Approach
Built by operators. Invested from conviction.
Our thesis, what we look for in AI HR tech founders, and how we work with the companies we back.
Investment Thesis
Investment Thesis
Sammalkko invests in seed-stage startups applying machine learning to the structural problems in how companies hire, develop, and deploy people. We are not generalist observers of this space — Antti built and sold a people analytics product, Elina shipped enterprise HR software at scale, and Jaakko wrote NLP pipelines that ranked two million CVs a month. We invest from that operating depth, not from a market map.
The core conviction: hiring workflows, workforce planning, L&D ROI measurement, and compensation benchmarking were all designed for manual decision-making. The products that replace them aren't feature upgrades — they are ML-native architectures that treat the model as the primary decision engine, not a bolt-on. The founders who understand that distinction are the ones we want to back.
We focus on companies headquartered or significantly operating in Europe, with particular depth in the Nordics. GDPR-first data design and cross-border employment law compliance are not afterthoughts here — they are genuine moats for founders who build them in from day one.
What We Look For
ML-Native Architecture
The product works because machine learning is the core decision engine, not an add-on. Workflow tools that automate existing HR processes are not what we invest in — we back systems where removing the model makes the product incoherent.
Operator Instinct for Enterprise HR
HR software buys through CHRO committees, procurement, legal, and IT security — not a single champion. Founders who've navigated that buying process before, or who've done the work to learn it early, reach first enterprise pilots significantly faster. That operational fluency is something we look for before we look at the product.
European Regulatory Seriousness
GDPR compliance in HR data is not a checkbox — it shapes how you store employment history, how you handle candidate data across jurisdictions, and what consent looks like for algorithmic decision-making. Founders who treat European regulation as a structural design constraint, not a legal hurdle to clear later, build products that last in this market.
Our Funds
| Fund | Size | Close | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sammalkko Fund I | $22M | April 2022 | Fully deployed |
| Sammalkko Fund II | $33M | November 2024 | Actively deploying |
$55M under management across two funds
Fund II is our active deployment vehicle. We write initial checks of $1M–$3M at Seed or Pre-Seed, with reserves to participate in follow-on rounds for companies reaching product-market fit.
How We Work with Founders
The check is $1M–$3M. The actual work starts after it clears. We built, shipped, and sold in this space before we started investing — which means the support we offer founders is specific, not advisory.
Enterprise Introductions
Antti's network spans HR and People Analytics decision-makers at 80+ Nordic and Central European enterprises — direct contacts at the CHRO, VP People, and Head of Talent Acquisition level, built over a decade of selling into and working inside enterprise HR functions. When a portfolio founder is ready for first enterprise pilots, we open those conversations directly. Not email forwards — calls we are already on.
ML Architecture and Technical Diligence
Jaakko leads structured technical reviews with founding CTOs every two months. Having built and maintained NLP pipelines parsing 2M CVs per month — and led the migration from keyword matching to embedding-based semantic retrieval — he can engage precisely on model architecture decisions, inference cost tradeoffs, and evaluation pipeline design. Portfolio founders get peer-level technical input, not high-level investor observations.
Enterprise Sales Motion and Product Packaging
Elina spent nine years in enterprise software product roles, including VP Product at a Berlin-based talent marketplace where she owned GTM into German and Dutch enterprise HR buyers. She works directly with portfolio startups on the decisions that determine whether enterprise adoption happens: pricing model, implementation scope, procurement navigation, and the product surface choices that affect IT security and legal sign-off. Most early-stage HR tech founders underestimate how much of the sales cycle is won or lost in those layers.
Key Hires
We run structured search for first senior hires before an agency is necessary. Our network in the European HR tech ecosystem is active — we know which ML engineers have built hiring-specific models, which VP Sales candidates have closed enterprise HR deals in the Nordics, and which Head of Customer Success profiles actually reduce churn at seed-stage B2B products.
Growth-Stage Fundraising Preparation
We help portfolio startups build the data room, narrative, and investor targeting strategy for their next raise. Antti has built relationships with growth-stage funds across London, Stockholm, Berlin, and Amsterdam who actively track the HR tech category. He knows what a compelling AI HR tech story looks like at the growth stage and what data points those investors will ask for first.
Board Participation
Antti takes a board observer seat at every investment. Fund II investments include formal board seats where that fits the founder's governance structure. Our preference is governance that increases decision-making velocity — not governance that adds quarterly reporting overhead to a team that should be shipping.
Building in AI HR tech or workforce intelligence?
Send Antti a note. We read every message and respond directly. If there's a fit, the first call is within the week.
Submit a Pitch