BADideas.fund launches a €22M fund for early-stage founders in CEE

BADideas.fund, a group of 250+ investors who helped build unicorns, has launched a €22M fund for early-stage startups.

BADideas.fund, a group of 250+ investors who helped build unicorns, has launched a €22M fund for early-stage startups across Central and Eastern Europe. The fund has already approved four investments.

In February 2025 the fund had its first exit, when Five Elms Capital made a $75M growth investment in RoomPriceGenie.

“We’re backing underdog founders solving real problems in overlooked markets,” said Raimonds Kulbergs

Since launching three years ago, BADideas.fund has invested in 30+ startups and built a community of operators from companies such as Wise, Deel, Printify and Shopify.

The new fund backs pre-seed and seed teams in the Baltics and CEE with money and advice from operators.

The fund is led by a newly formed full-time team:

• Arta Abāšina, Chief Operating Officer, has grown global teams and run people and operations in fintech and startups.
• Mārtiņš Pjalkovskis, Head of Investments, has worked in VC, private equity, early-stage investing and corporate finance.
• Jurģis Kalniņš, Marketing & Community Manager, has worked in edtech, NGOs and the public sector, and runs brand and community.
• Pēteris Pūpols, Compliance Officer: regulatory and risk specialist with experience in finance, government-backed funds, and advisory.

Moving forward, BADideas.fund will invest up to €250K in pre-seed and up to €1.5M in seed-stage companies.

“We’ve gone from a scrappy founder community to a full-stack VC fund, without losing what made us different. Now we’re playing on a bigger stage, but staying just as real,” said Kulbergs.

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