In 2005, from a tiny back-office in the Swedish capital, three young post-graduates created Klarna; a company that has gone on to become Europe’s most highly-valued fintech.

But that’s not all they’ve created. Over the past 15 years, Klarna has also bred a wave of top-class engineers and managers that are now becoming founders themselves, helping to seed a new generation of local startups.

It’s part of a growing trend across Europe where one tech success story creates a surrounding ecosystem of expert former employees.  Key founders often then become angel investors in their former colleagues’ ventures or allow them to use their equity to bank-roll themselves.

“Successful mafias are growing on the back of companies with a radical culture of entrepreneurship and ownership,” said Alexandre Dewez, an associate at France’s Idinvest.

In London’s fintech scene, there’s a burgeoning Monzo and Revolut “mafia”; as well as a TransferWise mafia. The original “mafia” were former PayPal employees who went on to found Tesla, LinkedIn, Palantir, Square, and YouTube.

Klarna’s mafia now counts founders as well as those that have become VCs, such as Linda Samlin Höglund at Luminar Ventures, Mikael Wintzell at Wellstreet, and Matthew Riley at QED. And the mafia is set to keep growing, according to Dewez, given the company’s plans to list publicly in the coming years.

“[Big exits generate a] positive feedback loop in which capital, talent and education are reinvested into the ecosystem, shortening the time from creation to exit and reducing the risk of potential failures,” says Dewez.

Meet 10 Klarna employees-turned-founders, hoping to leave their mark on Sweden’s fintech scene.

Sven Perkmann/ Filip Polhem/ Mikael Hussain

Who? All former credit analysts at Klarna. Hussain spent seven years at Klarna and eventually becoming VP Credit. Meanwhile, Polhem left Klarna after ~two years to serve as chief risk officer at iZettle.

Venture? Cofounded Anyfin, an app that helps users refinance their debt.

State of venture? Raised $30m Series B in May 2020, backed by investors including Accel, Northzone, and EQT Ventures.

Kevin Albrecht 

Who? Spent four years in Klarna’s Product team.

Venture? Cofounder and CEO at PFC, a Swedish neobank.

State of venture? Launched in 2018 and live to customers in Sweden. The company is backed by NFT Ventures and has now launched a children’s spending card too.

Sven Brauer

Who? VP product at Klarna between 2017-2018

Venture? Cofounder of MODIFI (Germany), a fintech that offers trade financing to small and medium-sized businesses wanting to trade internationally.

State of venture? Launched in 2017, it has now raised a €8.5m Series A.

Lena Hackelöer

Who?: A Klarnuaut for over six years, overseeing the marketing team.

Venture?: Founder of Brite, an account-to-account online payment tool (akin to Trustly).

State of venture?: Founded in early 2019, the company has already launched in three countries; Sweden, Finland and the Netherlands. The company also told Sifted it had broken even and had raised ~€6m in seed funding.

Kristofer Ekman Sinclair

Who?: Entered Klarna as a “trainee CEO” in 2009, and later moved into business development.

Venture?: Founder of Zimpler, a mobile payment solution (including account-to-account checkout services).

State of venture?: Zimpler is one of the oldest startups on this list, founded seven years ago. It has been recognised as a ‘Deloitte Fast 50’ twice and lists around 40 employees on LinkedIn. It boasted a 1000% increase in transactions volumes over the last six months.

Ekman Sinclair stepped back as CEO late last year.

Pär Isaksson

Who?: A former Klarna heavyweight, serving as CIO for three years

Venture?: Founded stoEr in 2017, offering a mortgage streamlining-solution to banks wanting to boost their customer experience

State of venture?: Still relatively small, the company has raised around $2m from angel investors so far. It is now focused on building its “mortgage as a service” and signing up bank clients. The idea is to strip banks of their legacy IT systems and replace them with a digital infrastructure.

Who? Bringeus joined Klarna as a summer intern in 2010, but stayed for three years, eventually joining the marketing division.

Venture? Bringeus founded the only ‘non-fintech’ startup on this list, ASKET — a men’s clothing range focused on sustainability. It boasts initiatives including ‘The Impact Receipt’, showing the environmental impact of each garment, and a single, timeless collection.

State of venture? ASKET was founded in 2015 and has since garnered 71k Instagram followers. It was also recently featured in publications like GQ and Forbes.

Erik Engellau-Nilsson

Who? A key member of Klarna’s US expansion team, serving as the local VP Comms and CMO

Venture? Runs the Norrsken Foundation; an “impact hub” which invests in startups that want to scale tech innovation for the greater good. The foundation is the brainchild of Klarna cofounder Niklas Adalberth, who has invested €70m in it so far. Engellau-Nilsson was brought on as the founding CEO.

Ohad Samet

Who? Former chief risk officer, Klarna

Venture?: Went on to found TrueAccord in 2013, hoping to change the way businesses collect debt in the US.

State of venture?  The company raised $22m in 2017 and now counts 130+ employees on LinkedIn.

Jens Saltin 

Who? At Klarna for over six years, most recently as UK country manager

Venture? Cofounder of Steven, a local “Venmo” which allows friends to settle their debts 

State of venture? The company was backed by Klarna’s own founder, Sebastian Siemiatkowski, who contributed to its $2.4m raise. Steven has has been quiet since mid-2019 but Saltin told Sifted it was still going strong.

Note, this list’s lack of female representation follows the general trend in Swedish fintech, with just 6% of CEOs of fintechs in Stockholm being women.

Isabel Woodford is Sifted’s fintech correspondent. She tweets from @i_woodford — let her know if we’ve forgotten anyone!