ALTERNATIVE FINANCING FORMS
FOR ENTREPRENEURS AND INVESTORS

Author: Tatjana Anderer

Gründerin des FYB-Verlag
News
The Hague — Bizz­de­sign announ­ces the comple­tion of two acqui­si­ti­ons that will make the company a global leader in the digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion soft­ware market.
Bizz­de­sign and MEGA Inter­na­tio­nal, two Gart­ner-reco­gni­zed leaders in Enter­prise Archi­tec­ture (EA) soft­ware, announ­ced a defi­ni­tive merger agreement.
In addi­tion, Bizz­de­sign has signed a further acqui­si­tion that will bring the group to total reve­nues of EUR 110 million and over 600 employees.
These two signi­fi­cant acqui­si­ti­ons will create a leading global player in the digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion soft­ware market with offices, employees and custo­mers around the world.
The combi­ned group will conti­nue to operate under the Bizz­de­sign brand, reflec­ting a shared commit­ment to inno­va­tion and custo­mer-centric solu­ti­ons. MEGA MEGA will be acqui­red by its foun­der and manage­ment, as well as by Belgian private equity inves­tor GIMV.
The acqui­si­tion of MEGA marks the second step in Bizzdesign’s buy-and-build stra­tegy since the merger with stra­te­gic soft­ware inves­tor Main Capi­tal Part­ners (“Main”).
MEGA was foun­ded in 1991 and is head­quar­te­red in Paris, France.
The company is repre­sen­ted world­wide, has offices in 10 count­ries and employs appro­xi­m­ately 350 people.
MEGA’s HOPEX plat­form enables colla­bo­ra­tion, auto­ma­tion and actionable insights to acce­le­rate trans­for­ma­tion initiatives.
HOPEX’s four core solu­ti­ons focus on Enter­prise Archi­tec­ture (EA), Busi­ness Process Manage­ment (BPM), Gover­nance, Risk & Compli­ance (GRC) and Data Governance.
MEGA serves more than 600 custo­mers in the EMEA, North America, LATAM and APAC regi­ons, inclu­ding major banks, insu­rance compa­nies and aero­space compa­nies. Buil­ding a global leader in Enter­prise Archi­tec­ture The combi­na­tion of Bizz­de­sign and MEGA crea­tes a new market leader in Enter­prise Archi­tec­ture and Digi­tal Trans­for­ma­tion, serving a diverse client base of more than 1,000 corpo­rate and govern­ment insti­tu­ti­ons, inclu­ding blue-chip clients such as HSBC, Shell, Wells Fargo and EDF.
With a highly comple­men­tary market presence across all conti­nents, the merger will create a true global market leader in this field.
Bizz­de­sign and MEGA have been reco­gni­zed as market leaders in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Enter­prise Archi­tec­ture for over ten years, under­li­ning the leading posi­tion of both compa­nies in this field.
The combi­ned product offe­ring is well posi­tio­ned to support orga­niza­ti­ons in their enter­prise trans­for­ma­tion initiatives.
“We are very exci­ted to part­ner with MEGA,” said Bert van der Zwan, CEO of Bizz­de­sign.
“The merger will acce­le­rate our growth and enable us to deli­ver more inno­va­tive solu­ti­ons and provide grea­ter value to our custo­mers around the world. We see a fruitful stra­te­gic part­ner­ship with great poten­tial to deli­ver a value propo­si­tion in inter­na­tio­nal markets toge­ther with MEGA.” 

Luca de Risi, CEO of MEGA Inter­na­tio­nal, explains: “Bizz­de­sign is an excel­lent stra­te­gic and cultu­ral fit for MEGA.
Our combi­ned strengths and resour­ces will greatly enhance the value of enter­prise archi­tec­ture in trans­forming organizations.
The MEGA manage­ment team is very exci­ted to be a part of this. Sven van Berge Henegou­wen, Mana­ging Part­ner at Main and Chair­man of the Super­vi­sory Board of Bizz­de­sign, summa­ri­zes: “This tran­sac­tion is a mile­stone in Bizzdesign’s growth stra­tegy. We stron­gly believe in working with commit­ted entre­pre­neurs to acce­le­rate inno­va­tion for the bene­fit of their custo­mers. Over the past 20 years, this has been one of the key value drivers for Main Capi­tal in the successful orga­nic and buy-and-build growth stra­te­gies we have execu­ted with our busi­ness part­ners. With Bizz­de­sign and MEGA, we are brin­ging toge­ther two compa­nies that are both known for their inno­va­tion and exper­tise in enter­prise archi­tec­ture, crea­ting a strong foun­da­tion for further global expan­sion. The merger rein­forces our stra­tegy of buil­ding leading inter­na­tio­nal soft­ware groups in one of our core product markets and also marks the offi­cial launch of our expan­sion into France.”
The closing of the MEGA acqui­si­tion is still subject to the neces­sary regu­la­tory appr­ovals. Addi­tio­nal stra­te­gic acqui­si­tion in the field of digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion In addi­tion to the acqui­si­tion of MEGA, Bizz­de­sign recently signed another signi­fi­cant stra­te­gic acqui­si­tion in the field of digi­tal transformation.
This further acqui­si­tion will further streng­then the Group’s alre­ady global market-leading posi­tion in this area and bring addi­tio­nal comple­men­tary and syner­gi­stic product oppor­tu­ni­ties to the Group.
The combi­ned group, inclu­ding this undis­c­lo­sed acqui­si­tion, will gene­rate reve­nues of appro­xi­m­ately EUR 110 million and employ over 600 people, crea­ting a strong foun­da­tion for further orga­nic and inor­ga­nic growth.
A detailed announce­ment of this latest acqui­si­tion is expec­ted to be published during Q4 2024. About Bizz­de­sign https://bizzdesign.com/ Foun­ded in 2000, Bizz­de­sign is reco­gni­zed as the trus­ted global SaaS plat­form for enter­prise archi­tec­ture and is reco­gni­zed as a leader by major analyst firms such as Gart­ner and Forrester.
Bizz­de­sign helps the world’s leading public and private orga­niza­ti­ons ensure successful prio­ri­tiza­tion of invest­ments, trans­for­ma­tion initia­ti­ves and risk management.
Bizz­de­sign helps archi­tects and execu­ti­ves to fully envi­sion multi­di­men­sio­nal archi­tec­tu­ral struc­tures, design and plan both current and future archi­tec­ture, and execute their stra­te­gic trans­for­ma­tion initia­ti­ves with confi­dence. About MEGA Inter­na­tio­nal https://www.mega.com/ Foun­ded in 1991, MEGA is a global soft­ware provi­der specia­li­zing in digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion solu­ti­ons to connect IT leaders, process owners, risk mana­gers and data gover­nance officers.
The company is head­quar­te­red in Paris, France, and has offices in 10 count­ries worldwide.
MEGA’s SaaS plat­form, HOPEX, enables colla­bo­ra­tion, auto­ma­tion and crea­tes actionable insights to acce­le­rate trans­for­ma­tion initia­ti­ves. MEGA serves more than 600 clients in the EMEA, North America, LATAM and APAC regi­ons, inclu­ding large banks, insu­rance compa­nies, public admi­nis­tra­tion and the airspace indus­try. About Main Capi­tal Part­ners https://main.nl/ Main Capi­tal Part­ners is a leading soft­ware inves­tor in the Bene­lux, DACH, the Nordics, and the United States with appro­xi­m­ately EUR 6 billion in assets under management.
Main has over 20 years of expe­ri­ence in streng­thening soft­ware compa­nies and works closely with the manage­ment teams in its port­fo­lio as a stra­te­gic part­ner to achieve profi­ta­ble growth and larger outstan­ding soft­ware groups.
As a leading soft­ware inves­tor mana­ging private equity funds active in Northwes­tern Europe and North America, Main has over 75 employees opera­ting out of its offices in The Hague, Düssel­dorf, Stock­holm, Antwerp, and an affi­lia­ted office in Boston.
Main main­ta­ins an active port­fo­lio of over 45 soft­ware companies.
The under­ly­ing port­fo­lio employs over 12,000 employees.
Through its Main Social Insti­tute, Main supports students with grants and scho­lar­ships to study IT and Compu­ter Science at Tech­ni­cal Univer­si­ties and Univer­si­ties of Applied Sciences. 

News

Berlin — Monda, the all-in-one data mone­tiza­tion plat­form, announ­ced that it has raised USD 5 million in a seed funding round.
The round was led by Senovo and Acro­ba­tor Ventures, with parti­ci­pa­tion from Techstars.
The capi­tal will be used to expand busi­ness opera­ti­ons in the US, grow the part­ner ecosys­tem and expand the plat­form to enable any busi­ness to secu­rely mone­tize data.
Monda’s soft­ware enables compa­nies to start and scale a data services business.
Monda has seen strong growth in 2024 and the plat­form is now used by over 150 Data-as-a-Service (DaaS) compa­nies that have crea­ted more than 6,000 data products.
Monda has built key part­ner­ships and inte­gra­ti­ons with world-leading cloud plat­forms such as Google Cloud, Datab­ricks and SAP.
Since the begin­ning of the year, the team has doubled to 32 employees.
In addi­tion, Monda is opening its first US office in Boston in fall 2024 to be closer to North Ameri­can custo­mers, who make up 50% of its custo­mer base.
Monda was foun­ded by tech entre­pre­neurs and data experts Thani Shamsi and Richard Hoffmann
as a spin-off of Berlin-based Datarade, the world’s largest compa­ri­son plat­form for data provi­ders. Thani Shamsi, foun­der and CEO of Monda, said: “AI has crea­ted a huge demand for high-quality and unique data sets to train AI models. Compa­nies have reco­gni­zed the mone­tiza­tion of their proprie­tary data for AI as a busi­ness oppor­tu­nity, but face an incre­asingly complex global data market. Having worked for a data provi­der myself, I know these chal­lenges first-hand. We have crea­ted Monda to enable any company to build a secure, growing and sustainable data services busi­ness — driving AI forward.” More and more AI compa­nies are trying to secure access to proprie­tary data sets to train and refine their models — and are signing data licen­ses with data-rich compa­nies like Reddit, Shut­ter­stock, or Yelp. But tech­ni­cal, regu­la­tory and opera­tio­nal chal­lenges prevent compa­nies from mone­tiz­ing their data: Buil­ding a successful data-as-a-service busi­ness invol­ves crea­ting data products, inte­gra­ting with data market­places, setting up data distri­bu­tion, secu­rely sharing data, hand­ling data licen­ses, and mana­ging compli­ance. Mona Gind­ler, Part­ner at Senovosaid: “As the sourcing and mone­tiza­tion of data moves into the main­stream, data provi­ders need better tools to manage the incre­asing comple­xity of the data market. Monda helps them reach more custo­mers while redu­cing opera­tio­nal over­head, putting the company in a strong posi­tion to lead this new soft­ware cate­gory. Thani and Richard have built a fanta­stic team and culture in Berlin. We are exci­ted to support their expan­sion into the US with the new Boston office.” Monda’s data mone­tiza­tion plat­form has three key diffe­ren­tia­tors: First, the product is easy to use and allows busi­ness users to create data products and publish them to their own data store­front or data market­places in just a few clicks. Secondly, Monda’s verti­cal SaaS approach enables compa­nies to run and manage their entire data services busi­ness on one plat­form. Thirdly, custo­mers appre­ciate the first-class service and support from an inter­na­tio­nal custo­mer care team. Part of the seed funding will be used to further deve­lop data inte­gra­ti­ons with cloud plat­forms, support unstruc­tu­red data products and roll out addi­tio­nal compli­ance functionalities.
Richard Hoff­mann, Foun­der and Presi­dent of Monda, said: “The opening of our first US office in Boston is a pivo­tal moment for Monda, our US custo­mers and for me perso­nally. I am curr­ently relo­ca­ting with my family from Germany to the United States to fully dedi­cate myself to the success and growth of our US client base and local team. The US has always been our most important market as a pioneer in data and AI inno­va­tion.” About Monda Monda is a leading B2B SaaS company in the data services industry.
Monda’s all-in-one data mone­tiza­tion plat­form enables any busi­ness to secu­rely share and mone­tize its proprie­tary data.
The company was foun­ded in 2024 by Thani Shamsi and Richard Hoff­mann as a spin-off of Datarade, the world’s largest compa­ri­son plat­form for data providers.
Monda’s vision is to create a global ecosys­tem for trans­pa­rent, secure data sharing to acce­le­rate the AI revo­lu­tion and progress.
— https://www.monda.ai/ About Senovo Senovo is an early stage venture capi­tal firm based in Munich and Berlin, part­ne­ring with excep­tio­nal foun­ders and buil­ding global B2B SaaS cate­gory leaders from Europe.
As a Euro­pean first-mover, the fund has been inves­t­ing since 2013 in a new gene­ra­tion of B2B soft­ware start-ups that enable the digi­ta­liza­tion of medium-sized and large companies.
Senovo invests after the first sales of a company in a late seed or Series A round.
The team of SaaS specia­lists looks for meaningful rela­ti­onships at eye level and regu­larly publishes their insights and exper­tise on https://medium.com/senovovc. — https://senovo.vc About Acro­ba­tor Ventures Acro­ba­tor Ventures is an opera­tor-led VC focu­sed on (pre-)seed foun­ders buil­ding tech­no­logy and data companies.
The part­ners bring a deep under­stan­ding of AI/ML and opera­tio­nal excel­lence with a foun­der-first mentality.
— https://acrobator.vc

News
London — The British start-up Doccla wants to go inter­na­tio­nal with its tele­me­di­cine system and has raised almost 41 million euros.
— Lake­star is leading the Series B round, with Elaia and Gene­ral Cata­lyst, Speed­in­vest and Bertels­mann as well as seve­ral exis­ting inves­tors also participating.
The funding comes two years after Doccla raised a $17 million Series A round. 
Hospi­tals around the world regu­larly struggle with bed shorta­ges — a problem that can be exacer­ba­ted in the event of a health crisis or other large-scale disaster.
The startup Doccla is using tech­no­logy to solve this problem: It is deve­lo­ping “virtual bed” tech­no­logy that allows doctors to remo­tely care for pati­ents who have either been dischar­ged early or, in some cases, never come to the hospi­tal at all. 
Doccla has been provi­ding doctors with tech­no­logy to moni­tor their pati­ents at home since 2019.
The company has comple­ted the new finan­cing round to ensure that its expan­sion into the D‑A-CH region (Germany, Austria and Switz­er­land) and France is as successful as possible. 
To date, Doccla has moni­to­red over 4 million pati­ent days, with a compli­ance rate of over 95%.
The company claims to enroll 1,000 new pati­ents per month.
In the long term, Doccla is aiming for 100,000 new pati­ents per month. 
An initial pilot project is alre­ady under­way in Germany Doccla enables pati­ents to be dischar­ged from hospi­tal and receive conti­nuous, high-quality care at home.
— Accor­ding to a study funded by the NHS, regio­nal NHS depart­ments were able to reduce emer­gency room visits by 63 percent by using Doccla and at the same time achieve a 300 percent return on investment.
This proba­bly also convin­ced those respon­si­ble at the Bad Reichen­hall district clinic: they brought the system to Germany without further ado as part of a pilot project in Febru­ary 2024, but are only using it for indi­vi­dual pati­ents for the time being due to the health­care system not yet being geared towards telemedicine. 
News

Munich / Hamburg — Liberta Part­ners, a Munich-based multi-family holding company, has taken over CBW- College Beruf­li­che Weiter­bil­dung GmbH from foun­der and mana­ging direc­tor Fahima Wieg­hard as part of a succes­sion solution.
As part of the take­over, Ms. Wieghard’s daugh­ter Naheed Priehn has been appoin­ted as the new Mana­ging Director.
Ms. Priehn has been with the company for 16 years and was most recently respon­si­ble for the opera­tio­nal manage­ment of the company as divi­sion manager.
Ms. Priehn has acqui­red a stake in the company as part of the tran­sac­tion, thus sending a strong signal for the joint growth plans.
CBW is a DIN EN ISO and AZAV-certi­fied trai­ning insti­tute with loca­ti­ons in Berlin, Hamburg and Frank­furt am Main.
In addi­tion to subsi­di­zed further trai­ning and retrai­ning, which can be funded by educa­tion or acti­va­tion vouch­ers, CBW also offers in-service and open semi­nars as well as indi­vi­dual company seminars.
CBW offers retrai­ning and further trai­ning with state-reco­gni­zed profes­sio­nal quali­fi­ca­ti­ons from the Cham­ber of Indus­try and Commerce as well as inter­na­tio­nally reco­gni­zed certi­fi­ca­tes, for exam­ple from SAP or Microsoft.
The focus is on commer­cial topics, IT trai­ning and indi­vi­dual coaching.
CBW also offers special German cour­ses for refu­gees, parti­cu­larly in the field of acade­mic health­care profes­si­ons, which are funded by the Fede­ral Office for Migra­tion and Refu­gees (BAMF).
Fahima Wieg­hard says: “After 20 years, it is time for me to pass the company on to new hands. I am deligh­ted that we have found a respon­si­ble owner in Liberta Part­ners, who will provide my daugh­ter with the best possi­ble support in the further deve­lo­p­ment of CBW.”
Naheed Priehn, Mana­ging Direc­tor of CBW, says: “I am looking forward to working with Liberta Part­ners. The labor market is in the midst of struc­tu­ral change. We want to accom­pany this change with our offer and enable people to bene­fit from digi­ta­liza­tion and give them new oppor­tu­ni­ties on the job market.” Nils von Wietz­low, Part­ner at Liberta Part­ners says: “CBW is ideally posi­tio­ned for further growth. Fahima Wieg­hard and her team have deve­lo­ped a strong product that we want to expand further with Naheed Priehn. We see great poten­tial for new loca­ti­ons, parti­cu­larly in other major German cities, in order to give even more people access to CBW’s high-quality educa­tio­nal offe­rings.” CBW- College Beruf­li­che Weiter­bil­dung GmbH CBW is a leading trai­ning provi­der in the field of voca­tio­nal training/retraining with loca­ti­ons in Berlin, Hamburg and Frank­furt am Main.
The company provi­des parti­ci­pants with up-to-date profes­sio­nal know­ledge using the latest tech­no­lo­gies for the labor market.
CBW offers chal­len­ging further trai­ning and retrai­ning in commer­cial subjects, IT trai­ning, language cour­ses and indi­vi­dual coaching.
Further infor­ma­tion can be found at: www.cbw-weiterbildung.de About Liberta Part­ners Liberta Part­ners is a multi-family holding company based in Munich. The company makes targe­ted invest­ments in compa­nies in German-spea­king count­ries, parti­cu­larly in succes­sion situa­tions and group spin-offs, with clear opera­tio­nal and stra­te­gic deve­lo­p­ment poten­tial. These compa­nies are actively deve­lo­ped as part of the 100% Core & Care concept and bene­fit from the entre­pre­neu­rial exper­tise of Liberta Part­ners. The Liberta Part­ners team consists of 20 employees working in the areas of M&A, Corpo­rate Deve­lo­p­ment and Legal & Admi­nis­tra­tion, supported by an active indus­try advi­sory board. www.liberta-partners.com

News

Munich — With a cross-loca­tion team led by Munich part­ner Eike Fietz (Corporate/M&A), Deloitte Legal advi­sed Rohlik foun­der Tomáš Čupr and his family office TCF Capi­tal on the prepa­ra­tion of a stra­te­gic invest­ment to rescue Töpfer GmbH based in Allgäu.
In coope­ra­tion with the restruc­tu­ring experts from PLUTA and Grub Brug­ger as well as Deloitte Finan­cial Advi­sory, the Deloitte Legal team deve­lo­ped an invest­ment concept that includes a capi­tal reduc­tion and breaks new ground in a number of aspects.
The inno­va­tive deal struc­ture provi­des for TCF Capi­tal, an invest­ment company owned by Tomáš Čupr, foun­der and CEO of the Rohlik Group, to acquire all of Töpfer’s busi­ness acti­vi­ties and assets.
The tran­sac­tion will enable Töpfer to conti­nue its busi­ness opera­ti­ons, in parti­cu­lar the produc­tion site in Diet­manns­ried, while preser­ving around 135 jobs.
Deloitte will conti­nue to support the project with an inter­di­sci­pli­nary team until completion.
The closing of the tran­sac­tion will take place in early fall 2024, subject to outstan­ding closing condi­ti­ons, inclu­ding the appr­oval of the respon­si­ble anti­trust autho­ri­ties. Peter Klekner, CEO of TCF Capi­talsays about the colla­bo­ra­tion with Deloitte Legal: “With the Deloitte Legal team and Eike Fietz in parti­cu­lar, we had a part­ner at our side who was extre­mely commit­ted, solu­tion-focu­sed and had an eye for the key issues. We were able to imple­ment our invest­ment in Töpfer quickly and effi­ci­ently and always had the legal issues under control.” Advi­sor TCF Capi­tal: Deloitte Legal Eike Fietz (lead, corporate/M&A, Munich), Tors­ten Cülter (restruc­tu­ring, Hamburg), Theresa Bayer (employ­ment law, Munich), Stefan Weste (employ­ment law, Berlin) Advi­sor to Töpfer: PLUTA Rechts­an­walts GmbH Florian A. Zist­ler, Ludwig Stern, Dr. Maxi­mi­lian Pluta, Daniel Barth, Laura Holz­mann­stet­ter, Dennis Stroh Grub Brug­ger: Dr. Hans Konrad Schenk, Phil­ipp Nuber, Lime Dauti About TCF Capi­tal TCF Capi­tal is an invest­ment company and family office foun­ded by entre­pre­neur Tomáš Čupr.
Its most important asset is the Czech Rohlik Group.
With a company valua­tion of over one billion US dollars, the Rohlik Group is one of the leading play­ers in Euro­pean online grocery retail.
Its broad product range includes around 17,000 products, from fresh food from regio­nal suppli­ers to super­mar­ket products and own brands.
With a turno­ver of 700 million euros and growth of 25% in 2023, the group is active in five Euro­pean countries.
In Germany, Rohlik is known under the Knuspr.de brand. About Töpfer Töpfer GmbH is a leading manu­fac­tu­rer of orga­nic baby food.
Its products include baby milk formula and baby porridge.
The company also produ­ces natu­ral cosme­tics for mothers and babies.
All products are manu­fac­tu­red at the Diet­manns­ried site in the Allgäu region. Deloitte Legal Deloitte Legal refers to the legal prac­ti­ces of Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limi­ted member firms, their affi­lia­tes or part­ner firms that provide legal services. Deloitte provi­des indus­try-leading audit and assu­rance, tax, consul­ting, finan­cial advi­sory and risk advi­sory services to nearly 90% of Fortune Global 500® compa­nies and thou­sands of private compa­nies. Legal services in Germany are provi­ded by Deloitte Legal. Our people deli­ver measura­ble, long-term results that help build public confi­dence in the capi­tal markets, support our clients to trans­form and grow, and lead the way to a stron­ger economy, a fairer society and a sustainable world. Deloitte builds on more than 175 years of history and opera­tes in more than 150 count­ries. Find out more about how Deloitte’s appro­xi­m­ately 457,000 employees live the mission state­ment “making an impact that matters” every day: www.deloitte.com/de.

News

Stutt­gart — Menold Bezler has advi­sed BWK GmbH Unter­neh­mens­be­tei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft on the acqui­si­tion of a majo­rity stake in VTQ Video­tro­nik GmbH.
The long-stan­ding mana­ging direc­tor and share­hol­der, Dr. Stef­fen Enke of VTQ Video­tro­nik GmbH, will remain closely asso­cia­ted with the company.
BWK GmbH Unter­neh­mens­be­tei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft, foun­ded in 1990 and based in Stutt­gart, is one of the largest German private equity companies.
BWK has around 300 million euros in invest­ment funds at its dispo­sal and curr­ently has around 150 million euros inves­ted in 20 companies.
VTQ Video­tro­nik GmbH, based in Quer­furt, Saxony-Anhalt, deve­lops and produ­ces high-quality elec­tro­nic assem­blies as well as various products and complete solu­ti­ons in the field of video technology.
A Menold Bezler team led by part­ner Vladi­mir Cutura advi­sed BWK on all legal and tax aspects of the tran­sac­tion, inclu­ding the finan­cing. Advi­sor BWK GmbH Unter­neh­mens­be­tei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft: Menold Bezler (Stutt­gart)Vladi­mir Cutura, Foto (part­ner, lead), Thomas Futte­rer, Dr. Björn Stau­din­ger, Nicole Brandt, LL.M.
(all corpo­rate law/M&A); Caro­lin Nemec, LL.M.
(IT and inter­net law/data protec­tion law); Isabelle Hörner (commer­cial); Lea Gäbler (IP); Elisa Himmer (real estate law); Dr. Frie­der Werner (part­ner, employ­ment law); Nico Haldy (part­ner), Clemens Mauch (part­ner), Laura Bommer (all tax); Daniel Haug (part­ner), Kevin Steg­bauer (both audit) About Menold Bezler Menold Bezler is a commer­cial law firm in Stutt­gart with a part­ner­ship struc­ture and around 350 employees.
More than 140 profes­sio­nals offer legal advice, tax advice, audi­ting and busi­ness advice from a single source. Our clients include well-known medium-sized compa­nies, listed corpo­ra­ti­ons, the public sector and its compa­nies as well as non-profit orga­niza­ti­ons. More at www.menoldbezler.de.

News

Frank­furt a. M. — Tike­hau Capi­tal, the global alter­na­tive asset manage­ment group, announ­ces the appoint­ment of Chris­toph Rinnert as Head of Private Equity Germany.
In this role, Chris­toph Rinnert will lead the stra­te­gic deve­lo­p­ment and manage­ment of Tike­hau Capital’s private equity port­fo­lio in the DACH region and focus on reali­zing invest­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties that align with Tike­hau Capital’s invest­ment objectives.
The Group’s private equity stra­tegy invests in mid-market compa­nies with high growth poten­tial, with a focus on digi­ta­liza­tion, build-up and natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal expansion.
It targets dyna­mic themes such as sustaina­bi­lity, energy tran­si­tion, rege­ne­ra­tive agri­cul­ture, cyber secu­rity, aero­space and defense.
With this announce­ment, Tike­hau Capi­tal is expan­ding its exten­sive invest­ment exper­tise and product offe­ring in Germany across all four asset clas­ses: Private Debt, Private Equity, Real Assets and Capi­tal Markets Strategies.
Chris­toph Rinnert will be based in Tike­hau Capital’s Frank­furt office and will report to Domi­nik P. Fels­mann, Head of Germany, and Emma­nuel Lail­lier, Head of Private Equity at Tike­hau Capi­tal. Chris­toph Rinnert (photo © Tike­haus Capi­tal) has more than 15 years of expe­ri­ence in private equity and M&A.
Previously, he was a Direc­tor at 3i Deutsch­land Indus­trie­be­tei­li­gungs GmbH and led the DACH indus­trial holdings busi­ness, global initia­ti­ves and nume­rous transactions.
Chris­toph Rinnert was a member of the Super­vi­sory Board of Weener Plas­tics Holding B.V., a port­fo­lio company of 3i, where he played a key role in the growth of the company and the execu­tion of various acquisitions.
Prior to that, he gained exten­sive expe­ri­ence in M&A advi­sory at Roth­schild GmbH and Price­wa­ter­hous­e­Coo­pers AG, where he led buy-side and sell-side projects and advi­sed clients on valua­tion and stra­te­gic analysis.
Chris­toph Rinnert holds a Master of Engi­nee­ring with First-Class Honors in Elec­tri­cal and Elec­tro­nic Engi­nee­ring with Manage­ment from Impe­rial College London.
“With Chris­toph Rinnert, we have gained an expe­ri­en­ced private equity expert for the German market. He brings a deep under­stan­ding of local condi­ti­ons and a strong buy & build track record, which he has built up in his port­fo­lio compa­nies. His appoint­ment also streng­thens our holi­stic invest­ment exper­tise across all four asset clas­ses and under­lines Tike­hau Capital’s strong one-stop-shop offe­ring,” said Domi­nik.
P. Fels­mann, Head of Germany at Tike­hau Capi­tal . About Tike­hau Capi­tal Tike­hau Capi­tal is a global alter­na­tive asset manage­ment group with €46.1 billion in assets under manage­ment (as of June 30, 2024).
Tike­hau Capi­tal has a broad range of exper­tise across four asset clas­ses (private debt, real assets, private equity and capi­tal markets stra­te­gies) as well as private debt, real assets, private equity and capi­tal markets stra­te­gies) and multi-asset and special oppor­tu­ni­ties strategies.
Tike­hau Capi­tal is a foun­der-led team with a diffe­ren­tia­ted busi­ness model, a strong balance sheet, proprie­tary global deal flow and a track record of support­ing high quality compa­nies and executives.
Deeply rooted in the real economy, Tike­hau Capi­tal provi­des custo­mi­zed and inno­va­tive alter­na­tive finan­cing solu­ti­ons to compa­nies, stri­ving to create long-term value for its inves­tors and a posi­tive impact on society.
The Group lever­a­ges its strong equity base (€3.1 billion of equity as of June 30, 2024) and invests its own capi­tal along­side that of its clients under each of its strategies.
Tike­hau Capi­tal is driven by a strong entre­pre­neu­rial spirit and DNA, which is also shared by its 763 employees (as of June 30, 2024) across its 17 offices in Europe, the Middle East, Asia and North America.
Tike­hau Capi­tal is listed on compart­ment A of the regu­la­ted market of Euron­ext Paris (ISIN code: FR0013230612; ticker: TKO.FP).
www.tikehaucapital.com.  

 

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Bochum — Skin­Love Ruhr GmbH, an inno­va­tive MedTech start-up from Bochum, has successfully comple­ted a seed finan­cing round.
The company was able to raise a mid-six-figure invest­ment, which will be used to further deve­lop and launch its revo­lu­tio­nary skin health solutions.
Foun­ded in 2023 by Dr. Frie­de­rike Kogel­heide, Skin­Love Ruhr specia­li­zes in the deve­lo­p­ment of cutting-edge cold plasma tech­no­logy to effec­tively treat skin problems.
The company’s goal is to replace nume­rous consu­ma­ble cosme­tic products with its self-deve­lo­ped and German-made device.
This tech­no­logy offers an inno­va­tive and sustainable alter­na­tive to conven­tio­nal skin­care products and aims to signi­fi­cantly improve users’ skin health.
Skin­Love Ruhr successfully went through the acce­le­ra­tor program of Batch #1 of our part­ner HIGH-TECH.NRW and has recently laun­ched its product successfully on the market.
The funds raised from the seed finan­cing round will mainly be inves­ted in the further deve­lo­p­ment of the cold plasma tech­no­logy and the prepa­ra­tion of the market launch.
In addi­tion, Skin­Love Ruhr plans to expand its produc­tion capa­ci­ties and estab­lish stra­te­gic part­ner­ships in the health and cosme­tics sector.
The seed finan­cing round was legally advi­sed by a team led by Dr. Patrick Müller, part­ner at the Düssel­dorf office of the law firm HEUKING.
He was supported by Dr. Henrik Lay and Caro­line Frohn­wie­ser from Hamburg and Phil­ipp Börger from Berlin.
HEUKING regu­larly advi­ses young start-up entre­pre­neurs and supports them in all legal matters from their foun­da­tion to market entry. Advi­sors to Skin­Love Ruhr GmbH: HEUKING Dr. Patrick Müller (lead), Düssel­dorf, Dr. Henrik Lay, Caro­line Frohn­wie­ser, both Hamburg, Phil­ipp Börger (all VC), Berlin

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Stutt­gart — A cross-loca­tion HEUKING team led by Stutt­gart part­ner Dr. Hermann Ali Hinde­rer has provi­ded legal and tax advice to Nolex AG on the take­over of Maibach Verkehrs­si­cher­heits- und Lärm­schutz­ein­rich­tun­gen GmbH.

The previous owners Hans-Dieter Maibach, Barbara Maibach, Sabrina Maibach and Marc-Chris­tian Maibach are selling all of their shares in order to promote the future deve­lo­p­ment of the company.
In the short term, there are plans to expand the product range and inter­na­tio­nal sales. 

Maibach VuL GmbH is a well-known and reco­gni­zed specia­list company in Germany and Europe in its product segments, prima­rily road safety, noise protec­tion and amphi­bian protection.
The company has subsi­dia­ries in Austria and Switzerland.
On August 1, 2024, Sven Becht­l­off took over the manage­ment of the Maibach Group.
Sabrina Maibach, who was a member of the manage­ment board toge­ther with Hans-Dieter Maibach, will remain with the company. 

Nolex AG is a Swiss invest­ment holding company based in Wollerau that invests in small and medium-sized compa­nies and deve­lops them stra­te­gi­cally and opera­tio­nally on a sustainable basis using entre­pre­neu­rial expertise.
The acqui­si­tion of Maibach is the second tran­sac­tion for Nolex this year. 

Consul­tant Nolex AG: HEUKING

Dr. Hermann Ali Hinde­rer, LL.M. (lead, M&A), Dr. Frank Baßler (real estate law), both Stutt­gart, Fabian G. Gaffron (tax law), Dr. Frede­rik Wiemer (anti­trust law), both Hamburg, Chris­toph Hexel (employ­ment law), Düssel­dorf, Dr. Andreas Scha­ben­ber­ger (trade­mark, design & copy­right law), Dr. Tania von Schwa­ne­bach (commer­cial), Marcel Behrendt, (corpo­rate law), Carina Bart (employ­ment law), all Stutt­gart, Simon Pommer (tax law), Hamburg

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Munich/Gütersloh — Biotec GmbH, a leading consul­ting and envi­ron­men­tal labo­ra­tory specia­li­zing in micro­bio­lo­gi­cal hygiene and occu­pa­tio­nal safety, has joined the CERTANIA Group, a dyna­mic orga­niza­tion known for its services in test­ing, inspec­tion and certification.
This stra­te­gic inte­gra­tion marks a turning point for Biotec GmbH and streng­thens its ability to expand its envi­ron­men­tal and hygiene solu­ti­ons globally.
The CERTANIA Group is a port­fo­lio company of GREENPEAK Partners.
Foun­ded in 1991 and based in Güters­loh, Germany, Biotec GmbH has built a solid repu­ta­tion over 25 years as a pioneer in air puri­fi­ca­tion technology.
Its custo­mer base includes indus­trial giants as well as major play­ers in the food indus­try who rely on its exper­tise in compre­hen­sive air puri­fi­ca­tion test­ing and certi­fi­ca­tion, drin­king water analy­sis and specia­li­zed hygiene training.
By joining CERTANIA, Biotec GmbH posi­ti­ons itself on a strong plat­form that supports its commit­ment to excellence.
The part­ner­ship streng­thens Biotec GmbH’s capa­bi­li­ties in the opti­miza­tion of hygiene-sensi­tive produc­tion proces­ses and the vali­da­tion of washer-disin­fec­tors in hospi­tals to meet strin­gent hygiene standards.
Under the leader­ship of Mana­ging Direc­tors Dr. Andreas Berm­pohl, Jörg Weißer and Frank Weißer, Biotec GmbH’s manage­ment team will main­tain its inde­pen­dence while acces­sing the resour­ces of the larger group, which will allow for contin­ued growth and expan­sion of services.
“We are very exci­ted to be part of CERTANIA, as this allows us to increase our impact on ensu­ring safe and compli­ant envi­ron­ments,” said Dr. Andreas Berm­pohl, Co-Foun­der and Mana­ging Direc­tor of Biotec GmbH.
“This part­ner­ship not only expands our service offe­ring, but also unders­cores our dedi­ca­tion to provi­ding high-quality solu­ti­ons backed by rigo­rous scien­ti­fic expertise.”
Moritz Gruber, CEO and major share­hol­der of CERTANIA, welco­mes Biotec and invi­tes other entre­pre­neurs and compa­nies in the field of scien­ti­fic, labo­ra­tory and compli­ance services to join this unique group: “We offer the oppor­tu­nity to inte­grate your busi­ness into a future-proof struc­ture. Our goal is to build a group for the future where strong part­ner compa­nies thrive while main­tai­ning their iden­tity. Biotec GmbH’s renow­ned exper­tise in micro­bio­lo­gi­cal hygiene perfectly comple­ments CERTANIA’s focus on envi­ron­men­tal and regu­la­tory services. Toge­ther, we are well posi­tio­ned to support indus­tries in meeting safety and compli­ance stan­dards amidst global chal­lenges such as the COVID-19 pandemic.”
CERTANIA’s ecosys­tem provi­des a plat­form for mid-sized, know­ledge-based compa­nies to thrive under one roof, retai­ning their entre­pre­neu­rial free­dom while bene­fiting from the group’s resour­ces and support. About Biotec GmbH Foun­ded in 1991 with head­quar­ters in Güters­loh, Germany and a branch office in Mitt­weida, Germany, Biotec GmbH is a leading consul­ting and envi­ron­men­tal labo­ra­tory specia­li­zing in micro­bio­lo­gi­cal hygiene and occu­pa­tio­nal safety.
With over 25 years of expe­ri­ence, we deve­lop pionee­ring solu­ti­ons for air puri­fi­ca­tion in various indus­tries and the food sector. Our services include air purity tests, inspec­tions of HVAC systems accor­ding to VDI 6022 stan­dards and hygiene training.
Biotec GmbH stands for excel­lence and supports its custo­mers with high-quality services and expert opini­ons to ensure safe and compli­ant environments.
www.biotec-gmbh.de About CERTANIA Under the umbrella of CERTANIA Holding GmbH, a new global market player in the fields of Test­ing, Inspec­tion & Certi­fi­ca­tion is emerging.
The group offers medium-sized part­ners a sustainable home for their life’s work.
CERTANIA enables entre­pre­neurs and owners to deve­lop their busi­ness with like-minded people while preser­ving their entre­pre­neu­rial roots, corpo­rate culture, brand and values.
More infor­ma­tion at certania.com About GREENPEAK PARTNERS Our goal is long-term growth and profi­ta­bi­lity by buil­ding sustainable businesses.
We are convin­ced that compa­nies that are truly sustainable can achieve above-average returns in the long term.
At the same time, compa­nies can only be truly sustainable if they are finan­ci­ally viable and growing.

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Düsseldorf/Munich — McDer­mott Will & Emery has advi­sed Great Point Part­ners (GPP) on the acqui­si­tion of contract deve­lo­p­ment and manu­fac­tu­ring orga­niza­tion (CDMO) Lyocon­tract GmbH.
The senior secu­red loan provi­ded by Rantum Private Debt Fund III serves as part of the purchase price finan­cing for this acquisition.
— The tran­sac­tion marks the first invest­ment by the Euro­pean arm of GPP Great Point Part­ners, which recently estab­lished a presence in London.
A McDer­mott team of German and US lawy­ers led by Dr. Jan Hückel and Ludwig Zesch provi­ded compre­hen­sive advice on the M&A tran­sac­tion, inclu­ding the acqui­si­tion finan­cing by Rantum Capi­tal. Great Point Part­ners, head­quar­te­red in Green­wich, Conne­ti­cut, is a leading invest­ment firm focu­sed on the health­care industry.
Since its foun­ding in 2003, GPP has provi­ded growth capi­tal and manage­ment buyout finan­cing to more than 100 growth-orien­ted companies.
GPP is curr­ently making new mino­rity and majo­rity private equity invest­ments from its GPP IV fund. Rantum Capi­tal is a mid-market finan­cier for the German-spea­king region (DACH), foun­ded by finan­cial profes­sio­nals, successful entre­pre­neurs and former DAX top managers.
Rantum Capi­tal curr­ently mana­ges three private debt funds focu­sed on flexi­ble, custo­mi­zed debt finan­cing and one private equity fund focu­sed on majo­rity invest­ments in mid-market companies.
Lyocon­tract GmbH, foun­ded in 2007, is an inde­pen­dent contract deve­lo­p­ment and manu­fac­tu­ring company based in Ilsen­berg, Germany.
The company specia­li­zes in the produc­tion of liquid and lyophi­li­zed paren­te­ral drugs, which are distri­bu­ted world­wide for both clini­cal and commer­cial appli­ca­ti­ons. Advi­sor Great Point Part­ners: McDer­mott Will & Emery, Düsseldorf/Munich Dr. Jan Hückel (Corporate/M&A, Düssel­dorf), Ludwig Zesch (Finance, Munich; both lead), Robert K. Clagg (Chicago, Corporate/M&A), Daniel N. Zucker (Chicago), Alex Farr (Dallas), Michael J. Bruno (Miami), Daniel J. Bell (Washing­ton, DC), Dr. Maxi­mi­lian Meyer (Coun­sel, Frank­furt), Sarah Gabbai (Coun­sel, London; all Tax), Chris­tian Krohs, Carina Kant (both Düsseldorf/Cologne), Dr. Laura Stamm­witz (Coun­sel, Frank­furt), Timo­thy Carson (Coun­sel, Washing­ton, DC; all Anti­trust), Dr. Alexa Ningel­gen (Public Law), Dr. Thomas Gennert (Employ­ment Law; both Düssel­dorf), Jana Grieb (Health­care & Life Scien­ces, Frank­furt); Asso­cia­tes: Dr. Alex­an­der Hoppe, Darius M. Mosleh (both Corporate/M&A, Düssel­dorf), Jeff Cass­idy, Joe Luzad­der, Betty Migue­lina Brito (all Corporate/M&A, Chicago), Matthias M. Bosbach, Romy Lanz (both Finance), Julian Rößler-Weis, Dr. Anja Bert­rand, Max Kütt­ner (all Anti­trust; all Düssel­dorf), Alex­an­dra Heberle (Healthcare/Regulatory, Frank­furt), Dr. Tim Weill (Public Law), Lukas Deutz­mann (Employ­ment; both Düssel­dorf), Carina Schüt­ze­berg (Frank­furt)

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Essen/ Frank­furt a. M. — Global growth inves­tor The River­side Company (“River­side”) has acqui­red a majo­rity stake in GFOS Group (“GFOS”), a market leader for profes­sio­nal work­force manage­ment and person­nel requi­re­ments planning.
River­side will support GFOS in key stra­te­gic value crea­tion stra­te­gies, in parti­cu­lar further inter­na­tio­na­liza­tion and cloud migration.
The manage­ment of the company remains unchanged.
POELLATH provi­ded legal and tax advice to the share­hol­ders of GFOS in connec­tion with the transaction.
Foun­ded in 1988 and based in Essen, GFOS Group is an inter­na­tio­nally reco­gni­zed provi­der of inno­va­tive soft­ware solu­ti­ons in the areas of work­force manage­ment, smart manu­fac­tu­ring and access control as well as secure and flexi­ble cloud & IT infrastructures.
GFOS employs more than 200 people and, in addi­tion to its head­quar­ters in Essen, has another office in Hamburg and a subsi­diary in Switz­er­land (GFOS Schweiz AG).
The company’s custo­mer base compri­ses 4,500 custo­mers in 30 countries.
These include ARI Arma­tu­ren Albert Rich­ter GmbH & Co KG, Arthrex GmbH, Feller AG, IMS Gear SE & Co KG, MANN + HUMMEL Inter­na­tio­nal GmbH & Co KG, Trans­gour­met Deutsch­land GmbH & Co KG, NOWEDA Apothe­ker­ge­nos­sen­schaft eG, Schwan Cosme­tics Germany GmbH & Co KG and Senn­ei­ser elec­tro­nic GmbH & Co KG. About River­side River­side is a global invest­ment firm that focu­ses on part­ne­ring with compa­nies to drive trans­for­ma­tio­nal growth and lasting value.
Since its incep­tion, River­side has made more than 1,000 invest­ments and curr­ently holds 140 port­fo­lio companies.
The company employs more than 350 people at 15 loca­ti­ons on three conti­nents. POELLATH advi­sed the share­hol­ders of GFOS on the legal and tax aspects of the tran­sac­tion with the follo­wing team: Otto Haber­stock, M.C.J. (NYU) (Part­ner, Lead, M&A/Private Equity, Munich) Gerald Herr­mann (Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Tax, Munich) Daniel Wied­mann, LL.M.
(NYU) (Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Anti­trust, Frank­furt aM) Dr. Andreas Reuther (Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Employ­ment, Munich) Daniel Zhu (Coun­sel, M&A/Private Equity, Munich)

News

Berlin — Macqua­rie Bank is faci­li­ta­ting new funding for the rental fintech Topi, which has grown stron­gly over the past year.
Further growth is now to be finan­ced: Macqua­rie Bank Europe is provi­ding a credit line of 50 million euros — linked to indi­vi­dual inte­rim targets.
Previously, promi­nent venture capi­ta­lists such as Index Ventures and Crean­dum had inves­ted a total of 50 million dollars in the young company, part of which alre­ady consis­ted of a credit line. Topi turno­ver increased twenty-fold The Topi foun­ders Char­lotte Pallua and Estelle Merle (photo © topi) toge­ther with online retail­ers such as Conrad and Cyber­port, who offer “Rent with Topi” as a payment method for corpo­rate custo­mers along­side PayPal, credit cards and the like.
topi offers retail­ers a hard­ware-as-a-service plat­form through which they can offer their products for rent.
— With this finan­cing, topi wants to conti­nue to grow in both the German and Austrian markets.
Along­side this loan finan­cing, Macqua­rie has also inves­ted in the fintech start-up so that “our refi­nan­cing part­ners have an inte­rest in the over­all long-term success”, says Char­lotte Pallua, one of the two founders.
Char­lotte Pallua came up with her start-up idea during her job at tech company Apple.
At the time, she was analy­zing possi­ble subscrip­tion programs for iPho­nes — and thought about offe­ring the service to diffe­rent companies.
Corpo­rate custo­mers can now rent smart­phones, laptops, robots and other devices from the Berlin-based company Topi, which Pallua foun­ded toge­ther with Estelle Merle.
To date, the propor­tion of women in many deve­lo­p­ment teams at German start-ups has been low.
At topi, the propor­tion of women is high.
The fintech curr­ently employs 35+ people. Advi­sor topi: Vogel Heerma Waitz Dr. Clemens Waitz and Dr. Lorenz Frey from the law firm Vogel Heerma Waitz advi­sed the fintech topi on this financing.
The company raised EUR 50 million from the Austra­lian invest­ment bank Macquarie.
The new finan­cing consists partly of equity, but also of funds to refi­nance new products.
Dr. Clemens Waitz, Dr. Lorenz Frey Vogel Heerma Waitz is a Berlin-based law firm specia­li­zing in growth capi­tal, tech­no­logy and media.

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Frank­furt a. M. — A cross-office team led by HEUKING part­ners Dr. Thors­ten Kuthe and Dr. Kai Erhardt has provi­ded legal advice to SGT German Private Equity GmbH & Co. KGaA on the acqui­si­tion of majo­rity stakes in three inter­net payment service providers.
The acqui­si­tion will be finan­ced by EUR 9.15 million in cash on the one hand and by issuing 24.8 million treasury shares on the other.
A price of EUR 2.40 per share has been set for the SGT shares.
On August 13, 2024, the Frank­furt-based private equity mana­ger announ­ced the acqui­si­tion of 72.9% of Funanga AG (Berlin), 75% of Campam­ocha Ltd (Malta) and 75% of Surfer Rosa Ltd (Isle of Man).
With this acqui­si­tion, SGT begins its trans­for­ma­tion into a listed FinTech company, which will operate under the new name “The Payments Group Holding”.
The tran­sac­tion is still subject to various condi­ti­ons, inclu­ding the neces­sary regu­la­tory approval.
SGT German Private Equity GmbH & Co KGaA is a listed invest­ment company based in Frank­furt am Main.
From its history as a leading German venture capi­tal provi­der under the former name German Start­ups Group, SGT German Private Equity holds a heri­tage port­fo­lio of mino­rity stakes in partly promi­sing German tech start­ups. Advi­sors to SGT German Private Equity GmbH & Co. KGaA: HEUKING Dr. Thors­ten Kuthe (Capi­tal Markets/M&A, lead), Colo­gne Dr. Kai Erhardt (M&A, co-lead), Hamburg, Dr. Chris­toph Grin­gel, Frank­furt, Dr. André Hofmann, LL.M.
(banking super­vi­sory law), Frank­furt, Dr. Frede­rik Wiemer (anti­trust law), Hamburg, Dr. Hans Markus Wulf (IP/IT), Hamburg, Marcel Maybaum (IP/IT), Düssel­dorf, Stefan Wester­heide, LL.M.
oec (Corporate/M&A), Colo­gne, Michèle von Lewin­ski (Banking Super­vi­sion), Frank­furt, Natha­lie Hemmer­ling (Corporate/M&A), Hamburg, Tatiana Vorot­nit­skaya, k.i.n. (Capi­tal Markets), Colo­gne About HEUKING With over 400 lawy­ers, tax advi­sors and nota­ries at eight offices in Germany, HEUKING is one of the largest German busi­ness law firms.
Foun­ded over 50 years ago, HEUKING is one of the TOP 20 law firms with the highest turno­ver in Germany accor­ding to the indus­try publisher JUVE.
The spec­trum of our legal advice ranges from medium-sized compa­nies based in Germany and abroad to large inter­na­tio­nal compa­nies (inclu­ding listed compa­nies) in all matters of commer­cial law.

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Aachen, August 9, 2024 — PL BioSci­ence GmbH, pioneer in the field of sustainable, animal-free cell culture media, has successfully closed a Series A financing.
The finan­cing round attrac­ted signi­fi­cant invest­ments from AVANT BIO (New York), LePure Biotech (Shang­hai), b.value AG (Dort­mund) and better ventures (Munich).
The four part­ners contri­bute their expe­ri­ence in deep tech, life scien­ces and health tech.
The consor­tium joins a group of exis­ting inves­tors led by Bright­lands Venture Part­ners (Geleen) and Tech­Vi­sion Fonds (Aachen), who have once again pled­ged their support for the Aachen-based biotech company’s mission.
PL BioScience’s inno­va­tive Human Plate­let Lysate (HPL) tech­no­logy enables breakth­rough deve­lo­p­ments in cell therapy.
“We look forward to conti­nuing our support for PL BioSci­ence and its outstan­ding HPL products in the coming years toge­ther with this great consor­tium of inves­tors,” says Bern­hard Kugel, Mana­ging Part­ner of the Tech­Vi­sion Fund.
Dr. Luc Starm­ans, Part­ner at Bright­lands Venture Part­ners, also expres­ses his contin­ued commit­ment: “We warmly congra­tu­late the team and welcome our new part­ners on this exci­ting jour­ney. Toge­ther, we look forward to buil­ding on PL BioScience’s ground­brea­king work to advance effec­tive cell thera­pies that will bring trans­for­ma­tive bene­fits to both pati­ents and the planet.” Pionee­ring cell culture tech­no­logy from Aachen
HPL is deri­ved from dona­ted blood that is no longer suita­ble for trans­fu­sion and offers a sustainable and effec­tive alter­na­tive to animal-deri­ved cell culture media. Conven­tio­nal methods often use fetal calf serum (TCS), which is obtai­ned from the blood of calf fetu­ses. With HPL, a more seam­less trans­fera­bi­lity of rese­arch results to humans is possi­ble. The tech­no­logy ensu­res relia­ble results in labo­ra­to­ries world­wide, paving the way for major advan­ces in rege­ne­ra­tive medi­cine. “PL BioScience’s Elarem plat­form uniquely meets the needs of rese­ar­chers by provi­ding human plate­let-based cell culture media along the entire rese­arch chain,” says Rein­hard Vogt, Part­ner at AVANT BIO, who will join PL BioScience’s Advi­sory Board upon comple­tion. “We are exci­ted to support PL BioSci­ence as it enters a new phase of commer­cial expan­sion, both with working capi­tal and with our team’s deca­des of expe­ri­ence in cell culture media.”
Rege­ne­ra­tive treat­ments based on cell thera­pies The company’s exten­sive custo­mer base, which includes leading life science and biome­di­cal compa­nies, rese­arch insti­tu­ti­ons and univer­sity hospi­tals, relies on PL BioScience’s HPL to deve­lop breakth­rough cellu­lar thera­pies. These cell thera­pies rely on highly safe and effec­tive growth media to improve the treat­ment opti­ons for auto­im­mune dise­a­ses such as type 1 diabe­tes melli­tus or the possi­bi­li­ties in wound heal­ing. Tina Drei­mann, foun­der and Mana­ging Direc­tor of better ventures, summa­ri­zes the company’s mission: “We are exci­ted to support PL BioSci­ence in revo­lu­tio­ni­zing rege­ne­ra­tive medi­cine with their inno­va­tive HPL tech­no­logy. With a strong team, a proven market fit and a stra­te­gic patent port­fo­lio, PL BioSci­ence stands out as an excep­tio­nal invest­ment in the biome­di­cal space.” Massive growth in global demand for cell culture media Dr. Hatim Hemeda, co-foun­der and CEO of PL BioScience
is obser­ving the growing demand for cell culture media that meet the high requi­re­ments of clini­cal studies: “The incre­asing number of clini­cal studies, espe­ci­ally with stem cells, is opening up promi­sing approa­ches. This increase is driving the estab­lish­ment of produc­tion faci­li­ties and the further deve­lo­p­ment of regu­la­tory frame­works, which is leading to a signi­fi­cant rise in global demand for cell culture media.” The global market for stem cell therapy, for exam­ple, is fore­cast to grow from USD 15 billion in 2024 to USD 63 billion in 2031, more than quadru­pling in terms of market volume. (Source: Global Stem Cell Therapy Market, Coher­ent Market Insights, 2024.) This trend is clearly visi­ble not only in Europe and the USA, but also in China, where demand for HPL is growing rapidly. “China curr­ently relies almost exclu­si­vely on impor­ted media for the culti­va­tion of stem cells and T cells. With the advance­ment of rege­ne­ra­tive medi­cine, the market poten­tial for HPL culture media in China is huge,” said Yu Chen, CFO at LePure Biotech.
Stra­te­gic part­ner­ship drives geogra­phic expan­sion Chris­tian Wilkes, co-foun­der and CFO of PL BioScience
empha­si­zes the stra­te­gic importance of the inter­na­tio­nal part­ner­ships: “By offe­ring high-quality, animal-free growth media, we have been able to build a solid repu­ta­tion both locally and globally. The invol­vement of renow­ned invest­ment compa­nies from Europe, the US and China acce­le­ra­tes our global growth stra­tegy and streng­thens our presence in these emer­ging geogra­phic markets.” Peter Kallien, Mana­ging Part­ner and foun­der of b.value AG, high­lights the poten­tial of the Aachen-based company: “PL BioSci­ence is perfectly posi­tio­ned as its HPL meets the high demands of clini­cal cell culture while being scalable to serve the growing rege­ne­ra­tive medi­cine market. We are proud to support a team that not only has the exper­tise, but also the passion to make a real difference.” 

News

Frank­furt am Main / Bous / Merel­beke — KTP Kunst­stoff Palet­ten­tech­nik (port­fo­lio company of Frank­furt-based invest­ment company VR Equi­typ­art­ner) and conTeyor Inter­na­tio­nal (majo­rity-owned by Dutch inves­tor Gilde Equity Manage­ment) have merged to form a new market leader in the pack­a­ging sector.
The group combi­nes KTP’s exper­tise as a leading specia­list for reusable, foldable carrier and contai­ner systems made of plas­tic with conTeyor’s know-how in the field of textile inner pack­a­ging solutions.
Toge­ther, the group with around 1,000 employees will gene­rate global sales of appro­xi­m­ately EUR 200 million.
The tran­sac­tion, which is still subject to regu­la­tory appr­oval, is expec­ted to be comple­ted this year.
KTP Kunst­stoff Palet­ten­tech­nik GmbH was foun­ded in 1988 and is a pioneer in the deve­lo­p­ment and manu­fac­ture of sustainable and inno­va­tive reusable plas­tic packaging.
The foldable contai­ners and large load carri­ers are made from 80% recy­cled mate­rial and save a signi­fi­cant amount of space when retur­ning goods by redu­cing their volume.
From the Saar­land, KTP supplies custo­mers world­wide with the vision of making logi­stics gree­ner by redu­cing CO2 emissions.
VR Equi­typ­art­ner acqui­red a mino­rity stake in KTP at the end of 2011 and has since supported the family entre­pre­neur and other manage­ment in the company’s strong expansion.
In addi­tion to diver­si­fy­ing the custo­mer struc­ture and ongo­ing product inno­va­tion, a new produc­tion site was built in Lisdorf, Saar­land, which enab­led the company to reflect the high growth and deeper value crea­tion in production.
In 2022/23, the Slove­nian inner pack­a­ging specia­list K2 PAK was also acqui­red. conTeyor, foun­ded in 1995 near Ghent, is an inter­na­tio­nal provi­der in the deve­lo­p­ment and produc­tion of custo­mi­zed textile and steel pack­a­ging solu­ti­ons for scratch- and damage-sensi­tive parts.
The company is a leader in inno­va­tive and sustainable pack­a­ging for the auto­mo­tive industry.
Its custo­mers include auto­mo­tive manu­fac­tu­r­ers, house­hold appli­ance and elec­tro­nics produ­cers in particular.
To achieve maxi­mum protec­tion with mini­mum space requi­re­ments, conTeyor uses advan­ced 3D design and cons­truc­tion methods, supported by proprie­tary software.
conTeyor’s produc­tion sites are loca­ted in Europe and North America.
conTeyor’s declared goal is to signi­fi­cantly reduce CO2 emis­si­ons through inno­va­tive pack­a­ging and to become an ESG pioneer in its field.
Gilde, a leading invest­ment company from Bene­lux, has held a stake in conTeyor since 2018.
As part of the tran­sac­tion, the KTP foun­ding family Wintrich is with­dra­wing from the share­hol­der group and manage­ment, although the previous CEO Andreas Wintrich will conti­nue to support the new group in an advi­sory capacity.
The KTP share­hol­ders VR Equi­typ­art­ner and Wagner Holding will retain a signi­fi­cant stake in the group.
The manage­ment team consists of the two conTeyor mana­ging direc­tors Orm Verberne (CEO) and Tim van Londer­sele (CFO) as well as KTP mana­ging direc­tor Martin Hent­schel (COO).
The current KTP site in Bous (Saar­land) will serve as the group’s head­quar­ters. Orm Verberne, CEO of conTeyor and the future group, says: “We are deligh­ted to open a new chap­ter in the history of both compa­nies. A joint market presence and the combi­na­tion of our know-how is the best of both worlds and makes us a true House of Compe­tence. Sustaina­bi­lity is in the DNA of KTP and conTeyor. We help our custo­mers to cut costs and reduce their carbon foot­print by deve­lo­ping reusable pack­a­ging and storage solu­ti­ons with a long shelf life. The combi­na­tion of stan­dar­di­zed contai­ners and custo­mi­zed inlays is the way to a more sustainable world.”
Chris­tian Futter­lieb, Mana­ging Direc­tor of VR Equi­typ­art­ner, adds: “The busi­ness models and market coverage of KTP and conTeyor are highly comple­men­tary — our KTP stands for foldable contai­ner solu­ti­ons and load carri­ers made of plas­tic, while conTeyor offers indi­vi­dua­li­zed inner pack­a­ging solu­ti­ons made of textile. A high-poten­tial combi­na­tion that bene­fits from the strong trends towards more sustainable logi­stics and custo­mi­zed pack­a­ging solu­ti­ons. We look forward to working toge­ther with the employees of KTP and conTeyor as well as our part­ners Wagner and Gilde. In addi­tion to the employees, special thanks are due to Chris­tel, Andreas and Horst Wintrich and Martin Hent­schel, whose tire­less commit­ment has made KTP a unique success story.”
Andreas Wintrich, Mana­ging Direc­tor of KTP, says: “Toge­ther with our long-stan­ding part­ners, VREP and Wagner, we as a family and manage­ment have deve­lo­ped KTP into a strong and successful inno­va­tion leader. Sustaina­bi­lity, custo­mer and employee orien­ta­tion are our top prio­ri­ties. The merger with conTeyor is an important step for the future of the company and the right time to hand over the baton to a new gene­ra­tion of mana­gers. My family and I are deligh­ted that KTP’s success story will continue.”
The VR Equi­typ­art­ner tran­sac­tion team: Sarah Oster­mann, Vincent Mrohs, Jens Schöf­fel, Simone Weck, Falk Stecken­born Advi­sors VR Equi­typ­art­ner on this tran­sac­tion: M&A: Rauten­berg & Company (Phil­ipp v. Hoch­berg, Maxi­mi­lian Gailer, Marcel Hellen­thal) Legal: Orrick, Herring­ton & Sutcliffe (Dr. Chris­toph Bren­ner, Adrian Deng­ler, Stefan Riedl) Finan­cial Due Dili­gence: Deloitte (Tanya Fehr, Nils Nobe­reit, Stefan Spies, Marvin Reiss­land) Tax Due Dili­gence: Deloitte (Hannah Hilde­brand, Doro­thea Paar, Marie-Chris­tin Wienand) Tax Struc­tu­ring: Flick Gocke Schaum­burg (Dr. Florian Kutt, Larissa Rickli, Rickard Kelch) Anti­trust Advice: Lupp + Part­ner (Tilman Siebert)

News

Munich — ARCUS Capi­tal AG has acqui­red a majo­rity stake in FLBE Health GmbH.
The foun­ders Betül Yönak-Bein and Florian Bein, toge­ther with other share­hol­ders, have acqui­red a signi­fi­cant stake in the company.
They will manage the busi­ness toge­ther with ARCUS in the future.
FLBE Health GmbH offers high-quality, certi­fied orga­nic bee products under the “bedrop” brand, which are prima­rily used as cosme­tics and care products.
Since its foun­da­tion in 2020, the company has grown stron­gly and has estab­lished exten­sive multi-chan­nel distribution.
Munich-based ARCUS Capi­tal AG focu­ses on majo­rity share­hol­dings in the DACH region.
ARCUS invests both its own capi­tal and capi­tal from selec­ted co-investors.
The company port­fo­lio curr­ently consists of indus­trial, media and online compa­nies with a total turno­ver of approx. 300 million euros. Legal advi­sors ARCUS Capi­tal AG: Gütt Olk Feld­haus, Munich Dr. Sebas­tian Olk (Part­ner, Corporate/M&A, Lead), Dr. Domi­nik Forst­ner (Senior Asso­ciate, Corporate/M&A, Lead), Thomas Becker, LL.M., David Ziegel­mayer (both Of Coun­sel, IP/IT/Commercial), Tobias Berg­meis­ter (Asso­ciate, Corporate/M&A) Alten­burg Fach­an­wälte für Arbeits­recht, Munich: Andreas Ege (Part­ner, Employ­ment Law) About Gütt Olk Feld­haus Gütt Olk Feld­haus is a leading inter­na­tio­nal law firm based in Munich. We provide compre­hen­sive advice on commer­cial and corpo­rate law. Our focus is on corpo­rate law, M&A, private equity and finan­cing. In these specia­list areas we also take on the litigation.

News

Munich — Gleiss Lutz has advi­sed Jern­bro, one of Sweden’s leading provi­ders of indus­trial services, on the acqui­si­tion of Veltec Nordics Holding GmbH from Bochum-based PSS.
The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to close in Septem­ber 2024 and is subject to custo­mary closing condi­ti­ons and approvals.
Jern­bro is a leading provi­der of indus­trial main­ten­ance services and projects with 30 loca­ti­ons and over 1,000 employees in Sweden.
Veltec is a leading indus­trial services company with a strong presence in Norway and Denmark.
Jern­bro is a port­fo­lio company of Blue­wa­ter, an inter­na­tio­nal private equity fund specia­li­zing in the energy sector.
Blue­wa­ter curr­ently has USD 2.5 billion of capi­tal under manage­ment with a port­fo­lio of 19 compa­nies, focu­sing prima­rily on projects or tech­no­lo­gies that contri­bute to the energy transition.
As a signa­tory to the UN Prin­ci­ples for Respon­si­ble Invest­ment, Blue­wa­ter has a strong focus on ESG.
Follo­wing the acqui­si­tion, a team of around 1,300 employees will operate in over 35 loca­ti­ons in Sweden, Norway and Denmark, provi­ding compre­hen­sive end-to-end indus­trial services and support­ing decar­bo­niza­tion projects. Advi­sors to Jern­bro: Gleiss Lutz Dr. Jan Bals­sen (lead, part­ner, photo © GL), Dr. Stepha­nie Daus­in­ger, Dr. Adrian Schulz (all Munich), Dr. Pirmin Emanuel Schrei­ner (all M&A, Berlin), Dr. Stefan Mayer (part­ner), Dr. Domi­nik Monz (both Frank­furt), Jochen Pfle­ger (all tax, Hamburg), Dr. Alex­an­der Molle (part­ner, Berlin), Chris­tian Eulen­pesch (both commer­cial, IP/tech, Stuttgart).
Jern­bro was also advi­sed on the acqui­si­tion by the law firms Wikborg Rein Advo­kat­firma AS and Accura Advo­kat­part­ner­sels­kab. About Gleiss Lutz Gleiss Lutz offers full service at the highest level in offices in Berlin, Frank­furt a. M., Stutt­gart, Munich, Düssel­dorf, Brussels and London.
We aim to be a market leader in every area of law and every sector.
The special plus: our lawy­ers always keep an eye on aspects to the right and left of their own area of law.
If neces­sary, they involve experts from all rele­vant areas in a project on an ad hoc basis.
In indi­vi­du­ally assem­bled teams, we deve­lop inno­va­tive solu­ti­ons and prag­ma­tic recom­men­da­ti­ons for action, even for the most diffi­cult and complex issues facing companies.
www.gleisslutz.com  

News

Schaff­hau­sen, Switz­er­land — Acro­nis (the “Company”) and EQT have agreed that EQT X Fund (“EQT”) will acquire a majo­rity stake in Acronis.
The Company’s foun­ders, manage­ment team and current inves­tors — inclu­ding CVC, Spring­co­ast and Black­Rock Private Equity Part­ners — will remain as signi­fi­cant mino­rity investors.
The tran­sac­tion values Acro­nis above the valua­tion of the last invest­ment round in 2021 (2021: over USD 250 million at a valua­tion of USD 2.5 billion).
Foun­ded in 2003, Acro­nis is a leading provi­der of IT solu­ti­ons for mana­ged service provi­ders, offe­ring an inte­gra­ted, highly effi­ci­ent plat­form for cyber secu­rity and data protection.
As data volu­mes conti­nue to grow and IT land­scapes become more complex, compa­nies are incre­asingly reco­gni­zing the importance of cyber security.
Acro­nis enables its custo­mers to outsource IT func­tions while ensu­ring high stan­dards of data secu­rity, inte­grity and reliability.
Through mana­ged service provi­der distri­bu­tion, Acro­nis is well posi­tio­ned to conti­nue to rapidly expand its custo­mer network.
With 15 loca­ti­ons world­wide and more than 1,700 employees, Acro­nis has a network that spans 150 count­ries and enables more than 20,000 service provi­ders to protect the data of over 750,000 organizations.
Johan­nes Reichel (Photo: EQT),
Part­ner and Co-Head of Tech­no­logy in EQT’s Private Equity Advi­sory team, said: “Acro­nis has built a strong market posi­tion as a cyber secu­rity and data protec­tion soft­ware plat­form by offe­ring a compel­ling propo­si­tion to mana­ged service provi­ders. EQT has follo­wed the company’s deve­lo­p­ment over many years and has been impres­sed by its perfor­mance and inno­va­tion. We are very exci­ted to part­ner with Acro­nis, the manage­ment team and exis­ting inves­tors in the next phase of growth.”
Ezequiel Stei­ner, CEO of Acro­nis, said: “We are very plea­sed to have EQT on board as a majo­rity share­hol­der who supports our stra­te­gic expan­sion and stands behind our growth vision. We would like to thank our exis­ting inves­tors for their support and are plea­sed that many of them will remain invol­ved. Most importantly, I would like to thank the Acro­nis team for the outstan­ding work that has enab­led us to achieve this.”
Phil Good­win, Rese­arch Vice Presi­dent at IDC, said of Acro­nis’ product offe­ring: “Data secu­rity is the foun­da­tion of cyber secu­rity and the two areas are incre­asingly intert­wi­ned. Acro­nis’ archi­tec­ture of inte­gra­ted data protec­tion, cyber secu­rity and remote manage­ment in a single, custo­mizable plat­form enables mana­ged service provi­ders and IT depart­ments to easily and relia­bly build a robust cyber readi­ness for their business.”
The closing of the tran­sac­tion is subject to custo­mary regu­la­tory appr­ovals and is expec­ted to close in the
1st to
2nd quar­ter of 2025. Advi­sor Acro­nis: Will­kie Farr & Gallag­her About EQT EQT is a global invest­ment orga­niza­tion with EUR 246 billion in assets under manage­ment (EUR 133 billion in fee-earning assets) across two busi­ness lines — Private Capi­tal and Real Assets.
EQT’s funds invest in compa­nies in Europe, Asia, the Paci­fic and the Ameri­cas. EQT supports its port­fo­lio compa­nies to achieve sustainable growth, opera­tio­nal excel­lence and market leadership.
www.eqtgroup.com About Acro­nis Acro­nis is a global cyber protec­tion company that provi­des directly inte­gra­ted cyber secu­rity, data protec­tion and endpoint manage­ment for mana­ged service provi­ders (MSPs), small and medium-sized busi­nesses (SMBs) and enter­prise IT departments.
Acro­nis solu­ti­ons are highly effec­tive and desi­gned to iden­tify, prevent, detect, respond to, reme­diate and reco­ver from modern cyber thre­ats with mini­mal downtime.
This complete approach ensu­res data inte­grity and busi­ness continuity.
Acro­nis offers the most compre­hen­sive secu­rity solu­tion on the market for MSPs with its unique ability to serve the needs of diver­si­fied and decen­tra­li­zed IT environments.
Acro­nis is a Swiss company foun­ded in Singa­pore in 2003 and has 15 offices and employees in over 50 count­ries worldwide.
Acro­nis Cyber Protect is available in 26 languages in 150 count­ries and is used by over 20,000 service provi­ders to protect over 750,000 organizations.
Learn more at www.acronis.com.

News

Munich — FSN Capi­tal, a private equity company based in Scan­di­na­via and Germany, has raised 588 million euros for its “FSN Capi­tal Confluence” fund.
The newly laun­ched fund focu­ses on the re-invest­ment in two port­fo­lio compa­nies whose regu­lar holding period is coming to an end.
FSN Capi­tal Confluence is acqui­ring the mana­ged IT service provi­der Nordlo and the traf­fic safety and infra­struc­ture solu­ti­ons provi­der Saferoad.
Both had been held by FSN Capi­tal Fund V since 2018. The new invest­ment by the conti­nua­tion fund provi­des both compa­nies with addi­tio­nal capi­tal and lays the foun­da­tion for the next growth phase. The fund was signi­fi­cantly over­sub­scri­bed at closing The inves­tors include leading insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors, inclu­ding inter­na­tio­nal foun­da­ti­ons, pension funds and invest­ment mana­gers, some of whom were and are alre­ady invol­ved in previous FSN Capi­tal funds.
The main inves­tor is Liech­ten­stein-based LGT Capi­tal Part­ners; Alta­mar­CAM Part­ners and Cubera act as co-underwriters.
As a so-called conti­nua­tion fund, FSN Confluence follows a model that is still rela­tively new in the indus­try: initi­ally it was a vehicle for the conti­nua­tion of invest­ments that were diffi­cult to sell, but today it is gene­rally used to support successful compa­nies at the end of the previous fund term.
With the Capi­tal Confluence Fund, FSN aims to seam­lessly conti­nue its successful part­ner­ship with attrac­tive port­fo­lio compa­nies and thus support them on their contin­ued growth path.
“We were able to solve a common dilemma in such models with an attrac­tive cons­truct for all sides,” explains Robin Mürer, Co-Mana­ging Part­ner at FSN Capi­tal Part­ners.
“Unusually for the indus­try, we offe­red exis­ting inves­tors the oppor­tu­nity to switch to the conti­nua­tion fund at the previous condi­ti­ons. Many took advan­tage of this status quo roll­over option, while others used the oppor­tu­nity to raise liqui­dity,” the invest­ment expert continued.
For FSN Capi­tal Confluence’s two port­fo­lio compa­nies, the re-invest­ment repres­ents an oppor­tu­nity for addi­tio­nal orga­nic growth and further stra­te­gic add-on acquisitions.
Nordlo, which FSN Capi­tal formed through the merger of four Scan­di­na­vian IT compa­nies, has alre­ady made 15 such acqui­si­ti­ons and is one of the region’s leading provi­ders of mana­ged IT outsour­cing, cloud services and process digitization.
Safe­road is conside­red one of the largest Euro­pean service provi­ders for traf­fic safety.
Since the delis­ting in 2018 and the subse­quent split into Safe­road and ViaCon, the company has been on a steady growth path through FSN Capi­tal, driven by inno­va­tion, ESG leader­ship, opera­tio­nal excel­lence initia­ti­ves and stra­te­gic market conso­li­da­tion. Fred­rik Almén, CEO of Nordlosays: “The conti­nua­tion of the part­ner­ship opens up exci­ting new oppor­tu­ni­ties for further deve­lo­p­ment. With addi­tio­nal capi­tal, we can further expand Nordlo’s successful entre­pre­neu­rial model and grow through even larger acqui­si­ti­ons, both in the Nordics and in other markets.” Bernd Früh­wald, CEO of Safe­roadcommen­ted: “We look forward to conti­nuing our jour­ney toge­ther with FSN Capi­tal. We share a passion for road safety, sustainable infra­struc­ture and our goal to create value for our custo­mers, employees and society. Looking to the future, our part­ner­ship puts us in an excel­lent posi­tion to seize new oppor­tu­ni­ties and lead the way in our indus­try.” Michael Gentili, Head of Capi­tal Markets at FSN Capi­tal Part­nersadded: “Through FSN Capi­tal Confluence, the FSN Capi­tal funds reaf­firm their support and confi­dence in Nordlo and Safe­road and their manage­ment teams. It is parti­cu­larly plea­sing to have such high profile inves­tors at the helm with LGT Capi­tal Part­ners, Alta­mar­CAM Part­ners and Cubera and so many exis­ting FSN Capi­tal V inves­tors wanting to be part of this next phase of growth — we look forward to conti­nuing our jour­ney toge­ther.” André Aubert, Part­ner at LGT Capi­tal Part­ners“We have been cove­ring the secon­dary market for more than two deca­des and have focu­sed on attrac­tive, high-quality assets. With this tran­sac­tion, we are not only support­ing Nordlo and Safe­road, but also deepe­ning our part­ner­ship with FSN Capi­tal Part­ners. This crea­tes oppor­tu­ni­ties for both FSN Capi­tal V and our own inves­tors.” The advi­sers to the fund closing: Camp­bell Luty­ens and K&E About FSN Capi­tal FSN Capi­tal, one of the leading Nort­hern Euro­pean private equity firms, was foun­ded in 1999 and has four offices in Oslo, Stock­holm, Copen­ha­gen and, since 2017, Munich.
The four funds advi­sed by FSN Capi­tal have more than four billion euros under manage­ment; for the latest Fund VI, 1.8 billion euros were raised for invest­ments in Scan­di­na­via and the DACH region.
The funds make majo­rity invest­ments in growth-orien­ted compa­nies in order to support them in their contin­ued success and to make them even more sustainable, compe­ti­tive, inter­na­tio­na­li­zed and profitable.
True to the motto “We are decent people making a decent return in a decent way”, FSN Capital’s team of more than 90 people (25 of whom are based in Munich) is commit­ted to inves­t­ing respon­si­bly, achie­ving a posi­tive ESG impact on the port­fo­lio and gene­ra­ting market-leading returns.
Current port­fo­lio compa­nies in Germany include Bäcker Görtz, MEGABAD (Swash Group), Ecovium, Lobs­ter, impreg, Adra­gos Pharma, Rame­der and TASKING.
www.fsncapital.com

News

Frank­furt am Main — Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG (DBAG) is inves­t­ing in UNITY AG — Akti­en­ge­sell­schaft für Unter­neh­mens­füh­rung und Infor­ma­ti­ons­tech­no­lo­gie (UNITY AG), a leading inter­na­tio­nal consul­ting firm specia­li­zing in tech­no­logy consul­ting and digi­ta­liza­tion processes.
A fund advi­sed by DBAG acqui­res a control­ling stake in UNITY AG.
The previous share­hol­der, UNITY Inno­va­tion Alli­ance, which in turn is owned by its foun­ders and employees, acqui­res an almost equal econo­mic stake.
In addi­tion, UNITY AG employees are also inves­t­ing directly in UNITY AG as part of the transaction.
This results in a constel­la­tion of strong part­ners through the capi­tal share ratios.
The tran­sac­tion, which is still subject to appr­oval by the anti­trust autho­ri­ties, is expec­ted to be comple­ted by the end of the third quar­ter of 2024.
The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the terms of the sale. Holi­stic consul­ting approach for sustainable success UNITY AG, which was named as one of the 14 most important manage­ment consul­tancies in Germany in the renow­ned Lünen­donk® List 2024, offers compre­hen­sive services to clients such as AIRBUS, GEA, Luft­hansa Tech­nik, Merce­des-Benz, Miele and the Univer­sity Hospi­tal of Cologne.
From 14 loca­ti­ons, almost 400 employees enable UNITY AG custo­mers to successfully posi­tion them­sel­ves in the age of digi­ta­liza­tion and sustaina­bi­lity — in 2023, a total output of more than 72 million euros was generated.
Tradi­tio­nal, isola­ted consul­ting approa­ches fall short due to the complex chal­lenges of digi­tal transformation.
This is UNITY AG’s core area of expertise.
It offers its custo­mers the expe­ri­ence of hundreds of successful projects paired with the inno­va­tive power of conti­nuous further deve­lo­p­ment of its areas of exper­tise and consul­ting approaches.
The strong growth of UNITY AG also charac­te­ri­zes this strategy.
In recent years, the company has grown by an average of 13 percent per year, clearly outper­forming the over­all market in Germany (approx. seven percent). UNITY AG is an ideal addi­tion to DBAG’s port­fo­lio The invest­ment decis­ion stems from the fact that the digi­ta­liza­tion market is largely resi­li­ent to macroe­co­no­mic effects.
The demand for consul­ting services is charac­te­ri­zed by struc­tu­ral growth and ther­e­fore offers attrac­tive deve­lo­p­ment opportunities.
These can be further inten­si­fied through the imple­men­ta­tion of stra­te­gic M&A transactions.
As a manage­ment consul­tancy, UNITY AG fits seam­lessly and comple­men­ta­rily into DBAG’s IT services and soft­ware port­fo­lio, which accounts for around 17 percent of the over­all portfolio.
The invest­ment in UNITY AG will bene­fit from this sector exper­tise and DBAG’s network.
Both are fed by current (akqui­net, AOE, Cloudf­light, freiheit.com) and former (in-tech, Solva­res) invest­ments. “UNITY AG is an ideal addi­tion to our port­fo­lio. The company impres­ses with its inno­va­tive and inte­gra­tive consul­ting approach, which goes far beyond pure IT consul­ting. UNITY AG supports custo­mers as a spar­ring part­ner along the entire value crea­tion process. This turns them into digi­tal cham­pi­ons and also enables them to take the deman­ding chal­lenges of digi­ta­liza­tion into their own hands. Toge­ther with the foun­ders, board members and part­ners of UNITY AG, this forms the basis for the growth path that we have jointly defi­ned and that will be pursued in the coming years,” says Jannick Hune­cke, Member of the Manage­ment Board of Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG (Photo: DBAG).
Values and manage­ment systems guaran­tee success UNITY AG orga­ni­zes its services within seven service units, inclu­ding Cyber Secu­rity, IT Trans­for­ma­tion and Sustainability.
The range of services is value-orien­ted and is based on “Inno­vate”, “Inte­grate”, “Trans­form” and “Realize”.
These values are the foun­da­tion of the consul­ting approach and ensure successful project implementation.
The UNITY AG manage­ment system plays a central role in the corpo­rate stra­tegy, focu­ses action on a concrete target image and serves as a compass in consulting.
By conti­nuously analy­zing new trends, UNITY AG is able to anti­ci­pate and iden­tify dyna­mic and tech­no­lo­gi­cal deve­lo­p­ments at an early stage.
The high quality of the manage­ment system is regu­larly confirmed by exter­nal certi­fi­ca­ti­ons, inclu­ding the inter­na­tio­nally valid DIN EN ISO 9001:2015 and DIN EN ISO/IEC 27001:2017 for infor­ma­tion secu­rity management.
Future-orien­ted consul­ting for digi­tal change “We are looking forward to great growth oppor­tu­ni­ties thanks to our brand core of ‘inno­va­tion, digi­ta­liza­tion and trans­for­ma­tion’. This can be further lever­a­ged through stra­te­gic acqui­si­ti­ons. DBAG’s diverse M&A expe­ri­ence also helps us here. In this respect, we are very much looking forward to the colla­bo­ra­tion and the oppor­tu­nity to work toge­ther on our stra­te­gic deve­lo­p­ment,” says
Chris­toph Plass, foun­der and CEO of UNITY AG, explains further: “We have found the ideal inves­tor in DBAG. Its proxi­mity to SMEs and its sector exper­tise repre­sent real added value for UNITY AG. In addi­tion to these tech­ni­cal factors, the ‘cultu­ral fit’ also played a decisive role for us — we not only share a common vision, but also the same values.”
Dr.-Ing. Frank Thie­le­mann, long-stan­ding CEO of UNITY AG, adds: “In recent years, we have reali­zed a very successful orga­nic growth story. The indus­try and custo­mer port­fo­lio that we have built up is an excel­lent basis, also for our orga­nic growth in the coming years. The conti­nua­tion of this path — coupled with the addi­tio­nal oppor­tu­ni­ties of acqui­si­ti­ons with our strong inves­tor DBAG — will lead to a more ambi­tious growth path.”
UNITY AG is commit­ted to active transformation.
In this respect, the corpo­rate stra­tegy is geared towards linking all rele­vant econo­mic and ecolo­gi­cal factors in order to conti­nuously increase custo­mer and employee satisfaction.
This claim is under­li­ned by various awards.
These include the fifth “Best of Consul­ting” award from Wirt­schafts­Wo­che, the “Top Company” award from the employer rating portal kununu and the “Very Good Employer” award from the inter­na­tio­nal rese­arch and consul­ting insti­tute Great Place to Work®.
In addi­tion, nume­rous certi­fi­ca­ti­ons and member­ships in the ESG context, such as the UN GLOBAL Compact, the German Sustaina­bi­lity Code, the ecova­dis® award and the ÖKOPROFIT® certi­fi­ca­tion, demons­trate UNITY AG’s high level of ESG commit­ment. About DBAG Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG (DBAG), which has been listed on the stock exch­ange since 1985, is one of the most renow­ned private equity compa­nies in Germany. As an inves­tor and fund advi­sor, DBAG’s invest­ment focus has tradi­tio­nally been on medium-sized compa­nies with a focus on well-posi­tio­ned compa­nies with deve­lo­p­ment poten­tial, prima­rily in the DACH region. The indus­try focus is on manu­fac­tu­ring compa­nies, indus­trial service provi­ders and Indus­try­Tech compa­nies — i.e. compa­nies whose products enable auto­ma­tion, robo­tics and digi­tiza­tion — as well as compa­nies from the broad­band tele­com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons, IT services, soft­ware and health­care sectors. Since 2020, DBAG has also been repre­sen­ted in Italy with its own office in Milan. Assets mana­ged or advi­sed by the DBAG Group amount to appro­xi­m­ately 2.6 billion euros. As part of its stra­te­gic part­ner­ship with ELF Capi­tal Group, DBAG is adding private debt capi­tal to its range of flexi­ble finan­cing solu­ti­ons for SMEs.

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Berlin — identity.vc has laun­ched the first Euro­pean LGBTQ+ venture capi­tal fund with a target volume of EUR 50 million.
The inves­tor team includes Til Klein, former BCG part­ner and FinTech foun­der, Jochen Beut­gen, family office inves­tor with 20 years of expe­ri­ence in venture capi­tal and Mari Luuk­kai­nen, marke­ting expert and former inves­tor at Icebreaker.vc.
Identity.vc invests prima­rily in LGBTQ+-led start-ups at foun­der or manage­ment level (C‑level) across all industries.
The focus is on young compa­nies, from the pre-seed to the Series A phase, prima­rily in Europe, but also beyond.
The social impact fund (Article 9 SFDR) has alre­ady made four invest­ments, inclu­ding in the Berlin start-up Front­now, which has deve­lo­ped an AI solu­tion for online retail­ers, and in the London start-up Omni, which offers vegan dog food. POELLATH advi­sed identity.vc on all contrac­tual, regu­la­tory and tax aspects of the fund struc­tu­ring and contrac­tual docu­men­ta­tion with the follo­wing Berlin team: Dr. Philip Schwarz van Berk (Photo, Part­ner, Lead, Private Funds) Katha­rina Hammer (Asso­ciate, Private Funds) 

About PÖLLATH POELLATH is a market-leading inter­na­tio­nal busi­ness and tax law firm with more than 180 lawy­ers and tax advi­sors in Berlin, Frank­furt and Munich. We stand for high-end advice on tran­sac­tions and asset manage­ment. We offer legal and tax services from a single source. In our selec­ted and highly specia­li­zed prac­tice groups, we not only know the law, but also shape best prac­tice in the market toge­ther with our clients. Natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal rankings regu­larly list our consul­tants as leading experts in their field. We offer compre­hen­sive services in the follo­wing areas: Mergers & Acqui­si­ti­ons | Private Equity | Venture Capi­tal | Private Funds | Real Estate Law | Corpo­rate and Capi­tal Markets Law | Finan­cing | Tax Law | Succes­sion and Assets | Foun­da­ti­ons and Non-Profit Orga­niza­ti­ons | IP/IT, Distri­bu­tion and Anti­trust Law | Liti­ga­tion and Arbitration.
www.pplaw.de www.identity.vc

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Munich — Biomat­ter, a company in the field of synthe­tic biology, closes a seed finan­cing round of 6.5 million euros.
UVC Part­ners and Inven­ture VC lead the round.
Exis­ting inves­tors Prac­tica Capi­tal and Meta­pla­net, as well as busi­ness angels and indus­try experts, are also participating.
The start-up plans to use the fresh capi­tal to further expand the plat­form and create funda­men­tally new enzymes.
Enzy­mes play a key role in various indus­trial appli­ca­ti­ons, such as in diagno­stics, for exam­ple with DNA poly­me­ra­ses, in gene therapy, for exam­ple with CRISPR, in biofuels, for exam­ple with cellu­la­ses, or in agri­cul­ture, for exam­ple with phytases.
Every new appli­ca­tion requi­res a new enzyme.
The design of new enzy­mes is curr­ently still leng­thy — the process can take months or years -, expen­sive and based on trial-and-error scree­ning around small impro­ve­ments to natu­rally occur­ring enzymes.
Biomatter’s tech­no­logy makes it possi­ble to over­come these chal­lenges with gene­ra­tive AI (arti­fi­cial intelligence).
“Enzy­mes will play a promi­nent role in the future of the bioe­co­nomy — they are the criti­cal element that will ulti­m­ately allow us to create new mole­cu­les, cells and orga­nisms for the world. The enzy­mes we have successfully deve­lo­ped for our global part­ners to date demons­trate our ability to go far beyond the simple opti­miza­tion of known enzy­mes. At Biomat­ter, we believe that the unli­mi­ted capa­city to design funda­men­tally new enzy­mes will help shape a better future for all,” says Laury­nas Karpus, co-foun­der and CEO of Biomatter.
Inno­va­tive tech­no­logy for a sustainable future Back in 2019, the Biomat­ter team published a key study show­ing that their gene­ra­tive AI tool can under­stand the intri­ca­cies of large amounts of enzyme data and use the infor­ma­tion to design enti­rely new enzymes.
This was a signi­fi­cant breakth­rough, demons­t­ra­ting for the first time the ability to create fully func­tional enzy­mes with gene­ra­tive AI.
The Intel­li­gent Archi­tec­ture™ plat­form is the result of these years of research.
Enzy­mes can be rede­si­gned as if on a drawing board: First, the ideal proper­ties of the enzyme are descri­bed, carefully conside­ring the end application.
The enzy­mes are then desi­gned from scratch or exis­ting natu­ral protein scaf­folds are redesigned.
This enables deve­lo­pers of new prote­ins to build precis­ely fitting mole­cu­les from the very first atoms.
This inno­va­tion has been made possi­ble by the deve­lo­p­ment of new gene­ra­tive AI and physi­cal models that are constantly impro­ving at a rapid pace with expe­ri­men­tal vali­da­tion in labo­ra­to­ries to create unique enzy­mes. “AI-powered protein design is curr­ently one of the most exci­ting and dyna­mic areas for venture capi­tal. Biomatter’s inno­va­tive approach to desig­ning funda­men­tally new enzy­mes allows them to break the boun­da­ries of natu­ral enzy­mes, leading to breakth­roughs in biotech­no­logy. We are deeply impres­sed by the strength of the team and are convin­ced that Biomat­ter is a pioneer in the field of AI-based protein design,” says Dr. Oliver Schoppe, Prin­ci­pal at UVC Part­ners. Appli­ca­tion of unique enzy­mes in various indus­tries Using the Intel­li­gent Archi­tec­ture™ plat­form, Biomat­ter crea­tes custo­mi­zed enzy­mes for various indus­tries, inclu­ding chemi­cal biopro­duc­tion, agri­cul­ture, food and medicine.
Custo­mers include compa­nies such as Thermo Fisher Scien­ti­fic, BASF and Neogen.
Kirin, a global leader in nutri­tion and health, achie­ved a breakth­rough in infant nutri­tion with Biomatter’s solu­tion: The colla­bo­ra­tion yiel­ded amazing results in the effi­ci­ent produc­tion of human milk oligos­ac­cha­ri­des (HMOs).
The focus here was speci­fi­cally on one of the most important HMOs in human milk (lacto-N-fuco­pen­ta­ose I; LNFP I for short).
HMOs are criti­cal to infant health and provide nume­rous bene­fits such as support­ing gut health, streng­thening the immune system and protec­ting against infection.
The ability to produce HMOs like LNFP I on an indus­trial scale means that more infants world­wide can have access to these bene­fits. About Biomat­ter Biomat­ter is a synthe­tic biology company that crea­tes new enzy­mes for medi­cal and indus­trial applications.
Through part­ner­ships with global compa­nies (inclu­ding Thermo Fisher Scien­ti­fic, BASF, Neogen) across multi­ple indus­tries, Biomat­ter is brin­ging new products and tech­no­lo­gies to market enab­led by its unique enzymes.
This funding round marks a signi­fi­cant mile­stone for Biomat­ter and posi­ti­ons the company well for the comple­tion of its next major mile­sto­nes and future growth.
More at www.biomatter.com About UVC Part­ners UVC Part­ners is a Munich and Berlin based early stage venture capi­tal firm inves­t­ing in Euro­pean B2B start-ups in the fields of enter­prise soft­ware, indus­trial tech­no­lo­gies and mobi­lity. The fund gene­rally invests between €0.5 and €10 million at the outset and up to €30 million in total per company. The port­fo­lio compa­nies bene­fit from the exten­sive invest­ment and exit expe­ri­ence of the manage­ment team as well as from the close coope­ra­tion with Unter­neh­mer­TUM, Europe’s leading inno­va­tion and start-up center. With over 400 employees and more than 100 indus­try part­ners, Unter­neh­mer­TUM can draw on many years of expe­ri­ence in buil­ding young compa­nies. This colla­bo­ra­tion gives UVC Part­ners the oppor­tu­nity to provide start­ups with unique access to talent, indus­try clients and other finan­cial part­ners. www.uvcpartners.com

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Munich, Germany, West­mins­ter, Colo­rado — Dcubed, a German NewSpace provi­der, has successfully closed a Series A finan­cing round that was over­sub­scri­bed by 26%.
Eight well-known inves­tors from France, Sweden, Germany and the US parti­ci­pa­ted in the round, inclu­ding Expan­sion and BayBG as lead inves­tors as well as HTGF, Aure­lia Foundry, Ventis, Rymd­ka­pi­tal and Decisive Point Europe.
The funds will be stra­te­gi­cally deployed to quadru­ple the produc­tion of satel­lite actua­tors by the end of 2024 to meet the expec­ted demand of over 100,000 satel­lite laun­ches in the coming years.
In addi­tion, Dcubed aims to extend its leader­ship in space manu­fac­tu­ring tech­no­lo­gies criti­cal to the deve­lo­p­ment of high-power satel­li­tes, space solar power, lunar bases and the acce­le­ra­tion of space exploration.
To support these plans, Dcubed is also expan­ding its presence in the U.S., NewSpace’s largest market, by opening an office in West­mins­ter, Colo­rado.
The new office will be headed by Andria Fortier as Mana­ging Direc­tor, who will over­see opera­ti­ons in the US and foster stra­te­gic rela­ti­onships with Ameri­can custo­mers and partners.
Dcubed also plans to demons­trate a world first in 2025 by 3D prin­ting a high-perfor­mance solar panel in free space.
The initia­tive is supported by the Euro­pean Inno­va­tion Coun­cil of the Euro­pean Commis­sion with 9.5 million euros.
“Despite a tense global finan­cial envi­ron­ment, inves­tors signi­fi­cantly over­sub­scri­bed our Series A round.
This finan­cing round demons­tra­tes the market’s high confi­dence in our capabilities.
Toge­ther with our global inves­tors, we now have a solid foun­da­tion to drive future growth in the booming space market.
With the new finan­cing, we will quadru­ple the produc­tion of our current product.
At the same time, we are stri­ving for the ’next big thing’ in space by taking a pionee­ring role in the field of manu­fac­tu­ring in space.
With the opening of our US office, we are tapping into the most dyna­mic space ecosys­tem in the world to further expand our global foot­print and deve­lop space inno­va­tions for years to come,” explains Thomas Sinn, CEO of Dcubed.
“Deep tech and NewSpace start-ups need to show that they can make money while pursuing a big vision.
Dcubed has done this impres­si­vely in recent years.
As lead inves­tor in the seed round, I am very plea­sed about the closing of the Series A and see my invest­ment thesis confirmed,” says Chris­tian Ziach, Prin­ci­pal at HTGF. “Space is one of the fastest growing markets.
The market volume is expec­ted to quadru­ple from around 500 billion dollars to 2 tril­lion dollars in just ten years,” comm­ents Ted Elvhage, Gene­ral Part­ner at Expan­sion Aero­space Ventures.
Dcubed also plans to demons­trate a world first in 2025 by 3D prin­ting a high-perfor­mance solar module in free space. The initia­tive is supported by the Euro­pean Inno­va­tion Coun­cil of the Euro­pean Commis­sion with 9.5 million euros. About Dcubed Dcubed, a NewSpace company based in Munich, Germany, makes space missi­ons acces­si­ble by deve­lo­ping dura­ble and afforda­ble release actua­tors, solar arrays and deploya­ble components.
Utili­zing paten­ted shape memory tech­no­logy and proprie­tary origami struc­tures, Dcubed’s products are supe­rior in cost, mass and volume while offe­ring increased relia­bi­lity, dura­bi­lity and reusability.
Serving a global custo­mer base in over 20 count­ries on 4 conti­nents, Dcubed offers imme­diate product avai­la­bi­lity through its Euro­pean supply chain and is ready to help you realize more cost-effec­tive and frequent space missions.
By deve­lo­ping tech­no­lo­gies to manu­fac­ture large struc­tures directly in space, Dcubed is at the fore­front of space manu­fac­tu­ring and is truly doing great things in space. About High-Tech Grün­der­fonds The seed inves­tor High-Tech Grün­der­fonds (HTGF) finan­ces tech­no­logy start-ups with growth poten­tial and has supported more than 750 start-ups since 2005. With the launch of the fourth fund, HTGF has around 1.4 billion euros under manage­ment. The team of expe­ri­en­ced invest­ment mana­gers and start-up experts supports the young compa­nies with know-how, entre­pre­neu­rial spirit and passion. The focus is on high-tech start-ups in the fields of digi­tal tech, indus­trial tech, life scien­ces, chemis­try and rela­ted busi­ness areas. To date, exter­nal inves­tors have inves­ted around EUR 6 billion in the HTGF port­fo­lio in more than 2,000 follow-up finan­cing rounds. In addi­tion, the fund has alre­ady successfully sold shares in more than 180 compa­nies. Fund inves­tors in the public-private part­ner­ship include the German Fede­ral Minis­try for Econo­mic Affairs and Climate Protec­tion, KfW Capi­tal, and 45 compa­nies from a wide range of indus­tries. www.htgf.de

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Wetz­lar / Feld­kir­chen-Wester­ham / Munich — Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor, in asso­cia­tion with sonn­tag corpo­rate finance one of Germany’s leading M&A advi­sory bouti­ques for medium-sized compa­nies, is support­ing the owners of roofing specia­list JNS Dach­tech­nik GmbH (“JNS”) in its merger with the Wierig Group (“Wierig”), a port­fo­lio company of Vidia Equity (“Vidia”).
Alex­an­der Neureit­her from the owner family will remain invol­ved in the future joint venture in his role as Mana­ging Direc­tor and as part of a growth partnership.
JNS, based in Feld­kir­chen-Wester­ham, was foun­ded in 1982 and is a long-stan­ding specia­list in the water­pro­ofing and reno­va­tion of flat roofs and the instal­la­tion of photo­vol­taic systems.
With a service port­fo­lio ranging from consul­ting and service work to project plan­ning and execu­tion, JNS mainly serves commer­cial and public custo­mers in the Alpine region, parti­cu­larly in the Munich and Rosen­heim area as well as in Upper Bava­ria and Austria.
The company’s high-profile custo­mer base includes nume­rous DAX-listed and inter­na­tio­nal corpo­ra­ti­ons as well as public-sector clients, inclu­ding JNS, which was respon­si­ble for the reno­va­tion of the roofs of the Deut­sches Museum in Munich and Schloss Elmau in Krün.
JNS curr­ently employs around 50 people and most recently gene­ra­ted a total output of around 14 million euros.
Wierig is an estab­lished family busi­ness with over 130 years of history and specia­li­zes in the water­pro­ofing and reno­va­tion of flat roofs and photo­vol­taic systems for indus­trial and commer­cial customers.
With over 200 employees at five loca­ti­ons in Germany, Wierig offers complete solu­ti­ons from plan­ning and execu­tion to conti­nuous roof main­ten­ance and monitoring.
Vidia is a medium-sized invest­ment company based in Munich that specia­li­zes in invest­ments in the field of indus­trial climate solu­ti­ons to promote decarbonization.
In Decem­ber 2023, Vidia Climate Fund I acqui­red a majo­rity stake in the Sieburg-based Wierig Group with the stra­tegy of lever­aging opera­tio­nal value crea­tion poten­tial and incre­asing the Group’s clout through selec­ted add-on acquisitions.
The merger of JNS and Wierig repres­ents the next mile­stone in the successful imple­men­ta­tion of this strategy.
Both compa­nies are united by their charac­ter as a family busi­ness and their focus on indus­trial flat roofs.
In future, the group will be able to offer custo­mers opera­ting nati­on­wide an even more compre­hen­sive range of services. In-depth exper­tise for succes­sion plan­ning in the trades Decar­bo­niza­tion in the wake of climate change is a global mega­trend, and the instal­la­tion indus­try is a key pillar in tack­ling it on a natio­nal level.
The tradi­tio­nally medium-sized and frag­men­ted skil­led trades sector is simul­ta­neously confron­ted with chal­lenges such as regu­la­tory chan­ges, a shortage of skil­led workers and a lack of company succession.
For affec­ted compa­nies, merging with larger groups is ther­e­fore often an option.
For the Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor project team, consis­ting of Sebas­tian Ring­leb and Dennis Minnert, the growth part­ner­ship they supported is part of a series of tran­sac­tions in this context. Sebas­tian Ring­leb, Part­ner in charge at Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor, says: “The roof is beco­ming incre­asingly important for property owners. Espe­ci­ally in the indus­trial sector, compa­nies rely on their produc­tion and storage faci­li­ties being fully protec­ted from the weather. The incre­asing preva­lence of photo­vol­taic systems for energy gene­ra­tion further increa­ses the rele­vance. The indus­try can ther­e­fore look forward to a posi­tive future. The part­ner­ship between JNS and Wierig will not only streng­then the market posi­tion of both compa­nies, but will also make an important contri­bu­tion to the energy tran­si­tion and the decar­bo­niza­tion of the buil­ding sector.” About Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor and sonn­tag corpo­rate finance Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor GmbH, in asso­cia­tion with sonn­tag corpo­rate finance GmbH, is one of the leading M&A advi­sory firms in the German SME sector. The team of almost 30 experts accom­pa­nies medium-sized entre­pre­neurs exclu­si­vely through the entire sales process. “Our task is to safe­guard life’s work,” is how we see oursel­ves. In doing so, custo­mers bene­fit from a unique approach that has won multi­ple awards from the busi­ness press, and which protects the iden­tity of their compa­nies to a special degree. Thanks to their excel­lent access to medium-sized compa­nies, Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor and sonn­tag corpo­rate finance have also estab­lished them­sel­ves as a strong part­ner at the side of renow­ned natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal major compa­nies and inves­tors in acqui­si­ti­ons. This is also demons­tra­ted by the top posi­tion recently achie­ved at the Merger­mar­ket League Table. With a total of ten accom­pa­nied tran­sac­tions in the first quar­ter of 2024, the M&A consul­tancy ranks first in Germany.
www.nachfolgekontor.de | www.sonntagcf.com About JNS Dach­tech­nik GmbH jns-dachtechnik.de

News

Frank­furt a. Main — Infle­xion, a leading Euro­pean mid-market private equity firm, is plea­sed to announce that it has part­ne­red with the foun­ders of Tier­arzt Plus Part­ner (“TPP”), Germany’s largest group of vete­ri­nary prac­ti­ces, to support the company’s contin­ued growth and expan­sion. The invest­ment is being made by Inflexion’s Buyout Fund VI. TPP was foun­ded in 2018 and has almost 100 vete­ri­nary prac­ti­ces throug­hout Germany with around 1,700 employees. The company works with local vete­ri­na­ri­ans to provide leading animal health services, prima­rily for small animals, and supports them with compre­hen­sive trai­ning, indus­try best prac­ti­ces and signi­fi­cant invest­ment in tech­no­logy. The market for vete­ri­nary services in Germany remains frag­men­ted and offers considera­ble poten­tial for further conso­li­da­tion and growth. Infle­xion plans to leverage its exten­sive indus­try expe­ri­ence to work with TPP’s foun­ding manage­ment and share­hol­ders to acce­le­rate the company’s growth. In parti­cu­lar, Infle­xion will support further invest­ments in the digi­ta­liza­tion of the company, in trai­ning and in the expan­sion of the vete­ri­nary prac­tice network in Germany, both through acqui­si­ti­ons and by opening new green­field sites. “As the largest and most successful vete­ri­nary network in Germany, TPP offers an excel­lent plat­form for future growth and deve­lo­p­ment. We look forward to combi­ning our exten­sive expe­ri­ence in this sector with the exper­tise of TPP’s foun­ders and an outstan­ding manage­ment team to further grow the busi­ness,” explains Martin Preuss (photo © Infle­xion), since March 2024 Part­ner and Head of DACH at Infle­xion. Fabian Kröll, Co-Foun­der and CEO, TPP, said: “We look forward to working with Infle­xion to conti­nue inves­t­ing in the growth of our busi­ness and the deve­lo­p­ment of our network. Our foun­ding and leader­ship team will remain on board and we will stay true to our mission of crea­ting the best expe­ri­ence for animals and people every day.” About Infle­xion Infle­xion is a leading Euro­pean mid-market private equity firm that invests in high-growth, entre­pre­neu­rial compa­nies with ambi­tious manage­ment teams, typi­cally valued between €50m and €1bn, and works in part­ner­ship with these compa­nies to acce­le­rate growth. Infle­xion has € 12 billion AUM and invests up to € 600 million of equity per invest­ment in majo­rity tran­sac­tions with various funds, but also in mino­rity tran­sac­tions with Europe’s largest specia­li­zed fund. www.https://www.inflexion.com

News

Stockholm/Hamburg — The Swedish soft­ware company Funnel AB has acqui­red the German AdTriba GmbH, a provi­der of marke­ting attri­bu­tion solutions.
A team led by Hamburg HEUKING part­ner Dr. Jörg Schewe advi­sed Funnel AB compre­hen­si­vely on all legal and tax aspects of the transaction.
The take­over is a further deve­lo­p­ment of the coope­ra­tion between the two compa­nies, which has alre­ady exis­ted for seve­ral years.
The acqui­si­tion of AdTriba streng­thens Funnel’s posi­tion as a leading provi­der of marke­ting intel­li­gence soft­ware in Europe.
Funnel provi­des a plat­form that makes it possi­ble to coll­ect, harmo­nize and visua­lize data from various marke­ting sources.
AdTriba offers a solu­tion to measure and opti­mize the contri­bu­tion of each marke­ting chan­nel to busi­ness success.
By inte­gra­ting AdTriba into the Funnel plat­form, Funnel’s custo­mers can now also analyze and improve the effec­ti­ve­ness of their marke­ting campaigns across diffe­rent channels.
Funnel AB is an inter­na­tio­nal soft­ware company head­quar­te­red in Stock­holm that has specia­li­zed in provi­ding clear dash­boards to help compa­nies coll­ect, report and export infor­ma­tion since its foun­da­tion in 2014.
With more than 2,000 custo­mers in over 60 count­ries, inclu­ding well-known brands such as Adidas, Sony, Uber, Triv­ago and Home Depot, Funnel AB employs around 350 people at loca­ti­ons in Stock­holm, Dublin, London and Boston.
Funnel AB has so far recei­ved more than 100 million US dollars in finan­cing from seve­ral well-known inves­tors over seve­ral finan­cing rounds.
AdTriba GmbH is a German soft­ware company based in Hamburg that was foun­ded in 2015.
With around 20 employees, it offers a marke­ting attri­bu­tion solu­tion that makes it possi­ble to measure and opti­mize the influence of each indi­vi­dual marke­ting chan­nel on the custo­mer jour­ney and to deter­mine the ROI of campaigns.
AdTriba GmbH has more than 30 clients in Germany, Austria and Switz­er­land, inclu­ding well-known brands such as Flix­bus, Deuba, Axel Sprin­ger Verlag, Douglas, Free­now and Montblanc.
Advi­sors Funnel AB / Funnel Holding AB: HEUKING Dr. Jörg Schewe (lead, M&A/Corporate), Dr. Henrik Lay (Tax), both Hamburg, Dr. Lutz Keppe­ler (IT/GDPR), Colo­gne, Caro­line Frohn­wie­ser (M&A/Corporate), Simon Pommer, LL.M. (Tax), Dr. Julia Fied­ler, LL.B., Theresa Arndt, LL.M. (both Labor Law, Employ­ment), Larissa Krebs (Corpo­rate, Finance), all Hamburg, Dr. Ruben Schnei­der (IT/GDPR), Cologne
Further advi­sors Funnel AB / Funnel Holding: Advo­kat­fir­man Vinge KB (Stock­holm) Matthias Pannier, Johan Winner­blad Filip Magnus­son, Adrian Filipovic

News

Munich — A Munich-based team of the global law firm Good­win has advi­sed Kipu Quan­tum GmbH (“Kipu”) on the stra­te­gic acqui­si­tion of the PlanQK plat­form for quan­tum appli­ca­ti­ons from Anaqor AG.
The PlanQK plat­form makes quan­tum compu­ting acces­si­ble in various sectors and serves a broad range of users from leading compa­nies such as BASF, DB Systel GmbH, T‑LABS and TRUMPF.
The bund­ling of compe­ten­cies of Kipu Quan­tum and PlanQK will signi­fi­cantly simplify the connec­tion of quan­tum compu­ting in various sectors such as the phar­maceu­ti­cal, chemi­cal, logi­stics and finan­cial indus­tries, thus enab­ling an early quan­tum advantage.
Kipu Quan­tum is a German company deve­lo­ping ground­brea­king, appli­ca­tion- and hard­ware-speci­fic quan­tum algo­rithms for a variety of industries.
PlanQK is an open, commu­nity-based plat­form for quan­tum applications.
With 30 successfully proven use cases and more than 100 part­ners, PlanQK is a pioneer in the field of quan­tum platforms.
PlanQK was initia­ted in 2019, conti­nuously deve­lo­ped toge­ther with leading univer­si­ties and compa­nies and supported as a light­house project by the German govern­ment. Advi­sor Kipu Quan­tum: Good­win LLP Corporate/Private Equity: Silvio McMi­ken (Counsel/ Photo), Florian Hirsch­mann (Part­ner, both lead), Tobias Schulz (Asso­ciate, Munich) Tax: Oded Schein (Part­ner), Phil­ipp Lauer (Asso­ciate, Munich) 

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