ALTERNATIVE FINANCING FORMS
FOR ENTREPRENEURS AND INVESTORS

Author: Tatjana Anderer

Gründerin des FYB-Verlag
News

Munich ‑PANGEA Unter­neh­mer­ka­pi­tal GmbH takes over GETECO GmbH. The acqui­si­tion was made via the soft­ware holding company NUBE Soft­ware GmbH, with which PANGEA focu­ses on the acqui­si­tion of majo­rity inte­rests in medium-sized B2B soft­ware companies.

With more than 10,000 daily users, GETECO has estab­lished itself as a specia­list for soft­ware solu­ti­ons for social insti­tu­ti­ons and offers specia­li­zed solu­ti­ons. GETECO gene­ra­tes 65% of its turno­ver from inte­gra­tion assis­tance and child and youth welfare. The two foun­ders, Theo Prinz and Concetta Prinz-Guarda­basso, will remain asso­cia­ted with GETECO as mana­ging directors.

PANGEA Unter­neh­mer­ka­pi­tal, based in Munich, sees itself as a part­ner for entre­pre­neurs who are plan­ning their succes­sion or looking for invest­ments for further growth, whether in the short or long term. The focus is on invest­ments in estab­lished medium-sized compa­nies in German-spea­king count­ries with sustainable and profi­ta­ble busi­ness models.

Legal advi­sors to PANGEA Unter­neh­mer­ka­pi­tal GmbH: Gütt Olk Feld­haus, Munich
Dr. Sebas­tian Olk (Part­ner, Corpo­rate Law/M&A), Thomas Becker (Of Coun­sel, IP/IT/Software), Dr. Domi­nik Forst­ner (Senior Asso­ciate, Corpo­rate Law/M&A), Sophie Stef­fen (Asso­ciate, Corpo­rate Law/M&A)

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. We also handle the liti­ga­tion in these specia­list areas. www.gof-partner.com

 

News

The Hague — Main Capi­tal Part­ners (“Main”), a Euro­pean inves­tor specia­li­zing in enter­prise soft­ware, announ­ces the successful closing of its two latest buyout funds, Main Capi­tal VIII and Main Foun­da­tion II, which have reached a total volume of EUR 2.44 billion in capi­tal commit­ments. With Main Capi­tal VIII and Main Foun­da­tion II, which have roughly doubled in size compared to the previous funds, Main’s total assets under manage­ment have risen to around EUR 6 billion.

As with previous fund­rai­sings, Main recor­ded strong parti­ci­pa­tion from its exis­ting inves­tor base. Inves­tors’ contin­ued confi­dence in Main is demons­tra­ted by a remar­kable re-up rate of 115%. In addi­tion to rene­wed invest­ments from exis­ting inves­tors, Main also recei­ved commit­ments from new inves­tors tota­ling around €1 billion, inclu­ding seve­ral renow­ned insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors such as APG (on behalf of its client ABP), Tecta Invest and Texas County and District Reti­re­ment System. Alre­ady active inves­tors such as Hamil­ton Lane have signi­fi­cantly increased their capi­tal commitment.

Fund­rai­sing for Main Capi­tal VIII and Main Foun­da­tion II began in Octo­ber 2023 with a target volume of EUR 1.6 billion and EUR 400 million respec­tively. The dual fund­rai­sing saw considera­ble demand from both exis­ting and new inves­tors world­wide, and Main was able to successfully complete the two fund­rai­sings, with their respec­tive hard caps of EUR 1.9 billion and EUR 500 million, within just under six months. The short period of time within which both funds were reali­zed in an over­all diffi­cult finan­cing situa­tion and the high level of inves­tor inte­rest, which signi­fi­cantly excee­ded the funds’ hard caps, confirm Main’s contin­ued strong invest­ment perfor­mance and its highly specia­li­zed focus on invest­ments in enter­prise software.

Main is a specia­li­zed buyout inves­tor in the enter­prise soft­ware sector, with a 20-year track record and broad market coverage in the mid-market, inves­t­ing between EUR 5 and 150 million in profi­ta­ble small to mid-sized soft­ware compa­nies. Main’s port­fo­lio compa­nies are supported by its in-house Market Intel­li­gence and Perfor­mance Excel­lence team, which provi­des access to proprie­tary data and rese­arch as well as best prac­ti­ces in the areas of go-to-market stra­te­gies, tech­no­logy, finance and M&A. Thanks to a team of more than 70 experts in the core markets Bene­lux, DACH, the Nordic count­ries and the USA, its local presence and the orga­niza­tion of topic-speci­fic events, Main is closely connec­ted with the local

soft­ware ecosys­tems, allo­wing exclu­sive rela­ti­onships to be estab­lished with soft­ware foun­ders and entre­pre­neurs. Over the last few years, Main has become one of the most active inves­tors in Europe. In 2023, Main reali­zed well over 40 tran­sac­tions, inclu­ding 12 invest­ments in new plat­form invest­ments, 26 add-ons and 6 disposals.

Throug­hout the company’s history, Main has reali­zed almost 30 exits with a weigh­ted average return of more than four times and a loss rate of well below 0.5%.
Main’s acti­vi­ties focus on the deve­lo­p­ment of larger, scalable and inter­na­tio­nally profi­ta­ble soft­ware groups within speci­fic product markets, which are expan­ded both through orga­nic growth and acqui­si­ti­ons. Main opera­tes across borders in around 10 product markets, inclu­ding health­tech, govtech, HRtech and cyber­se­cu­rity. Signi­fi­cant invest­ments in the area of cyber­se­cu­rity include Point­s­harp (SE), Oribi (NL) and Inverid (NL). In HRtech, Main is inves­t­ing in BCS (NL), Text­ker­nel (NL) and Perbi­lity (DE). Main’s acti­vi­ties in the health­tech sector include compa­nies such as Enova­tion (NL) and SDB Groep (NL), LuxSci (USA), Alfa eCare (SE), Buch­ner (DE), UHB (DE) and Oiva Health (FI). An exam­ple of a major govtech invest­ment is xxllnc (NL), a large SaaS govtech group with over 300 employees that provi­des produc­ti­vity tools for local muni­ci­pa­li­ties and soft­ware for tax and social affairs.

Charly Zwem­s­tra, Foun­der and Chief Invest­ment Offi­cer at Main (photo © Main Capi­tal), said: “Main was one of the early play­ers in the Euro­pean soft­ware space, focu­sing on buyouts of profi­ta­ble and robust enter­prise soft­ware compa­nies to build larger inter­na­tio­nal soft­ware groups. We are very proud of our 20-year track record and the contin­ued support and trust placed in us by a very insti­tu­tio­nal and global LP base. The successful comple­tion of Main Capi­tal VIII and Main Foun­da­tion II conso­li­da­tes our posi­tion as Euro­pean market leader for soft­ware buyouts. With the help of the new funds, we conti­nue to play a key role in conso­li­da­ting the frag­men­ted soft­ware market, within which we are buil­ding inter­na­tio­nally leading Euro­pean and trans­at­lan­tic soft­ware companies.”

Jorn de Ruij­ter, Head of Inves­tor Rela­ti­ons and Invest­ment Direc­tor at Main, said: “Closing two funds well above the origi­nal target and almost doubling the size of the previous funds in just six months under­lines Main’s excep­tio­nal track record and close rela­ti­onship with our LP base. We are grateful for the strong and contin­ued support from exis­ting and new LPs. Main’s proven approach to buil­ding larger, more resi­li­ent soft­ware groups has enab­led us to deli­ver consis­tent top quar­tile returns for our LPs and we will conti­nue to do so for these two new funds as well as for future funds.”

Main did not use a place­ment agent for the fund­rai­sing, Loyens & Loeff acted as legal advisor.

About Main Capi­tal Partners

Main Capi­tal Part­ners is a leading soft­ware inves­tor in the DACH region, the Bene­lux count­ries, the Nordic count­ries and the United States with assets under manage­ment of around EUR 6 billion. Main has more than 20 years of expe­ri­ence in streng­thening soft­ware compa­nies and works closely with the manage­ment teams in its port­fo­lio as a stra­te­gic part­ner to create profi­ta­ble growth and larger, successful soft­ware groups. As a leading soft­ware inves­tor mana­ging private equity funds in Northwest Europe and North America, Main employs 70 people in its offices in The Hague, Düssel­dorf, Stock­holm, Antwerp and a branch office in Boston. Main mana­ges an active port­fo­lio of over 45 soft­ware groups. This port­fo­lio employs a total of more than 12,000 people. Through the Main Social Insti­tute, Main supports students with grants and scho­lar­ships to study IT and compu­ter science at tech­ni­cal univer­si­ties and univer­si­ties of applied scien­ces. www.main.nl

 

News

Wetz­lar / Wesel / Munich — Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor, toge­ther with sonn­tag corpo­rate finance a leading German M&A advi­sory boutique, has successfully advi­sed RMS GmbH (“RMS”), known for its special LÜRA storage products, on its sale to the new majo­rity share­hol­der Hohn­haus & Jansen­ber­ger Group (“HJG”). With this tran­sac­tion, RMS GmbH, which specia­li­zes in steel cons­truc­tion and bulk goods storage tech­no­logy, is aiming for further natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal growth.

RMS GmbH was foun­ded in 1996 with a focus on the deve­lo­p­ment, produc­tion and sale of highly specia­li­zed products for the storage and sort­ing of bulk mate­ri­als and thus offers tailor-made system solu­ti­ons for bulk mate­ri­als logi­stics. Their robust, multi­func­tional LÜRA parti­tion walls made of steel form the basis. They are used for the flexi­ble cons­truc­tion of mobile-modu­lar box systems and a wide range of hall opti­ons inclu­ding roof constructions.

New pros­pects for RMS through stra­te­gic majo­rity shareholder
RMS intends to conti­nue its growth trajec­tory of recent years in the future: Foun­ded in 2013, the Hohn­haus & Jansen­ber­ger Group (“HJG”) is an invest­ment company focu­sed on medium-sized compa­nies in German-spea­king count­ries that has exten­sive indus­trial expe­ri­ence, parti­cu­larly in metal proces­sing. The company focu­ses on opera­tio­nal support for acqui­red compa­nies and pursues a long-term invest­ment approach. In total, around EUR 30 million has been inves­ted in SMEs in the DACH region since the company was founded.

With the majo­rity stake now held by Munich-based HJG, RMS will expand its posi­tion in the market and at the same time clarify the future succes­sion of RMS Mana­ging Direc­tor Stephan Lüger. He will remain with RMS as mana­ging direc­tor and share­hol­der; Peter Jansen­ber­ger, part­ner at HJG, will also join the manage­ment team.

New name, same values: RMS beco­mes LÜRA as part of the acquisition

RMS takes the start of the fourth decade of the company’s history and the new owner­ship struc­ture as an oppor­tu­nity to set the course for the future: At the same time as the chan­ges at share­hol­der level, the company is being rena­med from RMS to LÜRA. From a stra­te­gic point of view, this is a sensi­ble step, as the brand name alre­ady stands for unique products that combine inno­va­tion and quality in the bulk solids market.

Stephan Lüger, Mana­ging Direc­tor of RMS: “For around 30 years, we have been crea­ting flexi­ble, dura­ble system solu­ti­ons for bulk goods logi­stics with LÜRA — solu­ti­ons that are only available from us. I am deligh­ted to have gained the Hohn­haus & Jansen­ber­ger Group as a strong part­ner for my company. We agree on our busi­ness philo­so­phy. For us, the corner­sto­nes are appre­cia­tion and long-term part­ner­ships with custo­mers, suppli­ers and employees.”

Peter Jansen­ber­ger, Part­ner of the Hohn­haus & Jansen­ber­ger Group, adds: “We got to know Mr. Lüger and RMS very well in advance and are looking forward to shaping the future toge­ther with an entre­pre­neur of such compe­tence and integrity.”

Sebas­tian Wissig (photo © Sebas­tian Wissig), respon­si­ble project mana­ger at Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor“The acqui­si­tion of RMS by the Hohn­haus & Jansen­ber­ger Group combi­nes the opera­tio­nal excel­lence and inno­va­tive strength of RMS with the finan­cial strength and stra­te­gic exper­tise of HJG. We are convin­ced that this synergy has the poten­tial to take RMS to a new level of growth and market presence.”

About Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor and sonn­tag corpo­rate finance

Nach­fol­ge­kon­tor GmbH, in asso­cia­tion with sonn­tag corpo­rate finance GmbH, is one of the leading M&A consul­ting 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.
www.nachfolgekontor.de www.sonntagcf.com

About RMS GmbH
https://www.rms-luera.de

News

Munich — Inter­na­tio­nal law firm Reed Smith, led by corpo­rate part­ner Constan­tin Conrads, has advi­sed Aussa­fer Due Srl (Aussa­fer Due), an Italian high-tech metal proces­sing company, on the acqui­si­tion of a majo­rity stake in the German company Hail­tec toge­ther with Cappelli RCCD. Aussa­fer Due is a port­fo­lio company of 21 Invest, an Italian private equity inves­tor foun­ded by Ales­san­dro Benetton.

Aussa­fer Due, based in Italy, is an inter­na­tio­nal leader in metal­wor­king with high-tech proces­ses. The company has been in the port­fo­lio of the Euro­pean invest­ment group 21 Invest since Decem­ber 2020.

This tran­sac­tion is a funda­men­tal mile­stone for the project led by 21 Invest. It streng­thens the direct presence in Germany, the largest Euro­pean market, and brings the group to a total turno­ver of over 100 million euros (with a growing share abroad, curr­ently around 30%) and a total of almost 500 employees.

Hail­tec, which was foun­ded near Stutt­gart and is mana­ged by the young entre­pre­neur Alex­an­der Renz, will repre­sent considera­ble added value for the Group thanks to its specia­liza­tion in various market niches such as elec­tro­nics, e‑mobility, micro-precis­ion mecha­nics and medi­cal tech­no­logy, e.g. the deve­lo­p­ment of pros­the­ses made from special mate­ri­als such as titanium.

Alex­an­der Renz will remain a share­hol­der of the company and head of the Group’s German divi­sion after the takeover.

The Reed Smith team advi­sing Aussa­fer Due on all German legal aspects of the tran­sac­tion, inclu­ding tax, real estate, employ­ment, anti­trust, intellec­tual property and tech­no­logy, was led by Munich corpo­rate part­ner Constan­tin Conrads (photo © Reed Smith). He was supported by part­ners Dr. Martin Bünning, Dr. Michaela Westrup, Dr. Etienne Richt­ham­mer, Dr. René Loch­mann and Dr. Andreas Splitt­ger­ber, as well as asso­cia­tes Katrin Gerce­ker, Max von Döhren, Chris­tian Schnur­rer, Sylvia Rein­hart, Florian Schwind and Phil­ipp Bergmann.

Aussa­fer was also supported in legal and corpo­rate law matters by Cappelli RCCD, in finan­cial, tax and busi­ness due dili­gence by KPMG and by goetz­part­ners as finan­cial advisor.

About Reed Smith

Reed Smith is one of the leading inter­na­tio­nal law firms with more than 1,600 lawy­ers in 31 offices in Europe, the USA, the Middle East and Asia. For more infor­ma­tion, visit www.reedsmith.com.

News

Munich/ Berlin — The DUBAG team is plea­sed to announce the final closing of its third, over­sub­scri­bed LEO III fund with a total invest­ment volume of EUR 80 million. — Despite a chal­len­ging fund­rai­sing envi­ron­ment, the DUBAG team was able to close the new LEO III fund with the targe­ted cap of EUR 80 million in inves­tor commit­ments. With this volume, LEO III is roughly twice as large as its predecessor.

The invest­ment focus of the new LEO III fund is on compa­nies in special situa­tions, in parti­cu­lar spin-offs from conglo­me­ra­tes and tail-end situa­tions of PE inves­tors on a fund basis. The target turno­ver ranges from EUR 20 million to EUR 400 million. LEO III invests equity tickets from EUR 5 to 20 million and has direct access to a broad network of finan­cing part­ners willing to support chal­len­ging situa­tions. Tran­sac­tions with elec­tric vehic­les of up to EUR 125 million are included in the scope of investment.

“The coming years offer nume­rous exci­ting invest­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties with a variety of special situa­tions. With us, inves­tors have the oppor­tu­nity to parti­ci­pate in these inte­res­t­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties. Our track record shows attrac­tive returns for our inves­tors,” explains Emanuel Catta­nei (photo © DUBAG), Part­ner M & A at DUBAG. “The inte­rest shown by insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors in the new fund has signi­fi­cantly excee­ded our expectations.”

YPOG provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal advice to DUBAG Group on the final closing of its third fund Lenbach Equity Oppor­tu­ni­ties III.

Like its prede­ces­sor, the new fund is speci­fi­cally struc­tu­red to enable active support of the port­fo­lio compa­nies by the DUBAG Group. This commer­cial struc­ture sets the DUBAG Group apart from many other German PE investors.

About the DUBAG Group

The DUBAG Group is a Munich-based private equity inves­tor. The private equity funds set up by DUBAG specia­lize in the acqui­si­tion of compa­nies in special situa­tions. With the use of finan­cial and profes­sio­nal resour­ces, prag­ma­tism, exper­tise, stra­tegy and long-term vision, the DUBAG Group supports its port­fo­lio compa­nies in their day-to-day busi­ness, always keeping an eye on conti­nuous impro­ve­ment and sustainable growth. The current port­fo­lio compri­ses seven compa­nies with a total turno­ver of more than 700 million euros in various sectors in ten count­ries. www.dubag.eu

Advi­sor DUBAG: YPOG 

Dr. Fabian Euhus (Lead, Funds), Part­ner, Berlin
Dr. Helder Schnitt­ker (Tax, Funds), Part­ner, Berlin
Dr. Saskia Bong (Tax, Funds), Asso­ciate, Berlin
Dr. Dajo Sanning (Tax, Funds), Asso­ciate, Berlin/Hamburg Dr. Jannik Zerbst (Funds), Asso­ciate, Berlin/Hamburg

About YPOG

YPOG is a law firm specia­li­zing in tax and commer­cial law, active in the core areas of funds, tax, banking + finance and tran­sac­tions. The YPOG team advi­ses a wide variety of clients. These include emer­ging tech­no­logy compa­nies and family-run medium-sized enter­pri­ses as well as corpo­ra­ti­ons and private equity/venture capi­tal funds. YPOG is one of the leading addres­ses for venture capi­tal, private equity and fund struc­tu­ring in Germany. The firm and its part­ners are ranked natio­nally and inter­na­tio­nally by JUVE, Best Lawy­ers, Legal 500, Focus, Cham­bers and Part­ners and Leaders League. Today, YPOG employs more than 120 expe­ri­en­ced lawy­ers, tax consul­tants, tax specia­lists and a notary in three offices in Berlin, Hamburg and Cologne.

News

Aachen, Germany — Protem­bis GmbH (Protem­bis), a cardio­vas­cu­lar medi­cal device company, has raised EUR 30 million in a Series B finan­cing round. The startup will use the funds to advance the initia­tion of the PROTEMBO Inves­ti­ga­tio­nal Device Exemp­tion (IDE) Pivo­tal Trial (NCT05873816). The finan­cing round was split into two sepa­rate capi­tal increa­ses, both of which have now been comple­ted. A Euro­pean consor­tium of VC inves­tors led the invest­ment, inclu­ding Segu­lah Medi­cal Acce­le­ra­tion from Sweden, XGEN Venture from Italy and the Tech­Vi­sion Fund from Germany. Other inves­tors include Copa­rion, seve­ral large family offices, angel inves­tors and a multi­na­tio­nal medi­cal tech­no­logy group.

“We are plea­sed to announce the closing of the finan­cing round and thank our exis­ting and new inves­tors for their trust,” said Karl von Mangoldt and Conrad Rasmus, Co-CEOs of Protem­bis. “It reflects the fact that the field of cere­bral embo­lic protec­tion is thri­ving and that future growth will be driven by youn­ger and lower-risk pati­ents who do not accept the risk of brain injury when opting for trans­ca­the­ter aortic valve replacement.”

In addi­tion, Dr. Keith D. Dawkins, MD, was appoin­ted to the Protem­bis Advi­sory Board. Dawkins has more than 35 years of expe­ri­ence in the cardio­vas­cu­lar field. He was a prac­ti­cing cardio­lo­gist in the UK for over 20 years, a Fulbright Scho­lar at Stan­ford Univer­sity, Presi­dent of the British Cardio­vas­cu­lar Inter­ven­tion Society and author of more than 750 acade­mic publi­ca­ti­ons and presen­ta­ti­ons. Dawkins has been Chief Medi­cal Offi­cer (CMO) of Shock­wave since 2019. Previously, he held a senior posi­tion as Global CMO at Boston Scien­ti­fic since 2008. He is also a member of the super­vi­sory boards of Ventric Health LLC and Jena­Valve Tech­no­logy Inc. and as Chair­man of Innov­He­art s.r.l. Dawkins will contri­bute his exper­tise to Protem­bis’ clini­cal stra­te­gies and pre-commer­cial programs once the IDE study is completed.

“Having such a visio­nary leader as Dr. Dawkins on our advi­sory board demons­tra­tes the possi­bi­li­ties that cere­bral embo­lic protec­tion (CEP) holds for future trans­ca­the­ter thera­pies. We look forward to working closely toge­ther as the field evol­ves and our supe­rio­rity trial gains momen­tum,” says Azin Parhiz­gar, PhD and Advi­sory Board Chair.

“I have been empha­si­zing the need to protect the brain from new lesi­ons during trans­ca­the­ter aortic valve repla­ce­ment (TAVR) for many years and am ther­e­fore deligh­ted to be joining Protem­bis,” says Dawkins. “The ProtEmbo system and clini­cal trial design are inno­va­tive and I am confi­dent that they will greatly trans­form the field of cere­bral embo­lic protec­tion and elimi­nate or miti­gate many of the current issues of concern to the medi­cal profession.”

About Protem­bis!

The start-up Protem­bis, foun­ded by Karl von Mangoldt and Conrad Rasmus, has set itself the goal of offe­ring a simple and relia­ble solu­tion to protect pati­ents from brain inju­ries during left-sided heart surgery. To this end, the start-up is deve­lo­ping the ProtEmbo® Cere­bral Protec­tion System, which is curr­ently under­go­ing clini­cal trials. https://protembis.com

News

Amsterdam/ Bonn — The Amster­dam-based venture capi­tal fund INKEF Capi­tal has sold its stake in Cardior Phar­maceu­tic­las to Novo Nordisk. The purchase price amounts to €1.025 billion, inclu­ding an upfront payment and addi­tio­nal payments if certain deve­lo­p­ment and commer­cial mile­sto­nes are achie­ved. HTGF, one of the leading Euro­pean seed inves­tors, will also sell its shares as part of the tran­sac­tion. HTGF parti­ci­pa­ted in the first finan­cing round in 2017. At this early stage, HTGF belie­ved in the team’s vision and the poten­tial of RNA technology.

Comple­tion of the acqui­si­tion is subject to the appr­oval of the rele­vant autho­ri­ties and other custo­mary market condi­ti­ons and is expec­ted to take place in the second quar­ter of 2024.

Cardior is a leader and pioneer in the disco­very and deve­lo­p­ment of RNA-targe­ted thera­pies for the preven­tion, repair and rever­sal of heart dise­ase. The company’s thera­peu­tic approach targets charac­te­ristic non-coding nucleic acids as a plat­form for addres­sing the causes of cardiac dysfunc­tion with the aim of achie­ving a lasting effect in patients.
Novo Nordisk is an inter­na­tio­nal phar­maceu­ti­cal company head­quar­te­red in Denmark that has deve­lo­ped into one of the world’s leading insu­lin manufacturers.

“This acqui­si­tion reflects the trans­for­ma­tive poten­tial of CDR132L as a dise­ase-modi­fy­ing therapy for heart fail­ure,” said Dr. Clau­dia Ulbrich, CEO and co-foun­der of Cardior. “Novo Nordisk is the ideal part­ner due to its exten­sive clini­cal and commer­cial exper­tise combi­ned with its resour­ces to acce­le­rate our late-stage deve­lo­p­ment program, inclu­ding through larger pivo­tal trials. We look forward to advan­cing CDR132L to market approval.”

The agree­ment covers Cardior’s lead compound CDR132L, which is curr­ently in Phase 2 clini­cal deve­lo­p­ment for the treat­ment of heart fail­ure. — The acqui­si­tion is an important step in Novo Nordisk’s stra­tegy to build a presence in cardio­vas­cu­lar dise­a­ses. Novo Nordisk’s goal is to build a focu­sed, effec­tive therapy port­fo­lio through inter­nal and exter­nal inno­va­tion to address the signi­fi­cant unmet need in cardio­vas­cu­lar dise­ase, the world’s leading cause of death.

About INKEF Capital

INKEF is a leading venture capi­tal firm based in Amster­dam that supports early-stage compa­nies in Europe, Reitze Douma (photo © INKEF) is Mana­ging Part­ner. — As a long-term inves­tor, INKEF is in a posi­tion to accom­pany compa­nies through seve­ral rounds of finan­cing up to the IPO. INKEF supports tech­no­logy and life science compa­nies in deve­lo­ping their ideas into successful inter­na­tio­nal compa­nies. The best-known invest­ments include GitLab, Remote, Chan­ne­lEn­gine, Silver­flow, iOnc­tura and Castor. www.inkef.com.

Consul­tant INKEF: YPOG

Dr. Martin Scha­per (Lead, M&A/Transactions), Part­ner, Berlin Dr. Johan­nes Janning (M&A/Transactions), Part­ner, Cologne
Dr. Malte Berg­mann (Tax), Part­ner, Hamburg
Barbara Hasse (M&A/Transactions), Senior Asso­ciate, Berlin Dr. Jacob Schrei­ber (Tax), Senior Asso­ciate, Hamburg

About YPOG

YPOG is a law firm specia­li­zing in tax and commer­cial law, active in the core areas of funds, tax, banking + finance and tran­sac­tions. The YPOG team advi­ses a wide variety of clients. These include emer­ging tech­no­logy compa­nies and family-run medium-sized enter­pri­ses as well as corpo­ra­ti­ons and private equity/venture capi­tal funds. YPOG is one of the leading addres­ses for venture capi­tal, private equity and fund struc­tu­ring in Germany. Today, YPOG employs more than 120 expe­ri­en­ced lawy­ers, tax consul­tants, tax specia­lists and a notary in three offices in Berlin, Hamburg and Colo­gne. http://www.ypog.law

News

Munich/ Frank­furt a. M. — The DOUGLAS Group (“DOUGLAS”), Europe’s leading distri­bu­tor of beauty products, has retur­ned to the Frank­furt Stock Exch­ange after a break of seve­ral years. The total place­ment volume is around 34.2 million shares at a price of EUR 26.00 per share. Around 32.7 million of these are newly issued shares and around 1.5 million are exis­ting shares. Trading on the regu­la­ted market of the Frank­furt Stock Exch­ange (Prime Stan­dard) commen­ced on March 21, 2024. POELLATH provi­ded the Kreke family with compre­hen­sive tax advice in connec­tion with the IPO.

The total volume of the offe­ring amounts to appro­xi­m­ately EUR 890 million with gross proceeds for DOUGLAS of appro­xi­m­ately EUR 850 million, corre­spon­ding to a market capi­ta­liza­tion of appro­xi­m­ately EUR 2.8 billion. The proceeds from the IPO, toge­ther with an addi­tio­nal equity injec­tion, available cash and capi­tal inflows from a new EUR 1.6 billion loan agree­ment, will be used to fully redeem (refi­nance) the exis­ting finan­cial liabilities.

POELLATH advi­sed the Kreke family, which still holds around 10.2 percent of the Douglas shares after the IPO, compre­hen­si­vely on tax matters in connec­tion with the IPO with the follo­wing Munich team:
Dr. Michael Best (Part­ner, Tax), Dr. Tobias Deschen­halm (Senior Asso­ciate, Tax), Corne­lius L. Roth (Asso­ciate, Tax)

About POELLATH

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 Tran­sac­tions | Corpo­rate and Capi­tal Market Law | Finan­cing | Tax Law | Succes­sion and Assets | Foun­da­ti­ons and Non-Profit Orga­niza­ti­ons | IP/IT, Distri­bu­tion and Anti­trust Law | Liti­ga­tion and Arbitration.

News

Berlin — The law firm Vogel Heerma Waitz has advi­sed kopa ventures on the finan­cing of Daato in a EUR 5 million seed finan­cing round. The finan­cing round was led by kopa ventures in coope­ra­tion with neos­fer and IBB Ventures.

Daato is the pionee­ring ESG manage­ment plat­form from Berlin. kopa ventures is an estab­lished early-stage inves­tor with a focus on Euro­pean climate tech start­ups in the fields of energy, mobi­lity, nature and carbon tech. The invest­ment marks a mile­stone for Daato and streng­thens the company in its mission to make ESG manage­ment effi­ci­ent, compli­ant and effec­tive for compa­nies of all sizes.

Advi­sor to kopa ventures: Vogel Heerma Waitz

Sabine Röth (part­ner), Sina Lühr

About Vogel Heerma Waitz

Vogel Heerma Waitz is a Berlin-based law firm specia­li­zing in growth capi­tal, tech­no­logy and media. https://www.v14.de

News

Amster­dam / Munich — The Andra Tech Group, a leading group of compa­nies specia­li­zing in the manu­fac­ture of complex high-tech precis­ion compon­ents, is acqui­ring the Dutch company Lucas­sen Groep (Lucas­sen), a specia­list in high-precis­ion manu­fac­tu­ring and clean­room assem­bly. With this acqui­si­tion, the fourth to date since the funds advi­sed by Equis­tone acqui­red a majo­rity stake in spring 2021, the Group is once again under­pin­ning its strong posi­tion in its Dutch home market. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose details of the transaction.

Since its foun­da­tion in 1973, the Andra Tech Group (form­erly Kusters Beheer), head­quar­te­red in the Nether­lands, has deve­lo­ped into a leading company for the manu­fac­ture of high-tech precis­ion compon­ents and submo­du­les. The acqui­si­tion of Lucas­sen marks a further stra­te­gic step for the Group — both in terms of streng­thening Andra Tech Group’s alre­ady leading posi­tion in its home market of the Nether­lands and in the conti­nuous expan­sion of its tech­no­lo­gi­cal exper­tise in the field of high-precis­ion manu­fac­tu­ring. The merger of the Andra Tech Group with Lucas­sen will enable the two compa­nies to conti­nue their long-stan­ding coope­ra­tion and will also put them in an even better posi­tion to serve their joint blue-chip custo­mer base.

Lucas­sen Groep, foun­ded in 1989 and head­quar­te­red in Sittard, the Nether­lands, specia­li­zes in the manu­fac­ture of high-precis­ion compon­ents for custo­mers in the semi­con­duc­tor, analy­ti­cal and opti­cal sectors, among others. Under the leader­ship of Mana­ging Direc­tor Daniël Guli­kers, who will conti­nue to manage Lucas­sen within the Andra Tech Group, the company can look back on a strong track record in the Dutch market, not least due to its high-quality produc­tion and compre­hen­sive specia­list know-how. In addi­tion to manu­fac­tu­ring precis­ion mecha­ni­cal compon­ents with high clean­li­ness requi­re­ments from a wide range of mate­ri­als, Lucas­sen also specia­li­zes in clean­room assem­bly. The company curr­ently employs around 50 people.

Since the majo­rity invest­ment by the funds advi­sed by Equis­tone in March 2021, Andra Tech Group has contin­ued to grow on its way to beco­ming a leading inter­na­tio­nal manu­fac­tu­rer of high-tech precis­ion compon­ents and submo­du­les: With the support of Equis­tone, the Group further expan­ded its presence in the Nether­lands with the acqui­si­tion of Lemmens Metaal­be­werk­ing in Decem­ber 2023. This was prece­ded by the acqui­si­ti­ons of DKH Metaal­be­werk­ing, also based in the Nether­lands, in Febru­ary 2023 and Mayer Fein­tech­nik, based in Germany, in Decem­ber 2022. With the acqui­si­tion of Lucas­sen, the group of compa­nies — which serves an inter­na­tio­nal custo­mer base from the semi­con­duc­tor, high-tech, mobi­lity, food proces­sing, medi­cal, pack­a­ging and prin­ting indus­tries — has grown to a total of more than 700 employees.

“The Andra Tech Group and Lucas­sen can look back on many years of coope­ra­tion and value each other’s quality and exper­tise. We are ther­e­fore parti­cu­larly plea­sed to welcome Lucas­sen with Daniël Guli­kers and the entire team of highly quali­fied and expe­ri­en­ced employees to the Andra Tech Group. With the support and finan­cial strength of the Andra Tech Group, we can successfully conti­nue Lucassen’s growth trajec­tory,” explains Geert Ketel­a­ars, CEO of the Andra Tech Group.

“We are pursuing the ambi­tious goal of growing Lucas­sen stron­gly in the coming years. With the support that the Andra Tech Group can offer from an orga­niza­tio­nal and finan­cial perspec­tive, we can achieve this goal. At the same time, we are in a posi­tion to offer our custo­mers and employees attrac­tive pros­pects that will enable us as a company to conti­nue to operate at the highest level despite incre­asingly complex value and supply chains,” explains Daniël Guli­kers, Mana­ging Direc­tor of Lucassen.

“With this latest acqui­si­tion, the Andra Tech Group is further expan­ding its alre­ady leading market posi­tion in the Nether­lands and is also in a posi­tion to conti­nue the dyna­mic growth trajec­tory of recent years. Lucassen’s in-depth exper­tise and exten­sive custo­mer rela­ti­onships are an excel­lent addi­tion to the Group’s exis­ting product and service port­fo­lio,” empha­si­zes Hubert van Wolfs­win­kel, Part­ner in the Amster­dam office of Equis­tone.

The Equis­tone team includes Hubert van Wolfs­win­kel, Dr. Marc Arens, Phil­ipp Gauss and Josh Aalbers.

Equis­tone was advi­sed on the tran­sac­tion by PwC (Finan­cial & Tax) and Vesper (Legal).

About Equis­tone Part­ners Europe

The funds advi­sed by Equis­tone Part­ners Europe are among the most active Euro­pean equity inves­tors with a team of more than 40 invest­ment specia­lists in seven offices in the Nether­lands, Germany, Switz­er­land, France and the UK. The Equis­tone funds invest prima­rily in estab­lished medium-sized compa­nies with a good market posi­tion, above-average growth poten­tial and an enter­prise value of between EUR 50 and 500 million. Since incep­tion, the funds have inves­ted equity in more than 180 tran­sac­tions. The port­fo­lio curr­ently compri­ses around 50 compa­nies across Europe, inclu­ding around six invest­ments in the Bene­lux region. Equis­tone funds are curr­ently inves­t­ing from the sixth fund, which closed in March 2018 with 2.8 billion euros. In addi­tion, the “Equis­tone Reinvest­ment Fund” was recently laun­ched, from which it is possi­ble to reinvest in mino­rity posi­ti­ons follo­wing sales of port­fo­lio compa­nies from the main funds. www.equistonepe.com.

About Andra Tech Group
https://www.andratechgroup.com/en

About Lucas­sen Groep
https://www.lucassengroep.nl/en

News

Munich — The share­hol­ders of Swibox Holding AG have sold 100% of their shares to the Munich-based private equity fund EOS Part­ners. — The Munich and Frank­furt offices of the inter­na­tio­nal law firm Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP have advi­sed the share­hol­ders of Swibox Holding AG toge­ther with the Swiss law firm MLL Legal AG and the subse­quent re-invest­ment in a joint holding company.

Swibox AG is a leading provi­der of elec­tri­cal enclo­sures and enclo­sure solu­ti­ons. In addi­tion to its own product lines and paten­ted new deve­lo­p­ments, inclu­ding in the field of safety tech­no­logy, the company plans to market its products not only on the Swiss market, but also inter­na­tio­nally. In order to meet this objec­tive, the Swibox Group was merged with the alre­ady inter­na­tio­nally estab­lished SRG & SERVE Group from Germany and Luxem­bourg under a joint holding company. Both groups will conti­nue to be mana­ged as inde­pen­dent compa­nies that operate auto­no­mously. The manage­ment of the Swibox Group will remain share­hol­ders in the new group of companies.

About EOS Partners

EOS Part­ners GmbH (“EOS”), a Munich-based invest­ment company foun­ded in 20215, with a focus on small and medium-sized enter­pri­ses (SMEs). Phil­ipp Wege­ner and Thomas Röhrl are both Mana­ging Part­ners. — The company focu­ses on invest­ments in estab­lished compa­nies with strong busi­ness models and clear unique selling propo­si­ti­ons in growing markets. Important compon­ents of EOS’ stra­tegy are invest­ments in digi­ta­liza­tion and sales as well as opera­tio­nal effi­ci­ency impro­ve­ments. EOS Fund I builds on this proven stra­tegy and pursues majo­rity share­hol­dings in compa­nies in the DACH region, prefer­a­bly in part­ner­ship with foun­ders and strong manage­ment teams. As a rule, EUR 5 to 30 million of equity is inves­ted per tran­sac­tion. https://eoscp.com

Advi­sor to the share­hol­ders of Swibox Holding AG: WEIL

The Weil tran­sac­tion team was led by Munich corpo­rate part­ner Prof. Dr. Gerhard Schmidt and coun­sel Andreas Fogel (corpo­rate, Munich) and included part­ner Tobias Geer­ling (tax, Munich), asso­cia­tes Amelie Zabel, Seve­rin Scholz and Dr. Chris­to­pher Schlet­ter (all corpo­rate, Munich) and Alex­an­der Reich (tax, Frankfurt).

About Weil

Weil, Gotshal & Manges is an inter­na­tio­nal law firm with more than 1,100 lawy­ers. Weil has offices in New York, Boston, Brussels, Dallas, Frank­furt, Hong Kong, Hous­ton, London, Miami, Munich, Paris, Shang­hai, Washing­ton, D.C. and Sili­con Valley. In Germany, the firm has two offices and around 60 lawyers/tax advi­sors in Frank­furt and Munich. The focus here is on provi­ding specia­li­zed advice to natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal clients on cross-border private equity and M&A tran­sac­tions, high-profile liti­ga­tion manda­tes, complex restruc­tu­rings and finan­cings as well as tax structuring.

News

Colo­gne — The Colo­gne-based Zwei­rad-Einkaufs-Gemein­schaft eG (ZEG) has sold a majo­rity stake in its subsi­diary Euro­rad Deutsch­land GmbH (service bike leasing, Travel­bike) to the Düssel­dorf-based growth finan­cier Bencis Capi­tal Part­ners Deutsch­land GmbH. No details have been published about the purchase price or which Euro­rad majo­rity share the inves­tor now holds. BELGRAVIA & CO. advi­sed ZEG Zwei­rad-Einkaufs-Genos­sen­schaft eG on the tran­sac­tion of EURORAD to BENCIS.

With Bencis behind them, Euro­rad wants to set the course for growth. “Toge­ther with Bencis, the aim is to further expand the rele­vance of the successful company in a fast-growing market envi­ron­ment,” says ZEG head­quar­ters in Colo­gne. As part of the new part­ner­ship with Bencis, Euro­rad will grow by expan­ding its work­force and reali­zing new eMobi­lity offers.

At the same time, Eurorad’s goal for the future is “to be the service bike leasing provi­der of the trade for the trade. ZEG remains a share­hol­der in Euro­rad Deutsch­land GmbH. This enables dealers at the regio­nal loca­ti­ons to receive the best possi­ble support in acqui­ring leasing custo­mers. The sale of the shares is still subject to appr­oval by the anti­trust authorities.”

About Bencis

Bencis is an inde­pen­dent invest­ment company foun­ded in 1999 by Zoran van Gessel and Jeroen Pit. Bencis supports busi­ness owners and manage­ment teams in reali­zing their growth ambitions.
Bencis has been inves­t­ing in strong, successful compa­nies in the Nether­lands, Belgium and Germany for over 20 years. Our expe­ri­ence and exper­tise in sectors such as indus­trial and manu­fac­tu­ring, food and beverage, busi­ness and consu­mer services, health­care and leisure, and whole­sale and retail means we can add real value. “For us, the focus is not only on the company itself — above all, we support the people who want to build compa­nies and take them forward!” 
https://www.bencis.com

Consul­tant ZEG Zwei­rad-Einkaufs-Genos­sen­schaft eG: BELGRAVIA & CO.

With our inter­na­tio­nally active team of experts specia­li­zing in SME manda­tes, you are in the best hands. We provide M&A advice, company acqui­si­ti­ons and sales and support for finan­cial inves­tors. We advise owners, (family-run) medium-sized compa­nies and invest­ment compa­nies with perso­nal commit­ment, dili­gence and crea­ti­vity throug­hout all phases of a tran­sac­tion — from the defi­ni­tion of stra­te­gic and finan­cial objec­ti­ves to corpo­rate finance manage­ment and the successful comple­tion of a tran­sac­tion. The company was foun­ded in 2012. The company is based in Colo­gne. BELGRAVIA & CO. has a repre­sen­ta­tive office in New York.

 

 

News

Munich — ARQIS has acqui­red the Japa­nese company Nifco Inc. on the sale of its subsi­diary Nifco Germany GmbH to AEQUITA SE & Co. KGaA, an indus­trial group based in Munich. Nifco Germany deve­lops and produ­ces injec­tion-molded plas­tic parts for the auto­mo­tive indus­try. With over 1,100 employees at its loca­ti­ons in Germany, the USA and Serbia, the company gene­ra­tes a turno­ver of more than 200 million euros.

Nifco Inc. is a leading manu­fac­tu­rer of plas­tic compon­ents and fasten­ers for the auto­mo­tive and life-solu­tion indus­tries. From its head­quar­ters in Japan, Nifco opera­tes world­wide, offe­ring a wide range of products that contri­bute to the func­tion­a­lity and comfort of high-quality vehic­les, house­hold and fashion products. Nifco focu­ses on inno­va­tion, quality and sustaina­bi­lity. This commit­ment makes the company a prefer­red part­ner for indus­try-leading compa­nies worldwide.

The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to be comple­ted in the first half of 2024, subject to appr­oval by the rele­vant authorities.

Advi­sor for Nifco: ARQIS (Düsseldorf/ Munich)
Dr. Shigeo Yama­guchi, Eber­hard Hafer­malz (both lead; Japandesk/M&A), part­ners: Dr. Mauritz von Einem (PE/Tax), Dr. Meiko Dill­mann (Japandesk/M&A), Johan­nes Landry (Restruc­tu­ring), Marcus Noth­hel­fer (IP/Commercial), Lisa-Marie Niklas (HR Law), Coun­sel: Dennis Reisich (PE/Tax), Asso­cia­tes: Kiyomi Zimmer (Japandesk/M&A), Marius Mesen­brink (Japandesk/M&A), Thomas Lipsky (IP/Commercial), Anna Munsch (HR Law), Daniel Schle­mann (Data Law). www.arqis.com

About AEQUITA

We are a long-term inves­tor, entre­pre­neur and consul­tant. Exper­tise and focus make the decisive diffe­rence in trans­forming chal­lenges into change. Our invest­ment approach ensu­res stabi­lity and sustainable growth. With a capi­tal base of around EUR 100 million, we create secu­rity and conti­nuity throug­hout the entire tran­sac­tion and invest­ment process. www.aequita.com

News

Hamburg/Leonberg — A Gleiss Lutz team advi­sed H.I.G. Europe on the sale of the ICG Group (“ICG”) to the SPIE Group. ICG’s manage­ment will remain in office and will conti­nue to drive the company’s future deve­lo­p­ment. The tran­sac­tion is subject to appr­oval by the anti­trust autho­ri­ties. — Infra­tech builds complex FTTx networks for public and private network opera­tors in Germany.

ICG was origi­nally foun­ded in 2021 with the acqui­si­tion of Infra­tech by H.I.G. Europe. Infra­tech builds complex FTTx networks for public and private network opera­tors in Germany. The Group was initi­ally expan­ded through the acqui­si­tion of comcross, a leading provi­der of infra­struc­ture for mobile tele­com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons in Germany. The compa­nies were supple­men­ted by the acqui­si­ti­ons of Schwan, Triple A, Deut­sche Funk­bau (each a provi­der of tele­com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons solu­ti­ons) and the plan­ning office DPE. Gleiss Lutz advi­sed H.I.G. and ICG on all tran­sac­tions. Today, ICG employs more than 700 people at 16 loca­ti­ons in Germany, the Nether­lands and Croatia.

Holger Klein­garn, Mana­ging Direc­tor at H.I.G . (photo © H.I.G.), comm­ents: “We are very plea­sed about the merger with the ICG Group, which offers our custo­mers a single point of cont­act for the entire value chain of digi­tal infra­struc­ture services. Our invol­vement in ICG under­lines H.I.G.’s exper­tise in iden­ti­fy­ing strong plat­forms in important future-orien­ted sectors and expan­ding them sustain­ably through orga­nic growth and selec­ted acqui­si­ti­ons. We have estab­lished the ICG Group as a leading provi­der of next-gene­ra­tion infra­struc­tures and turn­key network solu­ti­ons in Germany and beyond.”

H.I.G. Europe is the Euro­pean arm of H.I.G. Capi­tal, one of the leading
the world’s leading private equity fund in the small and mid-cap segment.
H.I.G. Capi­tal curr­ently mana­ges capi­tal of USD 60 billion.
Miami and Euro­pean bran­ches in London, Hamburg and Madrid,
Milan and Paris as well as US and Latin Ameri­can subsi­dia­ries in
New York, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Los Ange­les, San Fran­cisco, Atlanta,
Bogotá, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, H.I.G. has specia­li­zed in the
Provi­sion of debt and equity capi­tal for small and medium-sized
specia­li­zed in medium-sized companies.

About the ICG Group

The ICG Group, based in Leon­berg (Germany), combi­nes the exper­tise of the leading provi­ders of commu­ni­ca­tion infra­struc­ture services: Infra­tech, comcross, Schwan, Trip­leA Networks and DPE. The Group covers the entire value chain from plan­ning and cons­truc­tion to the instal­la­tion and main­ten­ance of infra­struc­ture for fiber optic, mobile commu­ni­ca­ti­ons and elec­tri­city networks. All of the Group’s units are charac­te­ri­zed by a strong posi­tion in their respec­tive segments and long-stan­ding custo­mer rela­ti­onships. The ICG Group employs more than 700 people at 16 loca­ti­ons in Germany, mainly in the Nether­lands and Croa­tia. Further infor­ma­tion can be found at icg-gruppe.de.

Advi­sor to H.I.G. Europe: Gleiss Lutz

Dr. Vanessa Rend­torff (lead, part­ner, Hamburg), Dr. Jan Balssen
(lead, part­ner, Munich), Dr. Michael Knier­bein (Hamburg),
Maxi­mi­lian Imre (all M&A, Munich), Dr. Katja Lehr (Coun­sel), Yvonne
Gers­ter (both Banking & Finance, both Frank­furt), Dr. Doris-Maria
Schus­ter (part­ner, Hamburg), Dr. Hauke Darius Wolf (both employ­ment law,
Frank­furt), Dr. Hendrik Marchal (Coun­sel, Tax Law, Hamburg), Dr.
Matthias Werner (Part­ner), Dr. Sebas­tian Girschick (both IP/Tech), Dr.
Manuel Klar (Coun­sel, Data Protec­tion Law), Dr. Iris Benedikt-Buckenleib
(coun­sel, anti­trust law, all Munich), Dr. Eike Bicker (part­ner),
Chris­toph Ehrke (both Compli­ance), Konrad Discher (Coun­sel,
Real Estate Law, all Frank­furt), Dr. Thomas Frit­sche (Public
Law, Berlin).

News

Heidel­berg — The Mitsu­bi­shi Pencil Company from Japan is taking over the writing instru­ment manu­fac­tu­rer Lamy. The Heidel­berg-based family busi­ness is one of the leading design brands in its segment and has been rely­ing on Stutt­gart-based consul­tants Henner­kes for many years. Lamy was looking for a strong part­ner for the further deve­lo­p­ment of the growth area in digi­tal writing and the expan­sion of inter­na­tio­nal sales. No infor­ma­tion was provi­ded on the sales price.

Foun­ded in 1930 by C. Josef Lamy, the family busi­ness is one of the leading brands in the writing instru­ment sector. Lamy employs more than 340 people and has sales outlets in over 80 count­ries. The family busi­ness was run by the third gene­ra­tion. Accor­ding to media reports, Heidelberg’s turno­ver fell signi­fi­cantly during the coro­na­vi­rus crisis, from EUR 110 million in 2019 to a fore­cast of EUR 77 million for 2023.

The acqui­rer Mitsu­bi­shi Pencil is even older than Lamy; the company was foun­ded 137 years ago and has over 2,700 employees. The company, which opera­tes 22 sales offices and 11 produc­tion faci­li­ties inter­na­tio­nally, is also family-run. The uni-ball ball­point pens with water­proof pigment ink are also well-known in Germany.

Advi­sor to the Lamy owner family: Henner­kes Kirch­dör­fer & Lorz, Stutt­gart
Prof. Dr. Andreas Wiedemann (Lead), Dr. Chris­tian Klein-Wiele (both Corporate/M&A), Dr. Sebas­tian Maten­aer (Tax); Asso­ciate: Chris­tian Wurm­tha­ler (Corporate/M&A)
Falk (Heidel­berg): Dr. Alex­an­der Wünsche (Tax)

Advi­sor Mitsu­bi­shi Pencil: Henge­ler Muel­ler, Frank­furt
Dr. Annika Clauss, Dr. Frank Burmeis­ter (both lead; both corporate/M&A), Dr. Vera Jung­kind (anti­trust law; Düssel­dorf), Dr. Markus Ernst (tax law; Munich), Dr. Chris­tian Hoefs (employ­ment law), Chris­tian Dankerl (anti­trust law; Brussels), Dr. Matthias Roth­kopf (IP/IT; Düssel­dorf); Asso­cia­tes: Dr. Caspar Conzen, Niklas Lewi­cki, Dr. Laura Roth­mann, Guglielmo Ziani (all corporate/M&A), Dr. Thomas Kosmi­der (Düssel­dorf), Lino Völzke (Brussels; both anti­trust law), Dr. Sebas­tian Adam, Julia Gramer (Munich; both tax law), Dr. Andreas Kaletsch (employ­ment law), Kira Frit­sche (IP/IT; Düssel­dorf), Dr. Talbot Zander, Jean Fried­rich Härtelt (both real estate law)

M&A advi­sor Lamy: Manage­ment consul­tancy Imap, Mannheim

Karl Fesen­meyer (in charge)

News

Munich — The French private equity company Ciclad has sold its stake in Groupe SOLICE (“SOLICE”), a French district heating company. The buyer is the isoplus Group (“ISOPLUS”), a leading Euro­pean manu­fac­tu­rer of pre-insu­la­ted pipe systems for local and district heating supply. — Benoit Lejeune, Mana­ging Direc­tor of SOLICE, will conti­nue to manage the company and take on the role of Mana­ging Direc­tor of the new French ISOPLUS company. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the finan­cial details. The closing is expec­ted to be comple­ted in the coming weeks. POELLATH advi­sed ISOPLUS on the legal and tax aspects of the acquisition.

SOLICE compri­ses seve­ral compon­ents, inclu­ding the district heating gene­ral contrac­tor busi­ness WANNITUBE, the modern district heating pipe produc­tion faci­lity INPAL Ener­gie in Creutz­wald (France) and the company head­quar­ters in Chapon­nay near Lyon (France).

Based in Rosen­heim near Munich, ISOPLUS is the Euro­pean market leader for energy-effi­ci­ent district heating pipes for trans­for­ma­tio­nal and sustainable energy solu­ti­ons for milli­ons of house­holds, cities, muni­ci­pa­li­ties and utility compa­nies. The group of compa­nies is repre­sen­ted in more than 30 count­ries and employs more than 1,500 people across Europe.

Consul­tant ISOPLUS: POELLATH 

Dr. Michael Best, photo (part­ner, lead, tax)
Dr. Barbara Koch-Schulte (Part­ner, Manage­ment Participations)
Dr. Tobias Deschen­halm (Senior Asso­ciate, Tax)
Dr. Michael de Toma (Senior Asso­ciate, Manage­ment Participations)
Dr. Maxi­mi­lian Link (Asso­ciate, Manage­ment Participations)

News

Munich/Espoo — Infi­ni­ted Fiber Company, the Finnish manu­fac­tu­rer of a 100% circu­lar waste-to-textile fiber, has raised 40 million euros in a two-part Series B finan­cing round. Foun­ded in 2016, the company has deve­lo­ped a proprie­tary chemi­cal recy­cling tech­no­logy to convert textile waste or other cellu­lose-rich waste into so-called Infinna fibers, a new, 100% circu­lar and sustain­ably rege­ne­ra­ted textile fiber with the same look and feel as new cotton.

The new inves­tors are the Indi­tex Group (parent company of Zara and other brands), and TTY Manage­ment B.V., an asset manage­ment company priva­tely owned by Tada­shi Yanai, Chair­man, Presi­dent and CEO of Fast Retail­ing (parent company of the Uniqlo fashion brand). The leading outdoor clot­hing manu­fac­tu­rer Youngone Infi­ni­ted Fiber Company (YOH CVC Fund 1 Limi­ted Part­ner­ship) and the Japa­nese premium sports­wear manu­fac­tu­rer Gold­win (GOLDWIN Play Earth Fund Invest­ment Limi­ted Part­ner­ship) have also parti­ci­pa­ted in the recently comple­ted second finan­cing round of EUR 27 million. The first part of the deve­lo­p­ment finan­cing round, which was comple­ted in summer 2023, compri­sed invest­ments from exis­ting inves­tors, inclu­ding H&M Group, adidas, BESTSELLER and Zalando. Follo­wing the conclu­sion of this finan­cing round, Indi­tex, TTY Manage­ment and the H&M Group are the largest share­hol­ders of Infi­ni­ted Fiber Company.

Infi­ni­ted Fiber, based in Espoo, Finland, has deve­lo­ped a 100% circu­lar tech­no­logy for conver­ting waste into texti­les that bene­fits from the largest quan­ti­ties of available raw mate­ri­als, inclu­ding cellu­lo­sic products (paper, card­board, etc.) and some agri­cul­tu­ral resi­dues as well as textile waste. Seve­ral limi­ted-edition clot­hing coll­ec­tions, such as Wrang­ler jeans and Tommy Hilfi­ger T‑shirts, have alre­ady been produ­ced with the new fiber.

The company aims to play a signi­fi­cant role in trans­forming the conven­tio­nal mate­rial flow in the fashion and textile indus­try towards a circu­lar economy and is supported by leading inter­na­tio­nal consu­mer brands such as H&M, Indi­tex, Pata­go­nia and PVH. “They have tested the quality of the fiber and confirmed the market poten­tial by signing long-term purchase agree­ments in some cases. Indi­tex alone has signed a contract for more than 100 million euros,” says Falk Müller-Veerse (photo © Bran­Gar­nier), German part­ner at Bryan, Garnier & Co. who led the finan­cing round.

Infi­ni­ted Fiber curr­ently opera­tes two pilot produc­tion faci­li­ties and the newly raised funds will be used to enable the company’s contin­ued growth.

Sustainable textile market booming

The addressa­ble core market of Infi­ni­ted Fiber is esti­ma­ted by the analysts at Bryan, Garnier & Co. at EUR 66 billion and so far mainly compri­ses cotton and MMCF (man-made cellu­lose fiber). The demand for sustain­ably produ­ced texti­les is booming: “Not least due to the new Euro­pean regu­la­ti­ons, the market demand for sustainable fibres in Europe is expec­ted to triple to almost four million tons per year by 2030,” says Müller-Veerse. For exam­ple, under pres­sure from legis­la­tive measu­res and in response to a growing number of envi­ron­men­tally conscious consu­mers, one hundred of the world’s most pres­ti­gious fashion brands have commit­ted to redu­cing their green­house gas emis­si­ons by 30% by 2030.

Accor­ding to Bryan, Garnier & Co., textile produc­tion is respon­si­ble for around 20 percent of global water pollu­tion and around 2,500 liters of fresh water are needed to produce a single cotton T‑shirt. Accor­ding to Infi­ni­ted Fiber, the use of their inno­va­tive fiber results in appro­xi­m­ately 97% less water consump­tion and appro­xi­m­ately 67% less CO2 emis­si­ons per T‑shirt produ­ced compared to the use of pure cotton.

Müller-Veerse empha­si­zes: “It’s not just about repla­cing cotton produc­tion with its horren­dous water consump­tion. The new mate­rial could also replace up to 20% of the poly­es­ter fibers used world­wide today and is comple­tely biode­gra­da­ble without bioplastics.”

The Bryan, Garnier & Co deal team consis­ted of Falk Müller-Veerse, Pierre Kiecolt-Wahl, Phil­ippe LeSann , Julien Polenne, Grego­ire Angleys, Jean Cail­liau, Jakub Veiner and Camille Dubroc.

About Bryan, Garnier & Co

Bryan, Garnier & Co, foun­ded in 1996 in Paris and London, is an invest­ment bank focu­sed on Euro­pean growth compa­nies with over 200 employees in six offices in Europe (London, Paris, Munich, Stock­holm, Oslo, Amster­dam) and the US (New York). As an inde­pen­dent, full-service invest­ment bank, Bryan, Garnier & Co provi­des compre­hen­sive finan­cing advice and support along the complete life­cy­cle of its clients — from initial rounds of finan­cing to a poten­tial sale or IPO with subse­quent follow-on finan­cing. On average, the bank accom­pa­nies a good 70 tran­sac­tions per year.

News

Stuttgart/ Beuren/ Munich — The invest­ment company Fair­Cap GmbH has acqui­red Stumpp & Schüle GmbH from Lesjö­fors AB. The Swedish company Lesjö­fors AB, a subsi­diary of Beijer Alma AB, specia­li­zes in the produc­tion of tech­ni­cal springs, stam­ped and bent parts. The Group compri­ses around 40 manu­fac­tu­ring and sales compa­nies world­wide. Heuking advi­sed Fair­Cap on this transaction.

Stumpp + Schüle GmbH is a German manu­fac­tu­rer of wire springs, pres­sed and bent parts, which are used not only in the auto­mo­tive indus­try, but also in the elec­tro­nics, glass and cera­mics sectors. The company’s head­quar­ters are loca­ted in Beuren (Baden-Würt­tem­berg).

Fair­Cap GmbH is an entre­pre­neu­rial invest­ment company that acqui­res medium-sized compa­nies in special situa­tions (e.g. carve-out, succes­sion) and trans­forms them holi­sti­cally into sustainable, healthy orga­niza­ti­ons. In contrast to typi­cal private equity funds, Fair­Cap is a long-term invest­ment holding company, which is ther­e­fore not subject to a fund term and can hold invest­ments for the long term. Sustaina­bi­lity is a core element of FairCap’s invest­ment philosophy.

Follo­wing the acqui­si­tion of S & P Federn­werk GmbH & Co KG in 2021, the acqui­si­tion of Stumpp & Schüle GmbH repres­ents FairCap’s second take­over of a company in the spring and stam­ping and bending tech­no­logy sector.

Fair­Cap works regu­larly with HEUKING and Bene­dikt Raisch.

Advi­sor Fair­Cap: HEUKING
Bene­dikt Raisch (lead part­ner / corpo­rate law/M&A),
Antje Münch, LL.M. (trade­mark, design & copy­right law),
Ramona Bauer-Schöll­kopf, LL.M. (corpo­rate law/M&A), all Stuttgart

News

Düsseldorf/Munich — Karo Health­care is expan­ding its presence in Italy with this acqui­si­tion. The acqui­si­tion also streng­thens Karo’s stra­te­gic focus on premium brands in areas asso­cia­ted with discom­fort and shame. Proc­to­se­dyl® is a leading brand in Italy for the treat­ment of hemor­rhoids. The acqui­si­tion expands Karo’s posi­tion in one of its core compe­ten­cies, diges­tive health, which includes global brands such as Proct® and Hemoproct®.

ARQIS advi­sed Karo Health­care on the acqui­si­tion of Proc­to­se­dyl® from Bayer. The tran­sac­tion gives Karo the exclu­sive distri­bu­tion rights to the OTC product in Italy.

“This acqui­si­tion adds a trus­ted brand that covers an often negle­c­ted cate­gory with untap­ped poten­tial. We are exci­ted about the oppor­tu­nity to improve access to relia­ble treat­ments for Italian consu­mers and further expand our Italian busi­ness,” said Matt Roberts, CCO of Karo Healthcare.

The acqui­si­tion was carried out as an asset deal, without person­nel and produc­tion faci­li­ties, which redu­ces the commer­cial risk and ensu­res seam­less inte­gra­tion. Karo will use its exis­ting infra­struc­ture and rely on estab­lished part­ners in Italy.

The ARQIS team around Jörn-Chr. Schulze (Photo © arqis) acted for the first time for Karo Health­care, a Swedish EQT invest­ment company. The team’s healthcare/life science and private equity focus were decisive for the mandate.

Advi­sor Karo Health­care: ARQIS (Düsseldorf/Munich)

Dr. Jörn-Chris­tian Schulze (Lead Part­ner), Dr. Maxi­mi­lian Back­haus, Malte Grie­pen­burg (all Tran­sac­tions), Part­ners: Dr. Fried­rich Gebert (Regu­la­tory), Marcus Noth­hel­fer (IP), Mana­ging Asso­cia­tes: Daniel Schle­mann (Data Law), Rolf Tichy (IP), Asso­ciate: Dr. Bern­hard Gröhe (Regu­la­tory), Trade­mark Profes­sio­nal: Caro­lin von Fritsch

Fran­zosi — Dal Negro — Setti (Milan) Stefano Giberti, Fran­cesco Setti (both Italian regu­la­tory law)

About ARQIS

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

News

Frank­furt, Germany — Duravant LLC (“Duravant”), a global provi­der of engi­nee­red equip­ment and auto­ma­ted solu­ti­ons for the food proces­sing, pack­a­ging and mate­rial hand­ling indus­tries head­quar­te­red in Downers Grove, Illi­nois, USA, has acqui­red Henne­ken, a German engi­nee­ring company. — Global law firm Reed Smith has advi­sed Duravant LLC (“Duravant”) on the acqui­si­tion of Ferdi­nand Henne­ken GmbH (“Henne­ken”).

Henne­ken is a manu­fac­tu­rer of protein proces­sing solu­ti­ons based in Bad Wünnen­berg, North Rhine-West­pha­lia, Germany, that deve­lops and produ­ces inno­va­tive machi­nes, inclu­ding vacuum tumb­lers, tende­ri­zers, injec­tors and brine mixers, that enable higher produc­tion volu­mes and better product quality for meat, poul­try and seafood processors.

The acqui­si­tion of Henne­ken is part of Duravant’s corpo­rate stra­tegy to expand its invest­ments in the growing protein sector. The products and services offe­red by Henne­ken are highly comple­men­tary and enhance Duravant’s ability to offer complete and inte­gra­ted plant solutions.

Duravant was advi­sed by a multi­di­sci­pli­nary, inter­na­tio­nal Reed Smith team led by Dr. Octá­vio de Sousa , Foto (Part­ner, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt) and Sid Bale (Part­ner, Corporate/M&A, Chicago).

Dr. de Sousa adds: “We are very plea­sed to have been able to support Duravant in pursuing its inter­na­tio­nal growth stra­tegy in Germany. The tran­sac­tion has once again demons­tra­ted Reed Smith’s strength in provi­ding inte­gra­ted and compre­hen­sive advice on cross-border transactions.”

Advi­sor Duravant LLC: Reed Smith LLP 

Dr. Octá­vio de Sousa (Part­ner, Corporate/M&A), Sid Bale (Part­ner, Corporate/M&A, Chicago), both lead; with the assis­tance of Wim Vanden­berghe (Part­ner, Regu­la­tory Commer­cial, Brussels), Dr. Oliver Hahn­elt (Part­ner, Finance), Harald Heller (Part­ner, Real Estate), Dr. Martin Bünning (Part­ner, Tax) Chris­tian Leuth­ner (Part­ner, Tech & Data), Chris­tian Filip­pitsch (Part­ner, Anti­trust, Brussels), as well as Dr. Niklas Kout­sós (Coun­sel, Finance) and Ceci­lia Manny (Asso­ciate, Corporate/M&A), Jona­than Diehl (Asso­ciate, Real Estate), Dr. Hannah von Wickede (Asso­ciate, Tech & Data), Jonas Weimert (Asso­ciate, IP), Vincent Magotsch (Asso­ciate, Employ­ment Law) and Elisa Saier (Asso­ciate, Employ­ment Law).

About Duravant

Head­quar­te­red in Downers Grove, Illi­nois, Duravant is a global auto­ma­ted equip­ment company with manu­fac­tu­ring, sales and service faci­li­ties in North America, South America, Europe and Asia. Through its port­fo­lio of opera­ting compa­nies, Duravant deli­vers relia­ble end-to-end process solu­ti­ons for custo­mers and part­ners through engi­nee­ring and inte­gra­tion exper­tise, project manage­ment and opera­tio­nal excel­lence. With world­wide sales and service networks, Duravant provi­des imme­diate and life­time support for all the markets they serve in food proces­sing, pack­a­ging and mate­rial hand­ling. Duravant’s market-leading brands are synony­mous with inno­va­tion, dura­bi­lity and relia­bi­lity. Further infor­ma­tion can be found at www.duravant.com.

Advi­sor Ferdi­nand Henne­ken GmbH: Kanz­lei im Technologiepark
Peter Suminski

About Henne­ken

Henne­ken, head­quar­te­red in Bad Wünnen­berg, Germany, is a manu­fac­tu­rer and service provi­der of inno­va­tive machi­nes for the meat, poul­try and seafood indus­try. The Henne­ken port­fo­lio of highly deve­lo­ped machine solu­ti­ons includes vacuum tumb­lers, tende­ri­zers, injec­tors, curing mixers, flat­ten­ers as well as product hand­ling and loading systems. Since 1977, the company has been a leader in deve­lo­ping solu­ti­ons that meet the needs of food proces­sors who demand quality and safety while maxi­mi­zing produc­ti­vity and produc­tion volume. Henne­ken is commit­ted to custo­mer satis­fac­tion and works with its custo­mers to find the right solu­tion. The company deve­lops and deli­vers its systems on time and offers a relia­ble service and spare parts service. Further infor­ma­tion can be found at www.henneken-tumblers.de.

About Reed Smith

Reed Smith is one of the leading inter­na­tio­nal law firms. The firm compri­ses 31 offices with more than 1,700 lawy­ers in Europe, the USA, the Middle East and Asia. www.reedsmith.com

News

Frank­furt a.M. — McDer­mott Will & Emery has advi­sed Altium LLC, a leading provi­der of design soft­ware for the elec­tro­nics indus­try, on the acqui­si­tion of all shares in Bremen-based Vali­space GmbH and its wholly-owned Portu­guese subsi­diary Galac­tic Purpose Unipes­soal LDA.

Vali­space, foun­ded in Bremen in 2016, has deve­lo­ped a brow­ser-based engi­nee­ring SaaS plat­form that makes it easier for engi­neers to deve­lop tech­ni­cal docu­men­ta­tion for complex hard­ware products, among other things.

Head­quar­te­red in San Diego, Cali­for­nia, Altium is a multi­na­tio­nal soft­ware company foun­ded in 1985 and publicly traded in Austra­lia that provi­des elec­tro­nic design auto­ma­tion soft­ware for engi­neers who design prin­ted circuit boards.

Advi­sor Altium LLC: McDer­mott Will & Emery, Frankfurt

Prof. Dr. Clemens JustFoto (Corporate/M&A, lead), Dr. Heiko Kermer (Tax), Isabelle Suzanne Müller (Coun­sel, Corporate/M&A), Marcus Fischer (Coun­sel, Tax), Dr. Deniz Tschamm­ler (Commercial/Regulatory), Dr. Claus Färber (Coun­sel, Data Protec­tion, Munich), Dr. Gudrun Germa­kow­ski (Employ­ment, Düssel­dorf), Dr. Johan­nes Honzen (Real Estate), Renate Prinz (Finan­cial Regu­la­tory, Cologne/Düsseldorf), Dr. Chris­tian Masch (IP/IT, Munich), Dr. Laura Stamm­witz (Coun­sel, Anti­trust); Asso­cia­tes: Simon Apelojg (IP, Munich), Alex­an­dra Heber­ber (Healthcare/Regulatory, Munich), Dr. Laura Stamm­witz (IP, Anti­trust). Chris­tian Masch (IP/IT, Munich), Dr. Laura Stamm­witz (Coun­sel, Anti­trust Law); Asso­cia­tes: Simon Apelojg (IP, Munich), Alex­an­dra Heberle (Healthcare/Regulatory), Lisa Schei­pers (Employ­ment Law, Düssel­dorf), Dr. Anja Bert­rand (Anti­trust Law, Cologne/Düsseldorf), Matthias M. Bosbach, Romy Lanz (both Finance, Düssel­dorf), Tina Happ (Real Estate Law)

News

Munich — The joint venture company under the name “HMotion” is to combine the best of both worlds: The flight data and know-how of Airbus as a leading heli­c­op­ter manu­fac­tu­rer and the expe­ri­ence of ADAC Luft­ret­tung as a world-renow­ned heli­c­op­ter opera­tor. Toge­ther, the two part­ners want to create the world’s most modern simu­la­tor trai­ning center for H135 and H145 heli­c­op­ters. — The law firms Green­Gate Part­ners and Baker Tilly advi­sed both compa­nies on the estab­lish­ment of the joint venture between ADAC HEMS Academy and Airbus Heli­c­op­ters for flight simu­la­tor training.

Follo­wing appr­oval by the rele­vant super­vi­sory autho­ri­ties, the new joint venture, named HMotion, commen­ced opera­ti­ons on March 1, 2024.

The new joint venture offers a wide range of cost-effec­tive trai­ning cour­ses for heli­c­op­ter person­nel, inclu­ding mission and criti­cal flight trai­ning. In a first phase, HMotion will inte­grate the full-flight simu­la­tors at the Airbus Heli­c­op­ters site in Donau­wörth and at the ADAC HEMS Academy in Sankt Augus­tin near Bonn. In a second phase, all simu­la­tor acti­vi­ties will be relo­ca­ted to a new, state-of-the-art trai­ning center in Ober­pfaf­fen­ho­fen near Munich from 2025.

Green­Gate Part­ners and Baker Tilly each provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal advice on the tran­sac­tion and, in addi­tion to struc­tu­ring the joint venture, also draf­ted and nego­tia­ted all tran­sac­tion agreements.

Advi­sor Airbus Heli­c­op­ters: Green­Gate Partners

Dr. Diet­helm Baumann (lead; corpo­rate, Munich), Dr. Alex­an­der Raif (employ­ment law, Berlin), Alex­an­der Tribess (IT/IP, Hamburg), Tobias Percher­meier (corpo­rate, Munich).

Advi­sor ADAC: Baker Tilly

Stephan Zuber (lead; corporate/M&A, Munich), Kers­tin Weckert (employ­ment law, Frank­furt), Dr. Chris­tian Engel­hardt (IP/IT, Hamburg), Ines Paucksch (tax law, Munich), Dr. Stefan Meßmer (anti­trust law, Stutt­gart), Till Werner (corporate/M&A, Munich), Thomas Böhm (corporate/real estate, Munich), Peter Reiß (corporate/M&A, Munich), Chris­tine Ostwald (employ­ment law, Munich), Tobias Wald­schmidt (tax law, Munich).

About Green­Gate Partners

Green­Gate Part­ners, foun­ded in 2022, is a boutique law firm with a focus on tech­no­logy and tran­sac­tions, provi­ding sound legal advice to enable progress and prepare the legal ground for inno­va­tion. With a high level of indus­try know­ledge and a deep under­stan­ding of entre­pre­neu­rial proces­ses, not least due to sound expe­ri­ence as in-house coun­sel, the lawy­ers at Green­Gate Part­ners advise on corpo­rate law, labor law and gene­ral commer­cial law, among other things. In cross-border matters, Green­Gate Part­ners can offer custo­mi­zed advice from a single source thanks to its outstan­ding inter­na­tio­nal network.

News

Paris — The PEARL and Edmond de Roth­schild Private Equity teams announce the third closing of their new PEARL Infra­struc­ture Capi­tal II SCA fund, RAIF, which closed on Febru­ary 28, 2024 with a volume of EUR 306 million. This result comes seven months after the first closing of the fund and corre­sponds to the target of EUR 400 million.

The envi­ron­men­tal infra­struc­ture specia­list and part­ner of Edmond de Roth­schild Private Equity also announ­ces the start of the test­ing phase for the final invest­ment of its first vintage fund, the Green Valley Ener­gie biomass coge­nera­tion plant in France, Edmond de Roth­schild Asset Manage­ment said.

PEARL II has a solid base of French and Euro­pean inves­tors, inclu­ding the Euro­pean Invest­ment Fund (under the InvestEU program), banks, insu­rance compa­nies and pension funds.

PEARL II is an invest­ment fund specia­li­zing in the majo­rity finan­cing of envi­ron­men­tal infra­struc­ture projects in Europe. These projects include rene­wa­ble energy produc­tion, waste recy­cling and the circu­lar economy and are prima­rily aimed at large indus­trial groups and local autho­ri­ties facing the dual chall­enge of ecolo­gi­cal and energy transformation.

PEARL II is charac­te­ri­zed by its commit­ment to rene­wa­ble base load energy carri­ers that meet the industry’s decar­bo­niza­tion goals while meeting the requi­re­ments for the conti­nuous opera­tion of indus­trial and heating networks. The fund’s invest­ments will focus on various segments, inclu­ding biomass, biogas, biome­thane, solid and liquid biofuels for the trans­port sector (inclu­ding AFS), green hydro­gen, geother­mal energy and waste recycling.

PEARL II is clas­si­fied as Article 9 under the EU SFDR, bears the Green­fin label and complies with at least 66 percent of the Euro­pean taxonomy.

In line with its road­map, PEARL fully placed its first vintage fund, PEARL Infra­struc­ture Capi­tal I SCA, RAIF, within two and a half years of the final closing in March 2020. In this context, PEARL has reached a decisive mile­stone for its latest green­field invest­ment after one and a half years of cons­truc­tion: the Green Valley Ener­gie biomass coge­nera­tion plant in the Vosges (France), which will go into opera­tion with the first cold tests. Green Valley Ener­gie, which is sche­du­led to be fully opera­tio­nal in summer 2024, will be the largest biomass coge­nera­tion plant based on wood waste in France with a capa­city of 100 MWth of carbon-free heat and 25 MWe of rene­wa­ble elec­tri­city gene­ra­tion. The plant will gene­rate more than 900 GWh/year of rene­wa­ble energy (elec­tri­city and heat) and avoid the emis­sion of 213,000 tCO2eq per year.

Jean-Chris­to­phe Guimard (photo © PEARL), co-foun­der and Presi­dent of PEARL, says: “Europe is commit­ted to an indus­trial pact to recon­cile the objec­ti­ves of the energy tran­si­tion and re-indus­tria­liza­tion. In this context, PEARL is proud to contri­bute to the decar­bo­niza­tion of the indus­try with the launch of the test phase of its Green Valley Ener­gie combi­ned heat and power plant and the third closing of its second fund.”

Johnny el Hachem, CEO of Edmond de Roth­schild Private Equity, says: “Against the back­drop of infla­tion, inves­tors conti­nue to place their trust in us. The PEARL stra­tegy demons­tra­tes its importance and rele­vance in buil­ding a low-carbon, resi­li­ent and sustainable economy for future gene­ra­ti­ons, to which our Group is firmly committed.”

About PEARL Infra­struc­ture Capital

PEARL Infra­struc­ture Capi­tal is a private equity invest­ment fund that closed its first fund in March 2020 and focu­ses on infra­struc­ture for the energy tran­si­tion and circu­lar economy in Europe, mainly for indus­trial compa­nies. PEARL was foun­ded by a team of expe­ri­en­ced experts from the energy and envi­ron­men­tal sector and a part­ner from Edmond de Roth­schild Private Equity. As the majo­rity share­hol­der, PEARL invests in medium-sized, non-inter­mit­tent plants and rene­wa­ble energy gene­ra­tion projects inten­ded for indus­trial compa­nies and local autho­ri­ties. To date, PEARL has inves­ted in eight biomass coge­nera­tion plants in France, Germany and Croa­tia and comple­ted the first closing of its succes­sor fund PEARL Infra­struc­ture Capi­tal II SCA, RAIF, on July 13, 2023.

About Edmond de Roth­schild Private Equity

Edmond de Roth­schild Private Equity mana­ges assets of over EUR 4.0 billion via two AIFMs. With an entre­pre­neu­rial approach to finance and backed by strong convic­tions, Edmond de Roth­schild Private Equity deve­lops diffe­ren­tia­ted invest­ment stra­te­gies that provide a sustainable response to envi­ron­men­tal and social issues. Foun­ded in 1953, the Group mana­ges assets of around CHF 160 billion, employs 2,500 people and is repre­sen­ted in 30 loca­ti­ons worldwide.

News

Berlin — YPOG provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal advice to German elec­tro­ly­zer manu­fac­tu­rer Sunfire GmbH on its Series E finan­cing round, which raised €215 million in equity. The new inves­tors include LGT Private Banking, GIC, Ahren Inno­va­tion Capi­tal and Carbon Equity. The tran­sac­tion is subject to custo­mary regu­la­tory appr­ovals and is expec­ted to be comple­ted in the second quar­ter of 2024.
Exis­ting share­hol­ders have increased their invest­ments in Sunfire — inclu­ding Light­rock, Planet First Part­ners, Carbon Direct Capi­tal, the Amazon Climate Pledge Fund and Blue Earth Capital.

The rene­wed invest­ment in Sunfire, which repres­ents one of the largest finan­cing rounds to date in 2024, is a strong signal of the company’s crucial role in expan­ding the hydro­gen economy in a diffi­cult finan­cial envi­ron­ment. — In addi­tion, the company has secu­red a loan of up to €100 million from the Euro­pean Invest­ment Bank (EIB), which will enable it to conti­nue the deve­lo­p­ment and indus­tria­liza­tion of solid oxide electrolysers.

In addi­tion, Sunfire has access to appro­xi­m­ately €200 million from alre­ady appro­ved finan­cing projects to drive its growth. This makes the Dres­den-based company one of the most capi­ta­li­zed compa­nies in the elec­tro­ly­sis sector.

Sunfire is a leading global manu­fac­tu­rer of indus­trial elec­tro­ly­zers based on pres­sure-based alka­line and solid oxide tech­no­lo­gies (SOEC). With its elec­tro­ly­sis solu­ti­ons, Sunfire is tack­ling a central chall­enge of today’s energy system: The provi­sion of rene­wa­ble hydro­gen and synthe­sis gas as a climate-neutral repla­ce­ment for fossil fuels. Sunfire’s inno­va­tive and proven elec­tro­ly­sis tech­no­logy enables the conver­sion of carbon-inten­sive indus­tries that curr­ently rely on fossil oil, gas or coal. The company employs more than 500 people in Germany and Switzerland.

Advi­sor Sunfire: YPOG

Dr. Martin Scha­per (Co-Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Berlin Dr. Frede­rik Gärt­ner (Co-Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Berlin Dr. Malte Berg­mann (Tax), Part­ner, Hamburg
Matthias Kres­ser (Finance), Part­ner, Berlin/Hamburg
Dr. Bene­dikt Flöter (IP/IT/Data Protec­tion), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Berlin Dr. Ferdi­nand Cadmus (Finance), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Berlin/Hamburg Alex­an­der Sekunde (Transactions/FDI), Senior Asso­ciate, Berlin
Dr. Jonas von Kalben (Transactions/FDI), Senior Asso­ciate, Berlin Benja­min Müller (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­ciate, Berlin
Roman Schäle(Transactions), Asso­ciate, Berlin

 

News

Darm­stadt — Threedy is a high-tech start-up that was foun­ded in 2020 as a spin-off of the Fraun­ho­fer Insti­tute for Compu­ter Graphics Rese­arch (IGD) in Darm­stadt. Three remar­kably successful years after its foun­ding, Threedy has secu­red a USD 10.4 million invest­ment to acce­le­rate growth across multi­ple indus­tries and geogra­phies. New inves­tors in Threedy’s cutting-edge tech­no­logy include LBBW Venture Capi­tal, TRUMPF VENTURE, Futury Capi­tal and Equi­ty­Pit­cher Ventures. The invest­ment unders­cores Threedy’s strong posi­tion to capture a signi­fi­cant market share in the fast-growing indus­trial digi­tal twin space.

Digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion in the industry

Threedy’s instant3Dhub is a high-perfor­mance spatial compu­ting tech­no­logy that enables custo­mers to use their 3D data in any confi­gu­ra­tion and visua­lize it on a large scale. By making data available and acces­si­ble in real time on any device and at any time, it enables the opti­miza­tion of a variety of digi­tal proces­ses along the entire indus­trial value chain and a signi­fi­cant reduc­tion in the asso­cia­ted costs. By imple­men­ting instant3Dhub, compa­nies can save valuable time and resour­ces, e.g. by elimi­na­ting waiting times and redu­cing license and infra­struc­ture costs.

Threedy enables its custo­mers to estab­lish a modern soft­ware archi­tec­ture that redu­ces depen­dency on the mono­li­thic and closed stacks of estab­lished soft­ware vendors and opens the door for agile deve­lo­p­ment and the scalable roll-out of a modern, light­weight appli­ca­tion layer.

With a wide range of features for digi­tal engi­nee­ring, advan­ced colla­bo­ra­tion and seam­less mixed reality, Threedy’s soft­ware provi­des a strong foun­da­tion for the digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion of the industry.

Working with 3D data beco­mes as easy as sharing a link by simply refe­ren­cing it from any source, e.g. exis­ting PDM/PLM solu­ti­ons, without any prepa­ra­tion or simpli­fi­ca­tion. Threedy’s tech­no­logy enables new, scalable appli­ca­ti­ons across the entire product life­cy­cle, from deve­lo­p­ment to after-sales — web-based and with a zero-foot­print on the client.

By opti­mi­zing 3D data usage and commu­ni­ca­tion, compa­nies can also reduce their envi­ron­men­tal foot­print: busi­ness trips can largely be repla­ced by virtual exch­an­ges, saving resour­ces and time.

In the first three years, Threedy has successfully deve­lo­ped from a Fraun­ho­fer depart­ment into an inde­pen­dent company. Since its foun­ding at the end of 2020, Threedy has grown signi­fi­cantly, almost tripling its work­force to build a team of more than 50 highly quali­fied profes­sio­nals from around the world. The company has not only main­tai­ned its strong custo­mer rela­ti­onships, but has also expe­ri­en­ced remar­kable growth, parti­cu­larly in the auto­mo­tive and manu­fac­tu­ring industries.

Threedy’s cutting-edge tech­no­logy is valued by nume­rous indus­try leaders, inclu­ding the leading German car manu­fac­tu­r­ers. In addi­tion, Threedy has successfully expan­ded its network of part­ner­ships and has grown beyond its origi­nal focus areas of auto­mo­tive and the German market. With a substan­tial 10.4 million dollar Series A invest­ment, Threedy is now ready for the next step, backed by new inves­tors LBBW Venture Capi­tal, TRUMPF VENTURE, Futury Capi­tal and Equi­ty­Pit­cher Ventures. Exis­ting inves­tors Matter­wave Ventures, Fraun­ho­fer and High-Tech Grün­der­fonds (HTGF) rene­wed their commit­ment by parti­ci­pa­ting in the Series A investment.

Threedy will conti­nue its commit­ment to commer­cia­lize its inno­va­tive spatial compu­ting infra­struc­ture and acce­le­rate its adop­tion in various indus­tries and use cases. The invest­ment will enable Threedy to further advance the deve­lo­p­ment of its product portfolio.

Threedy’s expan­sion plans include further inter­na­tio­na­liza­tion, while the company conti­nues to focus on excel­lence and inno­va­tion and sustain­ably supports the digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion of its part­ners. Threedy is now actively looking for new employees in various roles to join the team and help shape the future of the indus­trial digi­tal twin.

“Threedy imme­dia­tely caught our inte­rest with its cutting-edge tech­no­logy and enorm­ous growth poten­tial. The advan­ced spatial compu­ting plat­form fits in with our invest­ment stra­tegy to support breakth­rough digi­tal inno­va­tions that trans­form key indus­tries in the DACH region such as mecha­ni­cal engi­nee­ring or the auto­mo­tive indus­try. Threedy’s instant3Dhub enables orga­niza­ti­ons to effort­lessly access their most valuable assets — 3D data — in real time, on any device, at any time. We are exci­ted to lead this invest­ment and support Threedy’s great team on its future jour­ney,” said Patrick Herlin­ger (Invest­ment Mana­ger, LBBW Venture Capital)

“Threedy has successfully built a strong custo­mer network of leading auto­mo­tive and manu­fac­tu­ring compa­nies for its revo­lu­tio­nary spatial compu­ting tech­no­logy, giving it the poten­tial to become the market leader. As one of Threedy’s valued custo­mers, TRUMPF relies on instant3Dhub to support sales repre­sen­ta­ti­ves with 3D visua­liza­tion. We are very plea­sed to support Threedy’s next growth step with our invest­ment,” explains Jens Ortgiese (Prin­ci­pal, TRUMPF VENTURE)

“We are exci­ted about the oppor­tu­nity to support the Hessian deep-tech company Threedy in a strong inves­tor consor­tium to drive the digi­ta­liza­tion of manu­fac­tu­ring compa­nies world­wide”, Benja­min Krah­mer (Mana­ging Direc­tor, Futury Capital)

“Inno­va­tive compa­nies from the DACH region always arouse our inte­rest imme­dia­tely. With its revo­lu­tio­nary spatial compu­ting approach, Threedy fits perfectly into our invest­ment stra­tegy,” says Sascha Horrig (Foun­ding Part­ner, Equi­ty­Pit­cher Ventures)

“We conti­nue to support Threedy with full commit­ment. In the last three years since its foun­da­tion, Threedy has shown a remar­kable success story and deve­lo­ped from a start-up and Fraun­ho­fer spin-off into an estab­lished company. With more than 50 employees, a growing custo­mer base, valuable part­ner­ships and incre­asing use cases, we look forward to support­ing Threedy’s next growth step,” said Robert Gallen­ber­ger (Foun­ding Part­ner at Matter­wave Ventures), Gregor Haidl (Prin­ci­pal at High-Tech Grün­der­fonds) and Markus Weit­zel (Invest­ment Mana­ger at Fraun­ho­fer Venture)

About LBBW Venture Capital

As an ever­green fund, LBBW Venture Capi­tal has been support­ing startup foun­ders in raising seed or Series A rounds in the DACH region since 1998. Its fields of acti­vity include B2B soft­ware, FinTech, DeepT­ech and life science. LBBW Venture Capi­tal also offers growth support through LBBW’s large custo­mer network and can offer addi­tio­nal finan­cial services in later phases as well as advice on M&A or IPO exits. https://www.lbbwvc.de/

TRUMPF VENTURE

TRUMPF Venture is the corpo­rate venture capi­tal unit of the TRUMPF Group. The CVC arm invests world­wide in early-stage deep-tech start-ups that operate in areas that comple­ment or are adja­cent to TRUMPF’s core business.
https://www.trumpf.com/en_INT/company/trumpf-group/trumpf-venture/

About Futury Capital

Futury Capi­tal is an early and growth stage inves­tor with a focus on tech start­ups in Germany and world­wide. The invest­ment port­fo­lio favors globally scalable busi­ness models in various sectors. Through its LP struc­ture with the State of Hesse, family offices, insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors and multi­na­tio­nal compa­nies, Futury Capi­tal provi­des stra­te­gic and opera­tio­nal support to the port­fo­lio to help build excep­tio­nal compa­nies. https://www.futurycapital.vc/en

Equi­ty­Pit­cher Ventures

Equi­ty­Pit­cher Ventures is a leading Swiss venture capi­tal firm foun­ded in 2016. It invests in high-growth start-ups from the DACH region in an indus­try-agno­stic manner. By working closely with renow­ned indus­try experts, co-inves­tors and exit part­ners, Equi­ty­Pit­cher paves the way for entre­pre­neurs to access the three key success factors: capi­tal, know-how and network.
https://equitypitcher.com/en/

About Fraun­ho­fer Venture

Fraun­ho­fer Venture is the central spin-off and invest­ment manage­ment depart­ment of the Fraun­ho­fer-Gesell­schaft. It offers foun­ders, start-ups, indus­trial compa­nies and inves­tors a compre­hen­sive support program with access to the cutting-edge tech­no­lo­gies of 76 Fraun­ho­fer Insti­tu­tes as well as to Fraunhofer’s infra­struc­ture and exper­tise — inclu­ding more than 7,600 patent fami­lies. The range of services offe­red by Fraun­ho­fer Venture includes compre­hen­sive support and advice from the concep­tion to the foun­ding of a company, active manage­ment of Fraun­ho­fer invest­ments, support in the search for finan­cing oppor­tu­ni­ties through to the possi­ble sale of the company.
https://www.fraunhoferventure.de/en.html

Matter­wave Ventures

Matter­wave Ventures is a Euro­pean venture capi­tal company based in Munich that has specia­li­zed in deep tech inno­va­tions with indus­trial appli­ca­ti­ons for many years. The expe­ri­en­ced team invests in early-stage soft­ware and hard­ware-based busi­ness models throug­hout Europe. The aim is to build world-leading compa­nies that drive the future of indus­trial value crea­tion, impro­ving resource effi­ci­ency, tech­no­logy sove­reig­nty and opera­tio­nal effi­ci­ency. Over the past 20 years, the team has inves­ted in over 60 compa­nies. Matter­wave invests in the “full stack”, from mate­ri­als and compon­ents to complete systems and soft­ware solu­ti­ons. With over EUR 200 million of capi­tal under manage­ment, Matter­wave typi­cally parti­ci­pa­tes in seed and Series A finan­cing rounds with initial invest­ments between EUR 1–4 million. Inclu­ding follow-up finan­cing rounds, more than EUR 10 million can be inves­ted per port­fo­lio company.
https://matterwave.vc

High-Tech Grün­der­fonds
The seed inves­tor High-Tech Grün­der­fonds (HTGF) finan­ces tech­no­logy start-ups with growth poten­tial and has supported more than 700 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 5 billion in the HTGF port­fo­lio in more than 2,000 follow-on finan­cing rounds. In addi­tion, the fund has alre­ady successfully sold shares in more than 170 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.

News

Achen — Membion GmbH from Roet­gen near Aachen recei­ved a Series A led by the Tech­Vi­sion Fund (TVF) and the DeepT­ech & Climate Fund (DTCF) in the amount of around 5 million euros. The company deve­lops and produ­ces membrane biore­ac­tor (MBR) modu­les for waste­wa­ter treat­ment. The multi-paten­ted tech­no­logy enables muni­ci­pal and indus­trial waste­wa­ter treat­ment plant opera­tors to meet the growing demands on water quality and signi­fi­cantly reduce opera­ting costs. — DC Advi­sory was commis­sio­ned by Membion to evaluate and imple­ment the stra­te­gic opti­ons for this transaction.

More filter perfor­mance in a smal­ler space — with up to 90 percent less energy consumption

Membion will use the capi­tal to achieve broad market entry, set up further produc­tion lines and deve­lop addi­tio­nal product features. — Foun­ded in 2012 by Dr. Klaus Vossen­kaul and Dirk Volme­ring, Membion is a deve­lo­per and manu­fac­tu­rer of a highly disrup­tive membrane biore­ac­tor (MBR) solu­tion with appli­ca­ti­ons in muni­ci­pal and indus­trial waste­wa­ter treat­ment. The product, secu­red by seve­ral patents, addres­ses key problems of modern waste­wa­ter treat­ment by: Redu­cing energy requi­re­ments by appro­xi­m­ately 90%, it requi­res signi­fi­cantly less space (appro­xi­m­ately 75%), this results in supe­rior water quality and large savings in opera­ting costs.

DC Advi­sory was enga­ged by Membion to evaluate and imple­ment stra­te­gic opti­ons, with a focus on iden­ti­fy­ing and intro­du­cing Membion’s disrup­tive solu­tion to poten­tial investors
DC Advi­sory conduc­ted a compre­hen­sive process to iden­tify the best part­ners for Membion — provi­ding stra­te­gic advice, prepa­ra­tion of rele­vant marke­ting docu­men­ta­tion, support in the nego­tia­tion phase and due dili­gence coordination.

This tran­sac­tion enhan­ces DC Advisory’s strong track record in sourcing equity for inno­va­tive compa­nies and its clear commit­ment to support­ing compa­nies with a strong sustaina­bi­lity focus. “With the current finan­cing round, we are setting the course for the effi­ci­ent scaling of Membion. With TVF and DTCF, we have part­ners on board who share our vision and support us in achie­ving our goals,” says Dr. Klaus Vossen­kaul, CEO of Membion.

“It was a great plea­sure to work with Dr. Vossen­kaul and his team. We are proud to have supported an emer­ging cham­pion in global waste­wa­ter treat­ment with this important step,” explains Stefan Jaecker (photo © CD Advi­sory), CEO of DC Advi­sory Germany.

About DeepT­ech & Climate Fund

The DeepT­ech & Climate Fund (DTCF) is a new fund that invests in the growth of compa­nies with future tech­no­lo­gies. It is finan­ced by the Future Fund and the ERP Special Fund and helps to expand the tech­no­logy ecosys­tem of the future. As an anchor inves­tor and part­ner of long-term inves­tors such as family offices, the DTCF will invest up to one billion euros in the coming years to deve­lop the new tech­no­logy-based SMEs of tomor­row. https://dtcf.de

About TVF

Tech­Vi­sion Fonds (TVF) is a leading early stage VC fund from the Rhineland/NRW with a focus on tech­no­logy start-ups in the pre-seed to Series A phase. TVF focu­ses on outstan­ding teams from the region, inclu­ding the neigh­bor­ing Nether­lands and Belgium. TVF Manage­ment has expe­ri­ence from four gene­ra­ti­ons of funds and curr­ently has over € 100 million in assets under manage­ment. The fund is backed by strong inves­tors such as NRW.BANK, seven savings banks from western NRW and more than 15 successful entrepreneurs.
The TVF supports start-up teams with proxi­mity, network and know-how and paves the way for them to become the next inter­na­tio­nal indus­try leader. Through the network of the S‑UBG Group, TVF offers unique access to over 150 successful compa­nies in various indus­tries and estab­lishes cont­acts between start-ups and their first custo­mers, part­ners and consul­tants. https://techvision-fonds.de

 

News

Stuttgart/Bogota — GFT Tech­no­lo­gies SE (GFT) acqui­res 100% of the shares in the Colom­bian core banking expert Sophos Solu­ti­ons S.A.S.. With Sophos, GFT beco­mes one of the top 3 provi­ders of IT services for banks in Latin America and also increa­ses its global deli­very capa­bi­lity. GFT acqui­res the company from Advent Inter­na­tio­nal, one of the largest and most expe­ri­en­ced global private equity inves­tors. The acqui­si­tion is a clear sign of GFT’s contin­ued focus on growth and profitability.

GFT gains a new foot­hold in core banking solu­ti­ons, AI and cloud moder­niza­tion, as well as addi­tio­nal part­ners and clients, inclu­ding Colombia’s major finan­cial insti­tu­ti­ons. The company is expan­ding its presence to 20 count­ries, six of which are in Latin America: Brazil, Mexico and Costa Rica are now joined by Colom­bia, Chile and Panama. The combi­ned strength of the two compa­nies will result in GFT beco­ming one of the top three provi­ders of IT services to banks across Latin America.

Thanks to the more than 1,700 employees of Sophos, GFT’s global work­force is growing by almost 20 percent to more than 12,000. This is the largest number of employees that GFT has ever gained through an acqui­si­tion. The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to be comple­ted at the begin­ning of Febru­ary 2024. In 2022, Sophos gene­ra­ted reve­nue of around 257 billion Colom­bian pesos (curr­ently around 60 million euros) and GFT global reve­nue of over 730 million euros.

“With this stra­te­gic acqui­si­tion, we are not only merging compa­nies, but multi­ply­ing poten­tial,” says GFT CEO Marika Lulay (photo © GFT). “It is a logi­cal conti­nua­tion of our profi­ta­ble growth stra­tegy. All aspects of Sophos are very valuable to us. From the new colle­agues, new compe­ten­cies and clients to the new part­ners for core banking solu­ti­ons such as Oracle Flex­cube. All of this leads to strong momen­tum for GFT in Colom­bia, the third largest Latin Ameri­can market, as well as expo­nen­tial growth oppor­tu­ni­ties in the Ameri­cas and beyond.”

Custo­mers bene­fit from exper­tise in core banking, AI and cloud modernization

Sophos is parti­cu­larly known for its exper­tise in the areas of core banking, AI and cloud moder­niza­tion as well as inno­va­tion and digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion. GFT’s clients will bene­fit from expan­ded deli­very capa­city and access to new exper­tise, inclu­ding core banking solu­ti­ons with Sophos’s estab­lished part­ners. For Sophos custo­mers, the acqui­si­tion means access to GFT’s large talent pool, exten­sive expe­ri­ence in successfully imple­men­ting cutting-edge tech­no­lo­gies, more part­ners such as Thought Machine and pre-built solu­ti­ons. All of this toge­ther leads to shorter time-to-market and effec­tive deli­very of services to all customers.

“We are proud to be working with the entire Sophos team at a time of strong growth for the company,” says Lucas Maru­landa, Direc­tor at Advent Inter­na­tio­nal. “Since our invest­ment in 2020, Sophos has stra­te­gi­cally scaled its plat­form through inter­na­tio­nal and regio­nal expan­sion, helping to drive tech­no­logy trans­for­ma­tion and moder­niza­tion in the finan­cial indus­try. We look forward to follo­wing the company’s contin­ued success.”

“It is a great oppor­tu­nity for ever­yone at Sophos to become part of GFT,” adds Felipe Villa, CEO of Sophos. “With the combi­ned exper­tise and global presence of Sophos and GFT, we comple­ment each other perfectly. This will enable us to better support our custo­mers in their digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion — great news for our employees and their profes­sio­nal deve­lo­p­ment, as well as for our custo­mers. We are grateful to Advent for taking our busi­ness to the next level.”

Canac­cord Genuity acted as exclu­sive finan­cial advi­sor to Advent and Sophos in connec­tion with the transaction.

News

Berlin — Green Gene­ra­tion Fund was advi­sed on its $16 million seed finan­cing of Swiss AI start-up Jua by YPOG toge­ther with Swiss law firm Wenger Vieli. The round was led by the Green Gene­ra­tion Fund toge­ther with 468 Capi­tal. Other inves­tors include Promus Ventures, Kadmos Capi­tal, the foun­ders of Flix Mobi­lity, Session.vc, Virtus Resour­ces Part­ners, Notion.vc and InnoSuisse.

Foun­ded in 2022 by Andreas Bren­ner and Marvin Gabler, the Swiss start-up has deve­lo­ped a weather fore­cas­ting plat­form based on arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence that can be used to display custo­mi­zed, high-reso­lu­tion weather models.

Big AI models — the large amounts of voice, image and audio data that power gene­ra­tive arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence services — will be as important to the deve­lo­p­ment of AI as opera­ting systems are to the deve­lo­p­ment of smart­phones: in a sense, they look like the plat­forms of the space (an idea that others are also tinke­ring with). Now a Swiss startup called Jua is using this para­digm with the aim of crea­ting a new fron­tier for the use of AI in the physi­cal world. The company has recei­ved 16 million dollars to deve­lop a large “physics” model for the natu­ral world.

The company is still at a very early stage. Its first appli­ca­tion will be the mode­ling and fore­cas­ting of weather and climate patterns, initi­ally in rela­tion to the play­ers in the energy indus­try. Accor­ding to the company, this will be intro­du­ced in the coming weeks. Other sectors that the company is targe­ting with its model are agri­cul­ture, insu­rance, trans­por­ta­tion and government.

Legal advice Green Gene­ra­tion Fund: YPOG

Dr. Benja­min Ullrich (Co-Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Berlin
Dr. Adrian Haase (Co-Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Hamburg
Dr. Bene­dikt Flöter (IP/IT/Data Protec­tion), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Berlin Dr. Chris­toph Cordes (IP/IT/Data Protec­tion), Asso­ciate, Berlin
Farina Weber (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­ciate, Berlin

and Wenger Vieli (Switz­er­land)

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