How common are solo founders in CEE?
Solo founders are common, and they ask for smaller rounds. 26% of the CEE founders who applied to BADideas in 2026 so far were building alone, up from 18% in 2025. Solo founders asked for a median of €400,000, against €520,000 for teams.
The figures
| Applicants who are solo founders | 2025 | 2026 (to date) |
|---|---|---|
| CEE, all stages | 18% | 26% |
| CEE, raising pre-seed | 22% | 33% |
| CEE, raising seed | 12% | 22% |
| CEE applicants, 2026 (to date) | Solo founder | Team |
|---|---|---|
| Round asked, median | €400,000 | €520,000 |
| Applied with no revenue | 71% | 56% |
In BADideas application data, solo founders are also less often technical: 38% have a technical background, against 74% of applicants overall.
What is changing
| Quarter | CEE applicants who are solo founders |
|---|---|
| Q2 2025 | 14% |
| Q3 2025 | 26% |
| Q4 2025 | 18% |
| Q1 2026 | 27% |
| Q2 2026 | 23% |
| Q3 2026 | 28% |
Across CEE
CEE founders who applied in 2025 and 2026 so far. We show each country with enough applicants; smaller countries count only in the CEE row.
| Where the founder is based | Solo founders |
|---|---|
| All of CEE | 22% |
| Baltics | 24% |
| Latvia | 36% |
| Estonia | 14% |
| Lithuania | 21% |
| Poland | 17% |
| Ukraine | 14% |
| Romania | 25% |
| Czechia | 24% |
| Bulgaria | 32% |
Solo founders: highest in Latvia (36%), lowest in Ukraine (14%).
What it means for you
- Solo is not unusual. About one in four CEE applicants builds alone.
- Expect the team question. Investors will ask who builds and who sells. Name the hires the round pays for, and anyone already committed.
- If you are not technical, show who builds. Most solo founders are not technical; if you are not, show who builds the product and on what terms.
Related questions
How common are solo founders in CEE?
26% of CEE founders who applied in 2026 so far, and 33% of those raising pre-seed, against 18% and 22% in 2025.
Do solo founders raise smaller rounds?
They ask for less: a median of €400,000 against €520,000 for teams, and more of them apply with no revenue yet.
How we measured it
- On this page: A solo founder is an application naming one founder. This shows how solo founders pitch, not whether they get funded. The application data cannot show investors' decisions, only what founders bring to them.
- Updated: 27 September 2026.
BADideas.fund, "How common are solo founders in CEE?", updated 27 September 2026. https://badideas.fund/answers/solo-founder-cee
Read next
- What backgrounds do CEE founders have?
- How many CEE teams have a technical founder?
- How many CEE startups have a woman founder?
Who we are
We are a pre-seed and seed fund for founders in Central and Eastern Europe. We have built and sold companies ourselves, and since 2022 we have backed more than 40.
We back founders who see something about their market that others do not see yet. They want to change how a whole industry works, and they start small.
Good founders rarely fail on the idea or the product. They fail on selling it. We give your company hands-on help from go-to-market operators who grew Zendesk, Square and Scale AI.