The reason to undertake making these maps is very simple: when we tried to figure out how Eastern Europe is being positioned on international level in PropTech, we found no information in one place which explicitly and clearly displays the big picture, particularly the number of PropTech companies in different geographical regions; which are the most dominant continents in PropTech (based on nr of generated tech solutions); how different European regions differ when compared to each other, and most importantly what the position of Eastern Europe is.

Hence, based on our own database, researches completed by fellow PropTech associations, internal information, the recent mapping published by axeleo.com (dd 01.07.2021), and of course, Unissu database, we drew the maps below. We don’t have the pressumption to be exhaustive in the numbers. If anyone of you who is reading these lines have a better and reliable source of information, we are open to correct the figures. We are perfectly aware that there are organisations with large databases which can make these mappings with better input data, however we could not find any such mappings, and don’t have information whether such have been released thus far. And just once more highlighiting that we are open to update the figures once we have additional or more updated information. You can find all our sources at the end of this mapping article.

Let’s get started with the mapping and some corresponding remarks and conclusions.

Let’s first have a zoom-out glance at the situation.

It gets pretty much evident from MAP ‘Number of PropTech Companies: Continental Level’ that Europe is the continent generating the highest number of PropTech solutions: 4 087 based on the available information.

North America [USA, Canada] – 2534 PropTechs based on Unissu data till June 2021 and a 2021 research by PropTech Collective, Canada;

South America – we don’t have information.

Asia – 548 PropTech companies. We are waiting for a more accurate figure by our partner Asia PropTech;

Africa – 89 PropTechs. This is the cummulative number in 4 African countries we have information about, namely, South Africa (38, last update in 2019), Kenya (35, last update in 2020), Uganda (8, last update in 2020), Tanzania (8, last update in 2020).

Australia – 381 based on Unissu update till June 2021.

All figures include only tech solutions, thus excluding co-workings.

As for Europe’s PropTechs, this cummulative number will rise significantly when we add up the solutions of countries with no available public information so far, such as Porgugal, Hungary, etc.

Particularly, this will affect the Eastern Europe figure, and position the region close to the Nordics, as we are already in front of Southern Europe.

We are sure that the numbers reported for other countries such as Estonia, Poland, and Greece might be different if additional research by local organizations will be undertaken. And again this will impact the Eastern European cummulative number of PropTechs in the region. However, these are the figures available at the moment.

JLL in their recent report state that the Global number of PropTechs nears 8 000, which is no surprise, having in mind that based on the presented figures on our map, the cummulative number  is 7 639.

We are pretty much sure that we will surpass 8 000 PropTechs worldwide if we add the figures for Russia, South America, and the EE countries, as all these countries and geographic regions are very well tech developed.

There is one more assumption when we consider the figures cited in our maps: all Unissu figures are based on the number of companies originating from a certain country, registered on their web platform. Axeleo mapping is comprised of PropTechs which the VC fund has encountered within 2020-2021. JLL Annual Report ‘Transforming with technology: Shaping the future of real estate‘ was announced on 25 Aug. 2021. Its mapping classifies all Eastern European (EE) countries as having between 0-10 PropTech solutions. Only in the case of Romania and Poland, it classifies them as having 11-20 PropTechs. As the Report itself states, all its conclusions and maps derive from Crunchbase data. Truly, Crunchbase is a public source of information about tech solutions. However, it has its serious limitations such as:

Firstly, the input data in Crunchbase is provided either by tech companies (if they want to get listed on such a database), or by angel investors or VC funds that have invested in a certain tech company, and would like to announce the round. And next, let’s just see the number of PropTechs which are externally funded in EE. Let’s see the external funding available to EE PropTechs. You can go and see our analysis on these points in ‘Eastern European Funding in Numbers‘. What our analysis shows: (1) For example, 84 % of PropTech solutions in Bulgaria are bootstrapped. This is valid for all other EE countries. (2) Furthermore, EE is the European region which is most deprived of external funding. Hence, simply no one enters information about these tech solutions on Crunchbase.

Secondly, Crunchbase classifies certain tech solutions as belonging to the country they have their legal entity established in. Then the rest 16 % of Bulgarian tech solutions which have received funding from the UK, for example, or from Germany, they have their legal entities there. However, their whole teams are Bulgarian; their founders, too; they are settled in Bulgaria, no matter that the legal entity is registered elsewhere. Consequently, EE solutions are being classified as British, French, etc. thus boosting their country figures.

Therefore, we daresay that the most precise numbers on a country level are being generated by national PropTech associations.

However, not all of them carry out researches in this domain. Some rely on the Unissu figures. And only few have completed and published national researches thus far, and these are: Bulgaria, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Slovakia, and Spain. In cases we have input information from 2 or more sources – just as the case of Finland where we have 191 PropTechs cited by Unissu and 64 by axeleo, we take the higher figure. There is also missing information about South America and Russia which are highly developed in PropTech.

As you can see on MAP ‘Number of PropTech Companies: European Level per Countries‘ which is the featured image of this mapping article, there is information about the number of PropTech companies in 26 out of 34 European countries [77%] depicted on the MAP (All countries on the European continent are included, not only those part of the EU). This is the input data to calculate how each of the European regions stands. Here we just have to specify that this MAP also depicts the year of input information release. There are figures officially released in 2019, and obviously cannot be valid any longer. Some companies have died, and others were born. But the good news is that we have 2020 or 2021 figures for 18 out of all 26 countries, that is, the data for 69 % of the countries is the latest possible. So, the big variable is not that much the updated input data in such an extent as the missing information. We believe that the latter will change the numbers significantly.

MAP ‘Number of PropTech Companies: European Level per Regions‘ displays the relative maturity in PropTech in each of the 6 geographic regions: DACH, BeNeLux & France, Eastern Europe, the Nordics, the UK, South Europe. As pointed out in the beginning of this article, this namely is the aim of the mapping: now we can clearly see how Eastern European PropTech is being positioned.

Though there is lack of information about Hungary, Slovenia, and Croatia, and for sure the number of Polish PropTechs is not 30, the EE region is positioned very close to the Nordics, together with South Europe, when talking about the intensity of PropTechs in these geographies.

We have 2 clearly defined groups of regions in Europe: Firstly, BeNeLux & France, followed by the DACH, and the UK. And secondly, the Nordic region, closely followed by Eastern Europe  and South Europe.

The YoY increase (2021 to 2020) of PropTech solutions included in BULGARIA: PropTech Mapping Report is 81%, inclusive of mobility solutions. The Report was closed in the end of April 2021, and all figures therein are calculated on the bases on 130 Bulgarian PropTechs which were listed in our database by that time. The YoY increase (2021 to 2020) exclusive of mobility solutions is 65 %.

This increase is as a result from 2 factors. The first one is the 14 newly-established PropTech companies in 2021. The second one the increased number of PropTech solutions we at PropTech Bulgaria have identified. As it is a well-known fact, there is no register in Bulgaria, alike many other countries, of tech solutions according to their type.

It takes time and a lot of efforts, and resources to do the scouting and identification of tech solutions per industry verticals. This makes BULGARIA: PropTech Mapping Report the only source and the only reliable source of information on Bulgarian PropTech.

The total number of Bulgarian PropTech solutions identified and analysed by PropTech Bulgaria is 114. The number rises to 130 when we add some Smart City solutions which don’t classify along the 5 PropTech life cycle stages, but are included in the 10^th Smart City categories which are typical for categorising such tech solutions.

Bulgarian PropTech solutions contribute to 7 out of all 17 SDGs of UN 2030, and 3 of them have the most solutions. These are: SDG 11, SDG 7, SDG 12.

16 % are the externally funded Bulgarian PropTechs, and 84% are bootstrapped.

The most well-funded Bulgarian PropTech company is Officernd. Crunchbase reports (dd 22.03.2021) that the company has received EUR 4.2M and is registered in the UK, though being physically based in Bulgaria, and founded by Bulgarians.

Austria 2021 based blackprit 2021 PropTech Report https://blackprintbooster.de/proptech-report/. Additional sources: members of APTI and our database https://apti.at/en/members/#/category=Partner

Belgium 2021 https://www.proptechlab.be/ based on members of PropTech Lab (Belgium)

Bulgaria 2021 based on annual BULGARIA: PropTech Mapping Reports http://proptechbulgaria.eu/bulgaria-proptech-mapping-report-2021/

Czech Rep. based on research of Czech & Slovak PropTech Association http://proptechbulgaria.eu/2020/08/02/bulgaria-as-a-service-bulgaria-as-a-proptech-service/

Croatia Information source: Bosis Andric

Denmark https://airtable.com/shrRchh3YSDkxckdP/tblMeTyZYHSKHnGAi based on members of PropTech Denmark association https://www.proptechdk.dk/community

Estonia based on our database and axeleo.com mapping https://www.axeleo.com/axeleos-mapping-2021-european-proptech-startups/

Finland based on Unissu database https://www.unissu.com/proptech-resources/proptech-europe

France based on Unissu database https://www.unissu.com/proptech-resources/proptech-in-france

Germany based on blackprit 2021 PropTech Report https://blackprintbooster.de/proptech-report/. See also Unissu database https://www.unissu.com/proptech-resources/proptech-in-germany

Greece based on Unissu database

Hungary no information

Ireland no information

Italy 2021 RE:Connect 2.0 based on a research by Politecnico di Milano

Latvia based on axeleo.com mapping https://www.axeleo.com/axeleos-mapping-2021-european-proptech-startups/

Liechtenstein no information

Lithuania based on axeleo.com mapping https://www.axeleo.com/axeleos-mapping-2021-european-proptech-startups/

Luxemburg 2021 based on members of the respective PropTech association

Netherlands based on Unissu database https://www.unissu.com/proptech-resources/proptech-in-netherlands

Norway based on axeleo.com mapping https://www.axeleo.com/axeleos-mapping-2021-european-proptech-startups/

Poland based on axeleo.com mapping https://www.axeleo.com/axeleos-mapping-2021-european-proptech-startups/

Portugal no information

Romania based on figures provided by PropTech Romania http://proptechbulgaria.eu/2020/08/02/bulgaria-as-a-service-bulgaria-as-a-proptech-service/

Serbia information source: Boris Andric

Slovakia based on research of PropTech Slovakia http://proptechbulgaria.eu/2020/08/02/bulgaria-as-a-service-bulgaria-as-a-proptech-service/

Slovenia information source: Boris Andric

Spain based on Unissu database https://www.unissu.com/proptech-resources/proptech-europe

Sweden based on members of PropTech Sweden https://www.proptechsweden.org/proptechmap

Switzerland based on blackprit 2021 PropTech Report https://blackprintbooster.de/proptech-report/. See also Unissu database https://www.unissu.com/proptech-resources/proptech-europe

UK https://www.unissu.com/proptech-resources/proptech-in-the-uk

Africa based on information kindly provided by SA Proptech and Proptech Africa

Asia based on Unissu database https://www.unissu.com/proptech-resources/global-proptech-analysis-asia

Australia 2021 based on Unissu database https://www.unissu.com/proptech-resources/proptech-in-australia

North America:

Canada 2021 based on PropTech in Canada Report by PropTech Collective, https://www.proptechcollective.com/report

USA 2021 based on Unissu database https://www.unissu.com/proptech-resources/proptech-retech-in-the-usa

Eastern EU capital efficiency of B2B startups is 5.6x higher than the one of US B2B startups. Actually, the highest in Europe.

EASTERN EUROPEAN FUNDING IN NUMBERS: HOW EE STANDS

McKinsey[1] (2021) in their report ‘Europe’s innovation wunderkinds: The rising B2B start-up ecosystem’ state as follows, ‘Comparing different regions in Europe, we observe that the funding efficiency (revenue per total amount of funding) is indeed higher in regions of Eastern and Southern European countries, where funding is least abundant (Exhibit 2). By contrast, the largest European start-up ecosystems in Germany and France have the lowest revenue-per-funding ratios in Europe; nevertheless, they still generate about 1.5 times more revenue per dollar invested thatn B2B start-ups in the United States’.