Startup Wantent won the Ukrainian selection of the international startup competition Startup World Cup. The company will represent Ukraine in the final of Startup World Cup in San Francisco, where it will compete for the grand prize of $1 million.
Startup Wantent won the Ukrainian selection of the international startup competition Startup World Cup. The company will represent Ukraine in the final of Startup World Cup in San Francisco, where it will compete for the grand prize of $1 million.
«We are pleased to announce that the Wantent team won the Ukrainian final of the Startup World Cup 2025 and is now preparing for the global final in the USA! Our mission is clear — to represent Ukraine worthily and show the best, giving it our all 300%!», — the startup reported.
Wantent thanked EIT Community Hub Ukraine for organizing the second Startup World Cup selection in Ukraine. Last year, Ukraine was represented by the startup Spendbase.
«This year, the pitching took place as part of the Startup Stage at DOU Day 2025, becoming the flagship event of the program. Nine promising startups from industries such as mental health, entertainment, music technology, recruiting, customer experience, etc. participated in the final», — EIT Community Hub Ukraine commented.
Startup World Cup is the world’s largest pitch competition, organized by global venture capital firm Pegasus Tech Ventures. The competition includes over 75 regional startup competitions in over 20 countries. The finals are held in Silicon Valley, where the world’s best startups compete for a $1 million investment.
The competition has so far attracted over 10,000 participants and over 2,500 investors. Global partners include Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and other tech giants, while the advisory board includes executives from companies such as Pfizer, Siri, Netflix, and Snap Inc.
Wantent is a startup founded in 2019 by a former student of Igor Sikorsky Kyiv Polytechnic Institute, Oleksiy Shaldenko. He and his team use AI algorithms to test viewers' reactions to video content and determine how to increase engagement. The technology is based on several deep learning models that detect emotions, analyze gaze direction, and facial microexpressions.
In April of this year, Wantent announced a partnership with social media monitoring platform YouScan. The startups say that the combination of technologies will allow brands, agencies, and content creators to get a detailed picture of the effectiveness of their campaigns.
