Milan, Italy · Startup Cortilia is Italy's leading farm-to-home e-grocery platform, connecting consumers directly with small and medium Italian producers — sourcing fruit, vegetables, meat, dairy, and artisan products from vetted farms and delivering across Lombardy, Emilia-Romagna, Piedmont, and six other regions covering 800+ municipalities. Founded in Milan in 2011 by Marco Porcaro, Cortilia has raised €53 million and became a certified B-Corp in 2022 following construction of a LEED Gold-certified green headquarters. Targeting EBITDA breakeven in 2026 and full-year profitability by 2027, the company carries a 2,500-product catalog with a strong focus on sustainability and local supply-chain traceability.
Ghent, Belgium · Startup Deliverect provides omnichannel digital ordering infrastructure for restaurants and food retail, integrating 1,000+ third-party platforms — Uber Eats, DoorDash, Deliveroo — directly into point-of-sale systems, with tools for menu management, fleet dispatch, loyalty and in-store kiosks. Founded in 2018 in Ghent by Zhong Xu, Jan Hollez, Jelte Vrijhoef and Jerome Laredo, the company reached unicorn status in January 2022 after a $208 M Series D at a $1.4 B valuation. Total funding exceeds $332 M from Coatue, DST Global and Redpoint. Deliverect now serves 96,000+ locations across 52 countries including KFC, Burger King and Chipotle.
Milan, Italy · Startup Everli is Italy's leading online grocery delivery marketplace, connecting shoppers with over 100 supermarket chains — including Lidl, Esselunga, and Carrefour — across 60+ Italian provinces. Founded in 2014, personal shoppers physically select products at partner stores and deliver to customers' homes within two hours. With 237 employees and a 23% take rate, Everli signed a $180 million business combination with Nasdaq-listed SPAC Melar Acquisition Corp in mid-2025, targeting a Nasdaq listing in early 2026. The company secured an additional $10 million in bridge financing ahead of the expected public debut.
Dublin, Ireland · Startup Manna is Europe's largest drone delivery operator, having completed over 250,000 regulated commercial UAV deliveries across Dublin, Cork, and expanding US and European markets. Founded in 2018 and built entirely in Ireland, the company raised a $50 million Series B in April 2026 from investors including ARK Invest, ISIF, and Coca-Cola HBC, bringing total funding to $110 million. Manna is expanding to 40 new US bases and has partnered with Uber Eats for European aerial delivery markets.
Birkirkara, Malta · Startup MannaEV is Malta's first electric motorcycle delivery and battery-swapping startup, founded in early 2023 by three co-founders with backgrounds from Google, Alibaba, TikTok, and Lazada. The company operates an on-demand same-day delivery platform powered by smart electric motorcycles and a battery-swapping network, eliminating range anxiety and enabling rapid fleet turnaround. Within its first year MannaEV scaled to 500+ customers and deployed 50+ electric motorcycles across three battery-swapping hubs on the island without external VC funding. It won multiple categories at the Malta Business Awards 2024 and has a commercial partnership with Bolt Malta.