Welcome to Startupradio rad dot Joe,
your podcast and YouTube blog covering the German
StartupRadio with news, interviews, and
live events. Hello,
and welcome to Startupradio dot Joe episode 425.
We welcome you to our April 2024 wrap up with vital
news from the Startupradio tech entrepreneurship scenes in Germany, Austria, and
Switzerland in 30 minutes or less. Let's hope so. Our
Startupradio news today is recorded with me, Christian, today in
Perugia, Italy. You can actually see a tiny bit
here of my Airbnb, where I'm attending the
International Journalism Festival. It's a place that this year
has a huge emphasis on AI and media. So also
quite interesting in terms of new Startupradio coming up in the media ecosystem.
And, with you, Joe, as always in
Hey, guys. In Frankfurt.
Today, our recording date is April 19, 2024.
All news not included will be in our next news,
to be released on May 30th. So you see it's a bit of a bigger
stretch there, but we had to record this episode a bit early due to our
schedules. And also due to another thing because May in Germany is quite
a spectacular May month for the Germans.
And as we always aim to also give you insights about doing business with the
Germans, May is gonna be a month where,
some of the people that you're working with might just not show up at one
day or another because there are many holidays in
Germany and, holidays that people use
as an opportunity to have a longer weekend. Sometimes 4 or 5
day weekends. So, if we have look, have a look at
this, May 1st, for example, is a public holiday across most
European states. It's International Workers' Day, so
basically Labor Day, as well as spring festival in
Germany. So and since this year, it's on a Wednesday, People might
take off Monday Tuesday as well or Thursday Friday as well,
making it nearly like a week, long, off.
And many people in Germany will go out dancing the night before called Tansen in
May, dance into May. May 9th
is Ascension Day, where we also celebrate
the inofficially labeled Father's Day in Germany. That is on a Thursday,
so people might take off the Friday, 10th,
which I think is great anyway because, May
9th May 11th are the semifinal and the big final of the Eurovision
Song Contest, which in my book should definitely be
holidays, for I mean, basically, the world in my opinion.
But, anyway, so if you're wondering, also the following Sunday is also Mother's
Day in Germany. Then May 20th is a public holiday across Germany with
Monday. May 30th is the day of our next
news publication, so we're working on having that, become a
national holiday so far. So good. Sorry for
the joke because it's also Corpus Christi. Again, also celebrated on a Thursday,
meaning people might take off Friday. Well,
and if right now you think, okay, how can I get, onto
this calendar of days off? You might wanna
double think because after this May extravaganza, the next
public holiday is only going to be on Thursday, October 3rd, German day of
reunification. So, in the whole summer, there's not much
happening. Plus, two two two data points, Chris,
here. 1st, it's also again a Thursday Joe many people would take
off Fridays. Plus, this year since we are
doing our labor day summer wrap up again published
to be on September 2nd, by the way my my birthday,
we will have our September news this year
published on this holiday, October 3rd. There you
go. Speaking, that's enough talk about
taking days off. Let's jump right into today's episode.
And let me give you a brief overview of what we will be talking about
more in-depth, later on. So here are a couple of our highlights.
Because in April 2024, we really saw that the German StartupRadio
scene witnessed seismic shifts, groundbreaking achievements. Among the
headlines were, for example, Novo Nordisk's acquisition of
Cardio Pharmaceuticals, which basically stole the
spotlight this month with a staggering 1.0,
€25,000,000,000 deal, monumental milestone in
biotech. Cardio Pharmaceuticals, spin off
from the medical school in Hanover, pioneers
RNA medications, for heart disease prevention,
showcasing transformative power of innovative research here.
And obviously a market worth a lot of hope and potentially
huge markets. Meanwhile, while
Zolar illuminated the renewable energy landscape by securing a
substantial €100,000,000 credit line from BNP Paribas,
BNP Paribas, propelling their mission forward with
Zola EasyPay financing options. Berlin
solidified its status as kind of German's Fintech capital fighting
over it for Frankfurt, I would say, boasting a 160 Fintech
Startupradio, while Element surged ahead in the insure tech
arena with a €50,000,000 euro funding round.
Minerix Munich based team achieved a milestone by
initiating volume production of the Condor MK Space Laser
Terminal. We will talk a bit more about what that means. It's but,
you can be sure it's a testament to German ingenuity driving
global space development. And, these might
not only redefine industry standards, but hopefully also underscore Germany's
position as hub for innovation and
entrepreneurial prowess as always. Stay tuned for more insights and
revelation. In the world of startups.
The video podcast will go live on Thursday, April 25th,
as will the audio podcast. You can subscribe to
us on all the platforms that you know and follow already. We have it all
in the show notes, obviously, too. You can tune in
to our Internet radio station, which is
being done by a staggering 170,000 people.
So, and we where we have some media partners, including but not limited
to tech tech.eu, Stanford University's Radio Show
Laptop Radio. You can find all that at StartupRadio.
So www.startup.radio. You can get your content
to our inbox. To your inbox, we have this all explained
in our show notes. And, I
hand over to you to for a little word from our sponsors and
enablers. Didn't we just declare last month that there's a
seismic shift with the, with the big financing out there, and then
solar comes along and has another 100,000,000.
Man, that is going to be big numbers. By the way, we
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Plus, this recording is supported by Hessen Trade and Invest
and the Enterprise Europe Network. Chris, you always look like
a top news guy to me, but I'll take a little bit of this this
time. Okay? Because you you you had you had to talk a little so much
about the public holidays here. As we already said, top
news, the $1,000,000,000 exit. Big news in the biotech world.
Novo Nordisk, acquires German Biotech
Adior Pharmaceuticals for whopping 1,250,000,000
including so earn out conditions. The
company is a spin spin off of medical school Hanover founded only in
2016, and they develop RNA
medications to prevent heart diseases. And you can learn more with link in
our show notes. Volocopter wanted to have 300,000,000
from the German government, but now only get half of it 150,000,000
despite Menninger. Volker Wissing, the federal minister of transportation
from FTP pledges 150,000,000 to support
futuristic dream of flying taxis. Think like very big
drones where you can step in. They originally wanted to have
double the amount, the state of Baden Wurttemberg where they're
headquartered back out of the deal, and Der Spiegel reported that
auditors of PwC also warned mister Wissing. Read
more about this ambitious venture here. And Volocopter's Menninger
competitor, Lilium, by the way, gets no money at all. Volocopter
needs the money to start production. They want to take off during,
Paris Summer Olympic this year in July. Let's see if
that works. As we already said, solar secures
100,000,000 from BNP Paribas for their solution,
solar easy pay. Solar, by the way, with a set like sorrow.
You can learn more about the founder in an interview that
did in the partner podcast started why published in December
2021. We'll also link this in the show notes.
And as we always claim, you may have never heard of our guests in the
past, but you will in the future. Held true again.
Element, German insurtech white labeller
secures 50,000,000 in latest funding. They write
founded just a few years ago in 2017. Element has
quickly distinguished itself in the intertech arena
operating under cloud based model. The company has earned a
reputation for its innovative white label insurance
product. Berlin remains the
Fintech capital. Berlin remains the hub for German
Fintech startups. The capital hosts 160 Fintech companies
surpassing major cities like Frankfurt, Munich, and Hamburg. The
scene continues to thrive with companies like n26 and
Wefox leading the charge. Chris, you wanna take the last
top news here? Yeah. Definitely. And, also, I just wanted to
add to the, Berlin as a Fintech capital.
Little grain of salt. It comes from the Berlin,
IBB, the, the study. So I've been probably
a publisher or, basically, a company that has some
vital interest in making Berlin sound good. So maybe not all is lost
for your hometown Frankfurt. It's actually the
government backed. So of this city state of Berlin backed
bank that helps with the economic development of the city. So
yes, it's it, it, it may be very one-sided this
research, but nonetheless, I think they tried
their best to be as objective as possible.
Speaking of, I don't know, high hopes, maybe.
Minarik, it's based in Munich, a company that says
that they started volume production for the Condor MK 3 space
laser terminal. They themselves wrote, hit
a product maturity maturity milestone,
by starting volume production for the Condor m k MK3,
its flagship optical communications terminal. They began production for
the terminal in early 2024 and completed the first shipment last week.
The initial shipments will be part of the US Space Development Agency's
SDA, Tran 1s, transport and tracking layer
programs. Joe, Joe
matter what comes out of it, I think it's still interesting to see that,
German companies are getting into that field as
well. I'll let you brag a bit. Yeah.
Just a tiny bit, here, Signal
Hill Insights has highlighted the growing significance of
podcast, particularly e to b ones as a
strategic tool for reaching high level executive
capable of influencing major corporate decisions. Not a
surprise seeing our audience here. Mental high five to all the
people out there. If you're looking to cooperate with us, there's a link
to our passion fruit, storefront down here.
Chris, I hand over to the ecosystem. Yes.
And the very first impulse here that we wanna give you,
has to do with, bitcoin,
which experienced quite a surge in the last couple of weeks months.
And Bloomberg had an interesting article about that, where they said
that also crypto VC creeps back towards a comeback.
And they wrote crypto Startupradio are back after brutal year for cryptocurrency
and blockchain related companies. Venture capital investment in the
industry ticked up by nearly 1 third from the previous quarter
according to new data. So that's probably some Startupradio
that might be relevant for your business on a global level. If we take
a closer look at Europe, we see, talent
shortage in deep tech. We can't find a single
German or European applicant, is a quote
that we saw in the, in an
article about the situation in the deep tech
industry vertical, on Sifted.
You can find the full article in our show notes. Then
March 2024 witnessed a shift in the fintech landscape
as European StartupRadio navigated a 30% decrease in fundraising
totaling €4,400,000,000 across 304 deals.
You can dive into the details
on a website called, or on a study on tech.eu.
And we see the maturation of Munich.
The Bavarian city has grown into a hub for more growth funds, international
law firms, and big banks in recent years. Kind of
moving from Europe to the German, topics here.
But one last idea before that, mega rounds are making a comeback in Europe.
We have more about that in the show notes as well. But now focusing on
Germany, where we see, one
article that says big changes are ahead in Fintech as the German government
proposes stricter rules for credit checks, potentially
impacting business like karma karma, like
Klarna, for example. The
details about that are on a, in an
article on finance forward backed by Capita, a
German, business magazine. And since we
are a bit early with our recording, we don't have a current I feel, E4
Business Climate Index. As you may remember, we usually take a
little look about into this index which is basically a
survey about business sentiment among German Menninger.
But we don't have the current numbers yet, which makes us move
on to hubs, and I hand it over back to you.
Yes. Again, hubs here starting again
with Frankfurt Rheinmains. Scavenger AI just secured
1,100,000 in pre seed funding. This Frankfurt based
AI StartupRadio is revolutionizing data analytics. You
can learn more about the game changing technology in the link
here in the show notes, which leads you to an article to
fin SMEs. By the way, a good place we found
in tracking fundings, speed, and efficiency are
crucial in food delivery. Knuspa, an online supermarket,
just automated its warehouse for the Rhinemann region offering a peek
behind the scenes of online supermarkets. You can learn more about
their approach in the article linking to FA
Tech. Then a FinnSMEs has been a
little bit mistaken because they write Frankfurt, but, actually,
it's Kaszruhe, Bayvest, a Frankfurt, Germany based b to b fintech
closed 1,100,000. Funding round link in the show notes.
Forschung Centrum Julich, meaning research center Julich
and Elektron with a q, big q in the
middle, team up to develop a modular quantum computer with
€21,000,000 boost from the NRW,
Nordheimers Pfal, one of Germany's states government. This partnership
marks a significant milestone for the tech industry.
Tristan. Tristan bet Whatron secures
12,000,000 in series b funding to revolutionize
sustainable packing. Again, link in the show notes. In
Aachen, Protenpis just closed 30,000,000
series b funding led by
Segula Medical Acceleration Exchange Future and
Tech Vision Fund. You can read more about the
innovative cardiovascular medical
device in our show notes. And as always, I hand over to
Chris and the Austrian top news. By the way, this time, we
removed a lot of the funding rounds and moved them to the end of
the funding. Well, again, Chris takes it over then.
Yeah. Taking a look at some of the companies in Austria,
we, for example, saw news from the, Tyrolean
savings at Monki. They just secured a 7 figure
investment from new investors along with its existing ones.
You can not only find an article about that in our show notes, but also
you can find an interview with Monkeys founder for more insights,
in our archives. Actually, it's a it's a little
bit older album, older interview. And again,
something you've never heard of in the past, but you will in the future. And
the big thing about monkey is it's a FinTech app but they have
80% female users. They really,
found the holy grave for FinTech there. Mhmm.
Texify. So tax as in you have to pay your taxes and
then e f y. A Vienna based startup is making waves with
the relaunch complete with updates, its own tax consultancy.
You can check out the full story at.
We had them in our news recently with not so nice news. Now they seem
to be turning the corner. Vienna's unicorn Joe
student achieved full profitability
in q one and are restructuring their leadership team. Halme
Brasco, I think that's how you pronounce it right, if if it's a Spanish name.
Yeah. Joins as CTO to drive innovation, while CFO
Duncan McIntyre bids farewell. And Vienna's chatbot
StartupRadio, tony.ai, tony with an I,
is being liquidated. It was once a promising venture in the age
of Facebook's chatbot hype a long long time ago, but it
couldn't keep up with evolving ai tech.
Yeah. So Menninger ending a bit on a sad note here, when it comes
to Austria. But moving on to Switzerland where there's more exciting
news from a former guest of yours. The Swiss American
StartupRadio SwissPod and the UK based financial provider
ICM are teaming up to supercharge hyperloop technology
worldwide. Also a lot of buzzwords in that
announcement. Then Proton from Switzerland acquires
standard notes from Chicago, trying to create a new era
of privacy first digital services.
This was it for the hubs,
but we now move on to our next section. General
news, tech news, company news. Just like a
an overview of what caught our attention in
the past couple of weeks. Let's first start with new funds in order
to inspire you to probably apply for some money.
One k x just secured a whopping $75,000,000
for their latest fund. They're based in Berlin and diving into the crypto world
focusing on g f I, n f t f I and
more. Their recent investment in botto and a I artist is
making waves. More in-depth information in
the show notes. Tiger Global VC, known
as the large known as a large ticket investor in GSA.
They have a fund that closed 63% below target with $2,200,000,000.
The firm told investors in 2022 that they aim to raise
$6,000,000,000. PIP 16 is dwarfed by the previous fund
which raised 12,700,000,000, so numbers are going down
there. Spotify Becker Lakestar raised
$600,000,000 for an early stage and growth stage fund
and likit, liqid, an online
wealth manager has surpassed all expectations by raising a €130,000,000
for a new venture capital fund allowing private investors to participate
starting from as low as €200,000.
Greentech. Wish one day I can say
as low as €200,000. It's a lot of money still.
Greentech news. Yes. This section is new. Maxima
Fusion raises €20,000,000 of venture capital to get closer to
green energy from nuclear fusion.
Carbon removal is the name of the game. Startups are racing to
secure the biggest carbon removal deal with Berlin's
Senken and Exomat Green, recently
closing impressive deals for 81,600
tons of c02. As always linked in the show notes.
And 15 investors and founders launched the
climate break to fast track European Climate
Fund. Then our always present fintech
section, Robinhood, set to take on Europeans
Europe's wealth tech on the home turf. Link in the
show notes. N n 26 appoints Mario Khammert
to key executive role. And Germany's Landers
Bank, Baten Wurttemberg, taps Bitpanda to offer crypto
custody services. You can read more in Fintech Futures.
Chris, you wanna take over the general news again? Joe. Yeah.
So, again, just some news in
StartupRadio dynamic companies that caught our
attention. Not always positive, not always related
to money. And, the first one actually is,
a bit problematic. There has been a massive data breach at
urban sports club exposing thousands of member records, personal
info, invoices, and even ID copies were found on an
unprotected cloud server.
More information about that is in the show notes. Then the
sec settles insider trading charges against Andy Bechtolsheim,
cofounder of Arista Sun Microsystems. Rene Kohler
buys back farad.da from signa after the Banco's
Empire's Banco Empire's downfall. Former guest Guilza
Wilke joins Diem Capital as partner and head of the German office.
True to our model you may have never heard of our guest, but you will
in the future. Again, there's the interview here. Oh, we
really, like, we really keep on mentioning this in this
episode. We talked about it before, so this did not make our top news
this time. Munich based StartupRadio Flix aims to dominate the global bus and train
market as it gives up for its IPO. This has also been a long time
coming. The company probably not always with, like, the biggest numbers.
Americans may now know it because Flix is now the company behind,
very traditional brand, Greyhound. Question now is,
will Flix become the next stock? We have some
details and analysis about it there. And some of the
CEO insights in our interview, which in this case probably
is a person that people might, might have heard of, at
least of their company before they heard it from us. Then,
10 German tech German StartupRadio watch in 2024, just a little
list of of inspiration. Get here, even after
the expensive deal buying gorillas is considering to leave Germany according
to a recent press report. I mean, the fact that we
kind of bundled this down here,
among the other news just shows you how the
ultra fast delivery StartupRadio is
over. And, I mean, we were talking about a lot. I think in Germany, a
lot of money has been burned in that field, because German are just so
crazy price sensitive when it comes to groceries. Not only that. I I
do believe the the the economics or the unit economics of
a single delivery don't make sense. You remember, like, all the players
been around here, gorillas, joker,
whatever was out there. I think a lot of them
either cut back completely here or
they disappeared at all. So And I would still argue
that having your groceries delivered without going to the supermarket is something
that so many Germans would still consider frivolous and would
be like, no. I I don't know. It's it's just seems like a
cultural, cultural thing compared to the US. US.
And there are new developments in the watch master case,
following a daring heist that led to the insolvency. The former CEO is now under
investigation for insurance fraud. You can read more about this
intriguing twist in our show notes. And l t l
ventures, the VC arm of 1 of Germany's largest TV stations,
will be shut down after not even 1 year.
So this is a, like, great segue into creative destruction.
We may we may add here that, a
competitor of theirs, Prossibinsat Ains, is doing this for quite some
time, quite successful, in terms of media for equity
deals. Not sure why this is not working for RTL
here. Maybe because they serve a different demographic.
As you said,
Switzerland baby food StartupRadio, shuts down operations
immediately despite efforts to secure funding. After 7 years of
innovating fresh baby, they are
they've achieved significant milestones, like expanding,
with products in over 200 stores, and it appears to
be done yet. 2,000 stores, actually,
even. 2,000. 2,000 stores. Oh, yeah. I I
was mistaken. 2,000 stores. I'm sorry. Full
database queen pioneers has to fight for insolvency
and Joe Louvinae.
Beloina announced that it will halt operations by the end of
April due to tough market conditions and
failed efforts despite past acknowledges
acknowledge accolades. Madhu,
I take this again. Sad news. Villainen announces it
will halt operations by the end of I would say I would
say, Halloween. Halloween. Like hero like the like
the female hero. Ah, Halloween announces it
will halt operations by the end of April due to tough market
conditions and failed funding efforts despite
past accolades including ISPO brand new winner
and Europike Gold Award. As always, read more in the link in the
show notes. And Berlin StartupRadio scene takes a hit as
water purifier innovator MITRE files for
insolvency despite early investor backing the venture
struggle to deliver and ultimately offering a
pricely alternative to established brands.
And, Chris, you wanna end on a high Joe? You have 2 and a half
minutes left. I was gonna say, just scattering off some,
successful fundraising and exits. As always, keep in mind, it's a small
selection. News here and their total value show just how
resilient the Startupradio scene is. We included some selected fundraisings at
above €5,000,000 or dollars. This
month, so many announcement. Not all will be, included here, but
some of the highlights. Number 1, our former guest, Kranos Health,
raises €5,000,000 to become the number one health companion of
men. NX Technologies, a cologne based
Fintech company that operates the automotive payment management platform,
Betzal.de, raised €22,000,000 in
series b. We have fundraisings from Switzerland.
€20,000,000 for underrepresented founders were raised there.
Then following the FDA approval for its Otenafil and Otenacure solutions,
Swiss dental StartupRadio, former Lumendo, raised
5,500,000 US dollars to fund the upcoming US
launch. Bakery Bakery secures 1,400,000
Swiss francs from 700 bay bakers bay
backers in that case for Swiss expansion,
while Quibi's mark rewards marketplace receives over 1,000,000
francs, from just 75 supporters. In total, 7
Startupradio a whopping 4.1 Swiss franc 1,000,000 francs
here. Adex Pharma and Perceptive Advisors joined forces to
launch Neurostorix, a new venture with $63,000,000
funding for advancing preclinical assets and drug discovery.
Zurich's own Progyle just launched test results CEO,
an AI platform for overcharging software development.
With a fresh round of seed funding, they're ready to revolutionize tech and
conquer new territories as they say. Photokiteag,
revolutionizing emergency response with fully auto
autonomous tethered UAVs, just closed its latest
series b financing round. And
Freeburg based cleantech b comp closes
€37,600,000 series c to foster mobility decarbonization.
Moving on to Austria, Austrian Health Tech Scale startup
xund, xund. Oh, xund. Oh, this is
a good name because xund is x u n d. X
u n d is Austrian dialect for healthy.
Sund extends seed round funding to €8,000,000
to digitize the patient journey. I mean,
425 episodes, and I think it's probably the first time ever that I,
commanded one of these, naming ideas to
start a first idea, It's our
425th episode, and it's the 425th time I'm
stumbling over StartupRadio don't worry.
Econitix, an Austrian StartupRadio, just secured a major investment to
revolutionize carbon tracking with sensors. This
wraps it up. We will be back on May 30th with the next news episodes
and the next Reg Labs. So we'll go live next week as we said. We
have some news to stay ahead of the curve. We are always looking for your
feedback. You can find us on LinkedIn and Twitter. And
to keep up to date, there's also a publication calendar online on Google.
As always, we thank you for listening, and we say, yeah, have a
nice dance into May. Have a nice
day. Have a good month, and we will be back next month.
That's a wrap. Thanks, Chris. Bye bye.
That's all, folks. Find more news, streams,
events, and interviews at www.startuprad.
Joe. Remember, sharing is caring.