In Helsinki, Nepali Founders Are Building Their Own Mini Slush, and Rewriting Finland’s Startup Story

Helsinki played host to a landmark event on Thursday as the inaugural Bato Summit 2026 brought together more than 150 Nepali and international founders, investors, and startup enthusiasts from Finland and across the Nordic region.

Organised by Bato Oy, the daylong summit at Finland’s capital featured keynotes, panels, networking sessions, and a startup showcase, all aimed at building what organisers call “the Nepali entrepreneurial mindset.”

“Too few of us pursue entrepreneurship, build companies, or actively engage with the startup and investment ecosystem,” said Bikash Gurung, Founder of Bato Oy. “Bato Summit exists to change that. This was the first attempt, and it was a grand success.”

The event opened with remarks from the summit’s main partners, Bijay Baniya of SisuCare, Barun Bashyal of Resimator, and Prakash Pant of Nordes, before diving into a packed programme of keynotes and discussions.

Nima Sophia Tisdall, Managing Partner at Nordic Makers, delivered the opening keynote, drawing on her experience scaling a major company in Denmark and offering insight into what investors look for when backing founders.

A panel of Nepali founders, Baniya, Bashyal, and Pant, moderated by Bijay Gurung of BGPLAY Capital, then took the stage to share candid stories about building businesses in Finland. Their message was clear: Finland offers tremendous opportunity, but the road for foreign-background entrepreneurs is far from easy.

They spoke about the early days. The loneliness of building a company in a country where you do not yet fully belong. The bureaucratic mazes. The cultural mismatch between Finnish restraint and the fire that drives an entrepreneur.

They spoke about Finland as a paradox, an excellent place for building a startup, with its strong institutions, digital infrastructure, and quality of life, and simultaneously a challenging one for foreign-background founders who must navigate invisible barriers that native-born entrepreneurs never encounter.

It was the kind of panel that lingers. The kind that makes someone in the fifth row think: If they did it, maybe I can too.

Apurva Ganoo, a Lecturer in Entrepreneurship at Aalto University, took the stage with a keynote titled Curiosity, Empathy, and the Entrepreneurial Mindset.

In a talk that blended academic insight with real-world resonance, Ganoo made the case that the most fundable startups are not born from spreadsheets alone; they are born from the ability to see what others miss, and to care deeply about the problem you are solving.

Nine Nepali Founders Pitched Ideas

One of the summit’s highlights was a startup showcase, where nine Nepali founders pitched their ventures, spanning tech, AI, industrial production, and even a new-concept bakery from Denmark, to a jury comprising Tisdall and Tarun Sharma, Partner and COO at Nokia Ventures.

Each pitch was evaluated on business viability, market validation, scalability, and funding readiness.

A closing panel on the Nordic startup ecosystem brought together heavyweight voices: Sarita Runeberg, CEO of Helsinki’s renowned startup campus Maria01; Monika Liikamaa, Co-Founder of fintech firm Enfuce; and Jussi Kallasvuo, General Partner at Antler, moderated by Gurung himself.

Runeberg acknowledged that the current investment climate is tough overall, but noted strong opportunities in sectors like defence and AI. Liikamaa urged founders to be precise and concrete in their pitches, while Kallasvuo encouraged the audience to “dream really, really big scary things” as “that’s where the money is.”

Pouria Kay, Founding Partner and Chief Venture Officer at Atlan, rounded out the programme with a keynote on building a fundable startup. Avinash Dhital of Cogknit Oy also shared his experience building an AI-driven ecosystem in Finland.

Prakriti Aryal Shah, a Digital Marketing Specialist at Amplon, hosted the program.

Attendees praised the event, particularly the keynote speeches and the opportunity to network with like-minded professionals.

“I have attended many entertainment programs organised for Nepalis in Finland,” one participant told The New Finland. “But this is the first time I am attending a program like this. We should have more programs like these.”

Finland’s Changing Entrepreneurial Landscape

The story of Bato Summit is, in many ways, the story of Finland itself—a country in transition.

For decades, Finland’s startup ecosystem was built largely by Finns, for Finns, in Finnish. The success of companies like Nokia, Supercell, and Wolt put Helsinki on the global map.

Slush, the annual startup conference, became a pilgrimage site for founders worldwide. But the founders and the faces on stage remained, overwhelmingly, from a narrow demographic.

However, it appears to be changing. Slowly, unevenly, but unmistakably.

Immigrant-background entrepreneurs, from countries like Nepal, India, from across Africa and the Middle East, are entering the Finnish startup ecosystem in growing numbers.

They are founding companies. They are raising capital. And, they are hiring people.

And, as Bato Summit demonstrated, they are building their own platforms, their own stages, their own mini Slushes, not to compete with the existing ecosystem, but to expand it.

It is a shift that Finland really needs. The country’s population is aging. Its labour market is tightening. And the next generation of globally competitive startups will not emerge from homogeneity alone.

They will emerge from the collision of perspectives, from founders who have navigated two cultures, two languages, two ways of seeing the world, and who carry that duality into every product they build and every pitch they deliver.

Bikash Gurung understands this. It is, in a sense, why he built Bato, and why he envisioned this summit.

Thanks to advocates and doers like Bikash, now, in conference rooms and co-working spaces, in pitch competitions and accelerator programs, immigrant-background entrepreneurs are beginning to change the old narrative.

And yes, the first Bato Summit is over for this year, but the movement it started has just begun.