for data managers, freeing up their time and resources. These factors have led to Vaultspeed being a very attractive investment opportunity, especially considering its present growth levels. Vaultspeed's most recent funding round took place in November 2023 and during this round it raised $15.9 Million.
10. Raito
Year Founded: 2021
HQ: Brussels, Belgium
Size: 11-50
Founders: Bart Vandekerckhove, Dieter Wachters
Raito is a Belgian startup that was founded in 2021 and is currently making itself at home in the capital, Brussels. It provides the complete data security package for your teams. With Raito, you can manage, monitor and automate aspects of your multi-cloud data infrastructure. This means you can securely provide your data teams with the information they need to do their jobs within mere minutes. This saves you significant time and money during your data operations.
Raito has been successfully growing its internal team and developing upon its platform, with these actions being accelerated by its successful October 2022 funding round, where it raised 4 Million Euros in Seed funding. This funding has also helped it to accelerate its rollout in North America.
11. Dualyx
Year Founded: 2021
HQ: Ghent, Belgium
Size: 11-50
Founders: Luc Van Rompaey
Dualyx is a Belgian startup that operates within the biotechnology market and is aiming to develop the next generation of immune modulators. These modulators are intended to provide crucial, life-changing treatments for those that suffer with critical autoimmune disorders. It is currently generating a pipeline of multiple treatment options that it is currently experimenting with and intends to distribute many of these to the market.
Developing and researching its groundbreaking Treg therapies is an expensive endeavour and requires some of the finest individuals in Biotechnology, which hiring does not come cheap. As a result of this, it is encouraging to see large-scale growth may be on the horizon as Dualyx has recently successfully raised 40 Million Euros to continue its research into autoimmune therapies.
12. BRIKL
Year Founded: 2019
HQ: Lubbeek, Belgium
Size: 51-100
Founders: Maarten Boone, Tobias Meixner, Jason Reinhardt
BRIKL is a startup in Belgium that was founded in 2019 and aims to make it easier for businesses to develop and order, on demand their own high-quality team apparel and create a store to sell branded items. These stores can be easily scaled and integrated with external software solutions, in addition the stores can be set up so that multiple languages and currencies can be used depending on user requirements. You can also factor in aspects of the design process using BRIKL, saving you precious time and money on product design.
Despite the massive growth that BRIKL has experienced since being founded, it has been very conservative in the level of startup funding that it has generated. This indicates that the impressive growth and development at BRIKL is due to product sales and actual commercial performance. BRIKL's last funding round took place in December 2021 and it raised an undisclosed amount.
13. LegalFly
Year Founded: 2023
HQ: Ghent, Belgium
Size: 1-10
Founders: Kasper Verbeeck, Dennis Montegnies
LegalFly is a LawTech startup that was founded in 2023 and is currently headquartered in Ghent. Its platform helps you to streamline the day to day operations of your internal legal teams, making a range of tasks such as contract review and contract drafting significantly quicker and less prone to human error. This frees your legal team up to deal with more pressing issues. On average, users are getting up to 110 minutes of their time back from each document they produce using LegalFly.
Developing a platform that can accurately and quickly produce and review legal documents in place of trained legal professionals requires a lot of technical expertise and also a lot of legal oversight to ensure nothing goes wrong. It should come as no surprise then that in November 2023, LegalFly successfully raised more than 2 Million Euros in order to accelerate its growth and develop its product suite to meet ever-increasing demand.
14. Tally
Year Founded: 2020
HQ: Ghent, Belgium
Size: 51-100
Founders: Marie Martens, Filip Minev
Tally is a Belgian startup that was founded in 2020 and it provides you with the opportunity to simply and quickly create online forms for free. You can create as many as you want and deploy them all without worrying about a paywall getting in the way. The interface is incredibly simple, acting like a simple text document but becoming something bigger and more beautiful when you deploy it. Furthermore, all information is stored safely to comply with European data protection regulations.
Despite the rapid growth and development of Tally, it is one of the few successful startups that has managed to get there successfully through bootstrapping. To date, Tally has not sought or gained any external startup funding, meaning all of its growth has been facilitated through its trading activity. In the event that Tally wishes to aggressively pursue more market share, it may be required to secure startup funding.
15. Alpega
Year Founded: 2017
HQ: Zaventam, Belgium
Size: 101-250
Founders: Todd DeLaughter
Alpega is a Belgian startup that was founded in 2017 and is currently headquartered in Zaventam. It provides a range of solutions to help to support your business with your supply chain requirements. With its software solutions, you get full visibility of every stage in the supply chain, in addition to being able to easily integrate your networks to ensure they also attain visibility. This, coupled with in-platform automation, allows you to reduce your costs and optimise your freight management processes.
Despite the size and scope of Alpega, it has only seen the need to attempt a single round of startup funding since 2017. This round took place in September 2018, and during this debt round, it secured an undisclosed amount of funding. This round was led by Ardian and has helped Alpega to facilitate its meteoric growth in Belgium.
16. Cronos Wallonia
Year Founded: 2021
HQ: Louvain-la-neuve, Belgium
Size: 51-100
Founders: Laurent Nogaret
Cronos Wallonia is a startup in Belgium that was founded in 2021 and has experienced rapid growth since then. They provide strategic support to you, whether you're an established SME or a startup, with the support they provide being digital support, including actual IT infrastructure or digital marketing to get your business noticed. Their state of the art solutions allow you to improve your internal efficiency.
Despite the intense growth seen by Cronos Wallonia since it was founded, it has not yet sought to accelerate its expansion through the use of external funding. It is currently unclear if further investment will be required in the future.
17. Timefold
Year Founded: 2021
HQ: Ghent, Belgium
Size: 11-50
Founders: Geoffrey De Smet, Maarten Vandenbroucke
TimeFold is a Belgian startup that was founded in 2021 and has steadily grown since then. It allows you to optimise your time, by reducing the amount of time it takes to optimise your operations and scheduling when coding using Java, Python or Kotlin. This is achieved through the support of open source AI integration which helps you to solve service route scheduling, employee scheduling and your last mile delivery routes for logistics.
As stated, Timefold has steadily grown since being founded and during its last funding round in April 2023, it raised 2 Million Euros during a Seed Funding round. This funding was used by Timefold so that it could further develop its underlying technology and allow it to expand its reach to more markets across the globe.
18. TechWolf
Year Founded: 2018
HQ: Ghent, Belgium
Size: 51-100
Founders: Andreas De Neve, Jeroen Van Hautte and Mikaël Wornoo
TechWolf is a Belgian startup that was founded in 2018 and is currently headquartered in Ghent. Identifying the skills of your employees and any deficits they may have in these skills is difficult and can be a touchy subject if left to subjectivity. With Techwolf, you can use a mix of HR information on your employees and their digital footprint within your organisation to identify where they are working well and to also identify areas where they may need more support. This gives you a data-based, objective look into how your employees are performing.
Techwolf has managed to very effectively grow its portfolio since being founded, with strategic use of 10 Million Euros, which it received in a startup funding round in May 2022 being dedicated to a blend of internationalisation and improvement on the existing Techwolf platform.
19. BelGaN
Year Founded: 2022
HQ: Oudenaarde, Belgium
Size: 101-250
Founders: Alan Zhen Zhou
BelGan is a Belgian startup that was founded in 2022 and is currently assisting businesses in the automotive, industrial and medical sectors by using its massive production and manufacturing capabilities to develop semiconductors which can serve these industries. By leveraging its previous experience in manufacturing, it can also ensure effective practices are put into place to ensure efficiency and ease of production.
Retooling production capabilities in order to facilitate semiconductor manufacturing is an expansive endeavour. As a result of this, BelGaN took the decision to undertake a round of startup funding to assist with this development and to meet new production needs. This investment was worth $10 Million and took place near-launch in 2022.
20. Swave Photonics
Year Founded: 2022
HQ: Leuven, Belgium
Size: 1-10
Founders: Theodore (Theo) Marescaux
Swave Photonics is a Belgian startup that operates in the semiconductor industry and is creating the next generation of fabless semiconductors. It is currently designing and building its own chips which make use of their own patented technology based on diffractive optics. This will go a long way to making these types of semiconductors commercially viable and eventually bring the metaverse to life as a result of the increased capability they provide for this sector.
Building up new and not yet commercialised technology is difficult and cost intensive, as a result of this, Swave Photonics has used a startup funding round in June 2023 worth 10 Million Euros to accelerate its product roadmap and engage with potentially increased partners and clients to build up the road to market for the technology.
21. Astrivax
Year Founded: 2022
HQ: Heverlee, Belgium
Size: 1-10
Founders: Hanne Callewaert
Astrivax is a Belgian startup that was founded in 2022 and operates in the vaccine market. It is currently developing plug and play vaccine platforms for a wide variety of different vaccine types. It has developed new patented DNA technology that allows for better uptake of vaccines with fewer side effects and it currently has its technology going through clinical trials with view to bringing eventual vaccine treatments to market.
The process of going through a clinical trial and developing a patent for medical technology involves burning through a lot of capital in lawyers and paying researchers. Its most recent funding round in 2022, was used to facilitate the route to market for its first thermostable yellow fever vaccine- this investment was worth 30 Million Euros.
FAQs
What Are The Strongest Startup Industries In Belgium?
The strongest startup industries in Belgium are Healthcare, Saas and Data, Energy and CleanTech, and IoT.
How Much Funding Do Belgian Startups Raise?
Belgian startups raised a total of $1,032,656,118 in funding during 2023, meaning the average Belgian startup received around $470,000 in investment.
How Many Tech Startups Are There In Belgium?
Current estimates show that there are around 2,200 tech startups operating in Belgium.
