NestAI, a defence tech startup from Finland backed by Nokia, is taking the next step in its strategy to build a battlefield OS that works across Europe. On Tuesday, it announced that it is expanding to Estonia.
Peter Sarlin, NestAI’s founder and executive chairman, announced the news at the Estonian Defence Industry Symposium in Tallinn.
The move is a natural progression for the startup: NestAI was already working with the Estonian Defence Forces after signing a joint Letter of Intent with them and the Finnish Defence Forces in June 2026.
The expansion will see NestAI open an office in Tallinn both to be closer to its customer, and to continue developing its technology in conjunction with local industry partners. NestAI said the set-up will include at least 25 engineers and other specialists, as well as a new R&D centre.
“Estonia is the right place to build because operational needs, technical talent, and political will are all present in one country,” the company said in a statement.
Dr Ivo Peets, commander of Estonia’s Force Transformation Command, said that NestAI’s presence gives Estonian talent the opportunity to develop sovereign AI for battlefield operations. “We have world-class engineers and data scientists, but retaining them requires world-class challenges,” he said in a statement. It is also, he added, “a way of keeping the right talent in Estonia.”
NestAI’s flagship product is NestOS. It describes it as an “adaptive intelligence” operating system for battlefield operations. Features include continuous AI services, even in low communication zones; and a set-up that enables the system to learn from and adapt to the operational data that passes through it.
NestAI’s expansion comes as militaries incorporate an increasing number of AI-powered tools into their battlefield systems, to power hardware, run analytics and help manage other operations.
European leaders have coalesced around the belief that working in conjunction with each other creates a more powerful defence than each nation working solely on its own, and that has been especially apparent in the Nordics, where alliances are forming to develop and use new technologies.
While NestAI could have carried out that strategy from a single base in Finland, expanding to Estonia gives it a much closer understanding of what it customer needs, and to be more responsive to that.
“Strengthening Europe’s borders is urgent, and it is not work that can be done at a distance,” said Sarlin in a statement. “Ukraine has shown how quickly operational requirements change. AI that cannot keep learning after it is deployed will not hold, and building that capability means building it with the forces and companies who face those conditions.”
Martin Herem, Estonia’s very new minister for defence, echoed the need to be close to ground, so to speak.
“Estonia’s objective is clear: new technologies must translate into real military capability faster,” he said in a statement. “To achieve that, we need a strong defence technology ecosystem, close cooperation between companies and the state, and access to international expertise in areas such as artificial intelligence and autonomous systems. Bringing this expertise together with Estonia’s operational experience and digital strengths helps us develop solutions that strengthen our defence and can be put to practical use by our forces.”
This is not NestAI’s first move outside of Finland. The startup has been building relationships across the Nordics and Baltics over the past few months with expansions into Sweden in August and Latvia in September.
Peter Sarlin will appear on stage at Resilience Conference London in October. Come join us there.
