Objective

Μap the Greek startup ecosystem and the dynamics shaping supply and demand for HPC/Big Data/AI capabilities, to support EuroCC competence mapping, capacity-building, and access to HPC resources.

Key Insights

• Ecosystem maturity is accelerating. Strong rise in growth-stage startups and scaleups, alongside increased investment activity.
• Strong geographic concentration in two hubs. Startup activity is heavily concentrated in Attica and Central Macedonia.
• Sector diversity with notable concentration in selected verticals. The ecosystem spans Life Sciences, Environment & Energy, Tourism/Leisure, and multiple software-intensive sectors.
• Sustainability and resilience are emerging demand drivers. They raise the need for data-intensive analytics and AI pipelines, and-where relevant- access to scalable HPC infrastructure to support modelling, prediction, and optimization.
• Technology tags point to strong AI and data orientation. AI and Data Analytics/Big Data are widely declared, while Cloud, IoT and Hardware appear at lower, yet still notable, levels.
• Skills pressure is a major constraint and opportunity. The ecosystem faces significant upskilling needs and persistent inclusion gaps, making talent development a key lever for scaling.

Introduction 

The Greek startup ecosystem exhibits clear signs of maturation in 2025 [1]. Based on data from Endeavor Greece(part of the global non-profit Endeavor network) [2], Found.ation (innovation hub to support startups) [3], and Elevate Greece(the official national startup registry) [4], the number of growth-stage startups and scaleups has more than tripled since 2018. More than €732.2 million were invested in over 90 startups, marking a 35% increase compared to 2024. In this report, we map the Greek startup ecosystem by extracting information from Elevate Greece, the government-backed initiative designed to map Greek startups and support their growth, with the broader objective of strengthening Greece’s innovation ecosystem. The Elevate Greece National Startup Registry comprises eligible Greek startups that are legal entities (IKE/EPE/SA), with up to eight years of operation, fewer than 250 employees and annual turnover below 50 million. Importantly, a key evaluation criterion for registry inclusion is the presence of technological innovation in the product or service and/or an innovative business model built upon recent technology. Although registry membership signals engagement with technological innovation, it remains agnostic to the specific technologies or computing intensity involved.

To enrich the ecosystem mapping with qualitative and contextual signals that are not directly available in the registry fields, selected observations are also drawn from the Innovation Pulse report [1], which combines Elevate Greece insights with publicly available sources (press releases, company announcements, news articles) and is authored by Found.ation, in collaboration with 28DIGITAL[5](formerly EIT Digital) and the Hellenic Development Bank of Investments (HDBI) [6].

Geographic distribution

Region

According to the StartupBlink Global Startup Ecosystem Index [7], which assesses national startup ecosystems across dimensions of quantity, quality, and business environment, Greece climbed to the 47th place globally (among over 110 evaluated countries), reflecting a positive trajectory of ecosystem development. This upward movement is reported to be driven primarily by the strengthening of the Athens and Thessaloniki startup hubs, positioning Greece within the EU top-20 startup ecosystems [7].

This assessment is consistent with national-level evidence derived from the Elevate Greece national startup registry. Indeed, examining the spatial distribution of registered startups in Figure 1, we observe a pronounced geographic concentration in Attica (64.8%), with Central Macedonia forming the second major hub (14.7%) and Crete following (6.0%). Thessaly (1.9%), Western Macedonia (1.5%), and Peloponnese (1.4%) appear as smaller, yet visible, regional clusters. A residual “Other” category (9.8%) captures activity distributed across additional regions.

Sectoral profile 

Sector

The sectoral mapping uses 14 concise sector buckets plus an “Other” category, based on the Elevate Greece registry’s sector labels mapped into standardized buckets. As depicted in Figure 2, the ecosystem exhibits a diversified portfolio with notable weight in Life Sciences (14.6%) and Environment & Energy (8.8%). 

The prominence of Environment & Energy in the registry can be interpreted as a supply-side signal of entrepreneurial engagement in green, energy, and resilience-oriented domains. At the same time, evidence from the Innovation Pulse report points to corresponding demand-side pressures, driven by climate risks and resilience challenges. This demand is further reinforced by targeted public and private funding mechanisms that prioritise sustainability- and resilience-oriented initiatives, for example, the Natural Disasters Resilience Masterplan, a technology-driven programme led by Smart Attica EDIH in collaboration with six partner Greek EDIHs. This initiative aims to strengthen disaster management in Greece through cloud platforms, predictive tools, and interoperability, and is accompanied by funding calls prioritised by urgency, impact, and applicability. 

Aligning with EuroCC goals, such ecosystem-level signals point to growing demand for data-intensive analytics and AI-enabled pipelines in sustainability application areas, where scalable infrastructure and advanced digital capabilities can act as enabling factors and targeted upskilling becomes imperative. More broadly, SMEs in Greece are increasingly oriented toward a sustainable transition, recognising that environmental and financial sustainability are increasingly interlinked in a country exposed to severe climate risks [1]. Roughly one-third of the Hellenic Development Bank of Investments (HDBI)’s programs focus on green and digital transitions, and its investment network has expanded from thirty funds and over one hundred portfolio companies to thirty-eight funds and more than 200 portfolio companies [1].

Beyond energy and climate solutions, there is also a shift toward B2B enterprise software and toward more complex and strategic technology fields such as healthtech, defence, and space technologies [1]. Consistent with this, the registry-derived sector distribution in Figure 2 indicates that Travel/Leisure accounts for 7.6% (an expected share in a country with a strong tourism economy), while other digital-intensive sectors are also prominent, including Big Data and Analytics (6.7%), Enterprise Software (6.4%), Marketing (6.3%), and E-commerce and Fashion (4.9%). The “Other” slice (17.4%) captures a long tail of specialized domains and includes areas such as Space technologies and Defense Systems among others.

As an indicator related to all sectors’ workforce composition and participation (relevant for understanding the talent pipeline supporting advanced computing) it is worth noting persistent inclusion gaps. The Innovation Pulse report highlights that women remain substantially underrepresented in technical and leadership roles across much of the Greek tech ecosystem, with representation strongest at pre-funding and founding stages but declining notably in growth and funding phases. It further notes that gender representation varies across sectors, with relatively higher presence in HealthTech, ClimateTech, and EdTech, while deep-tech fields continue to lag behind [1].

Declared technologies

Multi-label Technology

Technology is analysed as a multi-label profile of self-declared technology tags (i.e., technologies startups report using) over a denominator of 1,017 companies (Figure 3). Software (60.6%) and Web/Mobile Application development (55.5%) constitute dominant capabilities selected by the majority of the ecosystem, while AI (48.3%) and Data Analytics/Big Data (40.0%) indicate that data-driven methods are widely embedded across products and services. Cloud Computing (25.8%) and IoT (25.5%) show substantial adoption of scalable infrastructure and connected systems, and Hardware (19.6%) and Sensors (19.1%) point to meaningful activity in hardware-enabled and IoT-driven products. A sizeable “Other” share (45.5%) reflects additional technology tokens outside the explicit categories (e.g., robotics, blockchain/DLT, drones, quantum computing), underscoring variety and emerging-tech experimentation.

These labels provide useful signals for HPC/AI/Big-Data relevance, but they are not a definitive proxy for actual HPC usage. For example, a startup declaring “Hardware” may not rely on HPC at all, while a startup declaring “Drones” (falling into “Other”) may be highly data-intensive and require advanced infrastructure. However, technology adoption has become a top strategic priority (overtaking traditional cost-cutting) in the ecosystem as more than 80% of businesses plan to adopt technologies such as AI, cloud computing, and big data analytics [1]. Skills like agility, analytical thinking, AI and big data literacy, curiosity, lifelong learning and technological literacy are highly prioritized by companies [1]. Yet, this demand-side shift outpaces current workforce readiness, as 62% of employees are expected to require upskilling and only 52% of current skills are anticipated to remain relevant [1]. In line with these pressures, policy priorities will regard expanding education in digital and green skills and investing in AI infrastructure [1]. Taken together, these signals reinforce the value of EuroCC actions, including structured training programs and hands-on upskilling to help startups and SMEs develop the technical competencies needed to adopt and scale advanced computing, data, and AI capabilities.

Synthesis and implications

Taken together, the Greek startup ecosystem is geographically concentrated in major hubs, diversified across health and life sciences, environment and energy, tourism and agri-food, and a range of software-intensive sectors, with many companies building software and web/mobile applications and incorporating AI and data analytics. Evidence from the Innovation Pulse report indicates increasing ecosystem maturity, reflected in the growing presence of growth-stage startups. As more companies transition from early formation to scaling, needs shift from prototyping toward robust digital infrastructure and production-grade AI/data pipelines, while sustainability and resilience applications further strengthen demand for advanced analytics and AI solutions, and when needed, for HPC infrastructure.

Yet, Greece’s productivity is still at half the European average, and critical mass in technology is missing [1]. Tech is barely 1% of Greece’s GDP when the Western world is closer to 10%. A key forward-looking challenge is whether Greece will be able to create a cluster in tech, much in the way shipping and tourism have. Attracting know-how and firms from abroad is pivotal. Bureaucratic friction and slow administrative processes are highlighted as persistent constraints, with HDBI identified as key actors in this direction [1]. 

The aforementioned ecosystem dynamics shape both supply (what startups build and where) and demand (which capabilities become necessary to compete globally). The ecosystem-level constraints highlighted in this report intersect with EuroCC priorities, particularly regarding HPC/AI adoption and the formation of advanced digital skills and capabilities. Persistent inclusion gaps in technical and leadership roles suggest that scaling the ecosystem is not only a matter of funding and markets, but also of widening and strengthening the effective talent pipeline. In this context, EuroCC actions in training, competence development, and awareness can serve as enabling mechanisms that help the ecosystem translate widely reported AI/cloud/data ambitions into deployable solutions and -where relevant- connect stakeholders to appropriate pathways to HPC and scalable infrastructure.