What Askeladden & Co does

Askeladden & Co (A&CO) is a Norwegian venture studio founded in 2017 and headquartered in Oslo that systematically conceives, launches, and scales companies across consumer services, healthcare, food & beverage, new retail, B2B services, and technology. The firm operates an industrial model of company building: it screens over 1,000 industries annually, develops concepts with co-founders, launches within 3–6 months, iterates to product–market fit, and then scales with external capital. Its portfolio comprises 20+ operating companies including Dr.Dropin (healthcare, 40+ clinics across Norway, Sweden, UK and Switzerland), DIGG Pizza (18+ restaurants, 350+ employees), Rebil (used-car marketplace scaling from 17M NOK in 2021 to over 1B NOK in 2025), Cutters (hair salons), Squeeze (massage), Olio (skincare), Petrus Veterinærer (veterinary clinics, built with strategic partner Musti), Blid (dental), Kin (Nordic e-commerce roll-up), Randi (fixed-price home services), &Hamlet (vacation rentals), and Verd (bereavement services).

A&CO operates a shared-services platform that supports every portfolio company with centralized technology, marketing, HR, finance, and business-development functions. The internal tech organization (A&CO Tech) owns end-to-end digital mandate across ventures, using a modern stack (Next.js, TypeScript, GraphQL, tRPC, Postgres, Vercel, GCP/AWS/Azure) plus OpenAI, Anthropic, and LangChain for AI features. This infrastructure has produced standalone products now commercialized externally: Edda.ai (workforce management with 300+ customers using ML-based demand prediction and staffing recommendations), Watchdog (AI invoice anomaly detection that uncovered over $400K in errors across pilots), Journalia (medical-consultation AI documentation co-built with Dr.Dropin), A&CO Booking (proprietary SaaS handling hundreds of thousands of annual bookings for Squeeze, Olio, and Jubel), and Favor (B2C gift-card platform).

The business model is equity-driven: A&CO provides pre-launch and concept-stage capital, retains significant ownership stakes in portfolio companies, and generates revenue through exit proceeds, minority-stake monetization, and the scaling of internally-built platforms. Notable exits include the 2019 sale of a 65% stake in Cutters to Swedish PE firm Procuritas at a 400M NOK valuation (110M NOK realized, ~100x return), a 2021 Dr.Dropin round at ~850M NOK post-money led by Yabeo and SHS (diluting A&CO to 23%), and 2024 sales of Yellow (17M NOK, 4x) and Billy to investor groups. A&CO retains minority positions in several former portfolio companies and continues to launch 3–5 new ventures annually.

Name

Askeladden & Co

Legal name

Askeladden & Co

Website

https://askeladden.co

Company type

Private

Founded year

2017

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

51–100 employees

Short description

Askeladden & Co is a Norwegian venture studio that builds, funds, and scales companies across healthcare, retail, food & beverage, and technology. Founded in 2017 in Oslo, it operates 20+ portfolio companies backed by a shared tech, marketing, HR, and finance platform.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Venture Studio Services

NAICS

Management Consulting Services (54161), Administrative Management and General Management Consulting Services (541611)

SIC

Services-Management Consulting Services (8742)

akta.pro primary industry

Venture Studios / Company Builders (FSANAAAH)

akta.pro secondary industry

DevOps Consulting & Transformation (BPAEAKAA)

Keywords

• Venture studio operations
• Company building services
• Startup incubation
• Portfolio company development
• Venture building

Headquarters

HQ city

Oslo

HQ country

Norway

HQ region

Europe

Offices2 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2B and B2C

Offering type

Services

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Operations, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure

Revenue model

1. Equity ownership in portfolio companies: Askeladden & Co builds and funds companies from inception, taking significant equity stakes. They provide capital to develop concepts, build and launch companies, and achieve product-market fit. External funding is raised for scaling. Revenue is generated through exits when companies are sold or taken public.
2. Exit proceeds: Successful exits include Cutters (sold 65% stake for 110M NOK at 400M NOK valuation in 2019), Dr.Dropin (investment round valued company at 850M NOK), and others. Company retains stakes in some exited companies.

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels6 records

Core offering

Askeladden & Co is a Norwegian venture studio that identifies business opportunities, develops company concepts with recruited co-founders, and provides capital, know-how, network, and shared operational services (technology, marketing, HR, finance) to build and scale startups from inception through exit. Since 2016 it has bootstrapped more than 20 companies and deployed over 700 million NOK across sectors including healthcare, retail, food and beverage, real estate, and B2B services.

Product overview

Askeladden & Co is a venture studio that builds and scales multiple companies across sectors including healthcare, retail, food & beverage, and B2B services. The portfolio includes both internal AI-powered platforms (Edda for workforce management, Watchdog for invoice verification, Journalia for medical documentation, A&CO Booking for multi-brand reservations, Favor for gift cards) and operating companies across healthcare (Dr.Dropin, Blid, Petrus Veterinærer), retail/services (Rebil, Kin, Squeeze, Olio), food & beverage (Digg Pizza), and B2B services (Randi, Verd). The company follows a model of building internal tools that scale into standalone platforms benefiting the entire portfolio, with shared tech, marketing, HR, and finance support across all ventures.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• A&CO Tech: The technology team within Askeladden & Co that holds full tech ownership for every venture, building customer products, business tools, and data integrations across the portfolio.
• Edda
• Favor
• A&CO Booking

Products and services

• Dr.Dropin Norwegian private healthcare provider offering accessible general practice and specialist services to consumers through physical clinics and digital booking.
• Edda Workforce management software platform used to schedule and manage hourly employees for Norwegian businesses across multiple industries.
• DIGG Norwegian food and beverage brand serving pizza and related products to consumers through takeaway, delivery, and physical outlets.
• Squeeze Norwegian massage and wellness brand offering on-demand massage services to consumers through a digital booking platform.
• Rebil Online used vehicle marketplace serving Norwegian consumers and dealers seeking to buy and sell pre-owned cars.
• Watchdog AI-powered invoice checking and finance automation tool for businesses, designed to identify errors and anomalies in accounts payable workflows.
• Journalia Healthcare journaling platform supporting clinical documentation and patient communication workflows for healthcare providers.
• A&CO Booking Booking platform developed by A&CO Tech and used across multiple portfolio companies to manage appointments and reservations.
• Favor Gift card platform enabling consumers and businesses to purchase and redeem gift cards across portfolio brands.
• Petrus Veterinærer Norwegian veterinary clinic chain offering primary and preventive care services to pet owners through physical locations.
• Blid Norwegian dental clinic brand providing general and cosmetic dentistry services to consumers.
• Olio Norwegian skincare brand selling cosmetic and personal care products directly to consumers through online channels.
• Kin Norwegian e-commerce brand selling consumer products directly to households through online channels.
• Randi Provider of outsourced business services to Norwegian small and mid-sized businesses, supplying operational support on demand.
• &Hamlet Vacation home rental brand offering short-term accommodation experiences to consumers in Nordic destinations.
• Jubel Provider of curated consumer experiences and activities marketed to Norwegian consumers.
• Verd Norwegian bereavement support service offering counseling and related resources to individuals and families.

Quantifiable outcome

• 90% of startups fail, but A&CO model aims to significantly outperform these statistics through their support infrastructure
• +2 more outcomes

Named customers3 records

Segments6 records

Ideal customer profiles3 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration1 record

AI capability6 records

Feature4 records

Scale indicators7 records

Recent moves13 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• The Family: European startup studio and community that supports founders from day zero through scaling, with education, capital, and operational support. Similar to A&CO in its emphasis on supporting multiple early-stage ventures simultaneously with shared infrastructure.
• High Alpha: Indianapolis-based venture studio that conceives, launches, and scales B2B SaaS companies with shared go-to-market, design, and engineering resources. Closely mirrors A&CO's shared-tech, multi-venture studio playbook, though focused exclusively on SaaS.
• Antler: Global venture studio that identifies founders, supports ideation, and helps build companies from scratch across geographies. Most direct comparable in terms of the founding-from-zero, multi-sector studio model, though Antler operates at a much larger global scale than A&CO.
• Pioneer Square Labs (PSL): Seattle-based venture studio that builds software and tech-enabled companies from inception with shared engineering, design, and product resources. Comparable to A&CO on the studio mechanics of founding companies and seeding them through shared infrastructure.
• Founders Factory: Global venture studio that co-creates and scales technology startups with corporate partners, combining shared operational infrastructure with venture-building expertise. Closely analogous to A&CO's model of building companies alongside co-founders and operational partners.
• Atomic: San Francisco-based venture studio that partners with founders to build and fund early-stage companies from scratch, providing shared design, engineering, and product resources. Direct comparable on studio-stage company creation mechanics.
• eFounders (now Front): Paris-based venture studio that co-founds B2B SaaS companies and builds them to scale, sharing operational resources across portfolio. Comparable to A&CO's Edda/A&CO Booking/Watchdog portfolio of internal-then-standalone SaaS assets built on a shared platform.

Regional players

• Startuplab: Oslo-based startup accelerator and investor that supports Norwegian and Nordic founders from inception, providing shared resources similar to A&CO's community model. Relevant as a domestic Norwegian peer operating in the same founder ecosystem.
• Smedvig Ventures: Norwegian investment company that builds and invests in tech-enabled businesses, with a similar geographic focus to A&CO. Relevant as a regional Norwegian operator in the same market and talent pool.

Broad incumbents

• Rocket Internet: Berlin-based company builder and incubator that creates and scales internet/tech companies across emerging markets and verticals. Significantly larger and more established than A&CO, but pursues a comparable playbook of systematic company creation and operational support.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat5 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• Facebookfacebook.com/askeladdenco
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/18068154
• Instagraminstagram.com/askeladden.co

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles9 records

Subsidiaries15 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments2 records

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Askeladden & Co