NORRSKEN/100





The Norrsken/100 is a list of the world’s 100 most promising early-stage impact startups, as curated by Norrsken Foundation and our friends. It exists to give you hope and positive inspiration, and to remind you that even when things look pretty bleak, there are some incredible role models out there, and they deserve our praise and recognition. Scroll down for 100 ways to fix the future.





The list
The 2025 Norrsken/100 was compiled from over 1400 nominations sourced from 50 nominators, among them some of the world’s top investment funds, academic institutions and NGOs.
Ÿnsect
What If, We Could Farm Enough Insects To Feed The Entire World?
microTERRA
What if, we could clean the water in fish farms by growing food in them?
ZwitterCo
Membranes that can make even the foulest water clean and re-usable again.
eFishery
Ending hunger by improving shrimp farming.
Zipline
Using drones to deliver vital medicines to rural and inaccessible areas.
ZeroAvia
Developing hydrogen-powered aircraft with virtually zero emissions.
Zero Acre Farms
What if, we make oil from sugar instead of from vegetables?
XAG
Increases farm production and reduce waste through the use of flying drones.
Worn Again Technologies
Putting textiles back into the supply chain by making clothes fully recyclable.
Wota
Turns wastewater into a cost cutting resource with home-based, small-scale water recycling systems.
Woebot Health
AI-assisted mental health care, available on your phone.
Winnow
What if, we enlist AI to help restaurants reduce food waste?
Wildtype
What If, We Could Make Sushi Without Killing Fish?
Wild Bioscience
Boosts crops with carbon-cutting, yield-boosting solutions that turn farm productivity up to eleven.
WellaHealth
What if, we build a cutting-edge digital health platform for the largest country in Africa?
Watershed
Giving companies a way to measure, report and reduce emissions in just a few weeks.
Waterplan
Helps companies take control of water waste and water use in their facilities and supply chains.
Wala Digital Health
What if, we build a digital marketplace for developing countries to manage, share and request blood?
Volta Greentech
What If, Cows Stopped Farting And We Could Save The Ozone Layer?
Vira Health
What if, we use digital therapeutics to help women through menopause?
Verdox
Develops goodbye-to-carbon-emissions-tech for aluminum production
Vinted
What If, We Make Second Hand Clothing The First Hand Choice?
Via Separations
What if, we could save energy by separating chemicals with membranes rather than heat?
Verdagy
Turns water into green hydrogen with next-gen electrolysis technology.
Vaxess Technologies
Getting vaccines in the body through patches - not needles.
Veir
Creates a new way to transmit electricity using advanced superconductors, making power delivery more efficient.
Vara
Using AI to improve breast cancer detection.
Valence Labs
Using AI to discover and develop new drugs.
VIDA
What if, we use satellites to plan out electricity grids in the world's poorest areas?
Unspun
Remakes how clothes are made with sustainable and circular 3D weaving technology.
Unacademy
What if, we could give everyone the same shot at higher education?
TytoCare
What if, we build a device that lets patients perform common medical checks at home?
UPSIDE Foods
What if, we could grow all our meat in a lab?
UNDO
Capturing and storing CO2 in rocks for hundreds of thousands of years.
Twelve
Eliminates emissions by turning CO2 into essential products, like green jet fuel or plastic.
TurtleTree
What If, We Could Create Real Milk Without Animals??
Turntide Technologies
Creating advanced electric motors to drive down energy consumption from machinery.
Trukkr
Reinventing supply chains, putting tech in the driver’s seat to move businesses faster than ever.
To zero
Recycles lithium-ion batteries to recover vital materials and cut e-waste impact.
Tipa
Putting an end to plastic packaging with functional and cheap biodegradable materials.
The Great Bubble Barrier®
Cleans up river trash with water bubbles that acts like a high-tech vacuum.
Three Wheels United
Financing to bring electric mobility to emerging markets.
Terabase
Makes setting up solar power plants a digital delight.
Sweep
Sweeps carbon and ESG data into one platform - track, disclose, and act with style.
Syre
Decarbonizes the fashion industry via textile-to-textile recycling.
SunFi
Making solar power affordable and accessible for everyone in Africa.
Submer
Cooling down computers with less than half of the current required energy.
Stegra
What if, we could make steel using electricity and water?
Spoor
Deep-tech saving birds from flying into wind turbines to combat climate change.
Sourceful
Revolutionizing packaging, by making it frictionless for companies to go green and cut waste from their supply chains.
Sound Agriculture
What if, we convince microbes to help us grow better plants?
Solugen
What if, we make the chemicals we need from sugar, not petroleum?
Solstice
What if, we leverage community buying power to give everyone access to solar?
Smartex
Using AI to spot fabric flaws, cut waste, and collect primary production data - fashion just got smarter.
Shipzero
Helps global freight transport get to net-zero with software that turns emissions data into smart, green decisions.
SQUAKE
Giving the transportation industry no reason to not calculate and compensate for their emissions.
Shara
Unlocks financial access in Africa with tech that empowers communities to save, borrow, and grow.
SepPure
Filters chemicals with nanotech that’s 580x (that's a lot) more energy-efficient than traditional methods.
Sensegrass
Makes farming smarter by boosting crop yields and cutting chemical use with agrotech and AI.
Scipher Medicine
A science-based psychic to predict your body's reaction to medicine.
RxAll
Bringing safe, high-quality medicines to the African continent with tech that verifies and tracks every pill in real time.
Running Tide
What if, we could slow down climate change by putting seaweed on the ocean floor?
Rondo Energy
Powers industries with heat batteries that cut costs and wipe out emissions using renewable energy.
Roam
Accelerates clean mobility in emerging markets with electric motorcycles and buses.
Rology
Uses AI and remote technology to provide accurate medical scans, improving healthcare in difficult-to-reach areas.
Retein
What if, we mimic the behavior of plankton to purify water cheaply and at scale?
Resortecs
Melts seams to unleash garment recycling at scale
Relation Therapeutics
Merges machine learning and human genetics into life-saving therapies.
Redwood Materials
What if, we could recycle old electric cars into new electric cars?
Recycleye
Reinventing the economics of recycling
Reality Defender
Stopping deepfakes before they fool anyone.
Quaise Energy
What if, we could get limitless, clean and free energy by digging really, really deep holes?
ReGrow Ag
Using satellite data to get the agricultural industry to reduce emissions.
Qarbotech
Supercharging plants with a biocompatible boost for faster, greener growth.
Puna Bio
Supercharges crops with biological innovations that boost yields, cut carbon, and revive soil.
Proximie
Creating world-class robot-surgeons.
Praxis Labs
Using VR to help companies rethink biases and become more inclusive.
Prellis Biologics
Saving lives by 3D printing human tissue and organs.
Planet A Foods
Crafts chocolatey bliss from plants, without a single cocoa bean in sight.
Plan A
Giving companies what they need to lower their carbon emissions.
Pear Bio
What if, we test cancer treatments on tumors grown on computer chips?
Piclo
Making it easy to sell green energy at reasonable prices.
Pivot Bio
Creating sustainable, zero-waste nitrogen fertilizers with the help of microbes.
Pairwise
Saving harvests by giving produce super-immunity against diseases.
PILI
Replaces toxic, non-recyclable ink with a greener, cleaner alternative.
Overture Life
Saving couples money, time and emotional turmoil by developing IVF with better success rates.
Orca Fraud
Takes down fraud with AI that spots the threats others miss, keeping businesses a step ahead.
Opna
Turns climate pledges into real-world action by financing planet-thriving projects.
Olio
What if, we build an app to ensure food is shared, not wasted?
Northvolt
Making the world's greenest batteries.
Oerth Bio
Giving plants the ultimate shield against disease and pests.
Odys Aviation
Constructs hybrid-electric aircrafts that take off and land vertically, for regional travel.
Ochre Bio
Letting livers live their best life, so you can do the same.
Novoloop
Turns plastic waste into high-performance materials
Notpla
Developing plant-based plastic bags to end all plastic bags.
Nitrovolt
Gives farmers the power to create their own green fertilizer right on-site
Nitricity
Turns air into fertilizer, with zero carbon footprint.
Nilus
Distributing perfectly good, would-be-thrown-out, healthy food to low-income communities to end hunger.
Neurotrack
Early detection to put an end to Alzheimer's once and for all.
Neoplants
Bioengineered superhero plants fighting air pollution.
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Company Name
100
/100
The jury
The final curation was done by Norrsken Foundation and a hand-picked jury.
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Podcast
Want to hear more about these cool ideas? Lucky for you - we made a podcast about the Norrsken/100 with Alexander Skarsgård. Don't worry - this isn't yet another boring podcast about climate change. No this one is... a little bit different.
faq
The Norrsken/100 is curated by Norrsken Foundation. It is compiled from nominations made by our partners. This year, our team processed 1400+ nominations from 50 hand-picked nomination partners, among them some of the world's most prominent venture capital firms.
An impact startup is a fast-growing company where positive impact forms an intrinsic and non-negotiable part of the business model. We are particularly interested in companies that leverage scalable technology to solve global problems. We define impact as driving meaningful and measurable progress towards one or several of the UN global development goals. If you want to learn more about how we define and measure impact, check out Norrsken VC:s annual Impact Report at norrsken.org/about.
It’s hard to say! It might be that our team looked at the company and decided it wasn’t right for the list, at this point in time at least. Or - it might not have been nominated at all. We’ve done our best to source as many relevant nominations as possible, to cover a wide spectrum of companies, problems and solutions. But there will of course be cases we’ve missed, and calls made where you’ll disagree with us. If you’re a startup founder - don’t hesitate to let us know if you think you deserve a spot on the list. Or - if the Norrsken ecosystem can support you in any other way: info@norrskenfoundation.org.
Glad you asked! Norrsken is a global community of founders, funders, thinkers and doers, united by a shared belief in entrepreneurship and innovation as forces for positive change. We run award-winning Norrsken Houses in Stockholm, Sweden, Brussels, Belgium, Kigali, Rwanda, Barcelona, Spain and Amsterdam, Netherlands. Norrsken’s five funds have raised >750mUSD to back exceptional entrepreneurs who combine profit with positive global impact: Norrsken VC, Norrsken22, Norrsken Accelerator, Norrsken Launcher and Norrsken Africa Seed. Norrsken is a non-profit, non-partisan and non-religious foundation. It was founded by Niklas Adalberth, co-founder of payment services unicorn Klarna.
The Norrsken/100 is an annual list of the world’s most promising impact startups, compiled by Norrsken and our nomination partners. It exists to highlight the power of entrepreneurship to drive positive change, and to celebrate the individuals brave enough to try and change the world for the better. In other words: It’s 100 ways to fix the future. Pretty cool, right?
The Norrsken/100 consists of: Early-stage impact companies, meaning companies where positive global impact is an intrinsic and non-negotiable part of the business model. High-risk, high-potential ventures that aim to leverage scalable technology to do business and drive positive impact. Businesses with a scalable business model and a proven ability to combine growth with positive global impact. Companies that have delivered at least an MVP product to market and/or raised at least seed/series A-funding and at most series B-funding. Impact is defined as driving measurable, positive progress against the 17 sustainable development goals.
The Norrsken/100 is not ranked. Simply being on the list means you’re a winner. It means you’ve been selected by the world’s leading venture capital funds and NGOs as a future impact unicorn - a company that could positively impact the lives of 1 billion people.
Our team evaluated more than 1400 nominations this year.
Glad you like it! We’re always looking for more partners to help us source relevant nominations and give the Norrsken/100 companies the attention they deserve. Get in touch and we’ll make something cool happen. Email us at info@norrskenfoundation.org.

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