This Month in German, Swiss, and Austrian (GSA) Startups — February 2024
Welcome to our February 2024 wrap-up with vital news from the startup and tech entrepreneurship scenes in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland in 30 minutes or less 🙂.
Our startup news is recorded with Chris in New York City and Joe in Frankfurt. Recording date is February 26th 2024 and all news not included will be in our next news to be released on March 28th 2024.
Since today happens only every 4 years. Enjoy the additional day and happy leap year :-)
Easter Holidays in Germany
Next publication will be on Holy Thursday (Gründonnerstag) in Germany. Note that the Friday before and Monday after Easter are public holidays. Since both weeks are shorter and usually coincide with school holidays many people will take off either one or both weeks. — So don’t expect your calls to be returned in a timely manner during this time.
Our Highlights:
Microsoft plans to invest 3.3 billion euros in expanding data centers in Germany to handle AI and cloud computing, a move welcomed by Chancellor Olaf Scholz as a commitment to progress and global openness.
Vienna-based AI startup Magic secures $117 million funding, aiming to surpass ChatGPT-4 with its AGI ambitions, while Stuttgart’s Instagrid raises $95M to expand into North America with innovative portable battery systems.
However, fintech struggles surface as Elinvar faces insolvency despite €50M investment, and in the medtech world cannabis company Sanity Group cuts staff.
Meanwhile, BioNTech wins a lawsuit, Flixbus expands to India, Mondu secures €30 million for expansion, and changes in German insolvency regulations pose challenges for debt funded startups like Instafreight.
And finally, EV charging platform Monta raises €80M for European expansion.
Let’s talk startups:
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This recording was made possible by HTAI and the Enterprise Europe Network Hessen. These organizations have made tremendous contributions to helping startup businesses succeed and thrive, providing a range of services from helping to find grants to ongoing partnerships. By taking advantage of these resources, startup companies can network and develop innovative strategies for success on the international stage. The dedicated support of HTAI and the Enterprise Europe Network Hessen is paramount in providing startup businesses with the tools for lasting success. Look for our dedicated sub-podcast in partnership with them: Tech Startups Germany on our
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Top News
Microsoft Will Invest 3.3bn Euros in Germany
Microsoft to invest three billions expanding data centers to handle AI in Germany https://buff.ly/48mFq2V
Mirror writes “Germany’s Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has given a big thumbs up to Microsoft’s plan to invest a whopping 3.3 billion euros in the country.
The tech giant wants to boost its data center capacities for artificial intelligence and cloud computing. Mr Scholz said: “This is a really good commitment to progress, to growth, to modernity and to global openness as the basis for these opportunities.””
Austrian AI Startup Raises 117 M US$ Money Claiming To Surpass ChatGPT-4 In Some Aspects
Vienna-based AI startup Magic, founded by Eric Steinberger and Sebastian De Ro, has recently disclosed a hefty $117 million funding round, with former GitHub CEO Nat Friedman, his investment partner Daniel Gross, and Alphabet’s Growth Fund CapitalG among the investors. Magic aims to create an AI software developer superior to humans, capable of handling complete jobs rather than just individual tasks like current copilots, with ambitions towards achieving Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). Their model, including LTM-1 with an immense context window of 5 million tokens, surpasses other leading AI companies’ Large Language Models (LLMs) by a significant margin, potentially revolutionizing tasks like coding assistance with its ability to consider vast amounts of context. This vast context window, defining the model’s memory span and processing capabilities, underlines Magic’s substantial computational requirements, elucidating the substantial investment needed for LLM development. https://buff.ly/49pOTrK
Instagrid From Stuttgart Raises 95 M US$ (Round Totals 145 M US$)
Stuttgart-based Instagrid, a provider of high-performance portable battery systems, has secured $95M in Series C funding, bringing their total raised amount to $145M. The round was led by Teachers’ Venture Growth (TVG) from Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, with participation from Morgan Stanley Investment Management (MSIM) 1GT climate private equity strategy, and contributions from existing investors including Energy Impact Partners, SET Ventures, and others. This funding will facilitate their expansion into the North American market, boost production, and diversify their mobile power solutions for decarbonizing off-grid power. Founded in 2018, Instagrid’s innovative battery systems aim to replace fossil generators in various sectors, boasting smaller, lighter, and more powerful products enabled by stacked micro-level inverters. With the hiring of US CEO Rich Romer, the company plans to establish offices, expand their team, and launch new products tailored for the United States and Canada. https://buff.ly/49KP1Se
50 Million Were Not Enough To Succeed For Elinvar
Fintech Elinvar, with €50M investment, faces insolvency as it fails to attract buyers or investors. 70 employees have already been laid off. Prominent investors like Goldman Sachs failed to salvage. https://buff.ly/4bRW5ON
Former Guest Sanity Group Cuts Headcount
Sanity Group, the Berlin-based cannabis startup known for investors like Will i am or Snoop Dog, cuts up to 12% of their headcount https://buff.ly/3T9xyxo
Learn more about the entrepreneur behind Sanity Group Finn Hänsel in our interview here: https://buff.ly/42PzG0J
BioNTech Does Not Have To Pay
Woman from Rhine-Palatinate fails in a lawsuit against BioNTech in Germany. The court dismissed the claim for damages over the alleged vaccine injury. Learn more here: https://buff.ly/49KY71q
Namaste!
Unicorn Flixbus (known as the owner of Greyhound Bus) expands to India https://buff.ly/49LugGk Co-founder Jochen Engert has also won the Entrepreneur of the Year Award 2022, for which we interviewed him: https://buff.ly/3wxq9zj
In other news from Flixbus:
Flixbus among the winners in recent strikes at Germany railway operator Deutsche Bahn, along buget airlines and car rental companies #startupnews #germany #travelingermany https://buff.ly/4bJHl4F
Mondu Gets 30 Million Loan For Expansion
Exciting times for Berlin’s buy-now-pay-later fintechh Mondu! 🚀 With European expansion in full swing and demand soaring, they’ve secured an additional €30 million in funding from a renowned Fintech investors https://buff.ly/3OQnPte
Technicality May Lead To More Insolvencies And A Strong Headwind for Debt Funding
Yep, here we have some splaining to do: In Germany insolvencies are regulated by the Insolvenzordnung (which could be translated to: German insolvency statute). The rule has been that companies who take on debt need funding for 4 months during Corona, but the changes had a time limit to the end of 2023. There was no extension and so now startups with debt funding need to be funded for 12 months. Otherwise profitable startups need to file for insolvency e.g. like Instafreight https://buff.ly/4bOtLwR
Monta raises 80 M € And Will Be A Guest
EV charging platform Monta closes €80 million Series B to accelerate EV charging infrastructure deployment — Monta https://buff.ly/42WtDaz
They are from Denmark but are also active in Germany, and we will talk about their expansion to Germany and the European EV market. Stay tuned.
Housekeeping & Time to Brag
Our former guest Ivan completes a successful fundraising campaign with Monite: Exciting #StartupNews from Berlin! Monite, a fintech innovator, just secured $6M in Seed funding. 🚀 Led by Valar Ventures and Third Prime, they’re set to redefine B2B finance automation: https://buff.ly/3uWMntQ Our interview: https://buff.ly/3Nhzyiv
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Ecosystem
Europe
- Europe’s gender pay gap is 26 percent in the tech industry, where does your country rank? https://buff.ly/426USPf Here is the direct link to the report by Ravio on the European tech industry compensation trends. The link will directly open a PDF: https://buff.ly/3TbEUAB
The gender pay gap in Germany is 25% according to the report. In France it is just 18%, but in the UK 29%. - EU countries strike deal on landmark AI rulebook https://buff.ly/3uiWxox
Switzerland
- Swiss startups secure CHF 2.6 billion in funding despite a 35% decrease in investments for 2023. While mature startups faced a notable decline, the number of financing rounds remained steady, highlighted by the Swiss Venture Capital Report https://buff.ly/3I7vVtI
Germany
- ifo Business Climate Index rises (February 2024) https://www.ifo.de/en/facts/2024-02-23/ifo-business-climate-index-rises-february-2024
Ifo institute writes on their website: “Sentiment among German companies has brightened somewhat. The ifo Business Climate Index rose to 85.5 points in February, up from 85.2 points in January. This is due to slightly less pessimistic expectations. Assessments of the current situation remained unchanged — positive and negative responses here were nearly in balance. The German economy is stabilizing at a low level.” - 🚀 Germany steps up its cybersecurity game with BSI’s launch of the new National IT Operations Center . A big leap towards a safer digital landscape! #CybernationGermany #BSI https://buff.ly/42TbIS8
- Germany to Ease Fintech Growth Caps After Clampdown in Wirecard’s Wake — Bloomberg https://buff.ly/3UR5QGV
“BaFin has been leading what’s arguably Europe’s biggest clampdown on mostly digital startup banks as well as on payment firms. The actions taken by the watchdog have likely compounded deep valuation declines across the industry as borrowing costs rise.” writes the Fintech Collective on the topic
“We are seeing progress at individual firms, but not all,” BaFin Executive Director Birgit Rodolphe said in an interview from her Frankfurt office on Tuesday. “There will definitely be cases where we loosen restrictions this year.” - In the world of Family Offices! 📈 The number of Family Offices investing in private markets has more than doubled in the DACH region since 2018, reaching 2,000 active managers according to Preqin https://buff.ly/42RP0JW?utm_source=-custom-by-source-0-
Hubs
Here we want to highlight some hidden gems and cities of general startup interest.
Frankfurt — Rhein/Main
- CommerzVentures leads €25 million Series B in Tuum https://buff.ly/48uoR5p
- Frankfurt-based MedTech startup Implify raises “seven digits” series a venture funding https://buff.ly/49AjSky
- WeWork to shut down locations in Germany at the end of March in Frankfurt, Hamburg, and Berlin. A local company in Frankfurt will take the location and continue the contracts for the current tenants https://buff.ly/3wn5qxP WeWork will keep the second location in Frankfurt.
Walldorf
- SAP’s bold move: powering AI ventures through a major overhaul. 🔥 Amidst cutting 8000 jobs, they’re also investing €2 billion in AI. A transformative step towards shaping the future of tech https://buff.ly/3T4fe8V we know one place where they will spend this money:
- Related: SAP starts its own AI startup called „Projekt Jarvis“ https://buff.ly/49QpRSb someone else thinking of Iron Man here? ;-). Is
Hamburg
- Hamburg-based AI kitchen startup Circus, specializes in the kitchen for delivery, assisting with AI and robots lists in Frankfurt via direct listing https://buff.ly/3T5gZ5Q
- Hamburg-based coworking company Workrepublic has to file for insolvency. They have two locations in Hamburg. The future is yet unclear https://buff.ly/3wnzWrE
Stuttgart
- Stuttgart’s Climate Tech startup, Cyclize, secures a whopping €4.75M seed funding! 💰 Their innovative technology aims to revolutionize the chemical industry by recycling plastic waste and CO2 #startupnews https://buff.ly/3wtkRov
Karlsruhe:
- Daedalus, a Karlsruhe, Germany-based technology company building factories using AI, raised $21M in Series A funding https://buff.ly/48pM60m
Austria
- Cigna Backs Austrian 9amHealth in Revolutionary Health Tech Move, Boosting Cardiometabolic Care Innovation https://buff.ly/48u2z3I
- Austrian e-bike subscription startup Bike Gorillaz opens insolvency proceedings — founder fell sick and does not plan to continue https://buff.ly/3uI5d8a
- News from Vienna’s Biotech scene! 🌟 G.ST Antivirals raises over six million euros, combining a four million euro Series-A investment with a 2.2 million euro grant from FFG https://buff.ly/4bK2vj7
Switzerland
- Carbon credit insurer CarbonPool raises $12m in seed round https://buff.ly/49tjmVJ
- New investment brings LimmaTech’s series A to CHF 40 million https://buff.ly/3OXV6mF
“LimmaTech Biologics, a Swiss biotech startup from Schlieren, has raised an additional USD 3 million from healthtech investor Tenmile, bringing its series A round to USD 40 million (CHF 34,7 million). The funding will be used to further advance the company’s proprietary self-adjuvanting and multi-antigen vaccine technology platform and to initiate Phase 1 clinical trials for their Staphylococcus aureus candidate and Phase 2 trials for the Shigella vaccine candidate.“ - Lockheed Martin invests in Meteomatics an undisclosed amount https://buff.ly/49OEhm8
They write “Lockheed Martin Ventures, the venture arm of the global security and aerospace company, has made a strategic investment in Meteomatics. The funds will enable the St. Gallen-based company to scale its high-resolution weather and climate technology and expand into new markets and industries.” - QBIT Capital closes oversubscribed first fund at CHF 29M! Focused on Swiss tech startups tackling global issues, this Zurich-based VC firm strengthens its position in the venture capital market. https://www.startupticker.ch/en/news/oversubscribed-round-for-qbit-capital The fund will only invest in 12–15 swiss startups
- Global healthcare VC firm invests $30m in icotec https://buff.ly/3TaPI21
“a Swiss medtech company pioneering the development of implants for spine tumor stabilization, has secured $30m growth financing from MVM Partners” - 🚀 Sygnum, the global bank for digital assets, surpasses expectations in an oversubscribed funding round, raising over $40 million. Now valued at $900 million https://buff.ly/49BwsjG
- Switzerland’s leading auto subscription service, Carvolution: They’ve secured up to CHF 200 million in asset-backed financing, with Barclays among the new backers. This will fuel the expansion of their vehicle fleet https://buff.ly/4bPfyQ8
General News / Tech News / Companies News Section
We include some news we deem relevant from more established companies here as well:
New Funds, in case you are looking for money:
- Earlybird Health just closed a €173M fund focusing on healthcare innovation. They’ve even got major European health insurers on board! From digital health to biopharma 🚀 https://buff.ly/49wmzUK
Fintech News
- From the brink of insolvency to a new chapter! A health specialist has acquired berlin-based healthcare fintech Cure Finance. Founder Martin Buhl’s resilience shines as they bounce back stronger https://buff.ly/3OZ2eiC
General News
- Sepp Hochreiter, the mastermind behind LSTM, is set to challenge OpenAI’s dominance with NXAI. Backed by European partners, NXAI aims to revolutionize AI models globally. Can they surpass OpenAI? Stay tuned! https://buff.ly/3uJoXs3
- Both founders of Tonies Box step down from their management roles at the company https://buff.ly/3TbYbBL They hand over to a professional management team
- Big news in the startup world! Factory Berlin, once a hotspot for innovation at Görlitzer Park, is shutting this location. CEO hints at revamping the hub’s concept amidst changing work trends https://buff.ly/3wsZHqq
- Octopus Energy’s tech arm, Kraken, acquires Berlin startup Kwest https://buff.ly/49LVA7o
- HR tech unicorn Personio reshuffles Product and Technology department — 100 employees let go https://buff.ly/49JiSKZ
- German solar startup Nexwafe is building a gigawatt factory in the USA, seizing opportunities in America’s solar boom! 🌞🏭 Despite industry shifts, Nexwafe stays committed to German production https://buff.ly/3uFl8UL
- Berlin-based Veganz AG was once Europe’s first vegan grocery store chain. At times they also acted as wholesalers. Now they leave the brick and mortar business and close their last physical store, focusing on their own line of products https://buff.ly/3ODE2BU
Schumpeters Schöpferische Zerstörung ⇒ Creative Destruction Still Ongoing:
- Long stories do not always turn out well: Movinga files for insolvency. The story is long and littered with lawsuits. It seemed to have a good end with the takeover by a UK-based competitor last year -( https://buff.ly/42NJpo4 Movinga, Movago, Move24, a business angel building up a competitor, lawsuits, a merger, a takeover and now the end? We also talked about the story with Finn Hänsel from Sanity Group, because before he founded Sanity Group, he was one of the CEOs of the competing companies in the story: https://buff.ly/42PzG0J
- Gründerszene compiled a list of companies that had already to file for insolvency in 2024: https://buff.ly/3TgkJle The list includes Instafreight and the aforementioned new rule for startups with debt funding, that they need to be funded for 12 months.
- Trouble brews at Civey as they enter protective proceedings! 🛡️⚡️ Tensions rise within the shareholder circle amidst the storm. Stay tuned as this story unfolds. https://buff.ly/3UWKOqm “Civey is developing the world’s real-time representative opinion research technology.” they write.
- Neobroker for women fails: Fina gives up after just two years. 📉 Another reminder of the challenges in creating inclusive financial platforms. https://buff.ly/3Tufoaa
End on a High Note: Successful Fundraisings and Exits:
Keep in mind this is a small selection. The news here and their total value show how resilient the startup scene is. We included only selected fundraisings above 5 million Euros or USD. We also included some positive outlooks for 2024 here to keep the news in an upbeat mood
- Berlin-based creative platform Kittl raises another $36M for its browser-based design tool https://buff.ly/3UMAktF writes TechCrunch
- Qdrant, a Berlin, Germany-based open-source vector database, raised $28M in Series A funding https://buff.ly/3T945na
- Morressier, a Berlin, Germany-based startup which specializes in scholarly communications, raised $16.5M in Series B funding https://buff.ly/48qkJ6b
- Berlin-based Packmatic lands €15 million to scale its B2B digital packaging platform across Europe | EU-Startups https://buff.ly/3SQthO5
- Planet A Foods seals Series-A funding with €14.1M ($15.4M)! 🌱👏 Based in Munich, they’re revolutionizing the food industry with Choviva, cocoa-free chocolate for food giants. Sweet innovation ahead! 🌟 https://buff.ly/49sK94G
We will be back on March 28th with the next news episode and the next regular episode will go live next week.
#ThatsaWrap
Stay Ahead of the Curve
- Jensen Huang of Nvidia on the Future of A.I. | DealBook Summit 2023 #technews https://buff.ly/3uHBxYE
- Layoffs: Tech’s ‘year of efficiency’ continues as Wall Street cheers on Silicon Valley https://buff.ly/3T8XCbS
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The Hosts
The news are co-hosted by Jörn “Joe” Menninger, startup scout, founder, and host of Startuprad.io. And Christian “Chris’ ‘ Fahrenbach, co-founder Startuprad.io, freelance reporter, lecturer, author and blogger . Reach out to them:
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Automated Transcript
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:00:19]:
Hello, and welcome to our February 2024 wrap up with vital news from the StartupRadio tech entrepreneurship scenes in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland in 30 minutes or less. Welcome to this month in German, Swiss, and Austrian startups here at StartupRadio Joe. Our news was or is being recorded right now with me in New York City and you in Frankfurt. Joe, welcome.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:00:46]:
Hey, guys.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:00:49]:
Obviously the idiot calls himself first, Menninger himself first, as they say in Germany, the mule, the mule mentions himself first. Recording date today is February 26, and all news not included will be in our next, news to be released on March 28th 2024. And our publication date is actually the 29th of February. Since today happens only every 4 years, we all hope you enjoy the additional day and have a happy leap year. Happy birthday to everyone who just ages more slowly than the rest of us. Joe slowly. That’s also some yeah. Slower.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:01:31]:
So, looking ahead, there’s also Easter holidays coming up in Germany. Our next publication will be on Holy Thursday, Grindonnestag in Germany. The Friday before and Monday after Easter in Germany are public holidays. So, since both weeks are shorter than and usually coincide with school holidays, many people will take off 1 or both weeks. So in case you are dealing with, German business partners, just probably don’t expect your calls to be returned or emails to be answered in a timely manner. Yeah. There’s a lot of people who like to take Easter breaks.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:02:07]:
The meet?
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:02:10]:
I mean, for me as a freelancer, every day is Sunday. So there you go. Let’s get started with our highlights today. We are having a look at Microsoft who plans to invest €3,300,000,000 in expanding its data centers in Germany in order to handle AI and cloud computing. A move move welcomed even by German chancellor Olaf Scholz as a commitment to progress and global openness. I mean, we are very often here talk about how Germany struggles to stay relevant in, especially, like, the, like, high-tech and IT sectors. So that is something that, especially German politicians will have liked. Then we are looking at Vienna based AI StartupRadio, that secured a $117,000,000 in funding aiming to surpass CHET GPT 4 with its AGI ambitions, while Stuttgart’s InstaGrid raises $95,000,000 to expand into North America with innovative portable battery systems.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:03:12]:
However, Fintech struggles a bit. Surf they struggled here surfacing our at atellenvar, a company that faces insolvency despite a €15,000,000 investment. And in the medtech world, cannabis company, Sanity Group, cuts staff, in what is right now, very interestingly developing market environment in Germany too because there’s legalization talks going on. Meanwhile meanwhile, BioNTech wins a lawsuit. Flixbus expands to India. Mondu secures $30,000,000 for euros for expansion, and changes in German insolvency regulations post challenges for debt funded Startupradio Instafraid. And finally, we’ll have a look at the EV charging platform, Monter, who raises €80,000,000 for European Expansions. So let’s talk startups.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:04:07]:
But after all that, the video podcast and the audio podcast I already mentioned will go live on February 29th. You can find all of the places where you can listen to us on Spotify, Apple Podcast, Castbox, Global Podcast Network, Good Pods in our show notes. You can tune into our radio station at www.startup.radio. You can get our content to your inbox and cell phone. You can find our other channels on Linktree. There’s really no in case you want to consciously avoid us, you can. But in case you forget to avoid us, there’s no way.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:04:42]:
But but by the way, consciously following us, we are now taking officially live our Blue Sky accounts. They will be dedicated DeepTech Germany, Fintech Germany, and Startupradio panels there. You’ll find very likely, similar content to Twitter there, but we’re trying to figure it out. We also saved our, names, our accounts on threads, but threads does not allow you yet to use, social media management tools in the back end, which actually is a downer for us since most of the stuff is personally done by me despite all the other work. So I cannot spend so much time in maintaining this. That means for now, threats will be only have new content on occasion. Sorry. Talk about all our enablers, people who make this possible.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:05:37]:
This recording was supported by Essen Trade and Invest and the European Enterprise Network, Essen. These organizations have made tremendous contributions to helping start up businesses succeed and thrive, providing a range of services from helping to find grants to ongoing partnerships. By taking advantage of these resources, start up companies can network and develop innovative strategies for success on the international stage. The dedicated support of HDAI and the enterprise network, Hessen, is paramount in providing start up businesses with the tools for lasting success. Look for our dedicated sup podcast in partnership with them, Tech Startups Germany, or, of course, on our link to you. By the way, you could also have a look on Slack for our newsletter, or you can even go to Telegram where you get real time alerts every time we publish a podcast, and you are not victim of any algorithm there. The other supporter is, of course, start operating the best way to identify investors and corporation partners for a late stage startups. You could sign up for early access there and handing over to Chris and the top news.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:06:54]:
Yeah. Digging deeper into some of the stories that I just mentioned. First off, Microsoft. Microsoft is going to invest 3,000,000,000, €3,000,000,000 to expand data centers to handle AI in Germany, a move that caused huge international coverage to the mirror road. Germany’s chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has given a big thumbs up to Microsoft’s plan to invest a whopping €3,300,000,000 in the country. The tech giant wants to boost its data center capacities for artificial intelligence and cloud computing. They quote Olaf Scholz by saying, this is a really good commitment to progress, to growth, to modernity, and to global openness as the basis for these opportunities. We have news about an Austrian AI Startupradio that raised a 170,000,000 US dollars, claiming to surpass chat gpt in some aspects.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:07:52]:
And, it is about the Vienna based StartupRadio, founded by Eric Steinberger and Sebastian Dereau. They’ve recently disclosed that funding round of $117,000,000 with former GitHub CEO, Ned Friedman, his investment partner, Daniel Gross, and and Alphabet’s growth fund, capital g, among the investors. Magic wants to create an AI software developer superior to humans capable of handling complete jobs rather than just individual tasks like current copilots with ambitions towards achieving artificial general intelligence, AGI. Their model, including LTM 1, with an immense context window of 5,000,000 tokens surpasses other leading AI companies’ large language models called l LLM in short, by a significant margin, potentially revolutionizing tasks like coding assistance assistance with its ability to consider vast amounts of context. So, this vast context window defining the model’s memory span and processing capabilities underlines magic substantial computational requirements, elucidating the substantial investment needed for LLM development. And, you can find much more about this at, Menninger Topics who came up with the original reporting, and the link to that is in our show notes. We go to my old hometown of Stuttgart where InstaGrid raises 95,000,000 US dollars. And around in around that now totals 145,000,000 US dollars.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:09:27]:
Integrate is a provider of high performance portable battery systems. That’s already a series c funding we’re talking about, and it was led by Teachers Venture Growth, TBG, from Ontario Teachers Pension Plan with participate participation from Morgan Stanley Investment Management, MSIM, OneGT Climate Private Equity strategy strategy, and contributions from existing investors including Energy Impact Partners, SET Ventures, and others. They are planning to use the money from this funding to facilitate their expansion into the North American market. They wanna boost production. They wanna diversify their mobile power solutions for decarbonizing off grid power. And, to give you some background, InstaGrid was founded in 2018, and they want to replace fossil generators in various sectors and boost smaller, lighter, and more powerful products enabled by stacked micro level inverters. They hired the US CEO, Rich Romer, and, hinting at plans to establish offices, expand their team, and launch new products tailored to the United States and Canada. More in-depth news about or more in-depth details about that can be found at, FinsmES.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:10:47]:
FinsmES is that’s how it is. That’s how they pronounce it. F I n s m e s. Fin SMS, maybe. Fin SMS. Finsmus.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:10:57]:
I I I’m not sure.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:10:59]:
God. I’m like yeah. Okay. Setting myself up here for something it feels. Bit more problematic news is that the Fintech Elinvar, even though they had a €15,000,000 investment in the back, they still face insolvency as the StartupRadio fails to attract buyers or investors. 70 employees have already been laid off. Prominent investors here included Goldman Sachs, and they failed to salvage the company. Former Guest Sanity Group cuts headcount.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:11:35]:
It’s a Berlin based kind of a Startupradio that was on our show, known for investors like Will. I. Am or Snoop Dogg. They cut 12% of their headcounts of 1 in 8 people. You can more learn more about the entrepreneur behind Sanity Group, Fin Henze, in our interview. Link to that is in the show notes. And BioNTech, kind of like world famous because of the COVID vaccine, does not have to pay a woman from Ryan Lynn Palatinate that lost a lawsuit against the company. The court dismissed her claim for damages over the, alleged vaccine vaccine injury.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:12:11]:
So, yeah, Germany has a huge group of vaccine skeptics, but and some of them were, trying to get money from the vaccine companies, but so far to no avail.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:12:26]:
Thank you very much. By the way, guys, how do you like a little bit more in-depth content of our headlines? I hope you really like that. We we’re slowly changing a little bit the, news here. I’ve tried as well.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:12:41]:
So ridiculous.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:12:42]:
I’m sorry. Yeah. There there there is an automatic effect in the background of Chris. That is very nice. But let’s continue with the top news. Namaste. Unicorn FlixBus, known as the owner of Greyhound Bus, expands to India. The cofounder, Jochen Engert, has also won the entrepreneur of the year award 2022 for which we interviewed him.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:13:03]:
By the way, the interview with Finansel Wolf for his award of entrepreneur of the year 2021. In other news from FlixBus, FlixBus among the winners in recent strikes in Germany, Germany’s railway operator, Deutsche Bahn, along budget airlines and car rental companies, which is actually not a surprise. You don’t have that many opportunities to get around, if you don’t own a car. Mondoo gets 30,000,000 loan for expansion. Exciting times for Berlin’s buy now, pay later Fintech. Mondu, with European expansion at full swing and demand soaring, they’ve secured an additional 30,000,000 in funding from a renowned Fintech investor. Oh, that is some some very technical but important news. Technicality may lead to more insolvencies and a strong headwind for debt funding in Germany.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:13:58]:
There’s some background, and let’s do some explaining here. If if man explain women’s stuff, it’s called mansplaining. How would we call it if we explain Germany’s stuff? Germsplaining? Doesn’t sound right. Nah. Nah. We should think about something like that. Right? Let let let’s do some explaining here. In Germany, insolvencies are regulated by the which could be translated into Germany insolvency statues.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:14:26]:
The rule has been that companies who take on debt need funding for 4 month during corona, but the changes had a time limit until the end of 2023. There was no extension, and so now Startupradio with debt funding need to be funded for 12 month. Otherwise, profitable startups need to file for insolvency. That is likely what happened to Insta Freight. Also, Monter raises €80,000,000 and will be guest EV charging platform. Monter closes 80,000,000 series b to accelerate EV charging infrastructure deployment. They’re from Denmark, but also active in Germany, and we will talk about the expansion to Germany and the European EV market. Stay tuned.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:15:15]:
Housekeeping and time to brag. We keep it very short this time. Our former guest, Ivan, completes the successful fundraising campaign with Monite. Exciting start up news from Berlin. Monite, a fintech innovator, just secured 6,000,000 in seed funding led by Valla Ventures, P2G, I do believe. 3rd prime, they’re set to redefine b to b finance automation. There’s the link to to use and the link to our in-depth interview with him. If you are interested in working with us, for example, become an advertising sponsor, there is a link to our passion fruit, storefront, and I hand over to Chris with the ecosystem.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:15:55]:
Yeah. Let’s have a look at, some ecosystem news. So news that affect the Startupradio community or start up landscape in Germany and Europe. First off, we are, having a look at a report about a very contentious topic, which is the gender pay gap. So new research from Ravio, came up with a number or an estimate that the gender get gender pay gap in Europe is about 26 percent in the tech industry. There’s a link to the PDF in our show notes that shows you details for each country. In Germany, it is around 25% according to the report. In France, it’s just 18%, and, in the UK, it’s more like 29%.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:16:46]:
All those numbers usually have this little asterisk of that it’s not always easy to compare different different jobs and different tasks. Nevertheless, what we can always learn from it is whether the gender pay gap closes or does not close if you stick to the same way of calculating it. And the result usually is that it’s ridiculous how big and stubborn the gender pay gap actually remains. Another European news is that European Union countries strike a deal on a landmark AI rulebook. As we can see, a lot of the, yeah, a lot of, like, Western countries or Western structures try to come up with rules and guardrails for, artificial intelligence. And they all were walking on a very tight rope trying to say, okay. This is how we want to, like, how we want to rule you, but also please do business with us because we are too afraid that, we’re gonna lose out on you making money in our country or paying taxes in our country. For more details about the EU rule book, you can have a look in our show notes.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:17:57]:
Looking at Switzerland, Swiss Startupradio secured, 2,600,000,000 Swiss francs in funding despite a 35% decrease in investments for 2023. While, especially more of the mature Startupradio a notable decline, the number of financing rounds remained steady as is highlighted by the Swiss Swiss Venture Capital Report.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:18:22]:
That is, by the way, almost 3 building US dollars.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:18:27]:
Yeah. There you go. And in the German ecosystem, there is one of the, one of the numbers that people tend to look at a lot in order to get an idea of where German business and business sentiment is going is the e for business climate index, the e for gerscheftsklima index. And it is on the rise even though we have an ongoing discussion about the German economy probably be not that future proof. But for now, we see that, Ifo Institute wrote on their website for the February issue that sentiment among German companies has brightened somewhat. The Ifo Business Climate Index rose to 85.5 points in February, up from 85 0.2 points in January. This is due to slightly less pessimistic expectations. Assessments of the current situation remained unchanged.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:19:22]:
Positive and negative responses here were nearly imbalanced. Germany come economy seems to be stabilizing at a low level. Then Germany steps up its cybersecurity game with, BSI’s launch of the new National IT Operations Center. It’s a leap forward towards a safer digital landscape. BSIS, the German Institute For Security in IT Systems. Rough rough translation. I’m sure they have a more specific English title as well, but just to give you an idea. Then Germany is to ease Fintech growth caps after a clampdown in Wirecard’s wake.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:20:00]:
Wirecard, the big scandal that we often talk here about, basically, a Startupradio that everyone was in love with and, had kind of it turned out they had invented a lot of the money in the books that wasn’t actually there. So, we are still in, yeah, in the cleanup phase of this, with ongoing trials. And so as you can see here in this news, it is some governmental idea of how to solve this. And, Baffin, which is the German could one say the German SCC equivalent probably?
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:20:37]:
Mhmm. Finance watchdog. Yeah.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:20:40]:
Yeah. Finance watchdog. Buffen has been leading what’s arguably Europe’s biggest clampdown in mostly digital StartupRadio as well as on payment firms. The actions taken by the watchdog have likely compounded devaluation declines across the industry as borrowing costs rise, writes the Fintech collective on the topic. We are seeing progress at individual firms, but not all, says BaFin executive director Birgit Rodolf in an interview from her Frankfurt office. There will definitely be cases where we loosen restrictions this year. And then up into the world of family offices, The number of family offices investing in private markets has more than doubled in the reach in the DACH region, so Deutschland, Austria, Switzerland since 2018, reaching 2,000 active managers according to Prequin. So, yeah, as always, Germany seems to be doing what Germany is best at, and it’s SMEs doing their thing.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:21:40]:
Mittelstand. Moving on to hubs, and, let’s have a look at specific regions in Germany.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:21:47]:
Yes. Frankfurt, Rhein, Main, my home turf. As always, the the the the order of the cities here is just in the order we have the news, and that’s how they end up in our news. Comanche Ventures leads 25,000,000 series b in Tuum, Frankfurt based medtech Startupradio, Amplify, raises 7 digits, series a venture funding, and WeWork will shut down locations across Germany. We found here an article specifically focusing on Frankfurt. They, will shut down one of the locations in Frankfurt, but will keep the other one. And they’ll also shut down locations in Hamburg and Berlin. Weidolph, it’s the home of SAP, and there’s about move powering AI ventures through a major overhaul in amidst, I think, 8,000 jobs.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:22:47]:
They’re also investing €2,000,000,000 in AI, a transformative steps towards shaping the future of tech. We know one place where they will spend the money because we found related news. SAP starts its own AI start AI Startupradio called Project Jarvis. And that’s really the moment when I had some, some, Iron Man in my ear because you remember, Jarvis is the AI that it assist assists Iron Man. Hamburg Hamburg based AI kitchen StartupRadio circus specialized in the kitchen for delivery, assisting with AI and robots lists in Frankfurt via a direct listing. So that means a stock, dig it onto the stock exchange just by going over there and say, hey, guys. Now all shares are available without the IPO and all the, as we say in Germany, around it. Hamburg based coworking company, Work Republic oh, he’s smiling.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:23:46]:
Again, Hamburg based co working company, Work Republic, has to file for insolvency. They have 2 locations in Hamburg. The future is yet unclear, and going down to Stuttgart. Stuttgart’s climate tech Startupradio, cyclis, secures Cyclice? Yeah. Secures a whopping 4,750,000 seed funding. Their innovative technology aims to revolutionize the chemical industry by recycling plastic waste and Joe. Then we do have Carscore. Data Loss, a Carscore, which are based technology company building factories using AI, raises 21,000,000,000 US dollars in a series a funding.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:24:31]:
And as you could tell, when Chris is now taking over Austria and Switzerland, we also up the coverage of Austrian and Swiss startups there. Let us know how you like it, guys. Chris?
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:24:41]:
Yeah. Cigna bags the Austrian 9 AM Health in a revolutionary year, a health tech move, boosting cardiometabolic care innovation there. Rights, BNN breaking. Then also from Austria, ebike subscription Startupradio Gorillas opens its insolvency proceedings. The founder fell sick and does not plan to continue. And we have news from the Vienna Biotech scene, GST antivirals raises over €6,000,000 Menninger €4,000,000 series a investment with a €2,200,000 grant from, FFG. So, yeah, more news from the from the biotech scene in Austria. FFC is FFG is a governmental grant as far as I know.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:25:43]:
Sounds administrative to me, like from coming from an administration, not as in, like, bureaucratic, but just like legit. Sounds legit. That’s what I wanna say. Switzerland, the carbon credit insurer carbon pool raises $12,000,000 in a seed round. There’s a new investment that brings Limitec series a to 40,000,000 Swiss francs. Here we have a little quote for you. Limitec by or Logix is with biotech Startupradio from Schlieren in Switzerland has raised an additional 3 bill 3,000,000 US dollars from health tech investors 10 Mile, bringing its series a around to $40,000,000. The funding will be used to further advance the company’s proprietary self rejuvenating and multi antigen vaccine technology platform and to initiate phase 1 clinical trials trials for the staphylococcus Aureus candidate and phase 2 trials for the shigella vaccine candidate.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:26:40]:
And that was a, quote from StartupRadio tickerdot c h.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:26:46]:
AIP a little bit smart as because this stuff in the caucus Aureus is this MRSA, this multi resistance stuff in the caucus Aureus where you always have trouble in the clings because it’s it’s it’s, resistant against all the the the known antibiotics. So that’s why they are working on it to finally get
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:27:05]:
Well, not anymore. Yep. Better. Yeah. Up your game stuffy little cockers friends. So Lockheed Martin invests in Meteomatics an undisclosed amount. They write Lockheed Martin Ventures, the venture arm of the global security and aerospace company, has made a strategic investment in Meteomatics. The funds will enable this Angkalen based company to scale its high resolution weather and climate technology and expand into new market and industries.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:27:33]:
We have Qubit Capital that closes an oversubscribed first fund at 29,000,000 Swiss francs, focused on Swiss tech StartupRadio tackling global issues. The Zurich based VC firm strengthens its position in the venture capital market with that money. The fund will only invest in 12 to 15 Swiss Startupradio, writes Startupradio ticker.ch. Global Healthcare VC firm invests 30,000,000 in Ecotech, a Swiss medtech company pioneering the development of implants for spine tumor stabilization. The financing comes from MBM Partners. And then Signum, the global bank for digital assets surpasses expectations in an oversubscribed funding round raising over $40,000,000 and is now valued at $900,000,000. And Switzerland’s leading auto subscription service, Carvolution, has secured up to 200,000,000 Swiss francs in asset backed financing with Barclays among the new backers. So this will fuel the expansion of their vehicle fleet.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:28:34]:
Details about that in the show notes. Moving on to our final section, general news, tech news, company news. We include some news here that we think are relevant for more established companies as well. Usually kicking things off with new funds in case you’re looking for money. There’s EarlyBird Health that just closed a €173,000,000 fund focusing on health care innovation. They’ve even got major European health insurers on board from Digital Health to biopharma. You can find a bit more about this. I’m letting you do the Fintech news and take a deep breath to then wrap things up.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:29:10]:
Yes. Sorry that we’ve been, you know, that we’ve been so funny and gotten a little bit off the topic. We will surpass the 30 minutes for this recording. Really sorry. It was just because, Chris and I have then, another German word,
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:29:28]:
No. Important context.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:29:30]:
Important context. From the brink of insolvency to new chapter, Berlin based Healthcare Fintech CURE Finance has been acquired by health specialist founder, Martin Busch. Resilience shines as they bounce back stronger. You can find more in link in the show notes. Handing over again to Chris with the general news.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:29:53]:
General news. And I will rattle this a bit. Joe, Seppo Hochreiter, mastermind behind LSTM, is set to challenge open an AI’s dominance with NXAI. We have news about both founders of the Tony’s Box, which is like an audiobook, system for kids Step stepping down from their management roles of the company, they hand over to a professional management team. Factory Berlin wants a hotspot for innovation at Gorlitzapark, shutting down this location. The CEO hints at revamping the hub’s concept amidst changing work trends. Octopus Energy’s tech arm Kraken acquires Berlin Startupradio with KW. The HR tech unicorn, Pezzonio, reshuffled its product and, its products and tech department.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:30:39]:
A 100 employees are let go. German solar StartupRadio, NextWave, is building a gigawatt factory in the US seizing opportunities in America solar boom. And Berlin based Vegans or Vegans AG was once Europe’s 1st vegan grocery store chain. At times, they also acted as wholesalers. Now they leave the brick and mortar business and close their last physical store, focusing on their own line of products in other people’s stores instead. Back to you.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:31:12]:
Creative destruction as well going a little bit longer. Long stories do not always turn out well. Mvingea fights for insolvency. The story is long and littered with lawsuit. It seems to have a good end with the takeover by a UK based competitor last year, Menninger, Mvago, Move24, a business angel building a competitor, lawsuits, a merger, takeover, and now the end. We also talked to the the about the story with Finn from Sanity Group because before he founded Sanity Group, he was one of the CEOs of the competing companies in the story. We’re not going into details. It’s long and winded.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:31:52]:
Kundas in a compiled list of companies that had already filed for insolvency in 2024. The list includes Instafraid and, aforementioned new rule for StartupRadio debt funding that they need to be funded for 12 months. Troubled Bruce at survey as they they enter protective proceedings, tensions rise within the shareholder circle amidst the storm. Stay tuned as the story unfolds. They say Sylvia is developing the what’s real time representative opinion research technology. New broker for women fails. Fina gives up about just after just 2 years. Another reminder of the challenges in creating inclusive financial platforms, and we end on a high note with Chris.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:32:40]:
Only good news here, about successful fundings and exits. We included some selected fundraisings above €5,000,000 or dollars, and some positive outlooks for the remainder of the year in order to keep the to end the news in an upbeat mood. Berlin based creative platform, Kittl, raises another $36,000,000 for its browser based design tool, writes TechCrunch, Quadrant Qdrend, Berlin, Germany based open source vector database raises €28,000,000 in a c series a funding. Morissier, also from Berlin, a German based StartupRadio which specialize in scholarly communications, raised a $16,500,000 in a series b funding. The Berlin based pragmatic lends a €15,000,000 deal to scale its b to b digital packaging platform across Europe. And Planet A Foods seals a series a funding with €14,100,000. They are based in Munich, and they try to, modernize the food industry with Choviva, a cocoa free chocolate for food giants. This concludes all of it.
Christian “Chris” Fahrenbach [00:33:51]:
We will be back on March 28th as we said with the next episode. The next regular episode will go live next week. That’s a wrap. We have some stuff to stay ahead of the curve, but it’s been taken us too long today anyway. So I say goodbye from New York.
Jörn “Joe” Menninger [00:34:08]:
That’s a warp. Bye bye.
