A Postcard from Endeavor’s Worldwide Gathering through the eyes of Romanian Entrepreneurs

In the Endeavor community, there is a recurring theme: let’s dream bigger. With this in mind, Endeavor Romania recently joined the Endeavor Worldwide Gathering organized in the heart of Athens.

This year, Endeavor Greece took on the ambitious mission to bring together a global community of more than 3,000 people for three days of inspiring speeches, high-impact networking, and productive investor meetings.

Back in 2012, when Endeavor Greece became the first European chapter of Endeavor, we were full of hope for the future of the region. After countless other milestones, including Endeavor Romania’s launch as the seventh Endeavor office in Europe in 2021, we are confident in the power of the networks we created to support high-impact entrepreneurs on their quest to conquer global markets.

As Bogdan Colceriu, co-founder of logtech startup Frisbo, shares: “It’s hard to imagine a startup with development ambitions so high that they exceed the ability of Endeavor to provide 1-on-1, effective support. The Athens conference was perhaps the most impressive business event I have ever attended.”

What were the highlights for Endeavor Romania entrepreneurs attending the event? On the one hand, it was the perfect opportunity to meet and get inspired by other entrepreneurs who have built successful global companies.

“For us, Endeavor’s Worldwide Gathering was not only a business mission on which we had the opportunity to connect with players from the investment environment that is very difficult to reach, but also to know and discover potential partners and entrepreneurs. It was a unique opportunity to learn from those who have already built successful global companies about the importance of an environment designed to support you in the vision of global expansion. We have learned that developing a global business requires hard work, but it can be an easier journey if you surround yourself with the right people who have the same mindset as us and have felt their energy validate what we build at Prime Dash. For us Athens was about: global vision, community, and shared knowledge,” shares Catalin Rus, Chief Operating Officer at Prime Dash.

For Cristian Tudor, founder of vertical farming startup Microgreens, engaging with Endeavor Romania brought a new perspective on business goals, road scale-up strategy, and global mindset, as well as a new business partner. Endeavor’s Worldwide Gathering in Greece came at the perfect time, to open up new avenues for discussion with potential investors in a bearish market.

“In the last 3 days, I have been in Athens at Endeavor Greece’s 10th anniversary where I had the opportunity to meet some of the world’s most influential CEOs. Endeavor has an astonishing team that provided a flawless event set-up, gave us all a flavor of the organization’s vision (dream bigger, scale faster, pay it forward), and offered a program to meet as many mentors, partners, and investors as possible.

I have been experiencing first-hand what it’s like to be in a global entrepreneurial environment. This was inspiring and reinforced my confidence that Ultragreens is on a rewarding track. Of course, a lot of work is still to be done and we need an outstanding level of execution of our projects, at the speed of light. Even if we go through unease times in the entrepreneurial community, that somehow lessens the appetite for investments, the meetings I had during this event built up my trust that financing won’t be a challenge anymore after we will complete our ongoing project – the largest Vertical Farm in Europe, based near Ploiesti, Romania.” Cristian Tudor reflects.

Mircea Popa, the co-founder of Medtech startup Medicai, shares this opinion: “The Investor Roadshow in Athens was a blast! Endeavor truly brings together an awesome crowd of entrepreneurs and investors, all very friendly and willing to help. At the same time, everything was well organized and the evenings were a lot of fun. We were impressed!”.

Mihnea Craciun, the founding Managing Director of Endeavor Romania added: “This was a wonderful opportunity for Romanian entrepreneurs to experience the multiplier effect of Endeavor. Entrepreneurs from all walks of life and from around the world, sharing knowledge about their scale-up adventures, provided an amazing setting for our young Romanian founders to set their aspirations high and dream big. We’re looking forward to joining their journeys and supporting them in going global!”

The event was topped with an inspiring evening in the 2,000-year-old theater of Odeon of Herodes Atticus, where Greek Prime Minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, Netflix’s co-CEO and Chief Content Officer, Ted Sarandos, and Endeavor’s co-founder and CEO, Linda Rottenberg, discussed the future of technology, innovation, and democracy.