Lithuania has created its sixth unicorn in under a year, strengthening its position as a center for globally competitive technology firms that stay connected to their local roots.
Oxylabs reaches $3.6 billion valuation after first institutional funding
A decade after launching in Vilnius, Oxylabs received a $130 million investment from private equity firm Warburg Pincus. The funding valued the company at $3.6 billion and marked its first outside capital raise, a key moment for both Oxylabs and Lithuania’s developing tech industry.
The company, which offers web intelligence and data infrastructure, spent years funding its own growth before reaching over $350 million in annual recurring revenue. It now serves more than 350,000 customers worldwide while keeping its main office in Vilnius.
Gintarė Verbickaitė, CEO of Unicorns Lithuania, said Oxylabs demonstrated that no single path exists for building a successful tech company. It operated for years without outside funding, prioritized long-term value, and became one of Europe’s leading firms in its field.
The funding aligns with a trend seen in other Lithuanian unicorns like Cast AI, Nord Security, and Vinted. All have expanded globally while maintaining their local presence, helping Vilnius become Europe’s fastest-growing tech city in 2025, according to the Dealroom index.
Vilnius emerges as a tech hub with local roots
By early 2025, startups in Vilnius were valued at €15.5 billion, with venture capital investments climbing 60% from the previous year to €212 million. The city’s growth is measured by five factors: business-value increase, funding levels, startup density, output per person, and unicorn creation. While unicorns are only one factor, they carry significant symbolic importance.
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The broader Lithuanian startup sector has grown 6.8 times in value over the past decade, the strongest increase in Central and Eastern Europe. It now employs about 20,000 people, who earn roughly double the national average wage, and contributed €477 million to the state budget in 2024.
Economy minister Edvinas Grikšas described the figures as part of a deliberate strategy. “The goal is to generate lasting value for the national economy,” he said at a January event. Lithuanian startups are now valued at €16.4 billion, a fivefold increase in five years—far exceeding the regional average of 1.6 times.
While the trend isn’t unique to Lithuania, the country stands out for retaining talent and headquarters. A State of European Tech survey found that Europe produces 17% of new global enterprise value but captures only 10% of exit value, as founders and offices increasingly move to the U.S. Oxylabs, which rejected its first outside investor in 2015, chose to remain in Vilnius.
The Reinvantage IT Competitiveness Index placed Lithuania fourth among 32 countries, indicating the ecosystem’s strengths go beyond unicorn counts. Still, these high-value companies serve as a useful symbol, signaling ambition even as the real work involves building lasting businesses.
This growth reflects broader changes in how small nations balance global markets with local needs.