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Startup Funding Trends | September, 2026 (STARTUP EDITION)

Startup Funding Trends in September 2026 reveal where capital is flowing so founders can pitch smarter, avoid wasted months, and raise with confidence.

Violetta Bonenkamp

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MEAN CEO - Startup Funding Trends | September, 2026 (STARTUP EDITION) | Startup Funding Trends September 2026

Table of Contents

Startup Funding Trends, September, 2026 show a market where money is flowing again, but only to startups that can prove traction, margins, defensibility, and timing. If you are fundraising, this helps you focus on what investors want now: a clear category, tighter spend, real customer demand, and a story backed by evidence, not hype.

• AI leads venture capital, especially infrastructure, applied AI, robotics, and software tied to real business output, while weak “wrapper” startups face tougher scrutiny.
• Fintech, defense tech, sovereign tech, biotech, and deeptech are also winning attention, but mega-rounds hide how hard it still is for average founders to raise.
• Investors are making fewer bets with more conviction, which means longer diligence, stronger ARR expectations, closer attention to burn multiple, and less patience for vague positioning.
• European founders still have strong opportunities in industrial AI, manufacturing software, compliance-heavy fintech, digital identity, defense, and research-led sectors if they package technical depth with a sharper fundraising narrative.

Recent coverage like startup funding trends May 2026 and startup funding trends April 2026 points to the same pattern: capital is concentrated, the middle is squeezed, and disciplined founders who prepare early will have the best shot.

Startup Funding News | September, 2026 (STARTUP EDITION)

Startup Funding Trends
When the term sheet finally lands and suddenly everyone on the team starts calling instant noodles a temporary budgeting phase. Unsplash

Startup Funding Trends in September 2026 tell a very clear story: money is back, but trust is not. Capital is flowing fast into a narrower set of companies, especially in AI, fintech, defense tech, biotech, and deeptech, while average founders face a tougher bar, longer diligence, and far less patience from investors. From my point of view as a European serial entrepreneur, this is not a contradiction. It is the new funding logic of 2026.

I say this as someone who has spent years building across Europe, deeptech, edtech, IP tech, blockchain, and founder tooling. I have seen what happens when a market moves from broad optimism to concentrated conviction. Investors stop funding stories and start funding timing, traction, margins, defensibility, and geopolitical relevance. That shift changes how founders should pitch, hire, build, and even think.

September is a good moment to assess the year because enough data has accumulated to separate hype from pattern. Reports and market commentary from Seedscope on startup funding in 2026, Crunchbase coverage of North American funding records, HubSpot analysis of VC fundraising trends, and Crunchbase investor predictions for 2026 startup sectors all point in the same direction. Funding has surged, but it is heavily concentrated. Mega-rounds distort the headlines, and founder quality matters more than ever.

Here is why this matters for entrepreneurs, freelancers, and business owners. You do not need to be raising a billion-dollar round to feel the effects. These funding patterns shape customer budgets, hiring markets, valuations, exit windows, and which startup categories get attention. If you sell to startups, build one, advise one, or hope to fundraise soon, this market already affects you.

What are the biggest startup funding trends in September 2026?

If I had to compress September 2026 into one line, it would be this: capital is abundant at the top and selective everywhere else. That is the pattern founders must understand before they waste six months chasing the wrong investors with the wrong story.

  • AI remains the magnet for capital, especially infrastructure, models, tooling, robotics, and applied systems with clear economic value.
  • Fintech is back, but the money prefers payments, stablecoins, AI-native finance tools, and companies close to pre-IPO maturity.
  • Defense tech and sovereign tech moved from niche to serious investor interest.
  • Biotech held steadier than many expected, even while AI absorbed a huge share of attention.
  • Mega-rounds above $1 billion are no longer rare headlines, which pushes average round statistics upward and hides how hard fundraising still is for most founders.
  • Investors prefer fewer bets with stronger conviction, so diligence is stricter and storytelling alone has less value.
  • Emerging markets and non-US regions are getting more attention, especially where talent, policy, and digital adoption create a strong case.
  • Capital efficiency and burn multiple matter more, especially from seed to Series A.

This is a barbell market. At one end, giant checks go to category leaders or companies that investors believe can become category leaders. At the other end, early-stage teams with very clear proof of demand still get funded. The middle is where many startups suffer. They are too early for growth money and too messy for disciplined seed investors.

That middle zone is where many founders still use a 2021 playbook in a 2026 market. That is expensive. It creates fake momentum, bloated decks, weak unit economics, and hiring decisions that assume money will always be available. It will not.

Why is AI taking such a large share of venture capital?

Because investors believe AI can create outlier winners at historic speed. That belief may be partly correct and partly dangerous, but it is shaping fund allocation right now. According to market reporting, AI-related startups and adjacent sectors are pulling a huge share of deal value, and billion-dollar rounds have become far more common than in earlier cycles.

Let’s define the term clearly. In this article, AI means artificial intelligence used in startup products, infrastructure, or operations. It can include frontier model companies, agent systems, developer tooling, robotics, enterprise automation, vertical software with strong AI components, and hardware linked to model deployment. It does not mean that adding a chatbot to a weak SaaS product suddenly makes it fundable.

From my perspective, the market now separates AI startups into three buckets:

  • Infrastructure winners: chips, compute, model layers, data tooling, security, orchestration.
  • High-value applied AI: software that removes labor cost, speeds decision making, or creates measurable commercial output.
  • Cosmetic AI: startups that repackage generic models without a moat, proprietary workflow, distribution edge, or sticky data loop.

The first two buckets still attract money. The third is where founders face rude awakenings. Investors have seen too many thin wrappers. If you cannot explain why your product survives when model costs fall and competitors copy your interface, your fundraising story is weak.

As someone who builds AI tooling for founders and also works with no-code systems, I am very pro-AI and deeply sceptical of lazy AI positioning. My rule is simple: AI must remove friction, compress time, or create a hard-to-copy operational advantage. If it only decorates a pitch deck, investors will see through it.

What kinds of AI startups are getting funded?

  • Startups with proprietary data access or workflow ownership
  • Companies tied to defense, security, or sovereign compute
  • Developer platforms and infrastructure
  • Industry-specific software with proven customer pull
  • AI systems linked to robotics, logistics, manufacturing, healthcare, or finance

That last point matters for Europe. European founders often assume they are disadvantaged because they are not in Silicon Valley. Sometimes that is true. But Europe has an edge in industrial software, regulated sectors, engineering, digital identity, compliance, B2B software, and research-led deeptech. Those are real funding stories in 2026 if the founder knows how to package them.

What does the return of fintech funding actually mean?

Fintech is not back in the loose, easy-money sense. It is back in a more disciplined way. Investors want finance companies that either reduce operational cost, improve compliance, modernize payments, or sit close to structural shifts such as stablecoins, agentic payments, treasury workflows, and AI-native finance operations.

That means founders need to stop pitching fintech as a branding category and start pitching it as a financial machine with clear risk controls. In this context, fintech includes payments, lending, wealth tools, accounting systems, insurance technology, compliance software, treasury tools, and banking infrastructure.

One of the strongest themes in September 2026 is that investors like fintech more when it behaves like software with disciplined economics, not like growth theater. This is healthy. Finance is unforgiving, and markets eventually punish startups that confuse volume with quality.

I also see a parallel with my own work in IP and compliance tooling. Categories once treated as boring become attractive when regulation tightens and customers need automation. That is exactly why founders in payments, identity, audit trails, fraud prevention, and financial workflow tooling are getting sharper interest.

Why are defense tech and sovereign tech rising so fast?

Because geopolitics moved into venture capital with full force. Europe knows this well. Energy security, supply chains, dual-use hardware, cyber defense, space infrastructure, and sovereign AI are no longer abstract policy themes. They are investable startup categories with state interest, corporate demand, and investor urgency.

For founders, this changes the meaning of “big market.” A big market is no longer only a large consumer category or enterprise software spend. It can also mean a government-backed procurement wave, a strategic industrial bottleneck, or a national capability gap that must be filled quickly.

This trend will likely remain strong because it combines three forces:

  • National security pressure
  • Hardware and compute demand
  • Public-private capital alignment

European founders should pay attention. We often underestimate our own strengths in industrial systems, simulation, aerospace, materials, engineering workflows, privacy infrastructure, and trust systems. My own background in CAD, IP, and compliance makes this very visible. Real-world technical friction creates real startup opportunities, especially when software and infrastructure meet.

Are startups really raising more money, or are mega-rounds distorting the picture?

Both things are true. Total venture funding has surged in 2026, and some reports cite around $300 billion across roughly 6,000 startups, with early-stage deals also rising year over year. At the same time, averages are being pulled upward by giant rounds. That means headline funding strength does not automatically mean an easier market for normal startups.

This is one of the most misunderstood Startup Funding Trends of 2026. Founders look at giant deals and assume the market is open. It is not open in a general sense. It is open for the companies that match investor appetite, and often that appetite is narrow.

Median round size matters more than average round size when you want to understand real founder conditions. A few huge rounds can create a false sense of abundance. Smart founders read deal count, median sizes, stage distribution, investor concentration, and time-to-close. They do not read headlines as if they are operating instructions.

Here is the founder-level translation:

  • If you are a breakout company in a hot category, this market can feel euphoric.
  • If you are a solid but undifferentiated startup, this market can feel punishing.
  • If you are early but disciplined, you still have a chance.
  • If you are mid-stage with weak economics, fundraising can become painfully slow.

What are investors demanding from founders in September 2026?

The message from investors is blunt. Show traction. Show focus. Show financial discipline. Show why your category matters now. Also show why your team can execute with less waste than your competitors.

Market commentary this year suggests stronger expectations around annual recurring revenue, runway, and burn multiple. To define terms clearly, annual recurring revenue means recurring subscription-like revenue a startup expects over a year. Burn multiple means how much cash a startup spends to generate each new unit of net revenue growth. When investors discuss a burn multiple below 1.5, they mean the company is converting spend into growth with discipline. Above 3, many investors get nervous.

One useful benchmark from 2026 investor commentary is that seed-stage startups often look stronger when they can show roughly $50,000 to $200,000 in annual recurring revenue, while Series A expectations often center around $1 million annual recurring revenue and a credible path to much more. These are not universal rules, but they show the direction of investor thinking.

This fits my own founder philosophy. Startup education must be experiential and slightly uncomfortable. Fundraising is the same. If your business model falls apart when someone asks for cohort retention, customer acquisition cost, gross margin, IP position, or pipeline quality, your startup is underprepared. Good investors expose fantasy quickly.

What do strong founder signals look like now?

  • Clear traction, not vanity growth
  • Longer runway, often 18 to 24 months preferred
  • Tighter spend discipline
  • A sharp category story
  • Proof that customers truly need the product
  • Evidence of founder speed and learning rate
  • Defensibility, such as workflow control, data, IP, regulation knowledge, or distribution advantage

How should European founders read these startup funding trends?

With realism, but not inferiority. Europe is not copying the US cycle one-to-one. European capital tends to be more cautious, more grant-linked in some sectors, more policy-aware, and often more connected to industrial, scientific, and public-sector needs. That can be frustrating for founders chasing speed, yet it can also create stronger companies.

I have built across countries, accelerators, grants, technical teams, and founder education systems. My view is simple: European founders often have stronger technical depth than they think and weaker narrative packaging than they need. US founders often sell possibility better. European founders often build substance better. The winners learn both.

Here is where Europe has real leverage in late 2026:

  • Industrial AI
  • Manufacturing software
  • Defense and dual-use systems
  • Climate and energy engineering
  • Biotech and research-led ventures
  • Fintech linked to regulation and compliance
  • Digital identity, trust, and audit trails
  • IP tech, CAD workflows, and engineering infrastructure

That last category is deeply personal for me. At CADChain, we treated IP protection as part of the workflow, not a legal side quest. Investors increasingly understand this type of embedded trust layer. When a founder can show that compliance, auditability, or rights management sits inside daily work tools, that becomes a stronger commercial story.

Also, Europe’s founder scene has matured. There is more cross-border learning, more specialist investors, and more serious technical entrepreneurship than many outsiders assume. Capital still clusters, but the old idea that all serious startup ambition must physically relocate is weaker than before.

Which sectors are strongest beyond AI and fintech?

Biotech deserves more attention than it gets in mainstream startup chatter. While AI captured a huge share of attention and funding, biotech remained relatively steady. That matters because steady sectors often produce disciplined founder behavior. They are used to regulation, longer cycles, and scientific proof. Those habits age well in a selective market.

Space tech, robotics, health tech, and some climate categories also remain relevant, though investor appetite is more selective than founder branding suggests. The old pitch style of “big problem plus software layer” has weakened. Investors want a more precise explanation of timing, margins, dependency risks, and adoption path.

In plain language, these sectors get attention when they answer one of these questions:

  • Does this remove a costly bottleneck?
  • Does this serve a state, industrial, or regulated need?
  • Does this convert research into commercial advantage?
  • Does this sit inside a mission-critical workflow?
  • Does this create a hard-to-replace system once deployed?

How can founders raise in this market without wasting months?

Let’s break it down. Founders need a different fundraising operating system in September 2026. The old model of broad outreach, generic decks, and optimism-heavy projections is weak. You need sharper positioning, stronger evidence, and tighter process control.

A practical fundraising process for 2026

  1. Pick the right category story. Do not call yourself an AI startup if you are really a workflow software company with one AI feature. Investors fund clear categories faster than fuzzy ones.
  2. Define your moat in plain language. Explain whether your edge comes from proprietary data, regulation knowledge, workflow lock-in, IP, compute access, distribution, or founder insight.
  3. Build a real evidence room. Include customer interviews, retention numbers, revenue quality, burn profile, product usage, and pipeline proof.
  4. Map investors by thesis. Separate AI infrastructure funds, fintech specialists, defense-focused capital, family offices, angels, and grant-linked capital.
  5. Run a tight process. Create urgency with sequencing, not bluffing. Start with lower-priority investor conversations to sharpen the pitch.
  6. Show capital discipline. Explain exactly what the round buys you and what milestones it reaches before the next round.
  7. Protect the downside. Keep legal, IP, compliance, and cap table hygiene clean. Sloppy details kill trust fast.
  8. Use AI and no-code as your first team. Automate research, investor prep, follow-ups, CRM updates, and draft materials, but keep human judgment in the loop.

This last point matters a lot to me. I strongly believe founders should default to no-code until they hit a hard wall. In a market where investors demand discipline, spending six figures too early on custom builds can damage your fundraising case. Many early-stage teams can validate workflows, user behavior, onboarding logic, and monetization experiments without a full engineering department.

What mistakes are founders still making in late 2026?

Too many founders still act as if capital scarcity is a temporary mood swing. It is not. Selectivity is now part of the market structure. That means bad habits are more expensive than before.

  • Calling any software company an AI company without a convincing reason
  • Using top-line growth to hide weak retention
  • Pitching too many customer segments at once
  • Ignoring burn multiple and runway
  • Building too much before validating willingness to pay
  • Neglecting IP, data rights, or compliance hygiene
  • Chasing US investor language without matching US-level speed or ambition
  • Raising too late, when cash pressure destroys negotiating power
  • Mistaking media attention for investor demand

I would add a more provocative one. Many founders still think confidence means sounding certain. In 2026, investor-grade confidence looks different. It means being precise about what you know, what you have tested, what failed, and what you believe will happen next. Serious investors trust disciplined uncertainty more than polished fantasy.

What does this mean for women founders and under-networked entrepreneurs?

It means the old advice gets even less useful. Women do not need more inspiration. They need infrastructure. That has been one of my strongest beliefs through building Fe/male Switch and working with founders across levels of readiness. A selective market rewards access to better scaffolding, better feedback loops, and better fundraising preparation.

When money concentrates, insiders benefit first. That is why under-networked founders need process advantages, not motivational slogans. If you do not come from a warm-network environment, build one deliberately through accelerators, specialist communities, operator angels, grant programs, and visible proof of execution.

Here are practical moves that help:

  • Create a funding narrative tied to real traction, not founder biography alone
  • Collect artifacts that reduce doubt, such as pilots, testimonials, signed letters, and revenue proof
  • Practice negotiation in low-risk settings before real investor meetings
  • Use founder communities that provide review, accountability, and mock diligence
  • Build public credibility through niche content, technical insight, or customer-backed case studies

This is also where game-based founder training has value. Entrepreneurship is a behavior under uncertainty, not a theory exam. Founders improve when they practice decisions, stakes, and tradeoffs repeatedly. That is one reason I built gamepreneurship systems in the first place.

What should freelancers and business owners learn from startup funding trends?

You may not be raising venture capital, but these trends still matter. Startups with fresh money will spend differently. They will buy software that reduces headcount pressure, outsource specialist tasks faster, and demand stronger proof before signing service contracts. Sectors with new capital will create demand pockets. Sectors ignored by capital may cut budgets fast.

If you are a freelancer or small agency, position around where money is flowing:

  • AI workflow design
  • B2B content for technical categories
  • Fundraising support and investor materials
  • Compliance, legal ops, and documentation
  • Data labeling, research, and evaluation systems
  • Fintech growth support with regulatory awareness
  • Defense and industrial software marketing with careful language discipline

Founders and buyers have become more sceptical. That can help good service providers. If you can tie your work to revenue quality, product adoption, pipeline conversion, legal readiness, or customer retention, you become easier to buy. Generic branding talk is getting weaker in this market.

What is the smartest founder play for the rest of 2026?

Build for a market where capital exists but must be earned with proof. That means staying lean, keeping your category sharp, and tying every major spend to a learning objective or revenue outcome.

If I were advising a founder right now, I would say this:

  • Choose one painful problem and solve it with unusual clarity.
  • Build evidence before ambition theater.
  • Automate what does not need your judgment.
  • Protect your IP and data flows early.
  • Use investor conversations as market research, not validation theater.
  • Treat fundraising like a strategic game of timing and evidence.

That last line reflects how I have always approached startups. You do not win by avoiding failure. You win by collecting information, assets, and relationships faster than your competitors while wasting less cash on ego-driven moves.

What is the bottom line on Startup Funding Trends in September 2026?

The market is active, concentrated, and unforgiving. AI dominates attention. Fintech is regaining force. Defense tech and sovereign tech are climbing fast. Biotech remains steady. Mega-rounds are real, but they hide how selective investors have become.

For founders, the message is simple. Stop reading funding headlines as permission to be sloppy. This is a quality market. Investors want traction, discipline, timing, and a category story that makes immediate sense. If you can offer that, 2026 still holds real opportunity. If you cannot, the market will punish confusion fast.

From my European founder viewpoint, this is not bad news. It is a reset toward substance. And substance, when paired with speed and sharp communication, still wins.

People Also Ask:

Is it true that 90% of startups fail?

The “90% of startups fail” figure is a widely repeated rule of thumb, not a fixed universal statistic. Startup failure rates vary by industry, funding stage, business model, and time frame. A better takeaway is that startups face high risk, especially in the early years, and success often depends on product-market fit, cash flow, timing, and founder execution.

VC funding in 2026 appears to be shaped by stronger interest in AI companies, larger late-stage rounds for category leaders, and more selective early-stage investing. Investors are putting more money into fewer companies, with extra attention on revenue quality, path to cash generation, and defensible technology. Sectors tied to AI infrastructure, enterprise software, and applied automation are getting a lot of attention.

Startup activity in 2026 is centered on AI adoption, tighter fundraising standards, and stronger pressure to show real business traction. Founders are being pushed to prove revenue, retention, and sensible spending earlier than before. There is also growing interest in lean teams, automation-first operations, and products built for clear business use cases rather than hype.

What are the hottest startups right now?

The hottest startups are usually the ones growing fast in areas such as AI, developer tools, fintech, health tech, climate tech, and enterprise software. Companies get this label when they raise large rounds, gain users quickly, or show strong revenue momentum. The exact list changes fast, so “hottest” usually reflects current investor attention and market buzz rather than long-term success.

Why is AI getting so much startup funding?

AI is attracting a large share of startup funding because investors see it as a major source of new software products, productivity gains, and platform shifts. Many funds are backing companies that build AI models, tools, infrastructure, and business applications. The strong funding flow also comes from fear of missing the next big winner in a fast-moving category.

Are startup valuations rising again?

In many parts of the market, valuations have started rising again, especially for top AI startups and strong late-stage companies. Still, valuation growth is not happening evenly across all sectors. Startups without clear traction, steady growth, or a strong story may still face flat rounds, lower pricing, or tougher deal terms.

Are investors funding fewer startups with bigger checks?

Yes, that is a common pattern in recent startup funding activity. Many investors are concentrating capital into fewer companies they believe have stronger chances of breakout growth. This means founders may see larger rounds at the top end of the market, while average startups face more competition for each dollar raised.

What do investors want from startups before funding them?

Investors usually want proof that a startup can solve a real problem and turn that into a durable business. They often look for revenue growth, customer retention, reasonable burn, market size, and a team that can execute well. In 2026, many also want a clearer path to cash generation rather than growth at any cost.

Which sectors are attracting the most startup funding?

AI, enterprise software, fintech, cybersecurity, health tech, and climate-related companies are among the sectors drawing strong investor interest. AI stands out because it is influencing almost every software category, from coding tools to customer support and business operations. Investors also tend to favor sectors with large addressable markets and clear demand from businesses.

Founders should prepare for more scrutiny and build fundraising plans around real traction, strong financial discipline, and a clear use of capital. It helps to show why the product is hard to copy, why customers stay, and how the company can grow without wasting cash. In a selective funding market, sharp storytelling matters, but numbers matter more.

How should founders benchmark their startup if headline funding data feels misleading?

Use median round size, stage-specific deal counts, time-to-close, and investor concentration instead of average funding totals. That gives a truer picture of startup fundraising conditions in 2026 than mega-round headlines alone. Explore the Bootstrapping Startup Playbook and compare this with April 2026 startup funding trends shaped by AI mega-rounds.

What alternative funding options make sense if venture capital is too selective?

Founders should consider venture debt, grants, revenue-based financing, equity-free programs, and strategic angels before forcing a weak VC round. These options work especially well for capital-efficient startups with early validation. Explore the European Startup Playbook and review February 2026 startup funding alternatives for smaller startups.

How can a founder tell whether their startup is truly investable or just “AI-labeled”?

A fundable AI startup usually owns a workflow, proprietary data source, distribution edge, or measurable ROI. If the product is easily copied with generic models, investors will likely treat it as cosmetic AI. Discover AI Automations For Startups and see what investors expected from AI-related startup funding in May 2026.

What due diligence materials should be ready before starting investor outreach?

Prepare a clean data room with retention metrics, ARR quality, cap table, customer references, burn multiple, product usage, legal hygiene, and IP ownership. Strong documentation shortens diligence and builds trust faster. Discover Google Analytics For Startups and review March 2026 startup funding signals around profitability and revenue clarity.

How are fundraising expectations different for pre-seed, seed, and Series A in 2026?

Pre-seed still rewards sharp insight, but seed increasingly needs real traction and clearer ARR evidence. By Series A, investors expect repeatable growth, efficient spend, and a believable path to scale. Explore the Bootstrapping Startup Playbook and check HubSpot’s 2026 VC fundraising benchmarks for ARR, runway, and burn multiple.

Which investor conversations are worth prioritizing first in a concentrated market?

Prioritize investors with a clear thesis match, recent activity in your sector, and stage alignment. Warm intros help, but relevance matters more than prestige when capital is concentrated into fewer conviction bets. Unlock LinkedIn For Startups and compare with April 2026 funding announcements showing sector-specific investor priorities.

How can European founders turn regional constraints into a fundraising advantage?

European startups can win by highlighting regulation fluency, industrial partnerships, research depth, grant leverage, and trust infrastructure. These are advantages in deeptech, fintech, defense, biotech, and compliance-heavy software. Explore the European Startup Playbook and contrast it with Q1 2026 funding patterns where the U.S. led and Europe stayed more conservative.

What sectors may be underrated despite getting less hype than AI?

Infrastructure, space tech, sustainability, industrial software, foodtech, and compliance-heavy tools can still attract serious capital when they solve operational pain with durable economics. Less hype sometimes means less noise and clearer positioning. Discover SEO For Startups and review April 2026 funding announcements highlighting infrastructure, sustainability, and space tech momentum.

How should under-networked founders improve access without relying on cold luck?

Build credibility through specialist communities, operator angels, accelerators, customer proof, and consistent niche content. A visible execution trail often substitutes for elite network access better than generic personal branding. Explore the Female Entrepreneur Playbook and see how February 2026 funding favored practical, niche, compliance-led startups.

What operating habits improve fundraising odds over the next 6 to 12 months?

Stay lean, extend runway, validate willingness to pay early, and tie every spend to learning or revenue. Investors now reward disciplined operators more than charismatic storytellers. Discover Vibe Coding For Startups and compare with Crunchbase analysis on 2026 capital concentration, huge AI deals, and sector selectivity.

MEAN CEO - Startup Funding Trends | September, 2026 (STARTUP EDITION) | Startup Funding Trends September 2026

Violetta Bonenkamp, also known as Mean CEO, is a female entrepreneur and an experienced startup founder, bootstrapping her startups. She has an impressive educational background including an MBA and four other higher education degrees. She has over 20 years of work experience across multiple countries, including 10 years as a solopreneur and serial entrepreneur. Throughout her startup experience she has applied for multiple startup grants at the EU level, in the Netherlands and Malta, and her startups received quite a few of those. She’s been living, studying and working in many countries around the globe and her extensive multicultural experience has influenced her immensely. Constantly learning new things, like AI, SEO, zero code, code, etc. and scaling her businesses through smart systems.