SMP advises APEX Ventures on investments in Phantasma Labs and DeepSpin

Wie / Frank­furt a. M. — In addi­tion to lead inves­tor APEX Digi­tal Health, exis­ting inves­tors Entre­pre­neur First, SOSV and seve­ral high-ranking busi­ness angels also parti­ci­pa­ted in the seed round for Berlin-based medtech startup Deep­Spin. Deep­Spin says it plans to use the fresh capi­tal to expand the team and further deve­lop the tech­no­logy it has developed.

Alre­ady in Q2, a team led by SMP part­ner Martin Scha­per advi­sed APEX Digi­tal Health on its invest­ment in Berlin-based medtech startup Deep­Spin, as well as acting as lead inves­tor in the seed finan­cing round of Berlin-based startup Phan­tasma Labs. Other inves­tors include Signals VC, IBB Betei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft, Wi Ventures, Entre­pre­neur First, and seve­ral high-profile busi­ness angels. Accor­ding to Phan­tasma Labs, the capi­tal raised will be used to expand the team as well as product development.

“We are very plea­sed that we were able to advise APEX Ventures on two finan­cing rounds at the same time. The invest­ments in DeepT­ech and Health­Tech under­line the ever incre­asing importance of these sectors in the VC market”, says Martin Schaper.

APEX Ventures
APEX Ventures is a Euro­pean venture capi­tal fund focu­sed on DeepT­ech start­ups with unique IP and extra­or­di­nary market poten­tial. APEX Ventures has comple­ted nume­rous invest­ments in Europe as well as in the U.S., inclu­ding AI for medi­cal appli­ca­ti­ons, quan­tum and laser tech­no­logy, auto­no­mous mobi­lity, compu­ter vision, and digi­tal foren­sics. APEX Ventures is in close colla­bo­ra­tion with the foun­ding teams to work toge­ther on go-to-market stra­te­gies and acce­le­rate inter­na­tio­nal growth. For an effec­tive selec­tion of talen­ted teams and their best possi­ble support, APEX Ventures is in close exch­ange with acade­mic insti­tu­ti­ons, entre­pre­neur­ship programs and other inter­na­tio­nal VC partners.

APEX Digi­tal Health
APEX Digi­tal Health — the second fund under the APEX Ventures umbrella — invests in early-stage health­care compa­nies. As in the first fund, which has alre­ady made 16 successful invest­ments, the focus is on DeepT­ech compa­nies with defen­si­ble intellec­tual property in the DACH region. Howe­ver, invest­ments are also plan­ned in the rest of Europe, the USA and Israel. Since the fund was regis­tered in Janu­ary 2020, four invest­ments have been comple­ted, in patho­logy, radio­logy and neurology.

Deep­Spin
Based on arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence, Berlin-based medtech startup Deep­Spin is deve­lo­ping a novel magne­tic reso­nance imaging (MRI) system. Compared to conven­tio­nal systems, DeepSpin’s solu­tion is said to be a frac­tion of the cost, size and weight. The company’s goal is to make MRI acces­si­ble to all pati­ents world­wide through the use of its tech­no­logy, thus estab­li­shing a new stan­dard of care in this specialty. The company was foun­ded in 2020 by Clemens Tepel and Pedro Silva.

Phan­tasm Labs
Phan­tasma Labs offers a solu­tion to improve self-driving systems. Using virtual simu­la­tion and novel AI tech­no­logy, Phan­tasma Labs’ soft­ware will help self-driving cars predict and under­stand human beha­vior, for exam­ple. In the simu­la­ti­ons, entire cities such as London or New York are recrea­ted virtually, in which an auto­no­mously driving system encoun­ters real-life situa­tions with other road users or even pede­stri­ans. The company was foun­ded in 2018 by Rama­krishna Nanjun­daiah and Maria Meier, who previously met in the Talent Inves­tor Entre­pre­neur First program.

About SMP
SMP is a specia­list tax and commer­cial law firm opera­ting in the core areas of corpo­rate, funds, liti­ga­tion, tax and tran­sac­tions. SMP attor­neys and tax advi­sors repre­sent a wide variety of clients. These include emer­ging tech­no­logy compa­nies and family-run medium-sized enter­pri­ses as well as corpo­ra­ti­ons and private equity/venture capi­tal funds. Since its foun­da­tion in 2017, SMP has become one of the leading addres­ses for venture capi­tal, private equity and fund struc­tu­ring in Germany. The firm and its part­ners have been reco­gni­zed natio­nally and inter­na­tio­nally by JUVE, Best Lawy­ers, Legal 500, Focus, and Cham­bers and Part­ners. Today, SMP employs over 50 expe­ri­en­ced lawy­ers and tax advi­sors in three offices in Berlin, Hamburg and Colo­gne. www.smp.law

Advi­sor APEX Ventures: SMP
Dr. Martin Scha­per (Lead/Corporate), Part­ner, Dr. Chris­tian Jois­ten (Tax), Asso­ciate Pia Dürre (Corpo­rate) Associate

Advi­sor APEX Digi­tal Health: SMP
Dr. Martin Scha­per (Corpo­rate Law), Part­ner, Jonas Huth (Corpo­rate Law), Associate