News February 22, 2022: Mindler, xNomad, Nordic SeaFarm, Trustly, Albert, Avanza, blq Invest and more

Here is today's curation of news from Sweden's startup and tech sector, as well as some interesting reads, exclusively for subscribers of Swedish Tech News.

Mergers & acquisitions

• Mindler (Stockholm, digital service for talking with psychologists) acquired Finnish startup Medified, developer of a data-driven solution for mental health treatment. Financial terms were not disclosed (English).

Financing rounds

• xNomad (Stockholm, marketplace for short term retail spaces): SEK32M (€3M, $3.4M) in a funding round led by Luminar Ventures, with participation from Proptech Farm, Wework Alumni Fund and Joachim Hedenius (English, Swedish).
• Nordic SeaFarm (Koster, cultivating seaweed in nutritious Swedish waters): €2M ($2.1M) from Almi Invest, JCE Group, Sätila Impact Invest and Kale United as well as Swedish star chef Thomas Sjögren and board professional Magdalena Gerger (English, Swedish).
• Swedish family company group Axel Johnson led a €30M ($34M) funding round raised by Norwegian solar startup Otovo (English).

News from Swedish startups, the tech sector and VCs

• Trustly, Stockholm-based facilitator of seamless bank payments, is being slapped with a SEK130M (€12M, $14M) fine by Sweden's Financial Supervisory Authority for not meeting anti-money laundering requirements (Swedish, machine translation).
• Albert, Gothenburg-based edtech startup, is launching its offering aimed at adolescents between the ages of 10-16 years, under the brand Albert Teen in the UK (English).
• Avanza, Stockholm-based finance and broker app, is Sweden's highest trusted brand, according to the most recent Reputation&Trust ranking, followed by IKEA (the previous edition's #1) and Spotify (Swedish, machine translation).
• Spotify’s Car Thing, the dashboard accessory that controls Spotify on the smartphone, is now widely available to buy in the US for $89.99 (English).
• Revenue generated with audiobooks in Sweden grew by 13.3% last year to approx. SEK1B (€93M, $106M), compared to a growth of 32.3% in 2020. An estimated 900'000 households have access to a digital audiobook subscription (Swedish / DI Digital paywall).
• Stockholm-based VC firm and company builder blq Invest announced the first close of its second fund at SEK280M (€27M, $30M), eventually aiming for SEK800M. Karin Bjerde, Gabriel Lundberg and John Engholm are joining as new parters (Swedish, machine translation).

Swedish tech earnings reports

• Paydrive, Stockholm-based digital car insurance company: Swedish, machine translation.
• Adverty, Stockholm-based in-game advertising solution: Swedish, machine translation.
• Urb-it, Stockholm-based provider of sustainable last mile deliveries: English, Swedish.
• Dynamic Code, Linköping-based creator of health and diagnostic tests for end consumers: Swedish (PDF).

Other interesting things from the startup/VC world & beyond

• London-based VC firm Backed raises $169.7M to invest in tech entrepreneurs in Europe (English).
• German early-stage impact VC firm Revent closes €60M($68M) climate, health & impact-focused fund (English).

Other interesting things from Sweden

• Sweden had its most successful Olympic Winter Games ever in Beijing (English).
• Government wants to cut the use of single-use plastic cups and food containers by half in four years (English).
• Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) plans to restructure, aims to raise more cash (English / Reuters paywall, alternative URL, Swedish).

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That's it for today.