startup scanner 2025

The Digital Serbia Initiative has published the fifth edition of the Startup Scanner report for 2025, which once again this year offers a detailed analysis of the development of the Serbian startup ecosystem. The research is conducted with the aim of continuously providing insights into the state, challenges, and growth potential of startups in Serbia.
Data collected in 2024 indicates a decrease in the number of startups in the ecosystem and challenges in progressing to later stages of development. Startups experiencing growth of over 20% are the most successful in attracting investment and expanding their teams, making up 5.1% of the startups that participated in the research. According to the study, startups developing products for the global market have significantly higher chances of rapid growth and attracting investment. In contrast, excessive reliance on grants in the early stages of development slows down progress. Statistics show that startups that receive grants but do not operate outside Serbia or the region often struggle to attract external investments in later stages.

Startup Scanner this year points to three major challenges in the local ecosystem.

The number of startups has decreased by 20%, and the reason is not only external factors but also a shift in focus within the ecosystem itself—there are fewer startups with global ambitions and more that are focused on local and regional markets.
Secondly, startups relying on grants for a sense of security, without real market pressure, show low growth rates. Their solutions remain limited to local/regional needs and fail to compete globally or achieve scalability.
Thirdly, startups that reach the seed stage often struggle to achieve high monthly growth rates. This is reflected in the low number that advance to Series A funding and even fewer that progress to Series B.

In terms of technological focus, 41% of startups operate in the field of artificial intelligence, 19% in data processing and analytics, and 24% are developing innovations in sectors such as BioTech, MedTech, FoodTech, and AgriTech.
Startups in Serbia cite access to funding, acquiring customers, and hiring talent with appropriate skills—especially in sales—as key challenges. These issues have also been highlighted in previous editions of the Startup Scanner.
Although significant progress has been made in recent years—from an increase in the number of startups and the creation of various incentives to the development of support mechanisms—the findings of the Startup Scanner 2025 indicate that the next step is building an ecosystem that enables scaling. This year’s research will serve as a foundation for creating concrete recommendations and as a call to all ecosystem stakeholders to support startups with global ambitions.
The full Startup Scanner 2025 report is available HERE