Over the next few weeks, we’ll be sharing in-depth insights from key players in Lithuania’s Fintech sector in a series of exclusive interviews from the Fintech Landscape in Lithuania 2022-2023 Report. In our first instalment, Adriaan Hoogduijn, Chief Executive Officer of Hyarchis, talks about the company’s decision to locate itself in Kaunas and explains why Kaunas is becoming a hub for product development.
Why did Hyarchis choose Kaunas? What was the thought process and criteria for selecting a new office outside of the Netherlands?
The Regtech market, in which we operate, is booming and Lithuania is quickly developing into one of its main hubs in Europe. As a company, we’re always looking for breakthrough solutions within our market, and Lithuania offers the kind of talent that we need to stay at the helm of innovation within our industry. Whereas we started with a hub for our product development, our Lithuanian operations have quickly developed into our operational headquarters which includes HR, Finance, Support, Marketing and Sales. We selected Kaunas mainly because of the presence of high-quality institutions of higher education, which actively collaborate with the business environment. We successfully collaborate with both Kaunas University of Technology as well as Vytautas Magnus University and we are very happy with the talent we’ve been able to attract and nurture with them.
What is the current role of the Kaunas office within your company? And what are the unique advantages Kaunas has when compared to Vilnius?
Our Kaunas office serves as our main product development hub while our Vilnius office serves as our operational headquarters. For product development, we heavily rely on data scientists and the talent pool in Kaunas is deeper in this regard. Due to the presence of many homegrown Fintech successes, the operational experience, however, runs deeper in Vilnius. Since it’s a mere hour’s drive between the cities, we can easily combine the best of both worlds.
What would you recommend to companies looking to explore locations outside of Vilnius?
My advice would be to look first and foremost at the city’s potential. When I first touched ground in Kaunas in 2016, there were only a handful of international investors and barely any Class A office buildings. We, however, saw the potential of the city based on its infrastructure and decided to move in. Together with us, more and more international investors started moving in and together have created a great infrastructure that many companies can reap the fruits from. To my feeling, cities such as Klaipėda and Šiauliai will see a similar surge in the years to come.
