Arctic Startup Q&A: Sleetfleet builds Arctic worlds across books, games, and animation

By Elías Thorsson January 8, 2026
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The Arctic region is home to a growing number of innovative startups, each navigating the unique challenges and opportunities of the Far North. In our spotlight series, Five Quick Questions for an Arctic Startup, we’re inviting startups from the Near Arctic and Arctic regions to share their stories and insights on Arctic Today.

This Q&A series provides a platform for startups to answer five key questions, offering a glimpse into their ideas, what makes them distinctive, and the lessons learned from working in this remote yet vital part of the world. In this installment of our series, we hear from Finnish transmedia company Sleetfleet Ltd.

Fast Facts
Industry: Games, animation, publishing, transmedia IP
Location: Helsinki, Finland
Number of employees: Core team 3 + international collaborators
Most recent funding: Founder investment, public grants, foundation funding, private development capital
Website: sleetfleet.com (site currently being updated)
Team members: Multinational team of game developers, artists, composers, and producers

What is your elevator pitch?
Sleetfleet builds long-term entertainment IPs rooted in the Arctic. Through books, games, and animation, we create character-driven worlds that make the Arctic emotionally meaningful to global audiences. Our work combines premium storytelling with environmental themes under the long-running Save the Arctic! vision.
What makes your idea unique and hard to copy?
Our Arctic IPs are built over years, not trends. Before Icecube, we created the Icebreakers book series, which has been translated into several languages. The founder’s professional background in Arctic navigation, icebreakers, and Greenland operations brings real-world authenticity, while our unified transmedia strategy ensures consistency across publishing, games, and animation.
How does being located in the Far North affect your business?
Being located in Helsinki, Finland gives our work credibility and depth. The Arctic is not an abstract theme for us. Sleetfleet’s Icebreakers book series has been translated into multiple languages. Icecube and the Arctic Awakens, the first part of the Icecube trilogy, is published in Finnish, has received its first positive review, and is currently being read by two international literary agencies. The Icecube game is approximately 80% complete, with an animated series script also in development. Alongside its fictional IPs, Sleetfleet continues to develop maritime documentary films that reflect real-world Arctic and ice navigation.
Who is your ideal investor?
Our ideal investor understands that strong IPs take time to grow. We seek partners from games, publishing, or impact investing who value content-first development and believe Arctic storytelling has long-term global relevance.
What is the hardest or most surprising lesson you have learned?
The most difficult lesson has been realizing how hard it is to accelerate growth and attract investors when most effort has been placed on long-term content creation. For years, we focused on building strong stories, worlds, and products rather than visibility. Despite the Arctic being constantly in global headlines, long-term Save the Arctic! storytelling has not received the attention we expected. What keeps us moving forward is a highly committed, multinational team with diverse perspectives and strong belief in the work. To scale, we now need partners in funding and social media expertise to match the quality of the content already built.

 

    Would you like to have your startup featured?

    All startups in the Far North and Arctic region are invited to participate in a new spotlight series on Arctic Today’s Arctic Business Journal page, called “Five questions for an Arctic startup.”

    To participate, submit the following facts and answer the questions in brief elevator-pitch style to [email protected]. You must also submit your name, a photo of you alone or with your team, and photos of your product, business or location, as appropriate.

    Fast facts:

    • Industry:
    • Location:
    • Number of employees:
    • Most recent funding:
    • Website:
    • Team members:

    Questions: (Try to answer each question in one paragraph)

    1. What is your elevator pitch?
    2. What makes your idea unique and hard to copy?
    3. How does being located in the Far North affect your business, both challenges or benefits?
    4. Who is your ideal investor?
    5. What is the hardest or most surprising lesson you have learned?

    Submit your completed response to [email protected] and our editors will prepare it for publication.