Author: Tatjana Anderer

Ludgwigs­burg, Melle/Osnabrück (Germany), Bern (Switz­er­land) — bluu unit GmbH, a Triton Mittel­stands­fonds II company and rapidly growing alli­ance of regio­nally strong compa­nies in the field of sustainable refri­ge­ra­tion, air condi­tio­ning and venti­la­tion tech­no­logy as well as data center solu­ti­ons, is streng­thening its Germany-wide network by acqui­ring the isomix Group, a specia­list and full-service provi­der in the fields of venti­la­tion tech­no­logy and inno­va­tive room air puri­fi­ca­tion systems. In addi­tion, the Swiss company IPS Gebäu­de­tech­nik beco­mes a member of the bluu unit alliance. 

This acqui­si­tion marks the first step towards inter­na­tio­na­liza­tion. isomix Group, based in Melle near Osna­brück, has been a relia­ble part­ner for modern venti­la­tion and indoor air puri­fi­ca­tion systems for more than 25 years. A team of over 20 employees offers custo­mers from the health­care, logi­stics and indus­trial sectors the entire value chain, from specia­list plan­ning, project plan­ning and instal­la­tion to service and main­ten­ance. Special atten­tion is paid to opti­mi­zed, effi­ci­ent solu­ti­ons that are tech­ni­cally convin­cing and econo­mic­ally sustainable. 

With this acqui­si­tion, bluu unit is streng­thening its nati­on­wide network of now over 20 members with addi­tio­nal capa­ci­ties and exper­tise in the field of venti­la­tion tech­no­logy. IPS Gebäu­de­tech­nik AG was foun­ded in 2012 and has deve­lo­ped into a leading specia­list for venti­la­tion tech­no­logy in the canton of Bern within a decade. Berger Klima Biel AG in Biel has been part of IPS since 2022, streng­thening its exper­tise in refri­ge­ra­tion, air condi­tio­ning and venti­la­tion tech­no­logy. With the acqui­si­tion of IPS Gebäu­de­tech­nik AG, which is expec­ted to be comple­ted by the end of Octo­ber 2025, the bluu unit alli­ance is ente­ring the Swiss market and taking a signi­fi­cant, stra­te­gic step towards inter­na­tio­na­liza­tion. The bluu unit sees enorm­ous growth poten­tial across Europe due to simi­lar condi­ti­ons in the various markets, inclu­ding stric­ter PFAS regu­la­tion, rising tempe­ra­tures in urban areas and the incre­asing expan­sion of data centers. 

About Bluu Toge­ther, the bluu unit deve­lops sustainable, future-proof solu­ti­ons that are both econo­mic­ally and ecolo­gi­cally convin­cing. In 2025 alone, five groups consis­ting of ten inde­pen­dent specia­list compa­nies with over 200 employees have alre­ady joined the alli­ance — a strong sign of its attractiveness. 

The aim of bluu unit is to offer high-quality and future-proof solu­ti­ons for refri­ge­ra­tion, air condi­tio­ning and venti­la­tion tech­no­logy as well as data center solu­ti­ons that are better. Better for people and the envi­ron­ment. The range of services with a focus on inno­va­tive tech­no­lo­gies and natu­ral refri­ger­ants extends from consul­ting, project plan­ning and design through to instal­la­tion and main­ten­ance. — www.bluu-unit.de

About Triton

Triton is a leading Euro­pean private equity firm foun­ded in 1997 and owned by its part­ners. Triton specia­li­zes in the mid-market and invests in compa­nies that provide busi­ness-criti­cal goods and services in three core sectors: indus­try, busi­ness services and healthcare. 

Triton employs more than 150 invest­ment profes­sio­nals and experts in various areas of exper­tise, in three coor­di­na­ted stra­te­gies: Mid-Market Private Equity, Smal­ler-Mid-Cap Private Equity and Oppor­tu­ni­stic Credit. — www.triton-partners.de

The big surprise: Elec­tro­nic Arts (EA), one of the largest publishers in the video games indus­try, is taken over by a consor­tium of inves­tors in a 55 billion dollar deal (not yet confirmed) and delis­ted from the stock exchange.

The lever­a­ged buyout is the second-largest gaming deal in history to date. It is only surpas­sed by Micro­sof­t’s Acti­vi­sion-Bliz­zard take­over. EA is being acqui­red by the Saudi Arabian sove­reign wealth fund Public Invest­ment Fund (PIF, 9.9 percent), the US capi­tal company Silver Lake (Cali­for­nia) and the invest­ment firm Affi­nity Part­ners (the invest­ment firm of Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner). 

All exis­ting share­hol­ders will receive 210 US dollars per share, after which EA will be delis­ted and taken private.

Due to the nature of the take­over (a so-called “lever­a­ged buyout”), EA is ther­e­fore ente­ring into the new owner­ship struc­ture with new debt of around 20 billion dollars.

The tran­sac­tion is the largest all-cash private equity invest­ment in history. The consor­tium is working closely with EA to enable the company to move faster and deve­lop new oppor­tu­ni­ties on a global scale. Accor­ding to indus­try experts, this means layoffs, more intru­sive mone­tiza­tion and massive savings, which will proba­bly also be felt by users. 

What does the mega-deal mean for the gaming world?

EA was foun­ded in 1982 and has estab­lished itself as one of the key play­ers in the gaming sector with titles such as the life simu­la­tion “The Sims”, “EA Sports FC” (form­erly “FIFA”) and the mili­tary simu­la­tion “Batt­le­field”. The company has a broad port­fo­lio, strong brands and seve­ral leading deve­lo­per studios such as DICE and Respawn. 

Howe­ver, EA has recently come under pres­sure: rising deve­lo­p­ment costs, growing marke­ting expen­dit­ure and ever-incre­asing expec­ta­ti­ons of tech­ni­cal inno­va­tions such as arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence have made it diffi­cult to remain profi­ta­ble. At the same time, free-to-play games and large plat­form opera­tors such as Sony and Micro­soft are pushing into the market. 

The figu­res also shrank after the coro­na­vi­rus boom: In the first quar­ter of 2025, reve­nue slum­ped by 13.7%, net profit by as much as 30% and the important net bookings recently fell by 6%.

Luxem­bourg — The Global Resi­li­ence Inno­va­tion Fund (GRIF) has been offi­ci­ally laun­ched in Luxem­bourg and is plea­sed to announce that it is now offi­ci­ally opera­tio­nal. Sabine Hampel (most recently withEB-SIM and former company opera­ti­ons offi­cer in the German Armed Forces), Priscilla Schelp (foun­der of networkx) and Faik Yargucu (ACATIS) are laun­ching Global Resi­li­ence Inno­va­tion Fund (GRIF), an inves­tor in defense tech, secu­rity and disas­ter manage­ment. The target volume of the new fund is 200 to 250 million euros. 

The regio­nal focus is on “NATO count­ries and allies.

“We invest in mission-criti­cal tech­no­lo­gies that protect lives, stabi­lize demo­cra­cies and secure global infra­struc­ture — from AI-powered wild­fire detec­tion and anti-drone systems to resi­li­ent supply chains and next-gene­ra­tion cyber­se­cu­rity. We focus on defense, dual-use and civi­lian tech­no­lo­gies and support pre-seed to Series A stage start­ups at the inter­sec­tion of sove­reig­nty, resi­li­ence and inno­va­tion,” the foun­ders said. 

GRIF aims to support breakth­rough inno­va­tions in the field of resi­li­ence, with a focus on: Defense, Aero­space, Criti­cal Infra­struc­ture, (Cyber) Secu­rity and Disas­ter Manage­ment. With a struc­ture focu­sed on resi­li­ence and secu­rity, we have carefully assem­bled a world-class team of part­ners. — https://grif.vc/

Consul­tant GRIF: 

- ONE Fund Manage­ment S.A.
- Hauck Aufhäu­ser Lampe Privat­bank AG
- Fidu­cen­ter S.A.
- KLEYR_GRASS
- PwC

Munich — The share­hol­ders of synvert Holding GmbH (“synvert”), inclu­ding Maxburg Betei­li­gun­gen III GmbH & Co KG (“Maxburg”), advi­sed by Maxburg Capi­tal Part­ners GmbH, have sold their shares in synvert to Hita­chi, Ltd (“Hita­chi”). Synvert will become part of Global­Lo­gic Inc, the US subsi­diary of Hita­chi and a global leader in digi­tal engi­nee­ring. Will­kie acted as legal coun­sel to the share­hol­ders of synvert.

Head­quar­te­red in Müns­ter, synvert has offices in Munich, Hamburg, Croa­tia, Spain, Portu­gal and Abu Dhabi. The company offers a compre­hen­sive range of cloud, data and AI consul­ting services. Foun­ded in 1991, the company employs around 550 experts. Synvert is a market leader that is widely reco­gni­zed and appre­cia­ted for its excel­lent tech­ni­cal exper­tise, exten­sive indus­try know­ledge and unique ability to make complex data struc­tures under­stan­da­ble and analyzable. 

The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to be comple­ted in the finan­cial year ending March 31, 2026, subject to the usual regu­la­tory approvals.

Advi­sor to the synvert share­hol­ders: Will­kie Farr & Gallag­her LLP

The Will­kie team was led by part­ner Dr. Axel Wahl (photo, Corporate/M&A, Munich) and compri­sed part­ner Dr. Bettina Bokeloh (Tax, Frank­furt), coun­sel Sebas­tian Bren­ner (Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt) and Aurel Hille (Anti­trust, Washing­ton) and asso­cia­tes Nils Bock (Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt), Nils Hörnig and Fabiola C. Haas (both Corporate/M&A, Munich) and Dr. Laurin Havlik (Anti­trust, Munich)

Will­kie Farr & Gallag­her LLP provi­des leading legal solu­ti­ons to complex, busi­ness-criti­cal issues affec­ting diverse markets and indus­tries. Our appro­xi­m­ately 1,300 lawy­ers in 16 offices world­wide provide inno­va­tive, prag­ma­tic and sophisti­ca­ted legal services in more than 45 prac­tice areas. — www.willkie.com

Advi­sor to Global­Lo­gic (on the acqui­si­tion of synvert), a US subsi­diary of the Japa­nese Hita­chi Group: Gleiss Lutz 

The follo­wing Gleiss Lutz team led by Dr. Ralf
Mors­häu­ser and Dr. Rainer Loges (both part­ners, M&A, Munich) advised
Hita­chi Group and GlobalLogic:

Franz-Ferdi­nand Guggen­mos, Ansgar Johan­nes Grosch (both Munich), Dr. Phil­ipp Pord­zik (Frank­furt, all M&A), Dr. Jacob von Andreae (Part­ner), Aylin Hoffs (Coun­sel, both Public Law, Düssel­dorf), Dr. Matthias Werner (Part­ner), Dr. Jose­fine Börner, Magda­lena Rauch (all IP/Tech, Munich), Dr. Moritz Holm-Hadulla (Part­ner), Dr. Iris Bene­dikt-Bucken­leib (Coun­sel), Dr. Anto­nia Hage­dorn, Dr. Matthias Reiner (all Anti­trust, Munich), Dr. Marcus Reischl (Part­ner), Tabea Leidin­ger (both Compli­ance & Inves­ti­ga­ti­ons, Frank­furt), Dr. Ocka Stumm (Part­ner, Frank­furt), Dr. Hendrik Marchal (Coun­sel, Hamburg), Julian Kette­mer (Frank­furt, all Tax Law), Dr. Johan­nes Niewerth (Part­ner, Hamburg/London), Lesley A. Milde (Hamburg, both Real Estate Law), Thomas Kulzer (Coun­sel), Dr. Jan-Alex­an­der Lange (Coun­sel), Dr. Niklas Kaiser (all Banking & Finance, Frank­furt), Dr. Tobias Johan­nes Abend (Coun­sel), Lea Kuhr (both Employ­ment Law, Frank­furt), Dr. Manuel Klar (Coun­sel, Data Protec­tion, Munich).

— www.gleisslutz.com

Gleiss Lutz has worked as lead coun­sel with the follo­wing law firms: 

Pérez-Llorca (Spain and Portu­gal), Walder Wyss (Switz­er­land), Hadef & Part­ners (UAE), Honig­man (USA), Brodies (UK) and Schoen­herr (Croa­tia).

London — Supplier takes over buyer! Equis­tone Part­ners Europe has sold GALA Group to its long-stan­ding supplier TREND GLASS SP.z o.o. (Trend Group). Funds mana­ged by CVI, a leading provi­der of private debt finan­cing in Central Europe, and the Polish Deve­lo­p­ment Fund (PFR) finan­ced the tran­sac­tion. Trend Group recei­ved legal and tax advice from a cross-loca­tion HEUKING team. 

The Trend Group is a Polish manu­fac­tu­rer of house­hold, deco­ra­tive and gastro­nomy glass­ware based in Radom. The company was foun­ded in 1989 and has grown from a family busi­ness to an inter­na­tio­nally active supplier with a high produc­tion capa­city. Trend Glass combi­nes tradi­tio­nal glass proces­sing with modern tech­no­logy and offers a wide range of products, inclu­ding vases, candle holders and custo­mi­zed glass projects. Its custo­mers include global retail­ers, inclu­ding IKEA. 

The GALA Group, head­quar­te­red in Ansbach, is one of the leading manu­fac­tu­r­ers of cand­les, home fragran­ces and home access­ories in Europe and employs around 4,000 people world­wide. The company was foun­ded in 1972 and has been majo­rity-owned by Equis­tone Part­ners Europe since 2016. GALA produ­ces at seve­ral inter­na­tio­nal loca­ti­ons and supplies retail­ers, drugs­to­res and online plat­forms with its own brands and bran­ded products. 

Equis­tone Part­ners Europe is a Euro­pean private equity firm head­quar­te­red in London with offices in Germany, France, the Nether­lands and Switz­er­land. The company was formed in 2011 through a manage­ment buy-out from Barclays Private Equity and prefers to invest in medium-sized compa­nies with an enter­prise value of between 50 and 500 million euros. Equis­tone focu­ses on majo­rity share­hol­dings in the context of owner­ship chan­ges and supports its port­fo­lio compa­nies in their growth and stra­te­gic deve­lo­p­ment. Since 2002, over 10 billion euros have been inves­ted in more than 180 transactions. 

Consul­tant Trend Group: HEUKING
Dr. Hermann Ali Hinde­rer, LL.M. (Univer­sity of San Diego; photo © Heuking),
Bene­dikt Raisch (both lead, both corpo­rate law / M&A),
Dr. Frank Baßler (real estate & cons­truc­tion), all Stuttgart,
Fabian G. Gaffron (tax law), Hamburg,
Dr. Stefan Jöster, LL.M. (Insu­rance Law / Reinsu­rance Law), Colo­gne,David Loszyn­ski, (Restruc­tu­ring & Insol­vency Law),Sandra Pfis­ter, LL.M. (Univer­sity of Sydney), (Banking & Finance), both Hamburg,Dr. Sascha Sche­wiola (Employ­ment Law), Colo­gne,Dr. Frede­rik Wiemer (Anti­trust Law),Simon Pommer, LL.M. (Tax Law), both Hamburg,Char­lotte Schmitt, LL.M. (Corpo­rate Law/M&A),Ramona Bauer-Schöll­kopf, LL.M. (Queen Mary Univer­sity of London), (Corpo­rate Law/M&A), both Stuttgart,
Beli­ar­dis Ehlert-Gasde (Banking & Finance),
Oliver Kamme­rer (Tax Law), both Hamburg,
Dr. Ramona Segler, LL.M. (Labor Law), Cologne

Polish consul­tants Trend Group

(lead) Wolf Theiss, Bartosz Kuras, Domi­nika Getka

London (UK) — Hamil­ton Lane laun­ches global ever­green fund for venture capi­tal and growth. The fund provi­des access to inno­va­tive private venture and growth invest­ments. Private markets invest­ment mana­ger Hamil­ton Lane (Nasdaq: HLNE) has laun­ched the Hamil­ton Lane Global Venture Capi­tal and Growth Fund (“HLGVG” or “the Fund”) — an ever­green invest­ment vehicle focu­sed on growth and venture oppor­tu­ni­ties in private markets. 

The Fund is open to certain retail inves­tors and their advi­sers and insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors in parts of Europe, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East as well as Austra­lia, New Zealand and Canada that are not available in public markets.

HLGVG provi­des inves­tors with access to Hamil­ton Lane’s global venture capi­tal invest­ment plat­form, which aims to deli­ver strong perfor­mance by inves­t­ing in disrup­tive tech­no­lo­gies and inno­va­tive compa­nies. The fund lever­a­ges Hamil­ton Lane’s exten­sive exper­tise in private markets co-invest­ments and secon­dary market tran­sac­tions to unlock attrac­tive deal flows. As an ever­green vehicle, the port­fo­lio is diver­si­fied across vinta­ges, tran­sac­tion types, mana­gers, stra­te­gies and geographies. 

With a focus on inno­va­tion, diver­si­fi­ca­tion and assets other­wise only available to insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors, the fund aims to over­come common barriers to entry in this dyna­mic segment. It follows the launch of the Hamil­ton Lane Venture-Ever­green fund in the US earlier this year. The fund lever­a­ges Hamil­ton Lane’s proprie­tary data, tech­no­logy and AI to support decis­ion-making and opera­tio­nal excel­lence. Hamil­ton Lane’s track record in the digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion of the indus­try — now bund­led into the HL Inno­va­tions initia­tive — includes stra­te­gic capi­tal invest­ments in trans­for­ma­tive invest­ment tech­no­lo­gies and the deve­lo­p­ment of the proprie­tary Cobalt platform. 

Matthew Pellini, Co-Head of Venture Capi­tal and Growth Equity at Hamil­ton Lane, comm­ents: “As compa­nies are incre­asingly stay­ing in private hands for longer, many of the most attrac­tive invest­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties today are found exclu­si­vely in the private markets — a signi­fi­cant part of which is the venture and growth sector. HLGV­G’s port­fo­lio lever­a­ges disrup­tive inno­va­tion in estab­lished and emer­ging market segments to better posi­tion and respond more quickly to new tech­no­lo­gi­cal deve­lo­p­ments, such as Arti­fi­cial Intel­li­gence, which is curr­ently driving a wave of growth in tech­no­logy companies.”

Ralph Aerni, Member of the Manage­ment Board of Hamil­ton Lane Germany and Head of Client Solu­ti­ons EMEA, adds: “Since the launch of our first ever­green fund in 2019, we have conti­nuously expan­ded the global invest­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties for our inves­tors. We are convin­ced that these struc­tures play an incre­asingly important role in the port­fo­lios of many discer­ning inves­tors. With the launch of HLGVG, one of the few venture-orien­ted ever­green products world­wide, we are enab­ling our clients to parti­ci­pate in the most diffi­cult-to-access part of the private markets.”

Hamil­ton Lane has been active in venture capi­tal and growth equity for almost three deca­des. In this segment, the firm has $117.8 billion in assets under manage­ment and super­vi­si­on², has 260 estab­lished part­ner­ships and has made more than 370 invest­ments. HLGVG lever­a­ges Hamil­ton Lane’s exten­sive expe­ri­ence to provide access to attrac­tive venture capi­tal and growth equity market opportunities. 

HLGVG is the latest addi­tion to Hamil­ton Lane’s USD 13 billion-plus Ever­green Plat­form (as of 31.07.2025)

About Hamil­ton Lane

Hamil­ton Lane (NASDAQ: HLNE) is one of the worl­d’s largest private markets invest­ment mana­gers, provi­ding inno­va­tive solu­ti­ons to insti­tu­tio­nal and private wealth inves­tors around the world. The firm, which has specia­li­zed exclu­si­vely in private market invest­ments for more than 30 years, curr­ently employs appro­xi­m­ately 750 profes­sio­nals in offices across North America, Europe, Asia Paci­fic and the Middle East. Hamil­ton Lane has $986 billion in assets under manage­ment and super­vi­sion, compri­sed of nearly $141 billion in discre­tio­nary assets and more than $845 billion in non-discre­tio­nary assets as of June 30, 2025. Hamil­ton Lane specia­li­zes in deve­lo­ping flexi­ble and custo­mi­zed invest­ment programs that offer profes­sio­nal clients around the world diffe­ren­tia­ted access to the full spec­trum of private market stra­te­gies, sectors and geographies.

Oppen­hoff advi­sed VHV Holding SE on the sale of its majo­rity stake in the Eucon Group to Info­pro Digi­tal Holding GmbH, in parti­cu­lar on the upstream carve-out of the insu­rance-rela­ted digi­tal service provi­der Eucon Digi­tal GmbH. The carve-out served to prepare the sale of the Eucon Group’s auto­mo­tive busi­ness as part of an inter­na­tio­nal bidding process. 

As part of the sales process, Oppen­hoff also advi­sed VHV on the conclu­sion of various contracts between the insu­rance and real estate divi­sion remai­ning in the VHV Group and the sold auto­mo­tive divi­sion of the Eucon Group.

Advi­sor VHV Holding SE: Oppenhoff

The Oppen­hoff team led by Anna von Girse­wald (photo: Oppen­hoff) compri­sed Thomas Wismann (both M&A/corporate and insu­rance super­vi­sory law), Dr. Maike Mestmä­cker, Dr. Matthias Klefisch and Jan Kamin­ski (all M&A/corporate), Marc Krischer and Martin Bran­den­bur­ger-Nonnast (both tax), Dr. Marc Hilber, Marco Deggin­ger, Chris­tian Saßen­bach and Valen­tino Halim (all IT/Commercial), Anja Dombrow­sky and Lisa Strieg­ler (both Employ­ment), Dr. Fee Mäder (IP), Marvin Roch­ner and Julia Höyng (both Real Estate).

Other parties invol­ved were:
— VHV’s legal depart­ment (in-house) — Dr. Siddha­rta Schwen­zer (Head of Group Law and Compli­ance), and Jessica Posenauer
— Latham Watkins — advi­sor to VHV on the sale process

About Oppen­hoff
The full-service law firm Oppen­hoff finds indus­try-speci­fic solu­ti­ons for corpo­rate groups, large owner-mana­ged compa­nies and finan­cial inves­tors. More than 100 attor­neys advise on all major areas of busi­ness and tax law.

Berlin — paxi­pal raises USD 6.7 million in Series A funding. HV Capi­tal, Nebu­lar, Anam­cara, HPI Ventures and Angel Invest parti­ci­pa­ted in the finan­cing round. praxi­pal deve­lops Luna, an AI-supported recep­tio­nist that revo­lu­tio­ni­zes the way medi­cal prac­ti­ces work. 

By taking over pati­ent commu­ni­ca­tion by phone, SMS, Whats­App and email, Luna reli­e­ves the burden on staff and signi­fi­cantly impro­ves the pati­ent expe­ri­ence in an area that urgen­tly needs solutions.

The fresh capi­tal will be used for the further deve­lo­p­ment of AI as well as for the expan­sion of the team and the expan­sion in Germany and Austria.

Advi­sor paxi­pal: Law firm V14

Samuel Aebi, Part­ner at V14
Sinje Clausen

The law firm:

V14 is a Berlin-based law firm specia­li­zing in growth capi­tal, tech­no­logy and media.

Frank­furt a. M. — The Stutt­gart-based invest­ment company Süd Betei­li­gun­gen GmbH (SüdBG) has sold its shares in KKL Holding GmbH (KKL), Düssel­dorf, to bluu unit GmbH, a port­fo­lio company of Triton Part­ners. The tran­sac­tion also includes the shares of the foun­der Andreas Kohmann and the manage­ment invol­ved. The tran­sac­tion is still subject to anti­trust appr­oval. McDer­mott Will & Schulte advi­sed SüdBG on this transaction. 

Foun­ded in 1987, KKL is conside­red one of the most promi­nent specia­lists in the field of refri­ge­ra­tion, air condi­tio­ning and venti­la­tion tech­no­logy and data center solu­ti­ons in Germany. SüdBG inves­ted in the company in 2018 as part of a manage­ment buy-out and has since supported the manage­ment in imple­men­ting the growth stra­tegy toge­ther with the foun­der and advi­sory board. KKL curr­ently employs around 300 people and gene­ra­tes sales of over 80 million euros. 

bluu unit, head­quar­te­red in Ludwigs­burg, is an alli­ance of regio­nally strong, inde­pen­dent compa­nies with a focus on sustainable refri­ge­ra­tion and air condi­tio­ning technology.

SüdBG, a wholly owned subsi­diary of Landes­bank Baden-Würt­tem­berg (LBBW), is one of the leading invest­ment compa­nies in the German-spea­king region and a long-term inves­tor. Over the past ten years, SüdBG has supported the sustainable deve­lo­p­ment of more than 70 compa­nies with around EUR 600 million and a broad network. 

McDer­mott advi­sed SüdBG under the lead manage­ment of part­ners Dr. Chris­tian Marz­lin and Dr. Bene­dikt von Schor­le­mer. The team included part­ners Rolf Hüner­mann and Dr. Heiko Kermer, coun­sel Holger Mlynek, Dr. Simon Grone­berg, Marcus Fischer and Dr. Laura Stamm­witz as well as asso­cia­tes Jenni­fer Rogal­ski, Jan Ischreyt, Constanze Götz, Carina Schüt­ze­berg and Sönke Wassermann.

Lausanne / London (IT BOLTWISE) — Swiss AI startup Giotto.ai is plan­ning a signi­fi­cant funding round to advance its rese­arch in the field of Arti­fi­cial Gene­ral Intel­li­gence (AGI). With a target valua­tion of over USD 1 billion and a plan­ned invest­ment of more than USD 200 million, the company is posi­tio­ning itself as a serious player in the Euro­pean AI landscape. 

Invest­ment bank Lazard has been appoin­ted to lead the capi­tal raise to acce­le­rate Giot­to’s AI rese­arch, deve­lop commer­cial proto­ty­pes for corpo­rate and govern­ment clients and contri­bute to the AI commu­nity through open source releases.

Giotto.ai was foun­ded in 2017 by CEO Aldo Podesta, who previously worked in sales stra­tegy at Philip Morris. The company has raised around 19 million US dollars to date. Giotto origi­nally deve­lo­ped a compli­ance tool for medi­cal devices, which was sold to the medi­cal tech­no­logy company RQM+ in 2022, before focu­sing enti­rely on basic rese­arch in reaso­ning models. 

The company stands out with measura­ble progress on AI reaso­ning model chal­lenges and curr­ently leads the Kaggle ARC-AGI‑2 cons­trai­ned ranking with a score of 25%. This bench­mark tests a model’s ability to infer rules from limi­ted examp­les and shows early signs of gene­ral reaso­ning capa­bi­li­ties. Giot­to’s approach empha­si­zes effi­ci­ency and intel­li­gent resource allo­ca­tion and performs well under strict compu­ta­tio­nal cons­traints such as no inter­net access, limi­ted runtime and a fixed hard­ware budget. 

In contrast to large US AI labs such as OpenAI and xAI, which are known for trai­ning massive models on vast compu­ta­tio­nal resour­ces, Giotto focu­ses on deve­lo­ping AI systems that operate under fixed resource cons­traints, with the goal of cost-effec­tive and gene­ra­lizable AI research.

The upco­ming funding is inten­ded to acce­le­rate the deve­lo­p­ment of Giot­to’s commer­cial appli­ca­ti­ons while support­ing the company’s contri­bu­ti­ons to the broa­der AI rese­arch commu­nity through open source publi­ca­ti­ons. By combi­ning deep rese­arch exper­tise, effi­ci­ent tech­no­logy and stra­te­gic commer­cia­liza­tion plans, Giotto.ai is posi­tio­ning itself as a serious conten­der in the ambi­tious Euro­pean AI landscape. 

—https://www.giotto.ai/

In a market where the intro­duc­tion of AI is progres­sing rapidly, the Israeli startup Irre­gu­lar has now closed a finan­cing round of 80 million US dollars. The inves­tors include Sequoia Capi­tal, Redpoint Ventures, Swish Ventures, Assaf Rappa­port and Ofir Ehrlich. The company, foun­ded by Dan Lahav and Omer Nevo, specia­li­zes in stress test­ing advan­ced AI models under real-world condi­ti­ons, working with leading AI labs such as OpenAI and Anthropic. 

Irre­gu­lar was foun­ded in 2023 by Dan Lahav and Omer Nevo. Lahav, who previously worked at LabPi­xies, a startup acqui­red by Google, and later worked as an AI rese­ar­cher at IBM, brings exten­sive expe­ri­ence in AI rese­arch. Nevo is a serial entre­pre­neur with a back­ground in cyber­se­cu­rity. Toge­ther, they have built a company that focu­ses on evalua­ting and secu­ring advan­ced AI models. The new funding will be used to expand rese­arch and deve­lo­p­ment, expand the team, inten­sify colla­bo­ra­tion with leading AI labs 

Busi­ness model

Irre­gu­lar’s busi­ness model is based on conduc­ting stress tests for AI systems under real threat scena­rios. This includes tests that focus on how AI models react to attempts to circum­vent anti­vi­rus soft­ware or carry out auto­no­mous offen­sive operations. 

The aim is to iden­tify poten­tial vulnerabi­li­ties and deve­lop solu­ti­ons to ensure the secure imple­men­ta­tion of these systems on a large scale.

The foun­ders explain: “It’s about prac­ti­cal tools that stop thre­ats where­ver AI is deve­lo­ped or used.”

The start-up’s tech­no­logy has alre­ady attrac­ted the atten­tion of leading AI labs: OpenAI uses Irre­gu­lar’s ratings in system maps for GPT‑3, GPT‑4 mini and GPT‑5. Irre­gu­lar has also co-autho­red a white paper with Anthro­pic on confi­den­tial infe­rence systems, while rese­ar­chers at Google Deep­Mind have cited the company’s plat­form in studies on AI cyber­at­tack capabilities.

The funding reflects a broa­der realiza­tion across the tech­no­logy land­scape that the success of AI depends not only on buil­ding ever more powerful models, but also on protec­ting them from misuse, acci­dents and new threat vectors. As compa­nies and govern­ments acce­le­rate adop­tion, the demand for proac­tive AI secu­rity has increased. With its strong inves­tor support and early trac­tion, Irre­gu­lar is posi­tio­ning itself as a funda­men­tal player in this emer­ging layer of AI infrastructure. 

Aachen/Dormagen — The battery recy­cling company cylib has secu­red 26.1 million euros in funding from the Euro­pean Union’s ERDF/JTF NRW program to build one of the largest lithium-ion battery recy­cling plants in Europe at CHEMPARK Dormagen.

“We are deeply grateful to the state of North Rhine-West­pha­lia and the Euro­pean Union for funding this project and support­ing our mission to produce high-quality mate­ri­als for sustainable batte­ries and resi­li­ent Euro­pean value chains,” says Dr. Lilian Schwich, co-foun­der and co-CEO. “This under­lines both our tech­no­lo­gi­cal exper­tise and the successful work of our team.”

The funding, which is part of the “Produktives.NRW” program, follows an initial commit­ment in Novem­ber 2024 and will speci­fi­cally finance the first expan­sion stage of the indus­trial plant. The plant will process black mass (an inter­me­diate product from shred­ded battery mate­ri­als) to extract criti­cal raw mate­ri­als such as lithium, graphite, cobalt, nickel and manganese from lithium-ion batte­ries, ther­eby streng­thening Euro­pe’s geopo­li­ti­cal inde­pen­dence in these stra­te­gic materials. 

Tech­no­logy deli­vers supe­rior recy­cling rates

The OLiC (Opti­mi­zed Lithium & Graphite Reco­very) process reco­vers more than 90 percent of criti­cal mate­ri­als from used batte­ries and produ­ces 80 percent less CO₂ emis­si­ons than primary raw mate­rial extra­c­tion. cylib is now setting up its water-based tech­no­logy, which has proven itself in pilot opera­tion, as an indus­trial plant. In the final expan­sion stage, the plant, which is sche­du­led to go into opera­tion in 2027, will process up to 140,000 elec­tric vehicle batte­ries per year (equi­va­lent to 60,000 tons of used batte­ries or 20,000 tons of black mass). 

With the rapid growth of e‑mobility — every fourth new vehicle sold world­wide is alre­ady elec­tric — Euro­pe’s demand for battery mate­ri­als is also growing rapidly. The plant shows how modern recy­cling tech­no­logy is making Europe inde­pen­dent of raw mate­rial imports and at the same time streng­thening secu­rity of supply. 

About cylib
cylib is a holi­stic and sustainable battery recy­cling scale-up foun­ded in Aachen in 2022 by Dr. Lilian Schwich, Paul Sabarny and Dr. Gideon Schwich. With over 120 employees, the company grew out of rese­arch at RWTH Aachen Univer­sity and produ­ces high-quality mate­ri­als for sustainable batte­ries and resi­li­ent Euro­pean value chains. 

The water-based OLiC process effi­ci­ently reco­vers raw mate­ri­als from battery modu­les, black mass or produc­tion scrap and achie­ves a recy­cling effi­ci­ency of more than 90 percent for lithium, graphite, nickel, cobalt and manganese with an 80 percent redu­ced carbon foot­print compared to primary raw mate­rial extra­c­tion — thus enab­ling a circu­lar economy. Backed by indus­try-rele­vant inves­tors such as Porsche Ventures and Bosch Ventures, cylib raised 55 million euros in its Series A round — the largest finan­cing round in Euro­pean battery recy­cling to date — and secu­red more than 27 million euros in addi­tio­nal funding. — https://www.cylib.de/

Munich — The energy supplier BKW AG (“BKW”) has acqui­red Südvolt GmbH (“Südvolt”), one of the last inde­pen­dent balan­cing energy service provi­ders in Germany. With this tran­sac­tion, BKW enters the German market for balan­cing energy and ancil­lary services and streng­thens its presence in one of the largest and most important flexi­bi­lity markets in Europe. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the finan­cial details. POELLATH advi­sed the sellers on the legal and tax aspects of the transaction.

Munich-based Südvolt GmbH opera­tes a certi­fied virtual power plant (VPP) and offers all three control energy products (FCR, aFRR, mFRR). As a flexi­bi­lity provi­der, it provi­des primary control energy as well as secon­dary and tertiary control power for all four German trans­mis­sion system opera­tors. The exis­ting custo­mer port­fo­lio of over 1 GW of capa­city includes major and indus­trial custo­mers from energy-inten­sive sectors as well as muni­ci­pal utili­ties. Südvolt has 20 employees and serves over 70 custo­mers with more than 200 gene­ra­tion units. 

BKW, based in Berne, is an inter­na­tio­nal energy and infra­struc­ture company. BKW employs over 12,000 people and is active in ten countries. 

POELLATH advi­sed the sellers on the legal and tax aspects of the tran­sac­tion with the follo­wing team:

Dr. Sebas­tian Rosen­tritt, LL.M. (Coun­sel, Lead, M&A/Private Equity, Munich)
Phil­ipp von Braun­schweig, LL.M. (Ford­ham) (Part­ner, Co-Lead, M&A/Private Equity, Munich)
Dr. Nico Fischer (Part­ner, Tax, Munich)
Daniel Wied­mann, LL.M. (NYU) (Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Anti­trust, Frank­furt aM)
Dr. Saskia Bardens (Asso­ciate, Tax, Munich)
Lukas Wörlein (Asso­ciate, M&A/Private Equity, Munich)

Wetzlar/Munich/Amsterdam — design­funk­tion, the specia­list for the plan­ning and realiza­tion of modern working envi­ron­ments, is ente­ring into a long-term stra­te­gic part­ner­ship with Royal Ahrend, the Euro­pean market leader for sustainable office furnis­hings. As part of the part­ner­ship, Ahrend will become a mino­rity share­hol­der in design­funk­tion. Syntra Corpo­rate Finance advi­sed design­funk­tion on the transaction. 

The part­ner­ship combi­nes design­funk­ti­on’s strengths in the design of modern living and working envi­ron­ments with Royal Ahren­d’s exper­tise in the deve­lo­p­ment of circu­lar products. The aim of the colla­bo­ra­tion is to create future-proof and inspi­ring working envi­ron­ments, to inte­grate sustaina­bi­lity more stron­gly into new office concepts and to actively shape the German market. In addi­tion to compa­nies, both compa­nies also offer their services to educa­tio­nal estab­lish­ments and public institutions. 

“With Ahrend, we have gained a part­ner who shares our values and supports us in consis­t­ently inte­gra­ting sustaina­bi­lity into the design of office and working envi­ron­ments,” explains Samir Ayoub, Mana­ging Part­ner of designfunktion.

“The colla­bo­ra­tion with design­funk­tion is an important step for us in reali­zing our vision of future-proof working envi­ron­ments in the German market,” adds Rolf Verspuij, CEO of Royal Ahrend.

“We are deligh­ted to have supported design­funk­tion in this important part­ner­ship. Ahren­d’s mino­rity stake in design­funk­tion under­lines the long-term and stra­te­gic nature of this coope­ra­tion,” says Patrick Seip (photo: Syntra), Mana­ging Part­ner at Syntra Corpo­rate Finance. The project team consis­ted of Patrick Seip (Mana­ging Part­ner) and Janick Wagner (Senior Associate). 

About Syntra Corpo­rate Finance

Syntra Corpo­rate Finance is one of the leading inde­pen­dent M&A consul­tancies for the mid-market. The focus is on support­ing complex succes­sion plan­ning as well as company acqui­si­ti­ons and sales in the (lower) mid-market sector, with volu­mes between 20 million and 150 million euros. Syntra also advi­ses medium-sized compa­nies on stra­te­gic capi­tal and finan­cing measu­res and has estab­lished itself as a relia­ble part­ner for private equity inves­tors and family offices in German-spea­king count­ries, inclu­ding the sale of share­hol­dings and the deve­lo­p­ment and imple­men­ta­tion of long-term acqui­si­tion strategies.
Syntra Corpo­rate Finance is part of the part­ner-mana­ged Syntra Group, which also includes the M&A boutique Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor, which specia­li­zes in succes­sion plan­ning for smal­ler, predo­mi­nantly owner-mana­ged compa­nies. — https://syntracf.com/

About design­funk­tion

design­funk­tion, head­quar­te­red in Munich, is a German leader in the plan­ning and realiza­tion of modern working envi­ron­ments. The company combi­nes exper­tise in inte­rior design with a clear focus on sustaina­bi­lity and inspi­ring concepts. With over 350 employees at more than 18 loca­ti­ons, design­funk­tion offers its clients compre­hen­sive consul­ting services for the furnis­hing and finan­cing of offices, home offices, apart­ments and public facilities. 

About Royal Ahrend

Foun­ded in Amster­dam in 1896, Royal Ahrend is an inter­na­tio­nal leader in the office furni­ture indus­try. The priva­tely owned company crea­tes vita­li­zing working envi­ron­ments and high-perfor­mance system furni­ture that is deli­vered directly to custo­mers worldwide. 

The company’s system furni­ture and room solu­ti­ons are desi­gned to opti­mize the working expe­ri­ence of employees — with a focus on promo­ting health, well-being and produc­ti­vity in the work­place. The products are reco­gni­zed world­wide for their outstan­ding sustaina­bi­lity and time­l­ess Dutch Design signa­ture. The company has sales offices in more than 19 count­ries in Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

Colo­gne — GIATA, a port­fo­lio company of ODEWALD KMU, acqui­res the AI company Smart­seer GmbH. GIATA was advi­sed by HEUKING on this transaction. 

GIATA is a leading travel tech­no­logy company specia­li­zing in the manage­ment and distri­bu­tion of travel offers and hotel content. With a modu­larly desi­gned product range, GIATA offers custo­mi­zed complete solu­ti­ons that ensure the highest precis­ion in the allo­ca­tion of hotel infor­ma­tion. This is achie­ved through the use of state-of-the-art AI tech­no­lo­gies, digi­tal finger­prin­ting and careful manual post-proces­sing. Its custo­mers include almost all inter­na­tio­nally renow­ned online travel agen­cies, tour opera­tors, hotel chains and global search engi­nes from over 70 count­ries. With its inno­va­tive tech­no­logy and exten­sive exper­tise, GIATA makes a signi­fi­cant contri­bu­tion to opti­mi­zing sales proces­ses in the travel industry. 

Smart­seer offers an AI-supported solu­tion for the auto­ma­ted crea­tion of booking offers speci­fi­cally for the travel indus­try. The inno­va­tive AI tool analy­ses user beha­viour, in parti­cu­lar click beha­viour, in real time and anony­mously, enab­ling the perso­na­li­zed gene­ra­tion of offers for bookers. SMART­SEER’s custo­mers include well-known provi­ders in the travel agency sector. 

Consul­tant GIATA: HEUKING

Dr. Pär Johans­son (lead, Corporate/M&A),
Dr. Verena Hoene, LL.M. (Univer­sity of Washing­ton), (IP, Media & Technology),
Dr. Sascha Sche­wiola (Employ­ment Law),
Svea Kunz (IP, Media & Technology),
Julien Krause,
Chiara Diek­mann (both Corporate/M&A),
Lena Kurth, LL.M. (Stel­len­bosch Univer­sity), (IP, Media & Tech­no­logy), all Cologne

Stuttgart/Düsseldorf — The Stutt­gart-based invest­ment company Süd Betei­li­gun­gen GmbH (SüdBG) is selling its shares in KKL Holding GmbH, Düssel­dorf (KKL). The shares of foun­der Andreas Kohmann and the manage­ment invol­ved (Ingo Hoff­mann and Patrick Peters) are also chan­ging hands. bluu unit GmbH, based in Ludwigs­burg, will become the new owner of the well-posi­tio­ned KKL team. 

Foun­ded in 1987 by Andreas Kohmann, KKL is now one of the leading service provi­ders in the field of air condi­tio­ning and refri­ge­ra­tion tech­no­logy in Germany. SüdBG joined the company in 2018 as part of a manage­ment buy-out with the two mana­ging direc­tors Ingo Hoff­mann and Patrick Peters and, toge­ther with the foun­der and advi­sory board, supported the manage­ment in the deter­mi­ned imple­men­ta­tion of the growth stra­tegy. This included expan­ding the company’s excel­lent market posi­tion as a provi­der of sophisti­ca­ted air condi­tio­ning solu­ti­ons through
, FM Service as a specia­list in the cons­truc­tion and moder­niza­tion of data centers, the estab­lish­ment of XIUS Tech­no­lo­gie, which specia­li­zes in prefa­bri­ca­ted products in refri­ge­ra­tion and air condi­tio­ning tech­no­logy, the acqui­si­tion of Douba­ras Kälte-Klima-Tech­nik GmbH, a specia­list for ultra-low tempe­ra­ture appli­ca­ti­ons in the health­care sector, and the estab­lish­ment and deve­lo­p­ment of the Stutt­gart location. 

With over 60 trai­nees, KKL is one of the largest and best trai­ning compa­nies in refri­ge­ra­tion and air condi­tio­ning mecha­tro­nics in Germany. During the part­ner­ship with SüdBG, KKL has grown consider­a­bly, now employ­ing around 300 people and gene­ra­ting a turno­ver of over 80 million euros.

“We are deligh­ted that we have been able to expand KKL’s market posi­tion in close and trus­ting coope­ra­tion with the employees, manage­ment, foun­ding share­hol­der and advi­sory board. In addi­tion to streng­thening the orga­niza­tio­nal struc­ture, rapidly imple­men­ting digi­tal proces­ses and effi­ci­ent project control­ling, we have set the course for growth and demons­tra­ted our high level of system exper­tise in the plan­ning, instal­la­tion and servicing of sophisti­ca­ted air condi­tio­ning solu­ti­ons,” explain Gunter Max (Mana­ging Direc­tor) and Daniel Heinz­mann (Invest­ment Direc­tor) of SüdBG.

Andreas Kohmann, foun­ding part­ner and advi­sory board member, adds: “Brin­ging SüdBG on board at
in 2018 was the right move. Toge­ther, we have writ­ten an impres­sive growth story. We are now handing the company over to carefully selec­ted new hands and are convin­ced that KKL will conti­nue its extra­or­di­na­rily successful deve­lo­p­ment with bluu unit at its side.” 

Ingo Hoff­mann and Patrick Peters, the two mana­ging direc­tors of KKL, who will retain their roles, are opti­mi­stic about the future: “We are very proud of what we have achie­ved toge­ther and would like to thank the previous share­hol­ders for their successful and consis­t­ently coope­ra­tive part­ner­ship. We are now looking forward to the next deve­lo­p­ment steps with the support of our new inves­tor under the umbrella of bluu unit GmbH.”

Süd Betei­li­gun­gen GmbH (SüdBG) is a wholly owned subsi­diary of Landes­bank Baden-Würt­tem­berg (LBBW) and has been support­ing medium-sized compa­nies for more than 50 years with custo­mi­zed equity and equity-rela­ted solu­ti­ons in the context of succes­sion plan­ning, growth finan­cing and share­hol­der changes.

As one of the leading invest­ment compa­nies in the German-spea­king region and a long-term inves­tor, SüdBG has supported more than 70 compa­nies with around 600 million euros and a broad network in sustainable corpo­rate deve­lo­p­ment over the past 10 years.
— www.suedbg.de.

The tran­sac­tion is still subject to anti­trust appr­ovals. The part­ners have agreed not to disc­lose any details. 

SüdBG deal team: Gunter Max, Daniel Heinz­mann, Bettina Schäfer
Advi­sors invol­ved in the tran­sac­tion by SüdBG:

M&A: Lincoln Inter­na­tio­nal AG (Juan Carlos Montoya, Fabian Walisch, Daniel Lerch, Max von Ostrow­ski, Nicole Chubarov)

Legal: McDer­mott Will & Schulte (Dr. Chris­tian Marz­lin, Dr. Bene­dikt von Schor­le­mer, Jenni­fer Rogal­ski, Jan Ischreyt)

Commer­cial: Stra­te­gia Part­ners (Marco Mäder, Philip Geiser, André Mardi)

Finan­cial & Tax: 8P/BDO (Matthias Künzel, Patrick Bilstein, Gunnar Steffens)

Quakenbrück/ Frank­furt a. M. — Gowling WLG advi­ses Axeleo Capi­tal as lead inves­tor in the €16 million Series A finan­cing round for Bioweg. Bioweg is a German biotech based in Quaken­brück that deve­lops high-perfor­mance, biode­gra­da­ble ingre­di­ents to replace inten­tio­nally added acrylic poly­mer-based microplastics. 

The company has closed a €16 million Series A finan­cing round. The round was led by Axeleo Capi­tal Green (from its indus­try fund), toge­ther with EIC Fund, NBank Capi­tal, BonVen­ture and seed inves­tor Dr.-Ing.

The capi­tal will support the cons­truc­tion of Biowe­g’s first bacte­rial cellu­lose plant in Germany and acce­le­rate market entry across Europe. The latest funding round, which brings the total amount raised by the company to date to €32.5 million, will enable the move from pilot to indus­trial produc­tion, inclu­ding the cons­truc­tion of an indus­trial bacte­rial cellu­lose plant in Germany desi­gned to meet the growing demand from indus­trial custo­mers for sustainable, micro­pla­s­tic-free ingredients. 

Gowling WLG ‘s German corpo­rate and IP team advi­sed Axeleo Capi­tal on its invest­ment in Bioweg, a German biotech­no­logy company. The team was led by Dr. Michael Lamsa, Part­ner and Co-Head of M&A, Private Equity and Venture Capi­tal in Germany, and supported by Coun­sel Micha Gers­dorf and Asso­ciate Phil­ipp Esmek (both Corporate/M&A; Frank­furt) as well as Part­ner Miray Kavruk and Asso­ciate Ales­san­dra Birken­dorf (both IP/IT; Frankfurt). 

Axeleo Capi­tal is a multi-stra­tegy tech invest­ment manage­ment firm support­ing Euro­pe’s next leaders in digi­tal and green trans­for­ma­tion, provi­ding seed to Series B invest­ments combi­ned with stra­te­gic, hands-on support to bold backers in key industries.

Dr. Michael Lamsa said: “We are deligh­ted to have legally supported Axeleo Capi­tal as lead inves­tor in this land­mark finan­cing round for Bioweg. Bioweg exem­pli­fies the next gene­ra­tion of sustainable mate­rial inno­va­tion. The invest­ment under­lines not only the confi­dence in the foun­ding team, but also the strong inter­na­tio­nal inte­rest in scalable solu­ti­ons in the field of sustainable mate­ri­als. The market for real alter­na­ti­ves to micro­pla­s­tics is ready and the company is extre­mely well posi­tio­ned to make a real impact with its tech­no­logy, both econo­mic­ally and environmentally.”

Marc Lech­antre, Part­ner at Axeleo Capi­tal, commen­ted: “We are grateful for the strong support of Michael and the team at Gowling WLG, which was criti­cal to this transaction.”

Gowling WLG’s corpo­rate team provi­des excel­lent legal advice through a part­ner-led service of corpo­rate lawy­ers whose clients range from leading global finan­cial insti­tu­ti­ons and listed compa­nies to private compa­nies and entre­pre­neurs. The 200-strong team has exten­sive expe­ri­ence in all areas of corpo­rate advice, inclu­ding AIM and main market equity capi­tal markets, invest­ment funds, private equity and public and private mergers and acqui­si­ti­ons. —https://gowlingwlg.com/

About Axeleo Capital 

Axeleo Capi­tal is a multi-stra­tegy tech­no­logy inves­tor back­ing Euro­pe’s next leaders in digi­tal and green trans­for­ma­tion. Alexeo provi­des seed to series B invest­ments combi­ned with stra­te­gic, hands-on support for foun­ders in key indus­tries. With €300 million in assets under manage­ment, 4 successful funds raised and 18 employees, we have made over 70 invest­ments across the EU in recent years and achie­ved 13 successful exits. 

About Gowling WLG

Gowling WLG is an inter­na­tio­nal law firm with more than 1,500 lawy­ers in 20 offices world­wide. We advise clients of all sizes in Germany and abroad across all sectors and prac­ti­ces. We see the world through our clients’ eyes.
Gowling WLG (UK) LLP is a member of Gowling WLG, an inter­na­tio­nal law firm consis­ting of inde­pen­dent and auto­no­mous enti­ties provi­ding services world­wide. — — www.gowlingwlg.com.

Munich — The Euro­pean Circu­lar Bioe­co­nomy Fund (ECBF) is leading the Series A finan­cing round of nine million euros for Vegdog. The ECBF is a private venture capi­tal fund dedi­ca­ted exclu­si­vely to the bioe­co­nomy and circu­lar economy. It invests in visio­nary Euro­pean entre­pre­neurs who are driving the tran­si­tion from a fossil-based to a bio-based economy. 

Vegdog was foun­ded in 2015 by Tessa Zaune-Figlar and Vale­rie Hens­sen and offers the first vegan, gluten-free and 100% complete dog food deve­lo­ped in colla­bo­ra­tion with specia­li­zed veterinarians.

The ECBF is inves­t­ing in Vegdog because of the company’s enorm­ous poten­tial to revo­lu­tio­nize the dog food market with sustainable and healthy solu­ti­ons. Vegdog is plan­ning growth rates of up to 80 percent in the coming years. The Vegdog team is set to double in size in 2025 in order to realize the plan­ned expan­sion into the entire DACH region as well as the Nether­lands and other Euro­pean count­ries in 2026. 

A signi­fi­cant part of the invest­ment comes from the ECBF toge­ther with the exis­ting inves­tor Green Gene­ra­tion Fund (GGF). Further capi­tal comes from the busi­ness angels Domi­ni­que Locher, Attollo S.A. and Andrea Sker­sies (The Nutri­ment Company, form­erly Zooplus). The invest­ment plat­form Select Alter­na­tive Invest­ments and the exis­ting share­hol­der SFO are also invol­ved in the finan­cing round. 

Mridul Pareek, Invest­ment Asso­ciate at ECBF, says: “Driven by an outstan­ding leader­ship team and a compel­ling mission, VEGDOG has quickly become a pioneer in plant-based dog food. We are exci­ted to support their Series A round and guide them on their jour­ney to create sustainable and posi­tive change in the indus­try. Bird & Bird was instru­men­tal in guiding us through the comple­xi­ties of this invest­ment and ensu­ring a smooth and successful closing for all parties involved.”

About ECBF

The Euro­pean Circu­lar Bioe­co­nomy Fund (ECBF) is the first venture capi­tal fund in Europe[1] dedi­ca­ted exclu­si­vely to the bioe­co­nomy and circu­lar economy. The ECBF was foun­ded in 2019 and focu­ses on Euro­pean and asso­cia­ted count­ries. Origi­nally plan­ned with a total volume of 250 million euros, the fund over­sub­scri­bed with a total volume of 300 million euros. As a later-stage inves­tor, the ECBF invests in growth compa­nies. As a rule, the ECBF invests between two million euros and 20 million euros in port­fo­lio compa­nies. — https://www.ecbf.vc

Advi­sor Euro­pean Circu­lar Bioe­co­nomy Fund: Bird & Bird
Coun­sel Andrea Schlote (Corpo­rate, Munich).

As a leading inter­na­tio­nal law firm, Bird & Bird is the part­ner for ever­yone who wants to defend and streng­then their super­powers. Thanks to our orig­ins in IP law, we under­stand the core of every company, the requi­re­ments of the market and compe­ti­tion and how to achieve sustainable success. We call it sector focus. And with this DNA, we are now your law firm for all legal issues rela­ting to tech­no­logy, digi­ta­liza­tion and regu­la­tion. With over 1,600 lawy­ers in 33 offices in 23 count­ries, we are repre­sen­ted in Europe, North America, the Middle East, Asia-Paci­fic and Africa and main­tain close rela­ti­onships with law firms in other parts of the world. In Germany, we are repre­sen­ted by more than 280 lawy­ers in Düssel­dorf, Frank­furt, Hamburg and Munich. — www.twobirds.com.

Berlin/ Munich, Septem­ber 15, 2025 — Tangany secu­res €10 million in Series A, grows to €3 billion in assets under cust­ody at >and shar­pens its regu­la­tory edge: BaFin-licen­sed, MiCA-ready and expan­ding with strong bank inves­tors. The round was led by Baader Bank, Eleva­tor Ventures and Heliad Crypto Part­ners, with further support from exis­ting inves­tors HTGF and Nauta Capi­tal. YPOG advi­sed Eleva­tor Ventures, the venture capi­tal arm of Raiff­ei­sen Bank Inter­na­tio­nal, on Tanga­ny’s Series A finan­cing round. 

Tangany will use the new funds to acce­le­rate its expan­sion in Europe under the MiCAR regu­la­tory frame­work and further deve­lop its insti­tu­tio­nal cust­ody infrastructure.

Tangany curr­ently has over EUR 3 billion worth of digi­tal assets under cust­ody and mana­ges more than 700,000 accounts for over 60 insti­tu­tio­nal clients, inclu­ding Flatex­DE­GIRO, eToro and Bitvavo. The white-label cust­ody plat­form enables banks, fintechs and asset mana­gers to seam­lessly inte­grate secure, block­chain-based asset manage­ment via a scalable API. 

By offe­ring cust­ody solu­ti­ons for crypto assets, toke­ni­zed secu­ri­ties and NFTs, Tangany is posi­tio­ning itself as one of the first fully MiCAR-licen­sed digi­tal asset custo­di­ans in Europe, support­ing the finan­cial indus­try’s tran­si­tion to a regu­la­ted, block­chain finan­cial economy.

About Eleva­tor Ventures

Eleva­tor Ventures is the venture capi­tal fund backed by Raiff­ei­sen Bank Inter­na­tio­nal, Raiff­ei­sen-Holding Nieder­ös­ter­reich-Wien and Raiff­ei­sen-Landes­bank Stei­er­mark, mana­ging funds of over EUR 100 million to support the growth of tech­no­logy compa­nies in the fintech and beyond banking sectors. The team invests in Series A and Series B growth rounds in the DACH region and CEE, lever­aging the deep exper­tise and know­ledge of its corpo­rate inves­tors to provide targe­ted support to port­fo­lio compa­nies. To date, Eleva­tor Ventures has inves­ted over EUR 50 million — in 20 compa­nies, resul­ting in five exits — as well as in two other funds. 

Advi­sor Eleva­tor Ventures: YPOG

Dr. Carola Rathke (Photo/ Co-Lead, Fintech + DLT), Part­ner, Hamburg
Anika Patz (Co-Lead, Fintech + DLT), Part­ner, Berlin
Dr. Benja­min Ullrich (Co-Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Berlin
Stefan Rich­ter (Fintech + DLT), Part­ner, Hamburg
Tobias Lovett (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Berlin
Lukas Schmidt (Tax), Tax Specia­list, Cologne
There­sia Hein­rich (Corpo­rate), Senior Asso­ciate, Hamburg
Felix Pinke­pank (Fintech + DLT), Senior Asso­ciate, Cologne
Dr. Chris­toph Cordes (IP/IT/Data Protec­tion), Asso­ciate, Berlin
Martin Acker (Tax), Asso­ciate, Hamburg
Silke Ricken (Corpo­rate), Asso­ciate, Berlin
Dr. Mirko Grun­ert (Fintech + DLT), Asso­ciate, Hamburg
Thomas Tüll­mann (Fintech + DLT), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Hamburg
Dr. David John (Fintech +DLT), Senior Asso­ciate, Hamburg

Los Ange­les — Defense tech­no­lo­gies are all the rage. — Los Ange­les-based Diver­gent Tech­no­lo­gies has secu­red $290 million in new finan­cing at a valua­tion of $2.3 billion. The finan­cing round, led by Roche­fort Asset Manage­ment, includes $250 million in equity and $40 million in debt. 

The company plans to invest the proceeds in the cons­truc­tion of new produc­tion faci­li­ties to meet growing demand from aero­space and defense customers.
The timing of this capi­tal raise reflects a signi­fi­cant shift in the industry.

Supply chain disrup­ti­ons have rocked the aero­space and defense indus­try in recent years, slowing the intro­duc­tion of aircraft compon­ents and defense systems just at a time when demand is incre­asing. Addi­tive manu­fac­tu­ring offers a stra­te­gic response to this, enab­ling manu­fac­tu­r­ers to design and produce complex parts faster, with less waste and less reli­ance on tradi­tio­nal tooling. 

End-to-end digi­tal manufacturing

Foun­ded in 2014 by Kevin Czin­ger and Lukas Czin­ger, Diver­gent is the deve­lo­per of the Diver­gent Adap­tive Produc­tion System (DAPS™), the worl­d’s first end-to-end digi­tal manu­fac­tu­ring plat­form that enables rapid design, addi­tive manu­fac­tu­ring and auto­ma­ted assembly.

The company aims to rede­fine the way complex struc­tures are desi­gned and built. Diver­gent deve­lops hard­ware that enables custo­mers to 3D print and assem­ble parts with unpre­ce­den­ted efficiency. 

Its custo­mers include indus­try giants such as Gene­ral Atomics, Lock­heed Martin and Raytheon — compa­nies that are incre­asingly rely­ing on advan­ced manu­fac­tu­ring tech­ni­ques to circum­vent bott­len­ecks and speed up production.

Precis­ion in the defense and aero­space industry 

Diver­gen­t’s approach is more than just an incre­men­tal impro­ve­ment; it marks a funda­men­tal depar­ture from tradi­tio­nal manu­fac­tu­ring proces­ses. By digi­tally manu­fac­tu­ring parts layer by layer, the company enables rapid proto­type deve­lo­p­ment and produc­tion flexi­bi­lity. This is attrac­tive to inves­tors as both govern­ments and contrac­tors look to streng­then dome­stic manu­fac­tu­ring capa­bi­li­ties and reduce reli­ance on fragile supply chains. 

The deal also high­lights a larger trend in how modern indus­tries are rede­sig­ning their produc­tion lines. Aero­space compa­nies are leading the way because they can reduce costs while main­tai­ning precis­ion engineering. 

Earlier this year , Pratt & Whit­ney, an RTX company, announ­ced an addi­tive manu­fac­tu­ring process for repai­ring its geared turbo­fan engi­nes that redu­ced lead times by over 60%. Such breakth­roughs unders­core the importance of 3D prin­ting not only for proto­type deve­lo­p­ment, but also for real-world appli­ca­ti­ons that improve effi­ci­ency and reliability. 

For Diver­gent, the oppor­tu­nity lies in trans­fer­ring these capa­bi­li­ties beyond pilot projects to large-scale indus­trial opera­ti­ons. The plan­ned systems will make a decisive contri­bu­tion to demons­t­ra­ting that addi­tive manu­fac­tu­ring can relia­bly deli­ver large quan­ti­ties for mission-criti­cal programs. 

More than just capital

By secu­ring almost 300 million US dollars, Diver­gent Tech­no­lo­gies has gained more than just capi­tal and boos­ted inves­tor confi­dence in a future where digi­tal manu­fac­tu­ring is no longer expe­ri­men­tal, but essen­tial. If the expan­sion is successful, the startup could help set a new stan­dard for how the world builds the systems it relies on for safety, trans­por­ta­tion and innovation. 

With custo­mers from the defense sector as its core busi­ness, the company is posi­tio­ning itself as an important pioneer for next-gene­ra­tion avia­tion and mili­tary systems.

“Diver­gent was foun­ded to trans­form the built world with a soft­ware-defi­ned manu­fac­tu­ring plat­form,” said Lukas Czin­ger, Chief Execu­tive Offi­cer and Co-Foun­der of Diver­gent. “This funding will allow us to scale DAPS for aero­space and defense, expand our world-class team, and streng­then Ameri­ca’s indus­trial base with a truly game-chan­ging system.” 

“Diver­gent deli­vers exactly what America needs — a stron­ger, faster and more adap­ta­ble indus­trial base,” said Kyle Bass, Co-CEO of Roche­fort Asset Manage­ment. “By uniting advan­ced soft­ware and hard­ware in a single plat­form, Diver­gent is proving that the U.S. can lead on the global stage in inno­va­tion and manu­fac­tu­ring. We are confi­dent that this team will rede­fine manu­fac­tu­ring and streng­then Ameri­ca’s posi­tion in key industries.” 

About Diver­gent

Diver­gent is the deve­lo­per of the Diver­gent Adap­tive Produc­tion System (DAPS™), the worl­d’s first end-to-end digi­tal manu­fac­tu­ring plat­form that enables rapid design, addi­tive manu­fac­tu­ring and auto­ma­ted assem­bly. Head­quar­te­red in Torrance, Cali­for­nia, Diver­gent is resha­ping the future of defense, aero­space and auto­mo­tive manu­fac­tu­ring. — www.divergent3d.com

About Roche­fort Asset Management

Roche­fort Asset Manage­ment is a U.S.-based, natio­nal secu­rity-focu­sed private asset manage­ment firm that invests in trans­for­ma­tive tech­no­lo­gies. As a licen­sed mana­ger of the U.S. Depart­ment of War’s Office of Stra­te­gic Capi­tal (OSC), Roche­fort works with compa­nies driving inno­va­tion in defense tech­no­logy and the indus­trial base. 

www.rochefort.us

Düssel­dorf — A naval power­house in Germany: Düssel­dorf-based tech­no­logy group Rhein­me­tall has reached an agree­ment with the Lürs­sen Group on the acqui­si­tion of Naval Vessels Lürs­sen (NVL B.V. & Co. KG, Bremen-Vege­sack) and all its subsi­dia­ries, the mili­tary divi­sion of the long-estab­lished shipy­ard group. Subject to appr­oval by the rele­vant anti­trust autho­ri­ties, the parties are aiming to complete the acqui­si­tion at the begin­ning of 2026. With this signi­fi­cant stra­te­gic acqui­si­tion, Rhein­me­tall is expan­ding its port­fo­lio to include naval ship­buil­ding and streng­thening its posi­tion as a leading supplier of defense tech­no­logy in Germany and Europe. 

Both parties have agreed not to disc­lose the purchase price.

Armin Papper­ger, CEO of Rhein­me­tall AG: “In the future, we will be a rele­vant player on land, at sea, in the air and in space. Rhein­me­tall is thus deve­lo­ping into a cross-domain systems house.”

Fried­rich Lürßen, Mana­ging Part­ner of Lürs­sen Mari­time Betei­li­gun­gen GmbH & Co. KG: “We are deligh­ted to have found a trust­wor­thy and strong part­ner in Rhein­me­tall, who can secure a successful future for NVL and its
employees.”

Guns­mith sets sail

To date, the Düssel­dorf-based company has not manu­fac­tu­red ships, but prima­rily arma­ments for land forces, such as tanks, artil­lery and air defense systems. As a supplier, the company is also invol­ved in the produc­tion of the US F35 figh­ter jet, and the arms manu­fac­tu­rer also produ­ces drones and soon mili­tary satel­li­tes. Now the arma­ments group, which is on a steep growth trajec­tory in the face of the war in Ukraine and is rushing from one record turno­ver and order back­log to the next, is setting sail, so to speak. 

For deca­des, Rhein­me­tall has made a name for itself world­wide as a renow­ned supplier of mili­tary tech­no­logy, but has also been a proven part­ner to the navies of nume­rous count­ries in the mari­time sector for many years. Rhein­me­tall alre­ady offers a selec­ted range of modern system compon­ents for mari­time appli­ca­ti­ons and is a leading global supplier of simu­la­tion solu­ti­ons and mari­time protec­tion systems in particular. 

Armin Papper­ger: “With the now agreed acqui­si­tion, we are decisi­vely advan­cing the conso­li­da­tion of the defense indus­try in Germany and Europe. In combi­na­tion with Rhein­me­tal­l’s compe­ten­cies, we are crea­ting a vital German power­house for state-of-the-art surface ships. The combi­ned capa­bi­li­ties of Rhein­me­tall and NVL gene­rate joint growth and enable a strong posi­tio­ning of our Group in the mari­time domain. At the same time, we are making a substan­tial contri­bu­tion to streng­thening the maritime
defense capa­bi­li­ties of Germany and NATO part­ner nations.” 

The current conflict situa­tion shows that military
asser­ti­ve­ness is also beco­ming incre­asingly important in the mari­time sector. Rhein­me­tall aims to meet the massi­vely incre­asing requi­re­ments of naval forces and the
rising budgets for procu­re­ment with high-perfor­mance system solutions
that have a state-of-the-art digi­tal infra­struc­ture and cover the entire
spec­trum — from the plat­form and elec­tro­nics to the sensors and effectors. 

NVL is a priva­tely mana­ged shipy­ard group with four shipy­ards in nort­hern Germany (Peene-Werft /
Wolgast, Blohm+Voss and Norderwerft/ Hamburg, Neue Jadewerft/ Wilhelms­ha­ven) and
inter­na­tio­nal loca­ti­ons. It employs a good 2,100 people world­wide, gene­ra­ted sales of around EUR 1 billion in the
2024 finan­cial year and is conside­red a pioneer in the rese­arch and
deve­lo­p­ment of auto­no­mous mari­time surface systems. Since its begin­nings around 150 years ago,
NVL has built around 1,000 ships at its shipy­ards and deli­vered them to over fifty diffe­rent navies and
coast guards, and is an estab­lished player both in mili­tary ship­buil­ding and
in ship main­ten­ance and repair. Previously known as Lürs­sen Defence, NVL was sepa­ra­ted from the
Yachts divi­sion in 2021 and contin­ued as an inde­pen­dent company within the family-run
Lürs­sen Group. NVL looks after fleets throug­hout their entire life cycle
and thus helps to keep the German Navy and Navies ready for action world­wide at all times

Rhein­me­tall wants to offer complete system solutions

Armin Papper­ger: “The acqui­si­tion will not only turn us into a produ­cer of floa­ting platforms
. As an inte­gra­ted naval power­house, we want to offer complete system solu­ti­ons. We will be able to offer our custo­mers all
valuable compon­ents in future programs from our partner
network as an inte­gra­ted solu­tion from a single source: Naval missiles and launchers,
main and secon­dary naval guns, missile defence, sensors and other electronics.
For the battle manage­ment system, we want to enable the inte­gra­tion and
Germa­niza­tion of exis­ting solu­ti­ons from our part­ner network.” 

A key success factor for Rhein­me­tall is that the Group alre­ady has excel­lent market access as a
supplier in the global naval busi­ness, has a presence in the
inter­na­tio­nal markets and enjoys the corre­spon­ding trust of its customers.
Another advan­tage for Rhein­me­tall is the expan­sion of produc­tion capa­ci­ties and
the expan­sion of the Group’s indus­trial base in nort­hern Germany. In parti­cu­lar with the
vehicle produc­tion of Rhein­me­tal­l’s Vehicle Systems divi­sion — which operates
sites in Kiel and Flens­burg, among others — synergy effects can be expec­ted on the basis of shared mate­rial and tech­no­logy expertise
.

NVL’s shipy­ards offer the oppor­tu­nity to utilize the exis­ting heavy infra­struc­ture, employee exper­tise and equip­ment capa­bi­li­ties to streng­then Vehicle Systems’ produc­tion and create capa­city reser­ves in the vehicle sector for the future. This enables Rhein­me­tall to avoid exces­sive infra­struc­ture invest­ments or exten­sive conver­si­ons of other produc­tion facilities. 

www.rheinmetall.com

Düssel­dorf — The Welsh darts equip­ment manu­fac­tu­rer Nodor Group, in which Infle­xion Private Equity Part­ners holds a majo­rity stake, has acqui­red Auto­darts GmbH. Auto­darts is a hard­ware and soft­ware plat­form for auto­ma­tic scoring in darts. The aim of the acqui­si­tion is to estab­lish darts not only as an analog pub game and in profes­sio­nal sport, but also to enable global online games. Auto­darts’ modern scoring tech­no­logy comple­ments the Nodor Group’s range of premium darts products. — Infle­xion was compre­hen­si­vely advi­sed by ARQIS on this transaction. 

The parties invol­ved have agreed not to disc­lose details of the tran­sac­tion, such as the purchase price.

The Nodor Group, based in Bridgend, Wales, is a leader in the manu­fac­ture of dart­boards, darts and access­ories. The group of compa­nies, which includes the Winmau and Red Dragon brands, employs around 1,000 people world­wide and exports its products to over 100 count­ries. At the end of 2024, Infle­xion Private Equity Part­ners acqui­red a majo­rity stake in Nodor. 

Auto­darts GmbH, based in Erzhau­sen, Hesse, manu­fac­tures systems for auto­ma­tic scoring. Came­ras are moun­ted above or around the dart­board to detect where the darts land and auto­ma­ti­cally calcu­late the score. This enables seam­less online play and a networked, data-driven, global darts community. 

An ARQIS team led by Dr. Jörn-Chris­tian Schulze provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal advice to the Nodor Group on this tran­sac­tion. Infle­xion Private Equity Part­ners is thus once again rely­ing on ARQIS’ advice, as was recently the case with the acqui­si­tion of the finanzen.net Group from Axel Springer. 

Advi­sor Nodor Group/Inflexion Private Equity Part­ners: ARQIS (Düssel­dorf)

Core team: Dr. Jörn-Chris­tian Schulze (Lead Part­ner), Chris­tos Chou­de­lou­dis (Mana­ging Asso­ciate), Ivo Erte­kin (Asso­ciate, all Tran­sac­tions), Part­ners: Tobias Neufeld (HR Law), Marcus Noth­hel­fer (IP, Munich), Coun­sel: Chris­tian Judis (Compli­ance, Munich), Jens Knip­ping (Tax), Nora Strat­mann (Commer­cial, Munich), Martin Wein­gärt­ner (Tran­sac­tions), Mana­ging Asso­cia­tes: Dr. Maxi­mi­lian Back­haus (Tran­sac­tions), Marina Bume­der (HR Law, Munich), Rolf Tichy (IP, Munich), Asso­cia­tes: Rebecca Gester (Commer­cial, Munich), Paulina Hütt­ner (IP, Munich), Johanna Klin­gen (Data Law), Tim Meyer-Meisel (Tran­sac­tions), Senior Legal Specia­list: Qing Xia (Tran­sac­tions)

About INFLEXION

INFLEXION Private Equity Part­ners Holdings LLP is a leading inde­pen­dent private equity firm head­quar­te­red in London. With over 20 years’ expe­ri­ence and £2.5 billion of assets under manage­ment, we work with excep­tio­nal manage­ment teams to build market-leading busi­nesses across multi­ple sectors and geogra­phies. — https://inflexionprivateeph.app

About ARQIS

ARQIS is an inde­pen­dent commer­cial law firm that opera­tes inter­na­tio­nally. Around 80 lawy­ers and legal specia­lists advise dome­stic and foreign compa­nies at the highest level on German, Euro­pean and Japa­nese commer­cial law. With its focus groups Tran­sac­tions, HR Law, Japan, Data Law, Risk and Regu­la­tory, the firm is geared towards provi­ding its clients with compre­hen­sive advice. The law firm was foun­ded in 2006 and has offices in Düssel­dorf, Munich and Tokyo as well as a talent hub in Berlin. — www.arqis.com.

Munich/ Bad Sobern­heim — Siloco GmbH & Co KG has acqui­red NOVOCONT System­bau GmbH and NOVORENT GmbH & Co KG. Siloco was compre­hen­si­vely advi­sed on this tran­sac­tion by the inter­na­tio­nal law firm Bird & Bird.
.
Siloco GmbH & Co. KG is a tradi­tio­nal family busi­ness from Hamburg, which has been active as a trading and service company for the cons­truc­tion indus­try for over 100 years. The company has grown steadily since 1919 and offers a wide range of cons­truc­tion site equipment. 

NOVOCONT System­bau GmbH and NOVORENT GmbH & Co. KG are compa­nies in Bad Sobern­heim that specia­lize in the plan­ning, produc­tion, main­ten­ance, sale and rental of system buil­dings and their turn­key assem­bly. With their Europe-wide network of part­ners, they are able to respond to all requi­re­ments indi­vi­du­ally, quickly and without compro­mi­sing on quality. The compa­nies have estab­lished them­sel­ves as inno­va­tive provi­ders of modu­lar cons­truc­tion solu­ti­ons and have many years of experience. 

With this stra­te­gic acqui­si­tion, Siloco GmbH & Co. KG is expan­ding its port­fo­lio to include highly specia­li­zed system cons­truc­tions and streng­thening its posi­tion as a full-service provi­der for the cons­truc­tion indus­try. The acqui­si­tion of NOVOCONT System­bau GmbH and NOVORENT GmbH & Co. KG enables Siloco GmbH & Co. KG to signi­fi­cantly expand its plan­ning exper­tise and to utilize the Europe-wide part­ner network as well as the long-term expe­ri­ence in the turn­key assem­bly of system buil­dings in various indus­tries of the acqui­red compa­nies. Siloco GmbH & Co. KG would like to invest jointly in the further deve­lo­p­ment of the companies. 

Advi­sor Siloco GmbH & Co KG: Bird & Bird 

Part­ner Dr. Sandra Schuh, LL.M. (photo, lead), Coun­sel Dr. Ole Brühl, and Asso­ciate Michelle Pohl (all Corporate/M&A), Part­ner Dr. Barbara Geck, Senior Asso­ciate Carina Wirtz and Asso­ciate Henry Nico­lai (all Employ­ment Law) and Senior Coun­sel Elie Kauf­man, LL.M., Asso­cia­tes Amelia Weber and Nirary Gorges (all Real Estate), Part­ner Dr. Michael Jüne­mann and Senior Asso­ciate Timo Förs­ter (both Finan­cing & Finan­cial Regu­la­tion), Coun­sel Michael Brüg­ge­mann (Tax), all Frankfurt.

As a leading inter­na­tio­nal law firm, Bird & Bird is the part­ner for ever­yone who wants to defend and streng­then their super­powers. Thanks to our orig­ins in IP law, we under­stand the core of every company, the requi­re­ments of the market and compe­ti­tion and how to achieve sustainable success. We call it sector focus. And with this DNA, we are now your law firm for all legal issues rela­ting to tech­no­logy, digi­ta­liza­tion and regu­la­tion. With over 1,600 lawy­ers in 33 offices in 23 count­ries, we are repre­sen­ted in Europe, North America, the Middle East, Asia-Paci­fic and Africa and main­tain close rela­ti­onships with law firms in other parts of the world. In Germany, we are repre­sen­ted by more than 280 lawy­ers in Düssel­dorf, Frank­furt, Hamburg and Munich. For more infor­ma­tion visit www.twobirds.com.

Munich/Olpe - McDer­mott Will & Schulte advi­sed the syndi­cate of lenders, consis­ting of ABN Amro, CIC Private Debt, LBBW and ODDO BHF, on the refi­nan­cing of the acqui­si­tion of Schell GmbH & Co KG by Para­gon Partners.

After 93 years of successful company history in family hands, the siblings Andrea and Joachim Schell signed an agree­ment in April to sell their company to the owner-mana­ged, private Para­gon Group to secure the company’s succes­sion and keep SCHELL on course for growth.

The inno­va­tive and fast-growing Schell GmbH & Co KG employs 450 people world­wide. With its water-saving fittings, SCHELL offers future-proof solu­ti­ons for sustainable and resource-conser­ving water use. Whether in public faci­li­ties, commer­cial enter­pri­ses or private house­holds — SCHELL solu­ti­ons help to opti­mize water and energy consump­tion, effec­tively reduce costs and at the same time make a valuable contri­bu­tion to envi­ron­men­tal and climate protection. 

“By handing over our company to Para­gon Betei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft, we are ensu­ring that our company remains stable in the long term and will conti­nue to operate successfully in the future. The new owners will actively conti­nue the exis­ting growth stra­tegy,” explain Andrea and Joachim Schell, share­hol­ders of Schell GmbH & Co KG.

Schell, based in Olpe, is the global market leader in water manage­ment systems and angle valves. A specia­list in fittings, sani­tary tech­no­logy products and digi­tal solu­ti­ons for main­tai­ning drin­king water quality. The company employs around 450 people and is active in more than 80 countries. 

Para­gon is an owner-mana­ged invest­ment company that has been inves­t­ing in estab­lished medium-sized compa­nies in German-spea­king count­ries since it was foun­ded in 2004. The Munich-based company mana­ges equity capi­tal of more than 2.4 billion euros. 

Advi­sors to lenders: McDer­mott Will & Schulte, Munich

Ludwig Zesch, Dr. Matthias Weis­sin­ger (both Finance, both lead), Dr. Maxi­mi­lian Meyer (Coun­sel, Tax, Frank­furt), Asso­ciate: Bastiaan Wolters (Finance, Frank­furt), Konstan­tin Stro­bel (Tran­sac­tion Lawyer)

Munich/ Saarbrücken/ Luxembourg/LUX / Woustviller/FR / Lyon/FR — The French Groupe Pare­des Orapi (GPO) has acqui­red 100% of the shares in the opera­ting compa­nies of the Tous­saint Group in France (Tous­saint France) and Luxem­bourg (REDELUX) as well as the online store Propris­simo SAS. — Concen­tro Manage­ment AG provi­ded full support to the share­hol­ders of the Tous­saint Group in the course of the inter­na­tio­nal M&A process. 

The Jaro­li­meck family expan­ded the busi­ness of the German Tous­saint Group (N. Tous­saint & Co. GmbH), one of the three leading suppli­ers of profes­sio­nal hygiene and clea­ning products in Germany, to France back in 1981 and deve­lo­ped a successful Euro­pean group of compa­nies in the 1990s and 2000s through further stra­te­gic acqui­si­ti­ons and start-ups in France and Luxem­bourg. Today, with two subsi­dia­ries, five logi­stics loca­ti­ons and around one hundred employees in north-eastern France and Luxem­bourg, the group is one of the largest regio­nal suppli­ers of profes­sio­nal clea­ning and hygiene products, clea­ning machi­nes and equip­ment and asso­cia­ted services. 

Pare­des was foun­ded in 1942 in Villeur­banne, France, and has specia­li­zed in profes­sio­nal hygiene products and services ever since. Orapi has been active on the French hygiene and disin­fec­tion market since 1968 and is known for its wide range of products from clea­ning chemi­cals and disin­fec­tion solu­ti­ons to main­ten­ance services. At the begin­ning of 2024, Pare­des acqui­red a majo­rity stake in Orapi. The resul­ting Groupe Pare­des Orapi, head­quar­te­red near Lyon, has around 1,500 employees (1,200 of whom are in France) and the largest inte­gra­ted hygiene provi­der in France with a total turno­ver of around EUR 450 million .

With the take­over, GPO secu­res important market shares to further expand its market leader­ship in France and also gains access to the Luxem­bourg market. The group of compa­nies will conti­nue with Julian Jaro­li­meck as mana­ging direc­tor of the group, who will be retai­ned along with all employees in France and Luxem­bourg. The names Tous­saint and Rede­lux, which have been estab­lished in the market, will be retained. 

The German acti­vi­ties rela­ting to N. Tous­saint & Co. GmbH (with its various subsi­dia­ries) are not part of the tran­sac­tion and will be further deve­lo­ped in Germany in the future with a high level of commit­ment from the Jaro­li­meck family. In the future, a stra­te­gic coope­ra­tion between the compa­nies N. Tous­saint and Pare­des at Euro­pean level is also planned. 

“Both groups focus on high-quality and inno­va­tive hygiene and clea­ning solu­ti­ons and we are ther­e­fore deligh­ted to have found the perfect part­ner in GPO, who shares our values,” says Jürgen Jaro­li­meck. “We are very proud of the path we have trave­led in France and Luxem­bourg over the past 40 years and look forward to the further joint acti­vi­ties of both groups. In addi­tion, toge­ther with N. Tous­saint and the employees in Germany, we have great ambi­ti­ons to further deve­lop TOPSERV on the German market,” conti­nues Liane Jarolimeck. 

Fran­çois Thuil­leur, CEO of Groupe Pare­des Orapi, is deligh­ted about “the great addi­tion of the Tous­saint compa­nies in France and Luxem­bourg,” and “we are expan­ding our family-run group of compa­nies to include a market player — also family-run — with the same values, a first-class repu­ta­tion and high-quality products and services. In addi­tion, we are conso­li­da­ting our market posi­tion as number 1 in France and at the same time expan­ding into the lucra­tive Luxem­bourg market with the acqui­si­tion of the second largest provider.”

Lars Werner, Part­ner, and Phil­ipp Goller, Senior Project Mana­ger, at Concen­tro Manage­ment AG, add: “We would like to thank the Jaro­li­meck family for their trust, GPO for the cons­truc­tive and plea­sant coope­ra­tion and the advi­sory teams on the seller and buyer side for their focu­sed approach. Conclu­ding a trans­na­tio­nal deal with four French and one Luxem­bourg company within such a short period of time requi­res a high level of commit­ment at all levels and cons­truc­tive coope­ra­tion on an equal footing.”

Liane Jaro­li­meck also empha­si­zes the close and successful coope­ra­tion in this project: “We would like to thank the entire Concen­tro team for their great support. We have always found their advice to be extre­mely compe­tent, commit­ted and trustworthy.”

A team from Groupe FIBA and FIDAL Avocats (both from France) provi­ded legal/tax advice on the seller side of the transaction.
Groupe Pare­des Orapi was advi­sed on the tran­sac­tion by a multi­di­sci­pli­nary team from BDO, Akilys Avocats and the Hardis Group.

Advi­sor Jaro­li­meck family, Tous­saint Group: Concen­tro Manage­ment AG, Munich

Lars Werner (Mana­ging Part­ner), Phil­ipp Goller (Senior Project Mana­ger), Sönke Storm (Project Mana­ger), Fabi­enne Frech (Consul­tant), Niels Venus (Consul­tant)

Siège social de FIBA: Frédé­ric Wagner, Arnaud Vezy, Marie Flesch

FIDAL Avocats: Clarisse Vidal

Concen­tro Manage­ment AG is a medium-sized consul­ting company specia­li­zing in corpo­rate deve­lo­p­ment, tran­sac­tions (corpo­rate finance/M&A consul­ting) and turn­arounds. With over 40 employees at four loca­ti­ons in Germany, Concen­tro works in an imple­men­ta­tion and success-orien­ted manner. The aim is to gene­rate added value for the custo­mer through an indi­vi­dual consul­ting service. — www.concentro.de

Stutt­gart — HEUKING has provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal advice to the long-estab­lished dairy Rücker on the plan­ned take­over by MEGGLE Holding SE. The tran­sac­tion was led by HEUKING lawy­ers Dr. Rainer Hersch­lein and Dr. Emanuel Teichmann. 

The long-estab­lished company Rücker, with sites in Aurich and Wismar, is one of the leading private dairies in nort­hern Germany and has stood for exper­tise in milk and cheese proces­sing for over 130 years. In the 2024 finan­cial year, the company achie­ved a turno­ver of around 500 million euros and employed around 615 people. 

MEGGLE Holding SE, another family-owned company with a long tradi­tion, is taking over the Rücker compa­nies. MEGGLE has been pursuing a consis­tent growth stra­tegy for years and is streng­thening the stra­te­gi­cally important cheese product segment in parti­cu­lar with this take­over. MEGGLE had alre­ady taken an important step in this area in 2021 with today’s MEGGLE Cheese GmbH. 

The tran­sac­tion will provide Rücker with a long-term part­ner who shares its corpo­rate values and wants to conti­nue on its growth path. Rücker empha­si­zes that the tran­sac­tion will secure the future of the company, its loca­ti­ons and employees, while at the same time further streng­thening invest­ments in inno­va­tion and quality. 

The tran­sac­tion is subject to appr­oval by the rele­vant anti­trust authorities.

Consul­tant Rücker GmbH: HEUKING

Dr. Rainer Hersch­lein, LL.M. (Ford­ham Univer­sity), Dr. Emanuel Teich­mann (both lead, both corpo­rate law / M&A, private equity), both Stuttgart;
Fabian G. Gaffron (tax law), Hamburg, Dr. Frede­rik Wiemer (anti­trust law), Hamburg; Chris­toph Hexel (employ­ment law), Düssel­dorf; Dr. Chris­tian Stras­ser (liti­ga­tion & arbi­tra­tion), Munich; Bene­dikt Raisch (corpo­rate law / M&A), Stutt­gart; Michael Kreis­ler, LL.M. (invest­ment control), Berlin; Carina Bart (employ­ment law), Stutt­gart; Bettina Nehe­i­der (public law), Munich 

Advi­sor MEGGLE: Gleiss Lutz 

The follo­wing Gleiss Lutz team led by Dr. Rainer Loges (part­ner) and Franz-Ferdi­nand Guggen­mos (both corporate/M&A, both Munich) advi­sed MEGGLE Holding SE:

Peter Stef­fen Carl (Part­ner), Dr. Adrian Schulz, Dr. Valen­tin Zemm­rich, Ansgar Grosch (all Corporate/M&A, all Munich), Dr. Johan­nes Niewerth (Part­ner, Hamburg), Lesley Milde, Jonas Tafel (all Real Estate),
Dr. Johann Wagner (Part­ner), Dr. Markus Günther (both Tax, all Hamburg), Dr. Matthias Werner (Part­ner), Dr. Jose­fine Börner, Magda­lena Rauch (all IP/Tech, all Munich), Dr. Doris-Maria Schus­ter (Part­ner,
Hamburg), Dr. Jonas Hofer (Stutt­gart), Dr. Julian Glau (all employ­ment law, Hamburg), Dr. Chris­tian Hamann (part­ner, Berlin), Dr. Manuel Klar (both data protec­tion law), Dr. Iris Bene­dikt-Bucken­leib (coun­sel, anti­trust law, both Munich), Dr. Jacob von Andreae (part­ner), Matthias Hahn (both public law/foreign trade law, both Düssel­dorf), Dr. Thomas Kulzer (coun­sel, banking & finance, Frankfurt).

Colo­gne — DEUTZ AG has signed an agree­ment to acquire 100% of the shares in SOBEK Group GmbH, ther­eby ente­ring the defense market. The SOBEK Group specia­li­zes in drive systems for drones, among other things. The German company with three loca­ti­ons in Baden-Würt­tem­berg and Hesse is active in seve­ral specia­li­zed fields of appli­ca­tion, inclu­ding motor sports, aero­space and medi­cal technology. 

Among other things, the company supplies seve­ral top Formula 1 and Formula E teams with high-perfor­mance pumps based on its elec­tric motors and control elec­tro­nics. This is an attrac­tive market that enables signi­fi­cant double-digit margins and demands the highest stan­dards. Howe­ver, the grea­test poten­tial curr­ently lies in the drone busi­ness, which is growing stron­gly due to geopo­li­ti­cal deve­lo­p­ments and the incre­asing importance of unman­ned defense systems. With this acqui­si­tion, DEUTZ is syste­ma­ti­cally conti­nuing its ‘Dual+’ stra­tegy of broa­de­ning its base, beco­ming less depen­dent on the cycli­cal combus­tion engine busi­ness and syste­ma­ti­cally expan­ding its defense business. 

Sebas­tian C. Schulte (photo © Deutz), CEO of Deutz, explains: “Sobek gives us direct access to the rapidly growing defense market and crea­tes the basis for stra­te­gi­cally deve­lo­ping it beyond the use of clas­sic drives.” The expan­sion of the defense busi­ness is part of the corpo­rate stra­tegy to become less depen­dent on the cycli­cal busi­ness with combus­tion engines.

Drones are one of NATO’s top areas of investment

Drones are now one of NATO’s top areas of invest­ment, as the requi­re­ments profile of many armed forces is chan­ging: away from tradi­tio­nal plat­forms and towards auto­no­mous and highly mobile systems. Unman­ned aerial systems (UAVs) in parti­cu­lar are taking center stage, as they are conside­red cost-effi­ci­ent, quickly available and opera­tio­nally flexi­ble. Mili­tary requi­re­ments are funda­men­tally chan­ging the exis­ting drone busi­ness: away from the volume-driven B2C busi­ness of Asian provi­ders and towards secu­rity-criti­cal Euro­pean B2G solu­ti­ons that make Europe and Germany geopo­li­ti­cally independent. 

For DEUTZ, the acqui­si­tion is a logi­cal next step on the path from compo­nent manu­fac­tu­rer to system provi­der, from which other busi­ness segments will also bene­fit. The highly inte­gra­ted elec­tric drives from SOBEK offer great syner­gies with regard to alter­na­tive drives in the off-high­way sector, parti­cu­larly in control tech­no­logy. The growing system respon­si­bi­lity in aero­space and defense opens up new potential. 

With around 70 employees, SOBEK expects to gene­rate sales in the low to mid double-digit million euro range with a signi­fi­cant double-digit EBIT margin in the current finan­cial year 2025.

The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to be comple­ted shortly.

Advi­sor to Deutz AG: Belgravia 

Belgra­via advi­sed on this tran­sac­tion as exclu­sive buy-side M&A advisor
Team: Dr. Björn Röper (Mana­ging Part­ner), Diet­mar Rath (Part­ner), Chris­tian Olsen (Senior Vice Presi­dent), André Lauschke, Associate
www.belgravia-co.com