Blockchain startup Gapless raises 5.5 million euros

Berlin/Frankfurt — Gapless, the plat­form for things you love, has closed a seven-figure funding round. The block­chain start-up from Berlin around the foun­ding trio (photo) Jan Karnath (CEO), Malte Häus­ler (CFO) and Andreas Joeg­bes (CTO) has raised a total of 5.5 million euros from investors.

Lead inves­tor is FinLab EOS VC Fund — a joint venture between FinLab AG (ISIN: DE0001218063) and EOSIO block­chain deve­lo­per Block.one, global experts in block­chain tech­no­logy. In addi­tion to the fund, insu­rance entre­pre­neur Kers­ten Jodex­nis and his family office LA ROCA Capi­tal and Porsche AG, which has alre­ady inves­ted in Gapless since 2018, are also invol­ved in the financing.

The all-in-one app for the vehicle — and more Gapless is the all-in-one app for the vehicle — enab­ling users to create a complete and compre­hen­sive vehicle history and use vehicle-rela­­ted third-party services. “With FinLab EOS VC Fund as well as EOS VC, the venture capi­tal arm of Block.One, we have found the part­ner of choice for the further deve­lo­p­ment of our young company,” says Gapless CEO Jan Karnath about the successful seed finan­cing. “We are now taking the next step toge­ther to become the ‘plat­form, for things you love’.”

Toge­ther with Malte Häus­ler and Andreas Joeb­ges, Karnath foun­ded the plat­form in 2018 with the aim of safe­guar­ding the value and emotio­nal signi­fi­cance of vehic­les for the future. Block­chain archi­tec­ture exten­sion Block.one is the deve­lo­per of the leading block­chain proto­col EOSIO, which was released in June 2018. EOSIO is widely regarded as the first powerful enter­prise block­chain plat­form and is curr­ently one of the most active block­chain soft­ware plat­forms in the world. Gapless intends to invest the newly raised capi­tal in the product, block­chain archi­tec­ture expan­sion and user growth of the platform.

“We are plea­sed to welcome Gapless as a new invest­ment in our port­fo­lio,” said Stefan Schütze, Mana­ging Direc­tor of FinLab EOS VC Fund. “Gapless shows how block­chain tech­no­logy can trans­form services from the ground up — always thin­king from the user’s perspec­tive. FinLab AG mana­ges the FinLab EOS VC Fund and is one of the largest fintech and block­chain inves­tors in Europe. Part­ner from the very begin­ning: Porsche Since the foun­ding of Gapless, the Stut­t­­gart-based sports car manu­fac­tu­rer Porsche has stood by the side of the Berlin-based block­chain start-up, which today employs 20 people. Since Septem­ber 2018, Gapless
ancho­red in the Zuffen­hau­sen ecosys­tem and was also part of Porsche’s “Next Visi­ons” inno­va­tion agenda at the Slush Confe­rence in Helsinki and the IAA in Frank­furt am Main.

In addi­tion, the global inno­va­tion plat­form STARTUP AUTOBAHN powered by Plug and Play has included the young Berlin-based company in its current program. More than 50,000 regis­tered vehic­les Today, Gapless alre­ady mana­ges more than 50,00 vehic­les on the plat­form, with most of the users of the so-called digi­tal gara­ges coming from the USA, the UK and Germany. By the end of the year, block­chain specia­lists expect up to 100,000. www.gapless.app.

About Gapless
Gapless is the world’s first block­chain plat­form for vehicle owners. At www.gapless.app, users can manage their vehic­les online and create digi­tal, complete vehicle histo­ries or have them crea­ted by Gapless. All docu­ments, photos and infor­ma­tion belon­ging to the car are in one secure place and can be acces­sed online at any time, mana­ged or shared in the form of digi­tal expo­sés with veri­fied histo­ri­cal entries. This includes, among other things, infor­ma­tion on previous vehicle recalls, data on equip­ment features or even expenses.

About Block.one and EOS VC
Block.one’s EOS VC program helps deve­lo­pers and entre­pre­neurs launch commu­­nity-based busi­nesses using EOSIO. It provi­des support in the form of venture capi­tal part­ner­ships prima­rily aimed at sustainable use of the EOSIO ecosys­tem by inves­t­ing in a concen­tra­ted and diver­si­fied port­fo­lio of block­chain-orien­­ted compa­nies based on the EOSIO soft­ware. The EOS VC initia­tive aims to foster a global network of indi­vi­du­als from diffe­rent disci­pli­nes by holding events. As part of its mission and vision, EOS VC regu­larly colla­bo­ra­tes with the block­chain deve­lo­per commu­nity. More infor­ma­tion is available online at www.Block.one and at www.vc.eos.io.

About Porsche
The Dr. Ing. h.c.. F. Porsche AG, head­quar­te­red in Stut­t­­gart-Zuffen­hau­­sen, is one of the most profi­ta­ble auto­mo­bile manu­fac­tu­r­ers in the world. In 2019, Porsche deli­vered 280,800 vehic­les of the 911, 718 Boxs­ter, 718 Cayman, Cayenne, Macan, Panamera and Taycan models to custo­mers around the world. This was ten percent more than in the previous year. Porsche opera­tes plants in Stutt­gart and Leip­zig as well as a deve­lo­p­ment center in Weiss­ach. The sports car manu­fac­tu­rer employs 35,429 people. Porsche is commit­ted to inno­va­tion, and many of its tech­no­lo­gies have their orig­ins in motorsport.

About FinLab AG
Listed FinLab AG (WKN 121806 / ISIN DE0001218063) is one of the first and largest inves­tors in finan­cial services tech­no­lo­gies (“fintech”) and block­chain in Europe. To this end, FinLab’s focus is on provi­ding venture capi­tal to start-ups. FinLab aims to provide active and long-term support for its invest­ments. FinLab supports its port­fo­lio compa­nies in their respec­tive deve­lo­p­ment phases with its network and know-how. In addi­tion, FinLab acts as an asset mana­ger and mana­ges assets in the triple-digit million range.