Many Russian startups no longer want to be associated with the terrorist state. To raise funding from European VCs, the startups hide their origins and even pretend to be Ukrainian. An exciting trend among Russian startups was noticed by Borys Musielak, Founding Partner at SMOK Ventures, which is one of the most active funds in the CEE region.
“If you’re Russian and you pitch your startup, it’s not a good idea to:– hide being Russian by removing any Russian references from your LinkedIn / deck,– pretend to be Ukrainian (wtf??)Simply state where you’re from and what’s your stance on Putin / the war and move on!I’m going to find out anyway, so why waste everyone’s time?”
Musielak wrote in LinkedIn blog post.
He didn’t specify the names of those Russian startups, but noted that pretending to have Ukrainian origins is already a trend among them: “Happens all the time, actually. Both hiding (i can see this on every other Russian founder’s LinkedIn profile) and pretending (less often, but also multiple times).”