GROWTH STAGE
Armedangels - Sustainable Fashion E-Commerce
Armedangels is a social fashion e-commerce company headquartered in Cologne that focuses on sustainability, fair working conditions, and environmentally-friendly, non-hazardous material. The company sells its clothing online and through conventional distribution channels in five different countries. Armedangels appeals to a strongly growing customer group that places great value on the aforementioned criteria. Since its foundation in 2007 as a pure online shop with just a few T-shirt designs, the company has, in its own view, successfully established itself as a young, sustainable brand.Armedangels generates substantial turnovers, is growing strongly, employs over 90 people and is represented in fourteen countries. In 2018, Armedangels was able to achieve a 100 percent ratio in the use of sustainable raw materials. The company has not yet published its recent positive sales performance, which continues to be positive, so we are committed to confidentiality.Share 2.8%
AuctionTech - Online livestream technology for auctions
AuctionTech has been founded in 2017 by lead employees of Auctionata, the former biggest online auction house for luxury goods, and from which's insolvency estate the online livestream auction technology, developed over many years at great expense, has been acquired at a low price with the help of German Startups Group. The founding team around CEO Jan Thiel offers regular auction houses and online marketplaces this unique technology as a cloud Software-as-a-Serivce so they can operate live video auctions without latency and by that reach bidders worldwide no matter their respective size or geographical location. Potential segments besides artworks, luxury goods, watches, jewelry and antiquates are also classic cars, real estate and B2B investment goods. The product can be embedded easily in the auction house’s own website as a white label solution for a license fee so no brand or media disruption occurs. Late 2018 AuctionTech announced its cooperation with RE⁄MAX Austria, the Austrian market leader and world's biggest real estate agent, to roll out a digital bidding process for the sale of real estate which will be extended to other countries in the future. Only recently, AuctionTech entered into a partnership with star auctioneer and founder of the third largest auction house in the world, Simon de Pury, to jointly enable online auctions in real time from anywhere in the world. German Startups Group is involved as lead investor.Share 23,4%
Chrono24 - The world's leading online market for luxury watches
Chrono24 is the world’s leading online marketplace for luxury watches, based in Karlsruhe. Founded in 2003 by Tim Stracke, Dirk Schwartz and Michael Kroska, the company is considered the first choice online for watch enthusiasts as well as traders when it comes to new, pre-owned and vintage luxury watches. Already in 2017, the value of watches transacted through Chrono24 amounted to over 1bn euros. Chrono24 estimates that one out of three luxury watch enthusiast worldwide uses Chrono24.On Chrono24, more than 10,000 professional dealers and private sellers from over 90 countries offer more than 250,000 watches. With content in 22 languages, the website attracts more than 350,000 visitors every day. Over 2 million users have already downloaded the Chrono24 apps for iOS and Android.Share 1.2%
Delivery Hero – Online Food Delivery Service
Delivery Hero is an international online and mobile food ordering and delivery platform founded in 2011. Through the website or via the app, users can find restaurants filtered by cuisine in their area, browse menus, read reviews, and order with the appropriate delivery service with a few clicks. The affiliated restaurants pay Delivery Hero a commission for the placing of the orders with the restaurants.After the acquisitions of its competitor foodpanda in December of 2016 and the restaurant logistics provider Foodora in September of 2015, Delivery Hero processes each month, by their own accounts, orders in the double-digit million range on commission over the Internet, with approximately 270,000 restaurants in more than 40 countries connected to its service. The company has over 6,000 employees in different locations around the world with a staff consisting of approximately 1.000 people working from its Berlin headquarters. Delivery Hero is one of the fastest-growing young tech companies according to The Next Web European Tech5 2015 and listed in the Prime Standard segment of Deutsche Börse since 30 July 2017.
Exozet is a repeatedly awarded digital agency that offers consultancy and execution services for the 'Digital Transformation' of all business processes. This includes, in particular, the design, realisation, and operation of demanding multimedia solutions with focus on mobile, video, virtual and augmented reality as well as e-commerce and online marketing on various platforms – the seamless combination of technology and design in the digital media. Exozet employs approximately 140 staff in Berlin (headquarters), Potsdam-Babelsberg, and Vienna. In addition to media conglomerates such as Axel Springer or BBC, big-name brands and organizations such as ZDF, Media Broadcast - freenet, Gothaer, Burda, Audi and Deutsche Telekom as well as startups such as Wooga, LaterPay, Adviqo, colorfy, the Zene, and portfolio companies of German Startups Group have been or are clients of Exozet.Exozet was founded by CEO Frank Zahn. In 2016, Peter Skulimma joined Exozet as Chief Commercial Officer.Share 50.8%
Fiagon - MedTech for ENT Navigation
Fiagon is a MedTech startup that develops and manufactures innovative surgical navigation systems of the latest generation with its patented “Flexsensor” technology. With its electromagnetic navigation technology, Fiagon, together with world-renowned doctors, set a new standard in medical ENT navigation in recent years. This, in the company's view, unique technology is being used internationally, from the headquarters in Hennigsdorf near Berlin, in Europe as well as the US and China for oral and maxillofacial surgery, neurosurgery, and spine surgery. In 2018, Fiagon was named one of the top 1.000 fastest growing companies in Europe by the Financial Times.Share 2.2%
Friendsurance – Insurance FinTech
In 2010, the founders of Friendsurance realized that many people own insurances that they rarely or never use. Insurance companies, however, do not demonstrate appreciation for cautious and fair behaviour. Therefore, Friendsurance developed a new insurance principle, which rewards insurance customers with premium cash backs if they remain free of claims. Insurance customers form small groups and part of their insurance premiums are pooled. In case the group members remain claim free, they each get part of the money in the pool back at the end of the year in form of a cash back. Typically, every year over 75% of those who use the Friendsurance principle receive a cash back on their premiums.Currently, the Friendsurance principle can be used for personal liability, householders’, legal, and electronics insurances of renowned providers. Insurances closed directly on www.friendsurance.de already include the Friendsurance principle free of charge.Friendsurance's vision is to make insurances cheaper for everyone. Currently, approximately 90 employees work for this goal at the company's headquarters in Berlin. Friendsurance cooperates with many insurance providers.Apart from the German Startups Group, e.ventures and the technology investment fund Horizons Ventures of the Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-Shing count among the shareholders.
Fyber - Mobile Advertising Monetization Strategies
Fyber (formerly SponsorPay), founded in 2009, is an AdTech company and provider of mobile advertising monetization strategies for app developers and publishers. Fyber is able to automatically optimize and manage ad revenues with the aid of a unified mobile supply side platform, for example through an ad marketplace on which the offering of mobile ads by app developers and publishers is brought together with demand from advertisers using real-time bidding. Within this, advertisers are given the opportunity to reach over 150 million monthly unique app users. Fyber was recently chosen by VentureBeat as one of the Top 10 Mobile Advertising Companies, and it has approximately 180 employees across its headquarters in Berlin and branches in San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, London, Paris, Istanbul, Seoul, and Tokyo.German Startups Group had an indirect share in Fyber by means of Special Purpose Vehicles (SPV). The SPVs sold their shares to a company listed on the stock exchange in October 2014.
Lingoda - Online-Sprachschule
Lingoda is the number one trusted online language school. Founded in Berlin, Germany in 2013, and provides convenient and accessible online language courses in several different languages to over 60,000 students worldwide. Lingoda’s private and small group classes are taught by over 1,000 qualified, native-speaking teachers. With over 450,000 classes available per year and accessible 24/7, Lingoda’s mission is to empower even the busiest people to master a language and unlock their potential — at any time, from anywhere.The founders of Lingoda believe in a communicative approach to language learning: mastering a language means being able to speak it with confidence. Their CEFR-focused (Common European Framework of Reference) learning materials are designed by linguistic experts and focus on meaningful topics that are applicable to the students’ interests, careers and everyday lives. Thanks to their extensive rotating roster of teachers and the small group classes, students are exposed to a variety of regional accents and expressions within the same language and have the time and space to practice speaking in every lesson. Lingoda’s team includes over 100 international professionals from 30 countries and 40 languages. In 2020, Crunchbase listed Lingoda among the 10 largest online language learning companies globally. Lingoda has a score of 4.5 of possible 5.0 on Trustpilot and 75% of their reviews rated as ‘excellent’.
Share 0,8%
Mister Spex – Brand Glasses Online
For many,Mister Spex is a synonym for online opticians in Germany. Through the Internet, the company offers an extensive range of high-quality prescription glasses, sunglasses, and contact lenses at competitive prices. In addition to the broad product range, price transparency and price savings, customers also benefit from free services such as eye tests and the adjustment of glasses thanks to local partner opticians in Germany. The company also has its own optician workshop in Berlin with final assembly and quality control. Furthermore, the company extends its offline presence and has opened twelve brick-and-mortar stores, others are in preparation and planning. Only six months after opening, the first store received the Red Dot Design Award for its innovative space concept, one of the most important international design awards in the Communication Design category.In July 2013, Mister Spex acquired the Swedish online eyewear shops Lensstore and Loveyewear and the Norwegian online optician Lensit.no. Mister Spex now operates in ten countries and is Europe's leading online optician with a portfolio of around 9.000 frames. The company dispatches up to 15.000 parcels per day from the 2017 newly established Berlin logistics center.Share 0.5%
Onefootball - Largest online football platform
The mobile, web, and smartwatch app Onefootball with over 20 million users in around 200 countries, is the world's largest online football platform according to its own figures.As one of the most prominent German startups, Onefootball gives football fans various ways to inform themselves about their favourite teams through news, live results, and statistics. It also allows fans to actively engage with these clubs through social features and betting as well as tipping opportunities.
In 2019, Onefootball, in cooperation with the pay-TV channel Sky Deutschland, became the first provider worldwide to add the feature to stream matches of the second German Bundesliga as well as DFB Cup matches on a pay-per-view basis directly within the app.
Union Square Ventures, one of the most successful American venture capital investors, Klaus Hommels’ VC fund Lakestar, prominent business angels, and sports goods manufacturer Adidas, which also acts as a strategic partner, are some of Onefootball’s investors. Onefootball was chosen by Google as one of the top 50 Android apps globally in 2014 and 2015. Furthermore, Wired Magazine counted it as one of the „100 hottest European startups 2015“. Onefootball was featured at the WWDC 2016, Apple's major developer conference, as one of only a few German apps.Share 0.25%
reBuy – The Easy Buy and Sell Platform
More than five million happy customers and 15 years of experience in reCommerce - this is rebuy, the online shop for selling and buying used media and consumer electronics. reBuy offers a 36-month warranty, which is unique in the market, and over 3 million refurbished items are always available in the logistics center. The reCommerce company, founded in 2004, is the European market leader in the area of used electronics. reBuy closed the past financial year (2017) with a positive operating result (EBITDA) and revenues of 109 million euros. In Germany, customers can sell or buy electronics and media articles from a total of 14 categories on reBuy.de. Internationally, the company operates in Austria, France, the UK and the Netherlands and is continuing to expand with its 500 employees. reBuy's vision is that used goods will be seen as a conscious alternative to new goods, without any compromises in appearance or functionality, but with a great deal of price savings.German Startups Group is invested in reBuy together with well-known investors such as DuMont Venture, Hasso Plattner Ventures as well as Iris Capital and OP Ventures.
Remerge - App Retargeting
The AdTech startup remerge enables app providers to place ads through an integrated retargeting platform in more than 350,000 other apps, according to the company. Thus, advertisers can reach, according to Remerge, up to 700,000 users worldwide per second. The addressed user target group can be defined in detail according to various criteria. This reduces scatter losses and therefore increases the advertiser’s marketing impact as well as the revenue of the app publisher since higher click rates can be achieved through Remerge. Apps become increasingly more important as an advertising medium because of their enormous international prevalence on more than 2.5 billion smartphones worldwide. Remerge has achieved a growth in revenue of over 500% in the first three quarters of 2016 compared to last year’s period, according to the company.Share 2.4%
Scalable Capital - Asset Management Technology
With the help of modern risk management technology, Scalable Capital provides access to cost-efficient, professional asset management - a kind of financial investment that used to be reserved for wealthier investors due to the costs associated with personal investment advisors. The FinTech startup, founded in December 2014 in Munich, provides their customers with a globally diversified ETF portfolio, tailor-made to the personal risk profile of each user, supervised and managed around the clock. The individual risk tolerance of the investor is the benchmark for all investment decisions.CEO Erik Podzuweit previously was Co-CEO of Westing and Executive Director at Goldman Sachs. Scalable Capital is an authorised wealth manager by the BaFin and the FCA. The company is winner of the Angel's Choice Award of the Web Summit 2015 and the FintechGermany Award 2016, was awarded the grade 'very good' by the finance magazine Euro am Sonntag, won the Innovation Award for the best automatic online wealth management at the Börsentag 2016, and was named the best robo advisor in Germany by Brokervergleich.de. Scalable Capital is the leading robo advisor in Europe with assets under management of more than 200 million euros. Apart from German Startups Group, Holtzbrinck Ventures, Monk’s Hill Ventures, MPGI, and several buiness angels have invested in Scalable Capital.
Simplesurance – One-Click Online Insurance for Purchases
In partnership with reputable insurers, Berlin-based Simplesurance offers consumers individual product insurance. For example, insurance against iPhone breakage or warranty extensions can be bought directly at the point of online sale with just a few clicks and at very reasonable conditions. The online shop earns a commission and can offer its customers an additional service, while Simplesurance earns a margin on all insurance policies sold online. With B2C portals in, according to the company, nine European countries, Simplesurance also offers the option to insure products or devices already purchased. Together with the renowned insurer Tokio Marine and the largest Japanese airline All Nippon Airways, Simplesurance prepares the launch of Japan's first travel cancellation insurance for flight cancellations due to adverse weather conditions.Share 1.6%
SoundCloud - Social sound platform
SoundCloud, founded in 2007, is a social sound platform based in London, with operational headquarters in Berlin, which is also where the management is based. SoundCloud gives users access to one of the world’s largest communities of music and audio creators according to their own statements. SoundCloud allows everyone via widgets, apps, and their own platform to discover original music and audio, connect with each other, and share their sounds with the world. In addition, sound creators can use the platform to instantly record, upload, and share sounds across websites, blogs, and social networks.SoundCloud has approximately 170 million users. The company generates revenue through paid subscriptions like pro and premier plans, which give musicians the opportunity, for example, to gain more exposure. In early 2016, the platform introduced the subscription model 'SoundCloud Go', which enables listeners to gain access to an extended music catalogue - particularly of the three major labels - and an offline listening function.
The feature is now available in more than 15 countries worldwide, giving artists the opportunity to monetize their music. In 2019, SoundCloud announced several new features, such as the integration of its catalogue in DJ programs of the leading providers Native Instruments, Pioneer DJ, Serato and Virtual DJ, as well as the ability for artists to use SoundCloud Premier to list their songs with other streaming providers and monetize them there as well. SoundCloud is the only service that offers a holistic solution for the commercial distribution of music without disintermediaries.Share 0.15%
Wunder Mobility – Mobility technology service provider
Wunder, founded in 2014 in Hamburg, offers the world's leading urban P2P ridesharing platform which helps users organize carpooling in rural areas. Users can request a ride via mobile app to their desired destination at the push of a button and subsequently tip the driver. Wunder receives a certain percentage from each payment. Afterwards, both guest and driver have the opportunity to rate the experience with one another, which ensures the high quality of the community.Wunder is still considered the world's leading urban P2P ridesharing provider, while, over the years, also being able to develop its services into an own platform, which now even has its own operating system, the Wunder Mobility OS. In addition to its former core business, Wunder Mobility now offers complementary products such as Wunder Carpool, Wunder Shuttle or Wunder Fleet which serve as the technology for providers of connected cars, urban mobility solutions such as car parks or shuttles and even ride sharing providers of bicycles and e-scooters. In 2019, Wunder Mobility, in cooperation with the City of Hamburg, launched the first nationwide project for extensive digital documentation, analysis and planning of new mobility services. This exclusive direct connection to the city's traffic and mobility system gives Wunder Mobility a long-term competitive advantage through a more comprehensive data network.Gunnar Froh, founder and CEO of Wunder, previously was operations manager at Airbnb. German Startups Group is invested in the mobility startup alongside with Partech Ventures, amongst other venture capital providers, as well as a group of renowned business angels.Share 0.40%EARLY STAGE
Amorelie - Sensual E-Commerce
Since the beginning of 2013, Amorelie has stood for a sensual lifestyle online shop that offers a high quality portfolio as well as compelling functionality. Presented in a friendly and exclusive environment full of joie de vivre, Amorelie attracts confident, modern women and couples. The product range covers toys, exclusive lingerie, and sensual products, such as erotic literature. Passion, physical well-being, sex, and happiness are the main focus of Amorelie, which showcases a stylish, innovative, and accessible Lovestyle-world instead of intimidating “erotic products” of low quality.The team of founders held key roles before. Lea-Sophie Cramer previously was Vice President Asia of both Rocket Internet and Groupon, while Sebastian Pollok was an analyst at e.ventures in San Francisco and an entrepreneur also at Rocket Internet.German Startups Group invested together with well-known co-investors, such as SevenVentures, TA Ventures, Paua Ventures, Otto Capital, and Cherry Ventures, alongside whom it sold its shares to 7Commerce GmbH, the strategic investment arm of ProSiebenSat.1 Media, in March 2015.
CRX Markets - Supply chain finance platform
CRX Markets is a Munich-based supply chain finance platform that allows suppliers to sell claims against their clients, i.e. to securitize the bundled claims, without the involvement of an intermediary, e.g. a factoring bank, and to automatically trigger a bidding contest between institutional investors as sellers in order to maximize revenue from the sale of the claims and ensure that money is received earlier. According to the company, the customers benefit from a stabilized supply chain and the optimisation of circulating assets. Furthermore, the marketplace created by CRX Markets also offers, in our opinion, companies, banks, and investors attractive investment opportunities through its transparent structure and competition-oriented methods.CRX Markets won the FintechGermany Award in 2016. Founder and manager Moritz von der Linden and supervisory board member Carlo Kölzer are the founders of the highly successful foreign exchange trading online platform 360T, which was acquired by Deutsche Börse in 2015.
Software Solutions for review management
Since 2009, Customer Alliance supports hotels worldwide with the help of various products in collecting and integrating customer centric data as well as realising their revenue potential.
With its product 'Review Analytics', Customer Alliance provides a reliable 360° review management solution for the thorough and professional handling of online reviews. It manages online reviews and provides essential statistics for quality management.
Additionally, the tool 'Price Analytics' supports hotels in doing effective pricing by tracking the price structure of competitors and by warning hoteliers about changes on the business market in advance.
„Booked“, the newest product by Customer Alliance, is a responsive booking engine that enables hotels to implement an easily-maintained booking widget on their websites, with which customers can quickly and directly book hotel rooms. Thus, hotels can reduce their commission payments. Today, more than 3.500 hotels from over 35 countries use Customer Alliance software solutions.Share 1.9%
eWings.com – Platform for Flight Bookings
eWings is an online booking platform. eWings provides air travellers and frequent flyers with the opportunity for simple and easy booking.eWings was founded in August 2013 by Thilo Hardt, co-founder of Mister Spex and Entrepreneur in Residence of DN Capital London. In August 2015, eWings was ranked among CB Insights' '15 High Momentum German Early Stage Startups'. Apart from German Startups Group, DN Capital and Kima Ventures invested in eWings.
Pyreg - GreenTec for Carbonisation Machinery
Since 2010, Pyreg designs, develops, and manufactures machinery for carbonisation purposes, which convert wet biomasses into valuable biochar in an environmentally-friendly way as well as sewage sludge into fertilizing substrates which almost free of pollutants. During the process, a surplus in heat energy is created that can also be efficiently used for different purposes. Irrespective of whether used in the waste water, fertiliser, composting, forestry and agriculture industries or municipalities, the combination of multi-purpose benefits of a Pyreg system contributes to enhancing the value chain of its respective operators.Pyreg is committed to climate protection and its high-quality machines is not only known for its economical but also its ecological sustainability. A single Pyreg 500 unit – for the production of biochar for instance – effectively sequesters the annual CO2 emissions of up to 500 motor vehicles per year.Pyreg was nominated in 2016 by the German Institute for Invention for the, according to the institute, oldest innovation award in the world, the Dieselmedaille, as the most sustainable innovation.German Startups Group has invested in Pyreg along with different holding companies, including Skion GmbH of Quandt heiress Susanne Klatten, and knowledgeable business angels.Pyreg - GreenTec for Carbonisation Machinery
Since 2010, Pyreg designs, develops, and manufactures machinery for carbonisation purposes, which convert wet biomasses into valuable biochar in an environmentally-friendly way as well as sewage sludge into fertilizing substrates which almost free of pollutants. During the process, a surplus in heat energy is created that can also be efficiently used for different purposes. Irrespective of whether used in the waste water, fertiliser, composting, forestry and agriculture industries or municipalities, the combination of multi-purpose benefits of a Pyreg system contributes to enhancing the value chain of its respective operators.Pyreg is committed to climate protection and its high-quality machines is not only known for its economical but also its ecological sustainability. A single Pyreg 500 unit – for the production of biochar for instance – effectively sequesters the annual CO2 emissions of up to 500 motor vehicles per year.Pyreg was nominated in 2016 by the German Institute for Invention for the, according to the institute, oldest innovation award in the world, the Dieselmedaille, as the most sustainable innovation.German Startups Group has invested in Pyreg along with different holding companies, including Skion GmbH of Quandt heiress Susanne Klatten, and knowledgeable business angels.
realbest - online transaction platform for real estate
realbest is the first online transaction platform for real estate that digitalises the significant steps within the purchase and sales process. The company, founded in 2013 and based in Berlin, sells real estate across Germany from private and professional property sellers through its online network of qualified real estate agents and financial service providers. According to the company, this network reaches over 2.5 million potential buyers. Currently, over 350 million euros worth of real estate offering can be found on realbest.Co-investors include Obotritia Capital from Rolf Elgeti, Ventech as well as Immotech ventures from the property developer Marius Marschall von Bieberstein.
Thinksurance - Commercial Insurance Platform
Founded as Gewerbeversicherung24 in 2015, Thinksurance's online platform supports the development, analysis and sale of commercial insurance policies. With its B2B platform, Frankfurt's Insurtech connects insurers and distributors as well as insurance brokers, pools and agencies in order to digitally map the entire insurance process from needs analysis to conclusion in the future. Thinksurance relies on its own API, which can be easily integrated into the customer's own systems and used to analyse, optimise and control the sales process. According to Thinksurance, this reduces the time it takes to close a commercial insurance contract by an average of 80% from up to several weeks to just a few minutes to broker a policy. Thinksurance now has more than 10.000 brokers among its customers; with the change of name in 2019, the brand is no longer tied only to the German commercial insurance market. An expansion of the product range beyond traditional commercial insurance as well as projects for further internationalization are already planned with the first distributors and insurance partners.Share 1,34%*Operationally active companies only (i.e. without special purpose vehicles). We publish investments and hence the shares of companies that are in our portfolio at our sole discretion, if and when the time is thought best by the portfolio company itself and by us. Thus, the following list raises no claim to completeness.