The two-year contract will cover Work in Estonia marketing both locally and in target countries, including Brazil, Mexico, Sweden, Spain, Germany, the U.K., the U.S., Portugal, France, the Netherlands and Finland.

The program aims to attract foreign talent and promote Estonia as an international tech hub.

Work in Estonia head Kristi Veskus told ERR that the procurement will focus on digital marketing to "keep Estonia visible as an attractive career destination for foreign talent" and encourage applications for high-skill jobs.

Veskus noted that the choice of target countries is based on both talent interest in working abroad, but also cultural compatibility, and where companies have successfully recruited in the past.

She added that the program emphasizes highly qualified specialists in ICT and engineering — fields where local Estonian labor cannot meet market demand.

Campaign success will be measured initially by website engagement, and longer term by the number of applicants per position.

"On average, one talent applies for 1.2–1.3 jobs, meaning one candidate is potentially available to more than one company," Veskus said. For full campaigns, results can reach 1.5–1.7 applications per candidate.

The Work in Estonia portal was first launched in spring 2015, initially targeting Finnish IT specialists laid off from Nokia. Estonia's low wage competitiveness, however, limited its success.

By early 2017, the project faced criticism for falling short of its goals, with then-minister of entrepreneurship and IT Urve Palo questioning the need to maintain it. The ministry nonetheless later affirmed its necessity and set a target of 2,000 IT hires from outside the EU in subsequent years.

Because companies handle actual recruitment directly, exact results are hard to track. Still, EIS says more than 1,000 foreign talents have been employed through Work in Estonia since 2023.

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