At the centre of this shift is a stronger focus on science-based entrepreneurship, or “science tech”. Deep tech will remain important, but according to sTARTUp Day CEO Merle Antson, it is only one part of a wider field.

“We do not want to focus only on deep tech,” Antson said. “Deep tech is one of our main directions, but it is not the only one.”
The distinction matters. Deep-tech companies are usually associated with complex technologies, scientific breakthroughs, long development cycles and large capital needs. Science-based entrepreneurship is broader. It also includes companies and projects whose competitive advantage is based on research, knowledge or evidence-based innovation, even if they would not traditionally be labelled deep tech.

“Science has to be part of the solution, but it does not always have to be an extremely complex technology,” Antson explained.

This wider focus responds to a practical problem. Universities and research institutions generate strong ideas, but they cannot always provide every project with the business expertise, market access and industry contacts needed to reach customers. Scientific teams may have excellent technical knowledge, yet lack experience in validating demand, building a business model or presenting the idea to investors.

“They need business thinking and other competencies alongside the scientific team,” Antson said. “That is where we can be the platform in the middle and bring the different sides together.”

The platform is intended to work in both directions. Researchers need earlier contact with companies and end users to understand whether the problem they are solving actually exists in the market. At the same time, corporations and R&D teams are looking for new technologies, talent and solutions, but may not know what is being developed inside universities or early-stage research teams.

sTARTUp Day does not plan to replace universities, science parks, accelerators or investors. Its role is to connect them. The NGO wants to create formats where scientists, entrepreneurs, corporations and investors can meet earlier and with a clearer purpose.

“Our role is to be the connector and the platform,” Antson said.

More than one festival

The change is not only thematic. It also concerns how the NGO works.
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Previously, its activities were centred mainly on two major events: the sTARTUp Day festival and the Digit developers conference. Other projects took place between them, but the organisation was still known mostly through its events.

Under the new model, the festival should become the visible high point of year-round activity, rather than an isolated moment.

“We do not want sTARTUp Day to end and then have silence for half a year before the next event begins to take shape,” Antson said.

The NGO is now mapping the needs of different groups and identifying gaps that existing organisations cannot solve alone. According to Antson, new initiatives should respond to real problems, not be created merely because they sound interesting or because funding is available.

This could mean smaller thematic events, training programmes, curated meetings and science-to-business formats. One possible model would bring together research teams, entrepreneurs, companies and people interested in becoming co-founders. The aim would be to develop scientific ideas further and move towards a concrete result, such as a validated business concept, a pilot project, an investment opportunity or a new team.

Antson expects smaller, carefully selected events to become an increasingly important part of the platform. Large conferences provide access to thousands of people, but they also make it difficult to find the right contacts. General information is widely available online; what participants often need is a focused setting where they can discuss a specific topic in depth.

“Someone has already done the selection work for you,” Antson said, describing the value of curated formats.
The NGO is also considering more activities outside Estonia, particularly in Finland and Sweden. This supports its broader New Nordic ambition: connecting Baltic and Nordic science, startup, investment and corporate communities.

“If we want investors from Sweden to come here, we also have to go there ourselves,” Antson said.

For her, international growth does not mean attracting the largest possible foreign audience. The aim is to build practical relationships with selected investors, companies, universities and ecosystem partners.

What will change at the festival?

The new direction should also become visible at the main sTARTUp Day festival.

One priority is to give participants a clearer understanding of who is attending and why. At an event with around 3,000 people, a general networking application is not enough. Participants need better information about companies, startups and investors, including their sectors, development stages and interests.
Antson described the current challenge as being presented with thousands of people and then being expected to identify the relevant contacts alone.
More detailed profiles, curated matchmaking and smaller side events could make the process more useful. The organisation cannot guarantee that every meeting will lead to a deal, but it can improve the likelihood that the right people meet.

This also reflects a broader change in how sTARTUp Day defines success. In the past, the most visible indicators were participant numbers, speakers and the scale of the festival. In the future, the NGO wants to focus more on what happens after people meet.

The festival will remain open, energetic and community-based. The aim is not to dismantle what already works, but to add a clearer layer of value around science-based entrepreneurship.

For Antson, the strategy is about quality rather than mass. sTARTUp Day does not need to become the largest event in the region. It needs to become one of the most relevant places for early-stage science-based innovation.

The festival will still bring the community into one room. The year-round platform must ensure that the right people find each other, that scientific ideas receive commercial feedback early enough and that promising conversations continue after the event ends.

In that sense, sTARTUp Day is no longer positioning itself only as a festival organiser. It wants to become a year-round connector between science, business and capital - and a place where research has a better chance of becoming something the market can use.