I'm glad you enjoyed the chocolate and you enjoyed Christmas, Chris.
Hello and welcome everybody. This is Joe from start up rate dot o,
your startup podcast YouTube blog and Internet radio station
from Germany, Bringing you this month in German, Swiss, and
Austrian startups, January 2025. Happy New Year,
Chris. Yeah. Happy New Year. 1 month down.
11th to go. Actually, that that's last time. I
will say this. This year, we are in 2025
now, and, yep, the news are just in time for the Chinese New Year.
Happy New Year of the snake. Welcome to our
regular startup news from the startup and tech entrepreneurship
scene in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. Our start ups news
are recorded with Chris in New York City.
Hello. Hello. At the in
Frankfurt, today's news cut is January 27,
2025. As always, all news not
included will be in our next news rep
up. We need to cut our news seriously
so you can have a brief news overview. This time we
sifted through thousands of posts.
Note, our hubs section is gone.
We provide a location with each news piece.
And Chris, you take over the highlights. I actually
do, and there's the siren already. This today. Oh, so so you're
off the hook for a bagel today. Damn it.
So, the start up system across Germany,
Switzerland, and Austria continues to evolve as we
realize every, issue
and, in every broadcast. So, we
also see in early 2025 that opportunities and challenges still
are kind of in balance.
So we see. What are we talking about in terms of the highlights this
month? Notably notably, Berlin's
Zolais has lost its unicorn status amid valuation
woes. A reminder how volatile
the Fintech sector can be. Similarly, the air
mobility pioneer Volocopter, we've talked about them quite a lot in
recent, in recent wrap ups,
has filed for insolvency. Major setback for
the urban air taxi dream that at least
I and you also a little bit used to mock from time to time anyway,
probably. And, but also we see that competitor, Lyddium,
faces delays in their asset transfers. So there's also doubts there on
the viability of the whole emerging market because these are 2 of the
biggest companies there. On the brighter side, though, Switzerland has added a
new unicorn to its roster. Zurich based Signum Bank, a
leader in blockchain banking, reached unicorn status after a 58,000,000
funding round. This highlights the increasing momentum in the
digital assets and fintech sectors, of course. And meanwhile, we see
that the green tech sector across the DACH region, so DACH is the German
word, Deutschland or Osterreich Schweiz for GSA, Germany, Switzerland,
Austria, has made significant strides with €1,200,000,000
in found funding announced. Munich based Green Flexibility
is one of the companies there and secured €400,000,000 for their
battery storage solutions. Dresden Sunfire raised €200,000,000
to advance hydrogen technology, and Berlin's bees and bears
close to €500,000,000 round to expand renewable energy
financing. All these investments underscore the region's leadership
in driving sustainable innovation.
Despite these successes, challenges loom for start ups in high capital
sectors, apart from Volocopter's insolvency and
Solarus' valuation struggle struggles, we see that there are
broader difficulties in attracting and retaining investment amidst
shifting economic climate. However, though, there are,
there's no shortage of ambition as, for example, the Hamburg
based 1 comma Einskommafundf 1.5
pushes forward with a €150,000,000 in pre IPO funding
to accelerate its clean energy ecosystem and
its funding grounds like this that indicate that in general, investors
remain bullish on sustainability driven start ups even as the
broader market probably navigates some turbulences, I guess.
So, yeah, the startup landscape in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria remains one
of contrasts. Innovation thrives in green tech blockchain renewable
energy. There's high risk industries such as urban air mobility facing
mountain headwinds. And, as the market evolves,
both investors and entrepreneurs will need to balance their ambitions
with financial resilience to ensure long term success,
obviously. That's the little highlight
section. But, obviously, please,
don't turn off your podcast app just
now because now let's begin and let's talk Skook Startups.
Yes. A little bit about our schedule. Our schedule will not change
significantly in 20:45. You get at least 3
interviews a month from us with Chris taking over a few more this year.
We wrap up the news at the end of each month. Usually, the episode will
go live on the last Thursday of the month. We
take a news break in July August and come back with our summer start up
news wrap up on Labor Day, maybe in Hawaiian
shirts again. We are not sure yet, if we
post weekly or every other week in July
August. You you can get all
our content directly to your inbox on startupradio.substack.com,
and you can find all our other channels on Linktree, linktr.eeforward/startupradio.
Chris, you promised a little bit more about the top news here. Right?
Yeah. So let's look a bit more in-depth at what I already hinted
at. Let's start with Solaris, Berlin
based company, fintech company, which has significant
funding to continue its operations even though they,
also facing challenges with its valuation. As a
provider of embedded finance solutions, Zolaus powers services
such as digital banking, lending, payment system, Floyd's partners,
and partners include start ups, established financial institutions. So it's a real
broad company. Fresh Funding now comes at a critical juncture for
them because they experience valuation pressures
and which basically highlight broader concerns concerns in
the Fintech sector, particularly in the tightening capital
market. So, German press reports that soft SoftBank
International, SBI, is going to invest a €150,000,000
in this round and become the majority stakeholder actually.
So, Solarios has been lauded in the
past for a banking as a service model, but now they
also see that they have to navigate increased competition, regulatory
scrutiny in this year. And, a lot of analysts say that the
new capital now will, be used to primarily
focus on scaling the techno to the technological
infrastructure and compliance frameworks,
making sure that they, still experience
robust growth amidst the market uncertainties.
The company, as companies do, has expressed
optimism, pointing to a strong client portfolio and
consistent revenue streams. However, the question remains
whether they are able to maintain a competitive edge in a
market increasingly dominated by even larger players.
And, so we will see whether Solaris
can also probably become a, harbinger, an
example for, similar companies which
aim to scale sustainably. And,
yeah, more about this can be read, for example, in Handelsblad,
in a German report, and Zolais in and of itself,
I think I said it, is based in Berlin. Moving on
to Einskommafenf, 1com 1 comma 5.
I don't know. Like, this this would be interesting what their English title is, but
Einskommafimfimf just means 1.5. They are based in Hamburg,
and are one of the leaders in clean energy solutions. They've
also secured a €150,000,000 in funding ahead of a
planned IPO. This funding round solidifies their
position as one of Europe's most promising green tech unicorns,
so the general valuation is above 1,000,000,000. The
company focuses on integrating renewable energy systems such
as solar panels, energy storage, electric vehicle,
charging into residential and commercial infrastructure in order to
create a, seamless and sustainable ecosystem.
They are, willing to use the money
to expand their presence in European markets, invest in
innovative technologies to enhance energy efficiency.
So CEO Philip Schroeder, he used to work for
Tesla and was an executive there, has emphasized
the vision of the company to electrify
Europe's energy landscape. I think we speak about this from time to time
here that Europe is really fighting to, put a pin
on the map in terms of being a valid
alternative to, for example, what happens in Silicon
Valley. So the company's approach combines advanced
technology with user friendly interfaces in order to
basically make green and clean energy accessible to broader
audiences or the masses even. And,
they are also banking on the intensifying
green transition goals that we see in the European Union, and
Einscoff really hopes that they are positioned well to play a pivotal role
in achieving carbon neutrality here in the continent or in the European
Union. Investors are closely watching the pre
IPO performance, and analysts suggest that the
valuation could actually surge post IPO.
Worse news come from, I already said it in the highlight section, from
Volocopter, once hailed as probably, like, the
pioneer in air mobility because that company now has filed for
insolvency, marking a really sobering turn for,
the bauxite based startup, but also for the whole industry as a
whole because, Volocopter known for its revolutionary
air taxis designed for urban environments really struggled
with, mounting financial challenges. They had
really high operational costs, slower than expected market
adoption because, I mean, as you can tell, the, flying helicopters are not
around yet. And so the, yeah, the insolvency really
raises general questions about the viability of the whole sector,
especially amid regulatory hurdles and really lukewarm
investor confidence. So, yeah, so
from what we hear on background, we see
that industry experts believe that the concept might have
some potential, but, there's still really, really
big technological and infrastructure challenges that remain unresolved.
The company's leadership has expressed hope that they could probably
restructure and therefore, pave a
way forward, for a renewed focus on its core mission.
But, also competitors like Joby Aviation and Lydium
continue to push forward, signaling a still active market. So we
will see whether Volocopter is only is more
than just like a cautionary tale for start ups in one
of the emerging industries. And they are based in Ose. I think it's in
southwestern Germany. Yes. Not too far away from
us here. Yeah. Green flexibility,
though, on the other hand, it's a Munich based company, has raised €400,000,000
to scale, battery storage solutions. The funding
led by Partners Group aims, in this case, to accelerate the deployment
of large scale storage systems critical for balancing
renewable energy grids. These subsystems, as you may
know, play a pivotal role in ensuring the stability and efficiency
of energy grids that rely on solar and wind
power. Green flexibility plans to
expand their footprint in Europe by building more
advanced storage fix facilities in key markets.
Their CEO, Marcus Lang, has highlighted or Marcus Lang, I guess,
has highlighted the importance of this investment in addressing
Europe's energy challenges amid an increasing adoption of
renewables. As you may know, the,
war in the Ukraine has been a huge issue here in European energy
markets and, I think has been also really great push
for renewable energies here. Battery storage being one of the
essential, like, infrastructure elements of this and,
essential for overcoming the intermittency issues associated with
green energy. And green flexibilities,
offering, which is like a modular scalable system, really
try to meet these demands in that market. So
this funding round positions the company as a leader in the energy
transition movement, and analysts predict further growth as renewable
energy integration intensifies.
2 more to go. 3 more to go. Good lord.
Sunfire, company based in Dresden.
They have secured €200,000,000 to expand
hydrogen technology solutions. The,
yeah, green hydrogen also part of Europe's energy future.
Sunfire specializes there in high temperature electroly
electrolysis. Is that how you pronounce it in English? Electrolyse,
as we say in German, which efficiently
efficiently converts water into hydrogen using renewable
energy sources. So the founding round this time around led by several global
investors is going to support scaling its production capabilities
and enhancing r and d efforts. Hydrogen is seen as a
cornerstone for decarbonizing industries
such as steel production, chemicals, and heavy transport
to heavy transport. And Sunfire's technology there
addresses these demands, trying to provide a cleaner and more
scalable solution. CEO Niels Aldag said that the
company is focused on meeting Europe's ambitious hydrogen targets
while also eyeing other international markets.
They really hope that since governments are increasing their commitments to
hydrogen strategies, Sanfire is going to be in a
position that is considered to be the technological leader. They hope to become
one of the key players there. And, yeah, one of the few
success stories of, new companies and start up
with a start up culture happening in Eastern Germany since they are
based in Dresden.
Berlin based Bees and Bears has secured €500,000,000
for renewable energy financing across Europe. It's a
fintech that focuses on providing credit solutions for renewable
energy projects so that businesses and households can
adopt solar panels, wind turbines, other sustainable technologies.
It's a funding that for them marks a significant milestone to
expand its platform's reach, facilitate investments
in over 25,000 renewable energy projects across Germany
and beyond. CEO, Anne Lehmann, noted that the
company's mission aligns with the EU's green deal objectives,
again, going back to be carbon neutral and making financing
for, sustainability more accessible. Biese and Baers also
hinted at integrating AI to optimize credit allocation and
risk management. The, Fintech's
approach is expected to accelerate the green transition in
Germany and Europe while delivering strong returns for investors.
So a company that is really interesting on several
fronts here because they seem to be not only an
interesting Fintech company, but also one that is working for a
specific sector that has good, chances to prosper.
Beez n Bears is the name based in Berlin.
Signum, achieves unicorn status with
a €58,000,000 growth round. As I said, it's
Switzerland based, Zurich to be precise. The, bank
is a pioneer in digital asset banking and offers
solutions in blockchain based services, including tokenization,
crypto trading, and custody services. They will
use the money to support the bank's expansion into new markets,
particularly Asia and Europe. Matthias Imbach is one of the cofounders
here, and he said that the company's commitment to bridging
traditional banking with blockchain technology, creating new opportunities
for institutional investors are really the goals that they want
to achieve with that kind of money. And, yeah, we see it in the company's
growth already that the, increasing institutional adoption of
blockchain and technology and digital assets here actually
seems to work. And that analysis analysts
predict that Signum's valuation will continue to rise as
regulatory clarity improves and demand for blockchain
services grows even more.
So this is a roundup, and as you can tell, we try to
give you a bit more background than we probably traditionally did to just give
you an idea. And I think, I mean, the summary of this month definitely is
that a lot is happening in the green tech sector here.
And it's probably yeah. As it has always been one of the strengths in the
German market or German Swiss Austrian market to be,
like, the world engineer. Yes. Totally.
Going a little bit into housekeeping and time to brag very
we try to keep it from now on very short to get, kind of get
a balance. Sunpro Radio hits the spotlight twice
in Feedspot's 2025 top 15
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rock GSA. You can learn more on our LinkedIn post
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after tiny ad break.
Chris, I think I'll hand now over after my very extensive
report for the ecosystem here. What do you think? Yes.
Let me rattle it down. So we start, ecosystem
news, meaning this is everything that affects the,
startup ecosystem. We start with the world news,
from and where we see a, report in Handelsblad
from chatbots to health care, AI startups are seizing
opportunities in a booming $180,000,000,000
market. Question is, is the next unicorn among them? Of course, it
is. So, yeah, AI startups, one of the big stories.
You can read more about that in the, ecosystem news
there. We also see that We may add, Chris, that ecosystem is
this time quite long because we had, like, all the lookbacks
in 2024 and the outlooks for 2025 in there.
Sorry for interrupting. Yeah. The next one actually is a great
example for this because, Crunchbase writes about larger
VC funding rounds that dominated 2024.
We see that despite fewer deals, larger funding rounds characterize the venture
capital landscape in 2024.
AI Crypto Fund predicts Fintech trends for
2025. The latest report from them
is highlighting emerging trends in Fintech from blockchain to AI
applications. More about that in the report on tradingview.com.
Goldman Sachs urges startups to reevaluate
IPO's. David Salomon there, advises startups to rethink
their plans and especially amid fluctuating market conditions.
It's a report on TechCrunch. The same
goes for the venture capitalists increasing
who increasingly target AI startups with transformative potential
across enterprise and consumer applications. So
that is the lookout who which kind of AI
startups are going to dominate the VC focus in 2025.
Moving on from the world to Europe or focusing
focus zooming in, let's say, European startups increasingly
rely on venture debt as a an alternative funding
strategy amidst tighter VC markets rights sifted.
From green tech to AI, these European startups are poised to
dominate in 2025. It's a list of European startups to
watch. And we all wonder if they will,
achieve unicorn status. It's on business insider.de.
So the German equivalent of that or the German daughter company
of that. The European Tech Ecosystem Report offers a
comprehensive review of the region's growth and
innovation trends in 2024 more at tech.eu.
The siftedeu has a list of European Fintech IPO candidates
for 2025. Several of them prepare for public
listing, so let's see which ones are ready to go big. And
we also see that in general though, the investor
confidence takes a hit across the eurozone reaching the lowest levels in over a
year. So eurozone investor morale drops to a record
low. More about that in, report from Reuters,
the Newswire. Same goal not the same goes for
Germany. I'm sorry. The, Ifo Institute, we're always talking about it. The,
German Business Climate Index, basically, to do, like, a
once a month poll
survey about prison business projectives
improved in 2025. So we see that
German economy, German businesses actually are more optimistic in
January than they used to be in December. More from
Germany. Germany's dream of a semiconductor of
semiconductor dominance dims because Intel cuts
back its investment plans. And so, yeah, they
are investing less money in Magdeburg, Germany than they initially
planned. Darmstadt though, kind
of like a hidden, hidden, hidden champion. 1 of the
smaller, cities in the state of Hess,
climbs in Germany's startup rankings and already starts to
challenge traditional hubs like Frankfurt and Berlin.
More about that can be seen in a little report from Hessenschau,
which is the, local news
broadcast of the, Hessen state of Hessen's,
public broadcaster. Hamburg's VC Investments pay
off. So city of Hamburg had Strategic Venture Capital
Investments, and they are actually yielding significant returns, bolstering the
whole startup ecosystem of the company. If in case you wanna read
more about how that works, this type of, like,
political investment or involvement. You can read it in
Abenblatt, the local newspaper from Hamburg. Other end of the
country, Munich, where we see that they
also emerge as a strong contender in the German startup ecosystem,
rivaling Berlin for top honors. Wirtschaftwocke has
more about the state of Munich,
state as a, like, as an improving city, let's say.
And in general, though, Southern Germany rises as Bavaria
surpasses Berlin and start up funding dominance for the first time. So
Munich obviously being the biggest city in Bavaria, more about
that in capital. And one last
about one last article about German tech and
German companies. Sifted has a
list of tech predictions, German tech predictions to be more
precise, for 2025, where we see from AI
breakthroughs to clean energy innovations, what we
can expect in Germany's tech scene in the
well, I was gonna say upcoming year, in the current year.
Moving on from the ecosystem to well, which
is not hubs anymore. What is it, John? What is it? Not
hubs. Actually, Chris, you came up with the, with the
structure when we first joined forces back in 2015.
So I think this this start up news, we could say, hop hubs,
guys, here's a change. We'll now provide with each news piece a
location as far as we could tell. So this section is Relic
2015 till 2024. Talk about general
news, tech news, company news section here. Retech news, we
don't have any highlights here, but keep in mind the 1,200,000,000
fundraising, from Antscombe to
bears and bees or bees and bears bears and bees and so on and so
forth. We're going straight to the biotech news.
CureVac is back in the black. Biotech pioneer CureVac bounces
back into profitability, a German comeback story
worth noting from Tubingen. Sunafix
partners with Boehringer Ingelheim for ADC
Innovation. Dutch biotech, Sunafix collaborates with
Boehringer Ingelheim to advance antibody drug
conjugates, a promising cancer treatment.
Aragas partners with Shugai for Biotech
Innovation, or it it should be Shugai. Yeah. Swiss
Swiss Biotech Aragas enters a multimillion
dollar deal with Shugai to accelerate advancements in
drug conjugates. Bioversus to go
public on Swiss stock exchange, Swiss Biotech is set to
launch an IPO at SAX Swiss Exchange.
Tristan Pharma Firms Unite For Cancer Innovation. Druryston based
pharmaceutical companies collaborate to harness radioactive technologies
for advanced cancer treatments. Isabic
oh, that that's already in the in the general news. I'm
sorry. Madu, we cut this piece out.
Uh-huh. Move it. Move it. Move
it. Going into the
fintech news, Cash Link secures crypto custody
license. Frankfurt based Cash Link achieves a major milestone
with a crypto custody license. Tokenizations for the
mass market is no longer a dream. Forget
Finance joins Liquid. Berlin based Forget Finance merges with
Liquid, signaling further consolidation in Fintech.
What's next for the industry?
General news, Aleb Alfa scales AI
capabilities by 400%. Heidelberg based
Alibaba enhances its computational capacity by
400%, marking a breakthrough in AI innovation.
ISABIC, meaning the the business incubation
of the European Space Agency in Switzerland welcomes a new
cohort. Space innovation takes leap forward as
ISABIC Switzerland introduces its latest startup
cohort. Learn more on startup ticker.
TUM, meaning Technical University
Munich launches battery startup incubator.
The Unterne Metum and the Technical University Munich, which
Unterne Metum is a part of, launches a specialized in
oh, sorry. We do that again, Madu. TUM
launches battery startup incubator. Technical University Munich,
TUM, launches a specialized incubator for battery innovation,
empowering clean energy startups.
We have been talking about the company before.
Helsing, a defense tech company from Germany,
launches mass produced AI drones. They
are unveiling AI powered killer drones in mass production.
Lilium faces delays in financial struggles, Munich based air
mobility. Lilium experiences further delays in asset
transfer, complicating recovery efforts as we talked before in
the introduction, and Zalando makes a bold move to acquire
About You. Berlin's Zalando shakes up the ecommerce
space with a with a proposal to acquire
rival platform About You. We don't have anything
in Schumpeter Schopfverichtersturung, but for the very simple
reason that the news are already pretty long. Chris, I hand over
to the high news through fundraisings and exits. Yes.
Just a couple of highlights here because, as you can
tell, there's a plethora of good news already.
So here, we just want to highlight a couple of,
funding rounds that in general show you how resilient the whole start up scene
is. We included selected fundraisings above €10,000,000,
Swiss francs, or US dollars. And in order to start off
as, start you off, it's even one from the
United States. Cambridge based Windward Bio
secured a $200,000,000 round to lead transformative advancements
in biotech. Metzingen based NeuroRobotics
secures a €120,000,000 to scale AI
powered, robotic solutions and set new industry standards.
Berlin based, Omeo, strengthens its global footprint with a
$120,000,000 investment to expand into Southeast
Asia. It's a debt funding in that case.
Deerfront, gets a €30,000,000
funding to, promise smarter tools for b
to b sales, revolutionizing European sales strategies.
They are based in Espoo in Finland and in Kaswa in
Germany. C React, C React,
c React, c React, s e, and then React.
A German robotics startup secures €25,000,000 in series a to
advance a high powered logistics and industry automation.
They are in Karlsruhe, Germany. In Berlin, Germany is Apharess
raising $20,800,000 sorry, €20,800,000
to lead the charge in secure privacy first enterprise data
collaboration technologies. I think the original amount was
21,000,000, so it looks a little bit strange. Right?
Yeah. Maybe $21,000,000, maybe. Yeah.
N Safe, gets $18,000,000 in a series
a. It's a company working on greener finance and
therefore gaining momentous there momentum there. They're based in Berlin,
wanting to promote sustainable financial solutions.
In Milan, Italy, we see that Echoplanet lands
€16,000,000 in a series a funding in order to power
sustainable technology solutions. Green tech
startup Veridian, also from Munich, is taking off
with €14,000,000 to power a, cleaner
emission free future in regional air travel. And
those are just a couple of the deals there. We also see
that there are a couple of mergers and acquisitions, which I will leave up to
you. Yes. Of course. Mergers and acquisition,
m and a, t t t t
Chek Auto acquired for 625,000,000 by
nxp. Vienna based TT Chek
Auto joins nxp semiconductors in the $625,000,000
deal and financing software defined vehicle check.
Creative Dock Group acquires NFrontier.
Creative Dock Group expands its hardware innovation by acquiring
Berlin based NFrontier. Sona acquires
TiteLift to secure open source software. Sona acquiring
acquisition of TightLift strengthens security in
enterprise software mitigating open source risks.
Germany's Klukotopia
celebrates multimillion accent. Berlin based Glucotopy
achieves a significant accent showcasing the region's strength
in life science. That's a new question. That was last. Day,
we will just do, us pronouncing the
names wrongly. That's
a quite good idea. Gly glysotopy. Glysotopy
in Berlin. Yeah. So this is
this. That's it for the beginning of the year. I
think overall, more good news than bad news. Lot of money in the
market, and we just say thanks for listening, I guess.
Totally my pleasure. Hope to have you back soon.
And, Chris, you next month. Yes.
Definitely. And please say again happy New Year in Chinese. That sounded so
professional. Exactly.
Have a good day. Bye bye. Bye.