ALTERNATIVE FINANCING FORMS
FOR ENTREPRENEURS AND INVESTORS

Author: Tatjana Anderer

Gründerin des FYB-Verlag
News

Fank­furt a. Main — IK Invest­ment Part­ners (“IK”) has announ­ced that the IK VIII Fund has signed an agree­ment to sell its invest­ment in SCHOCK GmbH (“SCHOCK” or “the Company”) to Triton Fund V, advi­sed by Triton (“Triton”). The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the finan­cial details of the transaction.

SCHOCK has a leading global market posi­tion in the design and produc­tion of high-quality quartz compo­site kitchen sinks with a diverse base of more than 2,000 custo­mers in over 70 count­ries. The company stands for inno­va­tive, high-quality products and has a strong focus on sustaina­bi­lity. This is under­li­ned, among other things, by the recently laun­ched Green Line product line, whose sinks are made from over 99 percent natu­ral, rene­wa­ble or raw mate­ri­als. In addi­tion to the compre­hen­sive range of kitchen sinks with over 200 models in 40 diffe­rent colors, SCHOCK also offers faucets, shower trays and rela­ted access­ories. The company, based in Regen, Bava­ria, employs more than 500 people and produ­ces exclu­si­vely in Germany.

Since IK’s invest­ment in 2016, SCHOCK has pursued a successful stra­tegy based on the three main elements of gaining new custo­mers, inter­na­tio­na­liza­tion and conti­nuous product inno­va­tion. As a result, the company achie­ved signi­fi­cant orga­nic growth and more than doubled its opera­ting profit. At the same time, substan­tial funds were inves­ted in the expan­sion of produc­tion capa­ci­ties, opera­tio­nal effi­ci­ency and product development.

As part of the tran­sac­tion now agreed, IK is selling its shares to the invest­ment company Triton, which will further deve­lop the company as an entre­pre­neu­rial part­ner toge­ther with the exis­ting manage­ment team headed by Ralf Boberg.

Ralf Boberg, CEO of SCHOCK, stated, “We are very grateful to the IK team for their guidance and support over the past four years. During this time, we have inves­ted in our inno­va­tive and sustainable product range and streng­the­ned our brand and repu­ta­tion in the market for high-quality, dura­ble and contem­po­rary sinks. We look forward to working with Triton to build on this foun­da­tion and conti­nue our growth trajectory.”

Mirko Jablon­sky, Part­ner at IK and advi­sor to the IK VIII Fund, said: “It has been a privi­lege for us to work with SCHOCK as a market leader in an attrac­tive segment of the kitchen indus­try. The uncom­pro­mi­sing focus on quality and the undis­pu­ted ability to inno­vate while setting new tech­no­lo­gi­cal stan­dards will enable SCHOCK to win new custo­mers and expand its product range and market presence. We wish Ralf Boberg and the team every success with their new shareholder.”

Ruth Linz, Co-Head Consu­mer at Triton, commen­ted: “We are plea­sed to accom­pany the next phase of the company’s deve­lo­p­ment at SCHOCK with our invest­ment. The oppor­tu­nity to work with such a strong brand, which also has excep­tio­nal growth poten­tial, does not come around often — we see oppor­tu­ni­ties here parti­cu­larly in the US and through targe­ted M&A acti­vi­ties. We look forward to part­ne­ring with SCHOCK and taking the company to the next level of growth.”

Parties invol­ved:

IK Invest­ment Part­ners: Detlef Dinsel, Mirko Jablon­sky, Daniel-Vito Günther
Seller M&A advi­sor: William Blair (Phil­ipp Mohr, Dirk Felsmann)
Seller legal advi­sor: Latham & Watkins (Henning Schnei­der, Nils Röver)
Seller commer­cial advi­sor: EY Parthe­non (Björn Reineke)
Seller finan­cial advi­sor: EY (Hinrich Grun­waldt, Sandra Krusch)
Seller ESG advi­sor: EY (Robert Seiter)

About IK Invest­ment Partners

IK Invest­ment Part­ners is a Euro­pean private equity firm with an invest­ment focus on the Nordic count­ries, the DACH region, France, Bene­lux as well as the UK. Since 1989, IK has laun­ched funds with a cumu­la­tive equity volume of more than 13 billion euros and inves­ted in more than 145 Euro­pean compa­nies. The IK Funds support compa­nies with signi­fi­cant growth poten­tial and their manage­ment teams in deve­lo­ping busi­ness models for the future, streng­thening the compa­nies’ market posi­tion and thus crea­ting outstan­ding long-term deve­lo­p­ment poten­tial. www.ikinvest.com

About Triton

Triton was foun­ded in 1997 with the goal of working with boards, mana­gers and employees to build better compa­nies. We are entre­pre­neurs who invest capi­tal where we see an oppor­tu­nity to create long-term value. We are aware that the decis­i­ons we make affect people’s lives. The 46 compa­nies curr­ently in our port­fo­lio play an important role in their respec­tive loca­ti­ons in Nort­hern Europe. They employ around 101,000 people and gene­rate combi­ned annual sales of around €18.2 billion. In 2018, we raised €5.2 billion for our latest private equity fund, Triton V. For more infor­ma­tion, visit www.triton-partners.com

About SCHOCK

SCHOCK is the inven­tor of the granite sink and has been the global tech­no­logy and quality leader in this field for more than 40 years. The paten­ted combi­na­tion of quartz with high-quality acrylic crea­tes a premium product that is three times harder than natu­ral granite and is also supe­rior in many product proper­ties to sinks made of other mate­ri­als. The SCHOCK range includes sinks for every kitchen style and taste type. Custo­mers in over 70 count­ries rely on SCHOCK products, which are produ­ced exclu­si­vely at the company head­quar­ters in Regen in the Bava­rian Forest. For more infor­ma­tion, visit www.schock.de

News

Frank­furt — The commer­cial law firm 
Fried­rich Graf von West­pha­len & Partner
 (FGvW) is further expan­ding its office in Frank­furt am Main. With Dr. Annette Böde­ker, the firm gains a proven corporate/M&A expert and notary as a new part­ner. FGvW thus also streng­thens the notary’s office in Frank­furt, which since April 2020 has been 
Dr. Chris­toph Börskens
 was newly established.

Dr. Annette Böde­ker will join the firm on March 1, 2021, from Arnold & Porter, where she was a part­ner in the firm’s sole German office and respon­si­ble for the firm’s corporate/M&A busi­ness. She star­ted her career at Henge­ler Muel­ler, then moved to Link­la­ters, where she was a part­ner in the corpo­rate depart­ment for seve­ral years. Dr. Böde­ker also has many years of expe­ri­ence in U.S. law firms, having been with Orrick in 2009 and Arnold & Porter Kaye Scho­ler since 2012. In addi­tion to the social consul­ting of large, inter­na­tio­nal compa­nies and banks, the focus of their acti­vi­ties is the support of compa­nies from the medium-sized busi­ness sector. As a part­ner of Arnold & Porter, Dr. Böde­ker also advi­sed on tran­sac­tions from the Arnold & Porter network, where she regu­larly worked closely with colle­agues from London and the USA.

“Our Frank­furt am Main loca­tion has recei­ved a considera­ble boost in recent months — we are consis­t­ently conti­nuing along this path,” explains Mana­ging Partner 
Dr. Barbara Mayer
. “We are plea­sed that with Dr. Annette Böde­ker we are gaining another renow­ned and profes­sio­nally excel­lent rein­force­ment in the area of Corporate/M&A. After having expan­ded the Frank­furt office in recent years, espe­ci­ally in real estate law, employ­ment law, IP and the notary’s office, we will now also conti­nue to grow in the tran­sac­tional area,” adds Mana­ging Part­ner Annette Bödeker. 
Cars­ten Laschet
.

FGvW’s corpo­rate prac­tice has a strong presence nati­on­wide. In cross-office coope­ra­tion, FGvW has built up exper­tise in all matters of corpo­rate law — company forma­ti­ons, reor­ga­niza­tion of group struc­tures, prepa­ra­tion of share­hol­ders’ meetings and gene­ral meetings, corpo­rate finance issues. This also includes advi­sing inves­tors on the acqui­si­tion of listed compa­nies, tradi­tio­nal M&A busi­ness and advi­sing on joint ventures in Germany and abroad.

“Fried­rich Graf von West­pha­len & Part­ner is a leading German law firm with an excel­lent repu­ta­tion and strong inter­na­tio­nal orien­ta­tion,” commen­ted Dr. Annette Böde­ker on her decis­ion to join FGvW. “I alre­ady know long-stan­ding clients of FGvW from the phar­maceu­ti­cal and medi­cal tech­no­logy sectors as clients of Arnold & Porter. With FGvW’s Berlin office, the firm also has proven experts in tech­no­logy and venture capi­tal tran­sac­tions. FGvW is thus the ideal plat­form for my stron­gly inter­na­tio­nally orien­ted business.”

News

Zurich — Neural Concept, the Swiss soft­ware company in the field of Compu­ter Aided Design (CAD) and Engi­nee­ring (CAE), is plea­sed to announce new mile­sto­nes in the company’s deve­lo­p­ment. At the begin­ning of the year, the exis­ting inves­tors, Constan­tia New Busi­ness and High-Tech Grün­der­fonds, support the next growth phase with seed exten­sion finan­cing. Both inves­tors alre­ady led the seed round 18 months ago. With the fresh capi­tal, Neural Concept can acce­le­rate and realize its mission — to bring the enorm­ous poten­tial of Deep Lear­ning into the hands of design engi­neers for real-time simu­la­tion and inter­ac­tive design optimization.

Paral­lel to the finan­cing round, a new advi­sory board was estab­lished to comple­ment the exis­ting board of direc­tors. The two new advi­sory board members, Evrard Van Zuylen and Roberto Schett­ler, bring exten­sive expe­ri­ence in foun­ding, growing and mana­ging successful B2B soft­ware compa­nies in the areas of machine lear­ning and design engineering.

Pierre Baqué, foun­der and CEO of Neural Concept: “I am deligh­ted to advise Neural Concept on its future growth. The company’s disrup­tive deep lear­ning algo­rithms will set the new stan­dard in the simu­la­tion industry

Evrard Van Zuylen, Neural Concept Advi­sory Board: “Neural Concept has foun­ded a new world of simu­la­tion. Deep Lear­ning will not only speed up simu­la­ti­ons and demo­cra­tize them in all areas of design and deve­lo­p­ment. I am convin­ced that this will finally enable itera­tive design of better products at low cost. Rather than seeing this as a mere vision of the future, compa­nies can make it a reality today with Neural Concept’s soft­ware products.”

About Evrard Van Zuylen
Evrard van Zuylen is co-foun­der (2006) and mana­ging direc­tor of darts-ip, world’s leading AI-based data provi­der for IP liti­ga­tion until its acqui­si­tion by Clari­vate plc. Foun­der (2000) and CTO of Trans­wide, now part of Alpega N.V. Previously, he worked at BCG and IBM.Evrard holds a master’s degree in mecha­ni­cal engi­nee­ring from l’Ecole Poly­tech­ni­que de Louvain and an MBA from the Univer­sity of Chicago Booth School of Business.

About Roberto Schettler
Roberto was CEO of Real­time Tech­no­logy (RTT), a leading 3D soft­ware and services company for the auto­mo­tive and aero­space sectors. Under his leader­ship, he grew the company to nearly 1,000 employees before RTT was acqui­red by Dassault Systems in 2014. He subse­quently also served as CEO of the rebran­ded company 3DExcite. Previously, he co-foun­ded Core­Op­tics, which was later acqui­red by Cisco Inc. was purcha­sed, and worked as a consul­tant at Think­Team as well as BCG. Here, he helps tech­no­logy compa­nies in both Europe and the U.S. grow to new levels.

About Constan­tia New Busi­ness (CNB Capital)
CNB Capi­tal is an inde­pen­dent early-stage inves­tor focu­sed on B2B product compa­nies that have achie­ved initial market vali­da­tion. An expe­ri­en­ced team of invest­ment mana­gers actively supports foun­ders in func­tional areas, espe­ci­ally sales and marke­ting. The ever­green invest­ment approach supports the long-term orien­ta­tion of CNB’s stra­tegy in buil­ding substan­tial busi­nesses together.

About High-Tech Gründerfonds
The seed inves­tor High-Tech Grün­der­fonds (HTGF) finan­ces tech­no­logy start-ups with growth poten­tial. With a volume of around EUR 900 million spread across three funds and an inter­na­tio­nal part­ner network, HTGF has supported more than 600 start-ups since 2005. His 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. Almost EUR 3 billion in capi­tal has been inves­ted in the HTGF port­fo­lio by exter­nal inves­tors in more than 1,700 follow-on finan­cing rounds to date. In addi­tion, the fund has alre­ady successfully sold shares in more than 120 companies.Investors in the public-private part­ner­ship include the German Fede­ral Minis­try for Econo­mic Affairs and Energy, KfW Capi­tal, the Fraun­ho­fer-Gesell­schaft and the 32 companies.

News

Munich — GENUI acqui­res a stake in FACT-Finder. FACT-Finder is the Euro­pean market leader for search, navi­ga­tion and merchan­di­sing in eCom­merce. Since the early 2000s, the company has been deve­lo­ping AI-based search tech­no­lo­gies to help online shop­pers find the right products. Inter­na­tio­nally, the tech­no­logy is used in more than 1,800 stores. GENUI was advi­sed on this invest­ment by Pöllath & Partners.

GENUI is a company foun­ded by renow­ned entre­pre­neurs and invest­ment experts who believe in “Good Entre­pre­neur­ship”: GENUI only makes long-term commit­ments to compa­nies with the aim of crea­ting sustainable growth and social value. Compa­nies gain access to special entre­pre­neurs with indus­try-rele­vant exper­tise and the asso­cia­ted network as part of profes­sio­nal governance.

POELLATH advi­sed GENUI on the invest­ment with the follo­wing team:

Dr. Tim Kauf­hold, Photo (Part­ner, Lead Part­ner, M&A, Private Equity, Munich)
Dr. Nico Fischer (Part­ner, Tax Law, Munich)
Chris­tine Funk, LL.M. (Senior Asso­ciate, IP/IT, Frankfurt)
Dr. Moritz Klein (Senior Asso­ciate, M&A, Private Equity, Munich)
Matthias Ober­bauer (Senior Asso­ciate, M&A, Private Equity, Munich)
Johanna Scherk (Asso­ciate, M&A, Private Equity, Munich)

About PPLAW

POELLATH is a market-leading inter­na­tio­nal busi­ness and tax law firm with more than 150 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.

News

Munich / Münner­stadt — “We spice the future” — under this motto, the spice specia­list Vision Food GmbH, Münner­stadt, has been on the road to success for years. A dormant equity holding (mezza­nine) by BayBG Baye­ri­sche Betei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft enables further invest­ments and streng­thens working capi­tal. This means that the company, which was foun­ded in 2005, remains on a growth path.

The Lower Fran­co­nian company supplies, grinds and blends high-quality spices, extra­cts or vanilla for its custo­mers throug­hout Europe. Howe­ver, Vision Food does not limit itself to pure retail­ing, but clearly stands out from the compe­ti­tion with its “custo­mi­zing”. Vision Food thus offers not only “stan­dar­di­zed” spices and blends, but also products precis­ely tail­o­red to custo­mers’ requi­re­ments, for exam­ple in terms of oil or pipe­rine content in pepper. “With this and its many years of expe­ri­ence, Vision Food has a strong posi­tion with its custo­mers, which include the meat proces­sing indus­try or manu­fac­tu­r­ers of spice blends for the retail trade,” says Martin Kunze, invest­ment mana­ger at BayBG, describ­ing the company. “We see great poten­tial in the company, the market and the product,” adds Alois Bösl, who is respon­si­ble for BayBG’s busi­ness acti­vi­ties throug­hout nort­hern Bava­ria: “Cooking and ever­y­thing to do with it has and is gaining further cult charac­ter. This means that high-quality spices, for which Vision Food stands, are also incre­asingly in demand.”

Uwe Scher­baum, owner and mana­ging direc­tor of Vision Food, is also satis­fied: “With BayBG, we have gained a renow­ned part­ner that is very well ancho­red in the dome­stic SME sector and will support us in the long term. This puts us in a good posi­tion. The addi­tio­nal capi­tal will enable us to conti­nue our growth stra­tegy with balan­ced financing.”

About BayBG — Baye­ri­sche Beteiligungsgesellschaft

With an inves­ted volume of more than 300 million euros, BayBG Baye­ri­sche Betei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft is one of the largest provi­ders of equity capi­tal, espe­ci­ally for Bava­rian SMEs. With its venture capi­tal and equity invest­ments, which it provi­des in the form of equity and mezza­nine, it enables medium-sized compa­nies to imple­ment inno­va­tion and growth projects, manage corpo­rate succes­sion or opti­mize their capi­tal struc­ture. BayBG opera­tes as an ever­green fund and is not subject to exit pressure.

News

Frankfurt/Düsseldorf — McDer­mott Will & Emery has advi­sed soft­ware inves­tor Main Capi­tal Part­ners on the acqui­si­tion of DATA-PLAN Compu­ter Consul­ting GmbH as an add-on invest­ment by MACH AG.

MACH AG, an e‑government soft­ware and consul­ting company based in Lübeck, has been one of Main Capital’s port­fo­lio compa­nies since 2020. — DATA-PLAN Compu­ter Consul­ting GmbH is an IT system house with a focus on public admi­nis­tra­tion. The company employs around 50 people at its Stutt­gart and Chem­nitz sites.

Main Capi­tal is a stra­te­gic inves­tor focu­sing on the soft­ware sector in the Bene­lux, DACH region and Scan­di­na­via, with offices in The Hague, Düssel­dorf and Stock­holm. Main Capi­tal mana­ges appro­xi­m­ately €1 billion in assets for invest­ment in mature and growing soft­ware companies.

McDer­mott had alre­ady advi­sed Main Capi­tal on the acqui­si­tion of Mach AG. The team led by Frank­furt part­ner Norman Wasse has parti­cu­lar exper­tise in soft­ware and tech tran­sac­tions and has advi­sed, among others, Invest­corp Tech­no­logy Part­ners on the acqui­si­tion and subse­quent sale of Avira and Ratio­data AG on the acqui­si­tion of the Accesa Group.

Advi­sors to Main Capi­tal Part­ners: McDer­mott Will & Emery, Frankfurt/Düsseldorf
Norman Wasse (Lead, Private Equity, Frank­furt), Dustin Schwerdt­fe­ger (Corporate/Finance, Düssel­dorf), Dr. Kian Tauser, Marcus Fischer (Coun­sel; both Tax Law, Frank­furt), Dr. Gudrun Germa­kow­ski (Labor Law, Düssel­dorf), Dr. Chris­tian L. Masch (IT/IP, Munich), Dr. Alexa Ningel­gen (Public Law, Düssel­dorf), Dr. Maxi­mi­lian Clos­ter­meyer (Real Estate, Frank­furt); Asso­cia­tes: Dr. Marion von Grön­heim, Victo­ria Huf (Tran­sac­tion Specia­list; both Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt), Julian Jäger (Labor Law, Düssel­dorf), Isabella Kätzl­meier (IT/IP, Munich), Lene Niemeier (Public Law, Düssel­dorf), Elena Platte (Real Estate, Frankfurt)

News

Lausanne/Boston — Next­hink, the leading provi­der of digi­tal employee expe­ri­ence manage­ment soft­ware, today announ­ced a $180 million Series D funding round. This brings the company’s valua­tion to $1.1 billion.

The finan­cing round is led by the Growth Oppor­tu­ni­ties Fund of inter­na­tio­nal invest­ment firm Perm­ira, with parti­ci­pa­tion from exis­ting inves­tors such as High­land Europe and Index Ventures. Bruce Chizen, Senior Advi­sor at Perm­ira and former CEO of Adobe, joins Nexthink’s Board of Direc­tors. The company intends to use the proceeds from the finan­cing round to further acce­le­rate inno­va­tion, growth and global expan­sion, parti­cu­larly in the US.

Next­hink provi­des IT teams with a compre­hen­sive plat­form for mana­ging the digi­tal expe­ri­ence of enter­prise employees. This enables digi­tal employee bene­fits to be moder­ni­zed, relia­bly deli­vered, and proac­tively impro­ved. Accor­ding to a recent survey, 96 percent of tech­no­logy execu­ti­ves agree that mana­ging the enter­prise digi­tal expe­ri­ence with tech­no­logy is an essen­tial part of IT teams’ jobs. Still, more than a third (34%) rely on occa­sio­nal surveys to coll­ect rela­ted data, and nearly half (46%) don’t measure their employees’ digi­tal expe­ri­ence at all. Nexthink’s award-winning plat­form provi­des enter­prise IT with a cloud-based solu­tion that provi­des compre­hen­sive visi­bi­lity into employees’ day-to-day expe­ri­en­ces with tech­no­logy at the device, appli­ca­tion and network levels. The detailed analy­sis capa­bi­li­ties and visua­liza­ti­ons greatly faci­li­tate trou­ble­shoo­ting and enable IT teams to conti­nuously improve employee satis­fac­tion with IT and resolve issues within minutes.

Next­hink curr­ently employs nearly 700 people and plans to grow to 900 by the end of 2021 — across all major loca­ti­ons in Europe, India and the US. In the past fiscal year, the company contin­ued to grow rapidly, surpas­sing the $100 million mark in recur­ring reve­nue (ARR). The number of custo­mers has increased by more than 180 to now more than 1,000 compa­nies, inclu­ding global firms that use the soft­ware on more than eleven million workstations.

In 2020, Next­hink laun­ched nume­rous new products, inclu­ding the Remote Worker Expe­ri­ence solu­tion, Expe­ri­ence Opti­miza­tion for proac­tive support teams, and addi­tio­nal features for virtua­liza­tion and indi­vi­dua­li­zed IT support. In the Forres­ter New Wave™: End-User Expe­ri­ence Manage­ment, Q4 2020, Next­hink was reco­gni­zed as a market leader.

“The trend towards decen­tra­li­zed working has signi­fi­cantly acce­le­ra­ted the need for soft­ware solu­ti­ons for the digi­tal expe­ri­ence with IT in compa­nies. This is because a signi­fi­cant portion of employee inter­ac­tions are now comple­tely digi­tal,” says Pedro Bados, CEO and co-foun­der of Next­hink. “We are facing a unique oppor­tu­nity to rede­fine now how compa­nies will provide digi­tal work­places to their employees in the future. We are deligh­ted to have found a new part­ner in growth inves­tor Perm­ira to accom­pany us on this exci­ting jour­ney. Bruce is an excel­lent addi­tion to our team. As CEO of Adobe, he has inspi­red milli­ons of users with visio­nary soft­ware and perma­nently chan­ged the way people work toge­ther. Toge­ther with him, we now aim to do the same with Next­hink at thou­sands of compa­nies worldwide.”

“Next­hink has seen rapid growth in recent years,” says Bruce Chizen. “With the shift towards decen­tra­li­zed and digi­tal working, the digi­tal expe­ri­ence with IT in compa­nies takes on a promi­nent importance for employee satis­fac­tion. With this round of funding, Next­hink is well equip­ped to reshape the role of IT for the world’s largest compa­nies and provide a plat­form for opti­mally aligned digi­tal workplaces.”

“Disrup­tive soft­ware provi­ders that help increase produc­ti­vity and employee satis­fac­tion in compa­nies are a key invest­ment focus for Perm­ira in the tech­no­logy sector. With its strong growth and tech­no­logy focus, Next­hink ther­e­fore fits perfectly into the stra­tegy of the Perm­ira Growth Oppor­tu­ni­ties Fund,” adds Pierre Pozzo, Prin­ci­pal at Permira.

The Perm­ira Funds’ invest­ment is from the Growth Oppor­tu­ni­ties Fund I, which focu­ses on mino­rity invest­ments in high-growth compa­nies. The Perm­ira funds are among the largest soft­ware inves­tors in the world. Well-known invest­ments include Team­Viewer, a global plat­form for the digi­tal networ­king of people and machi­nes, Mirakl, a SaaS market­place plat­form, Zwift, a global online fitness plat­form for cyclists and runners, and Klarna, the leading inno­va­tive payment service provider.

The closing of this tran­sac­tion is sche­du­led for Q1. www.nexthink.com.

About Perm­ira

Perm­ira is a global private equity firm, was foun­ded in 1985 and advi­ses funds with a total volume of around USD 50 billion. The Permira
advi­sed funds invest in compa­nies for the long term with the aim of incre­asing the value of these compa­nies through sustainable growth. Perm­ira advi­sed funds have comple­ted more than 250 tran­sac­tions in four key sectors: Tech­no­logy, Consu­mer Goods, Services and Health­care. Perm­ira employs more than 250 people at 15 loca­ti­ons in Europe,
North America and Asia.

About High­land Europe
High­land Europe invests in extre­mely high-growth soft­ware and Inter­net compa­nies. Opera­ting as High­land Capi­tal Part­ners in Europe since 2003 and offi­ci­ally laun­ched in 2012, High­land Europe has raised over €1.8 billion and inves­ted in compa­nies such as Adjust, AMCS, Camunda, ContentS­quare, Feature­space, GetY­our­Guide, Huel, Jellys­mack, Malware­bytes, Matches­Fa­shion, NewVoice­Me­dia, Next­hink, Spot, Super­me­trics, WeTrans­fer, Wolt and Zwift. Highland’s total invest­ments in the U.S., Europe and China include 46 IPOs and compa­nies valued at more than $19 billion.

About Index Ventures
Index Ventures is an inter­na­tio­nal venture capi­tal firm based in London and San Fran­cisco that helps the most ambi­tious entre­pre­neurs turn bold ideas into global busi­ness. Index-backed compa­nies that are resha­ping the world around us include Data­dog, Drop­box, Elas­tic and Slack.

News

Vienna/Leobersdorf — Logsta, the logi­stics scale-up from Austria, with warehouse loca­ti­ons in Austria, Germany, UK and USA, impro­ves the effi­ci­ency of logi­stics proces­ses many times over with its highly inno­va­tive IT plat­form. For the company with over 860 satis­fied custo­mers like NEOH and Novrit­sch, the new year starts with posi­tive invest­ment news. The company secu­res a 7‑digit finan­cing from the Vien­nese invest­ment fund for growth finan­cing, Round2 Capi­tal, in order to conquer further inter­na­tio­nal markets and expand the IT plat­form, among other things. The high­light: Logsta does not give away shares in the company as usual, but instead Round2 Capi­tal parti­ci­pa­tes in the company’s sales until a prede­fi­ned upper limit has been reached.

Many people today rely — full-time or part-time — on e‑commerce to sell their products. Howe­ver, many SMBs, sole proprie­tors and start­ups invol­ved in e‑commerce that only distri­bute small quan­ti­ties or have special or crea­tive pack­a­ging needs often face the diffi­culty of finding a logi­stics company willing to work with them and provide a digi­ti­zed logi­stics process solu­tion for busi­nesses of any size. Georg Weiß, Chris­toph Glatzl and Domi­nik Bier­in­ger reco­gni­zed this in 2017 and laun­ched the logi­stics startup Logsta.

The goal of the three foun­ders was to support compa­nies that were simply too small or had too high digi­ta­li­zed requi­re­ments for the clas­sic logi­stics compa­nies with uncom­pli­ca­ted and custo­mi­zed logi­stics services world­wide from a single source and at fair prices: From inno­va­tive IT tools, warehouse loca­ti­ons in the USA, Germany, Austria and England, fast support for world­wide ship­ments to modern e‑fulfillment as well as favorable ship­ping condi­ti­ons. Now outgrown its start-up shoes, the scale-up has over 860 inter­na­tio­nal custo­mers and over 2 million products in its warehou­ses. With the speci­ally deve­lo­ped Logsta-Connec­tor, custo­mers can control and check their logi­stics world­wide free of charge, it enables 24/7 inven­tory check, expi­ra­tion date manage­ment, batch manage­ment, order status insight and much more.

In order to realize further expan­sion plans, the three foun­ders have raised a 7‑digit euro amount from Round2 Capi­tal, the invest­ment fund for growth finan­cing. The Vienna-based invest­ment fund is a Euro­pean pioneer in reve­nue-based finan­cing, inves­t­ing in leading scale-ups in the tech­no­logy and soft­ware sectors in Europe. It is a simple, trans­pa­rent and flexi­ble finan­cing instru­ment for compa­nies in the growth phase, which offers non-dilu­tive finan­cing against reve­nue sharing up to a prede­fi­ned cap. The advi­sor for this growth finan­cing was i5Invest, which sees this measure as an important step for Logsta in terms of scaling and internationalization.

“We have found the ideal part­ner for us in Round2. They convince with their flexi­ble finan­cing solu­tion, which gives us the chance to acce­le­rate our growth and conquer more inter­na­tio­nal markets,” said the foun­ders of Logsta.

Chris­tian Czer­nich, CEO and Co-Foun­der Round2 Capi­tal Part­ners: “We are impres­sed by the dyna­mism and inge­nuity of the Logsta team. The foun­ders have mana­ged to build a highly inno­va­tive and now globally opera­ting company in a short period of time without exter­nal funding. Logsta’s digi­tal logi­stics solu­ti­ons enable both large and small compa­nies to get their products sold online to the end custo­mer quickly, relia­bly and cost-effectively.”

About Round2 Capi­tal Partners

Round2 Capi­tal is a fast-growing Euro­pean invest­ment firm with €30 million under its manage­ment. The Vienna-based company is a strong part­ner for Euro­pean scale-ups with digi­tal and sustainable busi­ness models. Since its incep­tion in 2017, Round2 Capi­tal has been pionee­ring reve­nue-based finan­cing in Europe and is active in seve­ral Euro­pean count­ries, with a focus on Germany, Switz­er­land, Austria and the Nordic count­ries. To date, Round2 Capi­tal has inves­ted in 14 diffe­rent compa­nies, with Logsta being the newest company in the port­fo­lio. www.round2cap.com

News

Berlin — Educa­tion inves­tor Emerge Educa­tion is inves­t­ing in EdTech startup Tomorrow’s Educa­tion. This is the first time the VC from the UK has inves­ted in a company from Germany with its new gene­ra­tion of funds. In the course of the finan­cing round of Tomorrow’s Educa­tion, Emerge Educa­tion also acted as lead inves­tor and was legally advi­sed by SMP part­ners Frede­rik Gärt­ner and Martin Scha­per toge­ther with Jonas Huth.

“With the use of, among other things, arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence and a contem­po­rary concept, Tomorrow’s Educa­tion is poin­ting the way towards an even more modern and flexi­ble form of acade­mic trai­ning and is thus crea­ting a new form of know­ledge trans­fer. We are very plea­sed to have been able to provide legal support to Emerge Educa­tion in this tran­sac­tion,” says Frede­rik Gärtner.

Emerge Educa­tion

Emerge Educa­tion ranks as one of Europe’s leading inves­tors in the educa­tion sector. The London-based venture capi­ta­list focu­ses its invest­ments prima­rily on pre-seed and seed invest­ments of early-stage EdTech start­ups. In addi­tion to provi­ding capi­tal, Emerge Educa­tion also offers its port­fo­lio compa­nies access to inves­tors, stra­te­gic part­ners, and a network of key educa­tion and indus­try decis­ion makers. The venture capitalist’s invest­ments include Enga­geli, Aula, Lingumi, Four­thRev, Crehana and Eduflow.

Tomorrow’s Educa­tion

Tomorrow’s Educa­tion is a digi­tal lear­ning plat­form based in Berlin. Toge­ther with the Vienna Univer­sity of Econo­mics and Busi­ness Admi­nis­tra­tion, the company has deve­lo­ped an accre­di­ted part-time master’s program that is opti­mi­zed for mobile use and thus adapted to the needs of the target group. In addi­tion, Tomorrow’s Educa­tion focu­ses on teaching lear­ning content in compa­ra­tively short sequen­ces, as well as on prac­ti­cal and problem-orien­ted chal­lenges or even compe­ti­ti­ons from the entre­pre­neu­rial envi­ron­ment. Arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence also ensu­res progres­sive perso­na­liza­tion of the lear­ning envi­ron­ment. Tomorrow’s Educa­tion was foun­ded in 2020 by former N26 CTO and foun­der of the health app Vivy, Chris­tian Reber­nik, and educa­tion expert Thomas Funke, and curr­ently employs around 15 people.

About SMP

SMP is a specia­list tax and commer­cial law firm opera­ting in the core areas of corpo­rate, funds, liti­ga­tion, tax and tran­sac­tions. SMP attor­neys and tax advi­sors repre­sent a wide variety of clients. These include emer­ging tech­no­logy compa­nies and family-run medium-sized enter­pri­ses as well as corpo­ra­ti­ons and private equity/venture capi­tal funds. Since its foun­da­tion in 2017, SMP has become one of the leading addres­ses for venture capi­tal, private equity and fund struc­tu­ring in Germany. The firm and its part­ners are natio­nally and inter­na­tio­nally ranked by JUVE, Best Lawy­ers, Legal 500, Focus, and Cham­bers and Part­ners. Today, SMP employs more than 60 expe­ri­en­ced lawy­ers, tax advi­sors and tax specia­lists in three offices in Berlin, Hamburg and Colo­gne. www.smp.law

Consul­tant Emerge Educa­tion: SMP
Dr. Frede­rik Gärt­ner (Corpo­rate), Asso­ciate Partner
Dr. Martin Scha­per (Corpo­rate), Partner
Jonas Huth (Corpo­rate), Associate

News

Munich — The MEA Group, a subsi­diary of the Munich-based indus­trial holding ADCURAM, is expan­ding its acti­vi­ties in the field of concrete light wells. With Vilgerts­ho­fer Bausys­teme GmbH (Alling), a produ­cer with a long tradi­tion beco­mes part of the inter­na­tio­nal cons­truc­tion supplier based in Aich­ach. The tran­sac­tion has alre­ady been comple­ted; the parties have agreed not to disc­lose details.

Vilgerts­ho­fer Bausys­teme will operate in the future as MEA Bausys­teme Beton­fer­ti­gung GmbH and streng­then the concrete know-how of the MEA Group. The concrete light well busi­ness has been an important part of MEA’s offe­ring for many years. Comple­men­tary to the light and venti­la­tion shafts made of fiber­glass-rein­forced plas­tic, MEAVECTOR is used to produce high-quality concrete light shafts. Vilgerts­ho­fer offe­red. In addi­tion to stan­dard sizes, the incre­asing market demand for special light shafts can thus be met even better.

“With this acqui­si­tion, MEA is taking an important step towards more growth. The concrete produc­tion in Alling repres­ents the basis for a broa­der product range in the future and the expan­sion of produc­tion capa­ci­ties,” says Dr. Phil­ipp Gusinde, CEO of ADCURAM Group AG and member of the advi­sory board at MEA. Gregor Gais­böck, Mana­ging Direc­tor of MEA Bausys­teme, adds: “The expan­sion of our MEAVECTOR busi­ness is an important stra­te­gic step and the company site in Alling will become our compe­tence center for all concrete acti­vi­ties. We are very plea­sed to welcome Vilgerts­ho­fer Bausys­teme to the MEA Group.”

ADCURAM had acqui­red the family-owned company, foun­ded in 1886, in the summer of 2018 and has since been imple­men­ting an ambi­tious stra­tegy for further growth and expan­sion. MEA employs around 700 people and, as one of the leading suppli­ers to the cons­truc­tion indus­try, manu­fac­tures not only light wells but also special gratings, windows and drai­nage systems, among other products.

About ADCURAM

ADCURAM is a priva­tely owned indus­trial group. ADCURAM acqui­res compa­nies with poten­tial and deve­lops them actively and sustain­ably. For the future growth of the Group, the capi­tal-strong indus­trial holding company has a total of 300 million euros available for acqui­si­ti­ons. With the help of its own 40-strong team of experts, the indus­trial holding company conti­nues to deve­lop the port­fo­lio compa­nies stra­te­gi­cally and opera­tio­nally. Toge­ther, the group gene­ra­tes more than 400 million euros in sales with six holdings and over 2,500 employees worldwide.

ADCURAM sees itself as an entre­pre­neu­rial inves­tor and invests in succes­sion plans and corpo­rate spin-offs. www.adcuram.com

News

Hamburg — SCIO Auto­ma­tion GmbH (“SCIO”), a port­fo­lio company of the funds advi­sed by Quadriga Capi­tal Eigen­ka­pi­tal­be­ra­tung GmbH, acqui­res Bilfin­ger Grey­Lo­gix Aqua GmbH (“Aqua”), a subsi­diary of Bilfin­ger Grey­Lo­gix GmbH. Proven­tis Part­ners supported Bilfin­ger and the two mana­ging part­ners throug­hout the entire M&A process.

SCIO takes over all shares of the previous Aqua main share­hol­der Bilfin­ger Grey­Lo­gix GmbH. The two other mana­ging part­ners of Aqua will conti­nue to hold shares in the company in the future. In the future, the company will operate under the brand name VESCON AQUA GmbH and will be incor­po­ra­ted into SCIO. With the acqui­si­tion of the company, SCIO expands its custo­mer port­fo­lio and opens up new indus­tries. At the same time, it is streng­thening its auto­ma­tion and programming services in the process engi­nee­ring envi­ron­ment, thus setting the course for further growth in a future-orien­ted and sustainable envi­ron­ment such as drin­king water treat­ment and waste­wa­ter plants.

“Through this tran­sac­tion, we are streng­thening our auto­ma­tion tech­no­logy service port­fo­lio and expan­ding our custo­mer base in a very homo­ge­neous and stable envi­ron­ment. We are now contri­bu­ting our exten­sive know­ledge and expe­ri­ence in all areas of process tech­no­logy to further deve­lop Aqua in the long term,” says Michael Goepf­arth, Mana­ging Direc­tor of SCIO Automation.

The role of Proven­tis Partners

Proven­tis Part­ners supported Bilfin­ger and the two mana­ging part­ners throug­hout the entire M&A process. Services included prepa­ring all tran­sac­tion docu­men­ta­tion, iden­ti­fy­ing and approa­ching suita­ble inves­tors, coor­di­na­ting due dili­gence and commer­cial nego­tia­tion of the transaction.

About Bilfin­ger Grey­Lo­gix Aqua GmbH

Aqua was foun­ded in 1998 by Olaf Krem­sier and has been part of the Bilfin­ger Group since 2013 as a subsi­diary of Bilfin­ger Grey­Lo­gix GmbH. The focus is on control and process control tech­no­logy for drin­king water treat­ment and waste­wa­ter plants, mainly for custo­mers in the public sector. In doing so, Aqua acts as a systems inte­gra­tor with a focus on project manage­ment and high-end auto­ma­tion and programming services. Across seven loca­ti­ons, the company ensu­res that custo­mers receive compre­hen­sive support close to their sites.

About SCIO Auto­ma­tion Group

SCIO Auto­ma­tion GmbH was foun­ded in Janu­ary 2019 as a medium-sized plat­form in the field of indus­trial auto­ma­tion tech­no­logy and rela­ted engi­nee­ring services, combi­ning niche provi­ders with deca­des of expe­ri­ence in their fields of acti­vity. Custo­mers come from the auto­mo­tive, logi­stics, chemi­cal and process indus­tries, clean room and elec­tro­nics, life science and medi­cal tech­no­logy, as well as the energy indus­try and envi­ron­men­tal technology.
About Proven­tis Partners

About Proven­tis Partners

Proven­tis Part­ners is a part­ner-led M&A advi­sory firm whose clients include a majo­rity of mid-sized family busi­nesses, corpo­rate subsi­dia­ries and private equity funds. With 30 M&A advi­sors, Proven­tis Part­ners is one of the largest inde­pen­dent M&A consul­tancies in the German-spea­king region and looks back on 20 years of M&A expe­ri­ence and over 300 comple­ted tran­sac­tions. The M&A advi­sors with offices in Zurich, Hamburg, Colo­gne and Munich are active in the sectors Indus­tri­als, Busi­ness Services, Consu­mer & Retail, TMT, Health­care and Energy. Exclu­sive member­ship in Mergers Alli­ance — an inter­na­tio­nal part­ner­ship of leading M&A specia­lists — enables Proven­tis Part­ners to assist clients in 30 count­ries in key markets world­wide. Mergers Alli­ance members, with over 200 M&A profes­sio­nals, provide Proven­tis Part­ners, and thus its clients, with unique access to local markets in Europe, North America, Latin America, Asia and Africa.

News

Munich/ Frei­burg — With a team led by Part­ner Dr. Rainer Hersch­lein, Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek advi­sed Wagner Fern­mel­de­bau Holding GmbH on the majo­rity acqui­si­tion of Benzina Kommu­ni­ka­tion GmbH of Frei­burg. The seller of the shares is the sole share­hol­der and mana­ging direc­tor M. Benzina. He will remain on board unch­an­ged after the closing of the tran­sac­tion, and the company name will be continued.

The Wagner Group is curr­ently forming a full-service provi­der for the cons­truc­tion of fiber optic infra­struc­ture as part of a buy-and-build stra­tegy. With this acqui­si­tion, the Wagner Group is further expan­ding its range of services and will in future be able to imple­ment compre­hen­sive projects in the FTTX sector using a gene­ral contrac­tor approach. Benzina Kommu­ni­ka­tion GmbH comple­ments the exis­ting service port­fo­lio with all services within commu­ni­ca­tion and network technology.

Benzina Kommu­ni­ka­tion GmbH was foun­ded in 1999 by M. Benzina and has been owner-mana­ged ever since. The company imple­ments needs-based solu­ti­ons in the areas of commu­ni­ca­ti­ons and network tech­no­logy, buil­ding and light­ing tech­no­logy, and elec­tro­mo­bi­lity infra­struc­ture for muni­ci­pal faci­li­ties, compa­nies, and public-sector clients.

Wagner GmbH, based in Wald­bö­ckel­heim near Bad Kreuz­nach, is a prefer­red part­ner of Deut­sche Tele­kom AG in FTTC/B/H expan­sion in Germany. Wagner GmbH was foun­ded in 2006 by Peter Wagner and has been mana­ged by him ever since.

Advi­sors to Wagner Fern­mel­de­bau Holding: Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek
Dr. Rainer Hersch­lein, LL.M. (Lead, Corporate),
Char­lotte Schmitt, LL.M. (Corpo­rate, M&A), both Stuttgart

News

Frank­furt a.M. — McDer­mott Will & Emery has advi­sed ABL-TECHNIC Entla­ckung GmbH and the invest­ment company behind it, Rubicon Part­ners, on the acqui­si­tion of Indus­trie­be­darf GmbH as part of an asset deal.

Indus­trie­be­darf GmbH, foun­ded in 1979 and based in Sulz am Neckar, is a medium-sized company for envi­ron­men­tally friendly paint strip­ping with over 30 employees. Custo­mers include compa­nies from the auto­mo­tive indus­try, their suppli­ers and other compa­nies from all areas of surface technology.

The ABL Group — with ABL-TECHNIC Entla­ckung GmbH as the opera­ting parent company — is a specia­list service provi­der for indus­trial paint strip­ping and offers a broad port­fo­lio of services ranging from paint strip­ping manage­ment to dispo­sal and reco­very of recy­clable mate­ri­als. The company has 23 loca­ti­ons in 14 count­ries. The ABL Group has been part of the Rubicon Part­ners port­fo­lio since 2011.

The McDer­mott team most recently advi­sed ABL Group and the invest­ment company behind it, Rubicon Part­ners, on the successful comple­tion of the refi­nan­cing of exis­ting finan­cial debt (combi­ned with a growth finan­cing component).

Advi­sors to ABL-TECHNIC Entla­ckung GmbH/ Rubicon Part­ners: McDer­mott Will & Emery, Frankfurt
Dr. Michael Cziesla, Photo (Lead, Corporate/M&A/Private Equity), Dr. Maxi­mi­lian Clos­ter­meyer (Real Estate), Dr. Chris­tian Rolf (Labor Law); Asso­cia­tes: Isabelle Müller, Tobias Riemen­schnei­der (both Corporate/M&A/Private Equity), Elena Platte, LL.M. (real estate law)

News

Bonn, Germany — Kranus Health, the digi­tal men’s health plat­form, today announ­ced a seven-figure seed funding. HTGF, A Round Capi­tal, Venture Base­camp and Dr. Ralph Müller are new inves­tors in Kranus Health. In addi­tion to the new inves­tors, exis­ting busi­ness angels, inclu­ding Konstan­tin Mehl (foun­der Foodora + Kaia Health), have again parti­ci­pa­ted in the seed round.

With the fresh capi­tal, Kranus Health will conti­nue to expand its men’s health plat­form and take the next step of laun­ching a reim­b­ursable digi­tal therapy as a sustainable solu­tion for erec­tile dysfunc­tion. The exis­ting expert network of urology specia­lists will also be further expan­ded to reach even more men with Kranus Health solutions.

The digi­tal health company Kranus Health was foun­ded in 2020 by Jens Nörters­häu­ser, Thilo Klein­schmidt, Niko­lay Dimo­la­rov and Profes­sor Kurt Miller. The goal is to rethink men’s health­care and improve it using digi­tal solu­ti­ons. Men’s life expec­tancy is still up to 6 years behind women’s, thou­sands of men world­wide die too early due to unhe­althy life­styles and lack of preven­tive care and preven­tion — there is a lack of health awareness.

Kranus Health is on a mission to change that. Digi­tal and thus easily acces­si­ble pati­ent jour­neys lower men’s inhi­bi­ti­ons about consul­ting a doctor for their problems and sustain­ably support a healthy life­style because users inter­act with the digi­tal offe­ring in an uncom­pli­ca­ted and frequent manner. The first offe­ring being deve­lo­ped is a reim­b­ursable digi­tal therapy for erec­tile dysfunc­tion (DiGA as an “app on prescrip­tion”). In this clini­cal picture, there is a close connec­tion with serious cardio­vas­cu­lar dise­a­ses such as heart attacks, the risk factors of which should also be redu­ced by Kranus Health therapy. The startup works closely with medi­cal specia­lists and has alre­ady built up a broad network of experts from German urologists.

“Kranus Health has deve­lo­ped an offe­ring based on scien­ti­fic evidence that provi­des urolo­gists with enti­rely new and, most importantly, root cause-orien­ted opti­ons in trea­ting their pati­ents, accor­ding to Profes­sor Kurt Miller,” Chief Medi­cal Offi­cer at Kranus Health

With the fresh capi­tal and the inves­tors’ network, the digi­tal therapy will be further deve­lo­ped this year and laun­ched as a reim­b­ursable product, and the digi­tal plat­form for men’s health will also be expan­ded with addi­tio­nal offerings.

“In the clini­cal picture of erec­tile dysfunc­tion, current offe­rings such as medi­ca­ti­ons are aimed at alle­via­ting the symptoms, but not the causes. With its digi­tal solu­tion, Kranus is helping to improve the quality of life of a large number of men in a long-term and goal-orien­ted manner,” explains Louis Heinz, Invest­ment Mana­ger at HTGF

About Kranus Health

Kranus Health aims to help men live healt­hier, longer lives by provi­ding easy, straight­for­ward access to the latest medi­cal care. Foun­ders Thilo Klein­schmidt and Jens Nörters­häu­ser have known each other for many years through their time toge­ther at McKin­sey & Company, and both have been passio­nate about the possi­bi­li­ties of digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion for years. But both also had a keen inte­rest in the health­care sector. Jens is origi­nally a bio-engi­neer and has years of profes­sio­nal expe­ri­ence in the phar­maceu­ti­cal field. Thilo comes from a medi­cal family, his father is a urolo­gist. The idea of foun­ding Kranus at the begin­ning of 2020 was ther­e­fore an obvious one and also took place against the back­drop of regu­la­tory chan­ges, in parti­cu­lar the Digi­tal Utility Act (DVG). Since then, it has been possi­ble to signi­fi­cantly improve health­care in Germany through digi­tal therapies.

Profes­sor Kurt Miller, former Chief of Urology at Charité Berlin, and CTO Niko­lay Dimo­la­rov (Celo­nis, among others) comple­ment the foun­ding team to jointly imple­ment Kranus’ vision. For this purpose, Kranus Health deve­lops digi­tal thera­pies based on current scien­ti­fic findings supported by tele­me­di­cal care from medi­cal specia­lists. The spec­trum of services ranges from thera­pies for taboo dise­a­ses such as erec­tile dysfunc­tion to early detec­tion and preven­tion (e.g. cardio­vas­cu­lar diseases).

About High-Tech Gründerfonds

The seed inves­tor High-Tech Grün­der­fonds (HTGF) finan­ces tech­no­logy start-ups with growth poten­tial. With a volume of around EUR 900 million spread across three funds and an inter­na­tio­nal part­ner network, HTGF has supported more than 600 start-ups since 2005. His 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.

Almost EUR 3 billion in capi­tal has been inves­ted in the HTGF port­fo­lio by exter­nal inves­tors in more than 1,700 follow-on finan­cing rounds to date. In addi­tion, the fund has alre­ady successfully sold shares in more than 120 companies.Investors in the public-private part­ner­ship include the German Fede­ral Minis­try for Econo­mic Affairs and Energy, KfW Capi­tal, the Fraun­ho­fer-Gesell­schaft and the compa­nies ALTANA, BASF, Bayer, Boeh­rin­ger Ingel­heim, B.Braun, Robert Bosch, BÜFA, CEWE, Deut­sche Bank, Deut­sche Post DHL, Dräger, Dril­lisch AG, EVONIK, EWE AG, FOND OF, Haniel, Hettich, Knauf, Körber, LANXESS, media + more venture Betei­li­gungs GmbH & Co. KG, PHOENIX CONTACT, QIAGEN, RWE Gene­ra­tion SE, SAP, Schufa, Schwarz Gruppe, STIHL, Thüga, Vector Infor­ma­tik, WACKER and Wilh. Werhahn KG.

News

Munich/ Celle — Funds advi­sed by PINOVA Capi­tal GmbH (“PINOVA”) have acqui­red the majo­rity shares in ECOROLL AG Werk­zeug­tech­nik (“ECOROLL”), based in Celle, Lower Saxony, in Janu­ary 2021.

ECOROLL is a leading supplier of tools and machi­nes for mecha­ni­cal surface finis­hing of metal­lic work­pie­ces. The product port­fo­lio compri­ses mainly indi­vi­du­ally desi­gned tools and machi­nes for burnis­hing, deep rolling and cylin­der tube proces­sing. In close coope­ra­tion with custo­mers from various indus­tries, solu­ti­ons are thus crea­ted that guaran­tee high-quality compo­nent surfaces, an increase in compo­nent service life and a more effi­ci­ent produc­tion process.

“PINOVA has entre­pre­neu­rial roots and the tech­ni­cal exper­tise to sustain­ably drive the growth of medium-sized inno­va­tion leaders,” says Dr. Kars­ten Rött­ger, a long-time board member and share­hol­der, who is signi­fi­cantly expan­ding his exis­ting mino­rity stake in ECOROLL as part of the transaction.

“Dr. Rött­ger has posi­tio­ned ECOROLL as a market leader in the mecha­ni­cal surface treat­ment segment and has thus embarked on a sustainable growth path. Toge­ther with Dr. Rött­ger, we want to conti­nue to drive growth in part­ner­ship and in doing so further deve­lop ECOROLL into an inter­na­tio­nally active full-service provi­der for mecha­ni­cal surface finis­hing . We expect tail­wind from the incre­asing market demand for light­weight, dura­ble and thus sustainable metal compon­ents,” explains Herbert Segge­wiß, part­ner at PINOVA Capi­tal. Herbert Segge­wiß will also repre­sent PINOVA on the Super­vi­sory Board of ECOROLL in the future.

About ECOROLL AG Werkzeugtechnik

ECOROLL curr­ently employs 85 people and produ­ces exclu­si­vely at its head­quar­ters in Celle, Lower Saxony. In addi­tion, the company has a sales office in Cincin­nati, USA. Since 1996, ECOROLL has been distri­bu­ting tools and machi­nes for burnis­hing (roller burnis­hing), deep rolling and cylin­der tube machi­ning. Today, ECOROLL serves a global port­fo­lio of custo­mers and was awarded the Bosch Global Supplier Award in the “Inno­va­tion” cate­gory in 2019. www.ecoroll.de

About PINOVA Capital

PINOVA Capi­tal is an inde­pen­dent invest­ment company for equity finan­cing of fast-growing, inno­va­tive medium-sized compa­nies in the German-spea­king region with reve­nues between € 10 million and € 75 million and equity requi­re­ments between € 5 million and € 50 million. www.pinovacapital.com

News

Luxem­bourg — Vector Inno­va­tion Fund GP S.à.r.l. (VIF) has now laun­ched an expec­ted $300 million pande­mic protec­tion sub-fund 1. This first sub-fund aims to invest in tech­no­lo­gies for pande­mic protec­tion and future health­care, aiding and support­ing precis­ion medi­cine, highly advan­ced point of care and AI tech­no­lo­gies to support the global economy, sustainable health­care, and life longe­vity. This first sub-fund’s objec­tive is to target commit­ments total­ling $300m due to a strong deal flow, with an expec­ted first close of $120m and a final close expec­ted within 19 months.

The Gene­ral Part­ners have an excel­lent track record in indus­try, health­care, tech­no­logy and invest­ment, with 21 exits and a total value crea­tion of $2.4billion, inclu­ding two successful IPOs.

VIF is a Reser­ved Alter­na­tive Invest­ment Fund based in Luxem­bourg has just been incor­po­ra­ted under the laws of the Grand Duchy of Luxem­bourg as a corpo­rate part­ner­ship limi­ted by shares (société en comman­dite par actions) quali­fy­ing as an invest­ment company with varia­ble capi­tal — reser­ved alter­na­tive invest­ment fund (société d’in­ves­tis­se­ment à capi­tal varia­ble — fonds d’in­ves­tis­se­ment alter­na­tif réservé) under the RAIF Law.

VIF has been set up as an umbrella struc­ture with sub-fund Vector Inno­va­tion Fund — Pande­mic Protec­tion Fund 1 at incor­po­ra­tion date. The Gene­ral Part­ner might, at its discre­tion, launch addi­tio­nal sub-funds (which may be open-ended or close-ended) each of which is repre­sen­ted by one or more Clas­ses of Shares. The fund quali­fies as an AIF within the meaning of the AIFM Law.

Each sub-fund shall consti­tute a distinct and segre­ga­ted part of the assets and liabi­li­ties of VIF’s umbrella structure.

Econo­mic fore­cas­ters say fall­out from COVID-19 is driving huge invest­ment within AI and nano­tech­no­logy as health­care invest­ment is expec­ted to grow at a rate of nearly 50% extra a year toward a market set to be worth $1.333 tril­lion by 2027, accor­ding to Prece­dence Rese­arch 2020.

The Pande­mic Protec­tion sub-fund 1 plans to invest in sophisti­ca­ted biotech and nano­tech­no­logy-based diagno­stics, biomar­kers, vacci­nes, novel thera­pies, highly targe­ted nano­me­di­ci­nes, and AI, allo­wing us to move to a more sustainable, digi­ti­sed, decen­tra­li­sed and demo­cra­tised point-of-care envi­ron­ment. The world cannot afford another pande­mic, the ongo­ing impact of long Covid symptoms will have a profound effect on health­care provi­sion for the next five to ten years. The world of invest­ment, indus­try and govern­ments are gearing up to be better prepared and are funding future proof tech­no­lo­gies for global health.

These dyna­mic invest­ments will help to poten­ti­ally free up our econo­mies and future-proof us from infec­tious dise­a­ses as well as deve­lop solu­ti­ons to anti­bio­tic resis­tance, another global health­care chall­enge that only tech­no­logy can solve.

VIF, repre­sen­ted by its mana­ging gene­ral part­ner Vector Inno­va­tion GP, has also appoin­ted Fuchs Asset Manage­ment S.A., led by CEO Timo­the Fuchs. Fuchs Asset Manage­ment S.A. is a public limi­ted liabi­lity company based in Luxem­bourg, as the quali­fied Fund Mana­ger (AIFM) gover­ned under Luxem­bourg law for reser­ved alter­na­tive invest­ment funds under RAIF Law 2016.

The appoin­ted invest­ment advi­sor for the fund is Enab­ling Tech Invest­ment Advi­sors S.À R.L. who is also based and incor­po­ra­ted in Luxem­bourg under Luxem­bourg law. VIF’s depo­si­tory bank is Banque de Luxem­bourg. Other inter­na­tio­nal service provi­ders include Mait­land, Ashurst, The World Nano Foun­da­tion and World Science Aid.

The fund has brought toge­ther some of the world’s leading figu­res in biome­di­cine, advan­ced diagno­stics, nano biomar­kers, tele­me­di­cine, AI and machine lear­ning to acce­le­rate these trans­for­ma­tio­nal tech­no­lo­gies into the markets, backed by sophisti­ca­ted, UHNW and insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors crea­ting poten­ti­ally one of the most dyna­mic inter­na­tio­nal invest­ment structures.

VIF’s fund invest­ment stra­tegy looks to deli­ver 25–30% esti­ma­ted gross IRR, 4x MOIC over the life of the fund with an esti­mate of 10–12 diver­si­fied invest­ments per sub-fund.

Each pros­pect company seeking invest­ment from VIF must demons­trate to our invest­ment advi­sors, our global advi­sory board, invest­ment commit­tee and fund mana­gers, their ability to commer­cia­lise highly disrup­tive tech­no­logy globally. For this, VIF uses its unique proprie­tary rating system for stra­tegy imple­men­ta­tion, using world-class bench­mark mode­ling for tech­no­logy and health­care investment.

The Fund’s Enab­ling Tech­no­logy Invest­ment Advi­sors and global advi­sory board are inter­na­tio­nal leaders in these fields of exper­tise. This has been demons­tra­ted via previous start ups that have gone on to become ‘unicorns’, as well as our team’s wider expe­ri­ence with large conglo­me­ra­tes in terms of advi­sing and support­ing them on stra­tegy, scaling or commer­cia­li­sing disrup­tive inno­va­tions in inter­na­tio­nal markets.

One inter­na­tio­nal invest­ment plat­form is a Pande­mic Protec­tion alter­na­tive invest­ment fund opera­ted by Vector Inno­va­tion Fund in Luxem­bourg focu­sed on limi­ting the effect of long form Covid-19, insu­la­ting the world against the impact of future pande­mics, whilst mini­mi­sing any impact on the global economy and health­care provi­sion and prepared­ness. As well as this, the fund is commit­ted to enhan­cing the deve­lo­p­ment and preva­lence of nano­tech­no­logy in healthcare.

The Vector Inno­va­tion Fund is a Reser­ved Alter­na­tive Invest­ment Fund (RAIF) specia­li­sing in support for tech­no­logy compa­nies able to trans­form global markets, nota­bly in global health­care, sustaina­bi­lity and longe­vity. These trans­for­ma­tio­nal tech­no­lo­gies come from the nano­tech­no­logy, biotech, AI and machine lear­ning, medi­cal devices, thera­pies and digi­tal health sectors.

The Vector Inno­va­tion Fund (VIF) is a semi-regu­la­ted alter­na­tive invest­ment fund based in Luxem­bourg and offers all the bene­fits a sophisti­ca­ted or accre­di­ted inter­na­tio­nal inves­tor would require and has seve­ral sub-funds: Pande­mic Protec­tion Fund, Enab­ling Tech­no­lo­gies Fund, Future Health­care Fund.

The VIF was incor­po­ra­ted on Novem­ber 30th, 2020 for its first sub fund for Pande­mic Protec­tion Fund and Future Health­care. www.vectorinnovationfund.com

News

Munich — ABIONIK Group reali­zes a unitran­che finan­cing in the amount of more than 20 million euros with ELF Capi­tal Group.

ABIONIK Group GmbH, head­quar­te­red in Berlin, is one of the leading envi­ron­men­tal tech­no­logy provi­ders for water and air treat­ment; in parti­cu­lar, the group has an inno­va­tive and mature product port­fo­lio, which is used in muni­ci­pal as well as indus­trial and mari­time envi­ron­ments. With sales and produc­tion faci­li­ties in Europe, China and India, the company has a global presence.

The clean­tech company ABIONIK will further acce­le­rate its growth and will in future have an equally expe­ri­en­ced and entre­pre­neu­rial private debt inves­tor at its side in the Frank­furt-based ELF Capi­tal Group. In total, ELF Capi­tal Group provi­des a medium- to long-term finan­cing volume of more than EUR 20.0 million for ABIONIK to replace the previous bank finan­cing and for further growth

ELF Capi­tal Group, head­quar­te­red in Frank­furt, is an inde­pen­dent Euro­pean invest­ment mana­ger offe­ring private capi­tal solu­ti­ons to middle market compa­nies in Germany, Austria, Switz­er­land and Western Europe. www.elfcapital.de

Legal advi­sors ABIONIK Group: Gütt Olk Feld­haus, Munich

Dr. Tilmann Gütt, LL.M., Julian J. Zaich, LL.M. (both part­ners, banking/finance law), Chris­to­pher Ghabel (senior asso­ciate, banking/finance law), Chris­to­pher Müller (asso­ciate, banking/finance law)

About ELF Capi­tal Group

ELF Capi­tal Group specia­li­zes in flexi­ble finan­cing solu­ti­ons for medium-sized compa­nies with a focus on Germany, Austria and Switz­er­land as well as Northwest Europe. The entire invest­ment team has many years of expe­ri­ence in struc­tu­ring custo­mi­zed finan­cing solu­ti­ons for owner-mana­ged middle-market compa­nies, manage­ment teams and private equity port­fo­lio compa­nies looking for an entre­pre­neu­rial, relia­ble and commit­ted finan­cing partner.

Through ELF Capital’s network of entre­pre­neurs, private equity spon­sors and advi­sors, ELF Capi­tal offers indi­vi­du­ally desi­gned finan­cing solu­ti­ons for estab­lished, fast-growing medium-sized compa­nies as well as for compa­nies in special situa­tions. Target invest­ments for compa­nies range from EUR 10 to 40 million, with a focus on capi­tal solu­ti­ons for compa­nies with solid and profi­ta­ble busi­ness models, leading market posi­tio­ning and good growth prospects.

News

Wall­dorf, Germany — SAP SE is acqui­ring Signa­vio GmbH from a consor­tium consis­ting of Apax Part­ners, Deut­sche Tele­kom Capi­tal Part­ners, Summit Part­ners, GP Bull­hound and the foun­ders, repor­tedly paying about 1 billion euros. — Wilkie Farr & Gallag­her LLP advi­ses the consor­tium on the sale of Signa­vio GmbH to SAP SE.

Signa­vio, foun­ded in 2009, is a leading provi­der of SaaS-based busi­ness process analy­sis and decis­ion manage­ment soft­ware that enables orga­niza­ti­ons to design, imple­ment, analyze and manage complex proces­ses, decis­i­ons and work­flows. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose details of the tran­sac­tion. The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to be comple­ted by the 2nd quar­ter of 2021.

The inves­tors were invol­ved as follows: The Ameri­can finan­cier Summit Part­ners, which has been with Signa­vio since 2015, still held around 8.1% of the company at the exit. Deut­sche Tele­kom Capi­tal Part­ners — now better known as DTCP — held 6.6%. The Ameri­can inves­tor Apax, which, like DTCP, inves­ted in Sgna­vio in 2019, was last on board with 40.6%. Which, at best, has now raised over 400 million. Last but not least, GP Bull­hound also held a stake in Signa­vio (0.4%).

Signa­vio foun­der Gero Decker last held around 15.2% of Signa­vio. On paper, this means around 152 million euros. Signa­vio co-foun­der Nico­las Peters, who will work at the soft­ware startup until the summer of 2020, most recently held around 9.3% of the company. Co-foun­der Willi Tsche­sch­ner (CTO) most recently held around 9.5% of the company’s shares. Co-foun­der Torben Schrei­ter, who worked at Signa­vio until 2016, came to 2.8% shortly before the exit.

Will­kie advi­sed the consor­tium consis­ting of lead inves­tor Apax Part­ners, Deut­sche Tele­kom Capi­tal Part­ners, Summit Part­ners, GP Bull­hound and the foun­ders (“Consor­tium”) on the sale of Signa­vio GmbH (“Signa­vio”) to SAP SE (“SAP”). The consor­tium announ­ced that it has ente­red into an agree­ment to sell Signa­vio, a leader in busi­ness process intel­li­gence and process manage­ment, to SAP.

Advi­sor to the consor­tium: Will­kie Farr & Gallagher
under the leader­ship of part­ner Dr. Kamyar Abrar (Corpo­rate, Frank­furt), consis­ted of part­ners Simon F. Spen­cer (IP, New York), Eugene L. Chang (IP, New York), William H. Rooney (Anti­trust, New York), Michael L. Katz (Corpo­rate, New York), Dr. Markus Lauer (Corpo­rate, Frank­furt), coun­sels Miriam Steets, Wolf­gang Münchow, Daniel Zakrzew­ski, Dr. Moritz Vetter­mann (all Corpo­rate, Frank­furt), Ludger Kempf (Tax, Frank­furt), Matthias Schr­a­der (Liti­ga­tion, Frank­furt), Matthias Töke (Finance, Frank­furt) and Jona­than Konoff (Anti­trust, New York), asso­cia­tes Aurel Hille (Anti­trust, Frank­furt), Cesare Vannuc­chi, Jane Hentz, Ilie Manole, Andreas Sand­ber­ger, Philip Thür­mer (all Corpo­rate, Frank­furt), Dr. Nadine Kramer, Martin Waskow­ski (both HR, Frank­furt), Chris­tian Schmidt (Tax, Frank­furt), Chris­to­pher Cleri­hew, Stefa­nie Lech­ler (both Finance, Frank­furt), Ahmad El- Gamal (Trade & Export, Washing­ton), Scott Wallace (Tax, London).

About Will­kie Farr & Gallag­her LLP
Will­kie Farr & Gallag­her LLP is an inter­na­tio­nal law firm with more than 750 lawy­ers with offices in New York, Washing­ton, Hous­ton, Palo Alto, San Fran­cisco, Chicago, Paris, London, Frank­furt am Main, Brussels, Milan and Rome.

News

Helsinki/ Stock­holm — EQT is plea­sed to announce that EQT Growth has inves­ted in Wolt Enter­pri­ses Oy (“Wolt” or “the Company”), a leading food deli­very plat­form. The invest­ment, which is the first by the EQT Growth stra­tegy, is made through EQT AB’s balance sheet and is part of Wolt’s USD 530 million capi­tal raise. EQT Growth will, toge­ther with EQT Ventures, support Wolt on its acce­le­ra­ted expan­sion jour­ney into new geogra­phies and verticals

Wolt was estab­lished in 2014 in Helsinki, Finland by CEO Miki Kuusi who had a vision of crea­ting a tech­no­logy company that would make it easy and fun to disco­ver great food and get it delivered
directly to your home or office. Since then, Wolt has expan­ded rapidly and today the Company
part­ners with over 30,000 restau­rants and retail part­ners and 60,000 couriers in 129 cities across 23 count­ries. Wolt’s plat­form and deli­very infra­struc­ture provide great custo­mer conve­ni­ence and new reve­nue oppor­tu­ni­ties for both restau­rants and retailers.

The trans­for­ma­tion of food deli­very into a digi­tal service model has acce­le­ra­ted over the past years and the market is esti­ma­ted to be worth around USD 365 billion by 2030 (accor­ding to UBS Evidence Labs’ report from June 2020). The combi­na­tion of mobile app usage, connec­ted restau­rants and onde­mand deli­very networks have paved the way for tech­no­logy plat­forms, such as Wolt.

The EQT Ventures I fund was one of Wolt’s first inves­tors and led the Company’s Series A finan­cing round in 2016 and has parti­ci­pa­ted in all subse­quent rounds, making the fund one of Wolt’s largest owners. Since then, the EQT plat­form has provi­ded active board and opera­tio­nal support to the Wolt team and EQT will conti­nue to part­ner with the Company on its mission to make cities better places to live and by enab­ling econo­mic oppor­tu­ni­ties in local commu­ni­ties. Wolt offsets 100 percent of its deli­very-services’ CO2 emis­si­ons and will conti­nue the imple­men­ta­tion of its green agenda with support from EQT’s sustaina­bi­lity team and global advi­sory network.

Johan Svan­strom, Part­ner and Invest­ment Advi­sor at EQT Part­nersEQT Growth is proud to support Wolt with both capi­tal and compe­tence as the company expands to new heights. Ever since EQT Ventures part­ne­red with CEO Miki Kuusi and his team in 2016, we have seen Wolt build an incre­di­bly effec­tive and inter­na­tio­nal growth machine with strong empha­sis on respon­si­ble part­ner­ships and great custo­mer solu­ti­ons. We believe that there are strong pros­pects for contin­ued inter­na­tio­nal expan­sion and deeper pene­tra­tion in the company’s core markets.”

News

The share­hol­ders of Claus Nitsche & Sohn GmbH (“NITSCHE”), distri­bu­tor of high quality essen­tial oils and natu­ral flavors have sold the majo­rity of their shares to OQEMA AG. Network Corpo­rate Finance exclu­si­vely advi­sed the owners and the company on the transaction.

As part of the company’s succes­sion, NITSCHE was able to gain the OQEMA Group as a new majo­rity share­hol­der. The product range is a perfect comple­ment to the “Flavour & Fragrance” range of the OQEMA Group. NITSCHE will conti­nue to be mana­ged by one of the current mana­ging direc­tors in order to combine the long-stan­ding product know-how with the inter­na­tio­nal custo­mer and supplier network of the OQEMA Group.

The company

NITSCHE has specia­li­zed in high-quality essen­tial oils, natu­ral flavors, fragran­ces and inno­va­tive ingre­di­ent solu­ti­ons for over 60 years. The company excels in its analy­ti­cal under­stan­ding of high quality natu­ral essen­tial oils and products. www.nitsche-gmbh.de

About Network Corpo­rate Finance

Network Corpo­rate Finance is an inde­pen­dent, owner-mana­ged advi­sory firm focu­sed on mergers and acqui­si­ti­ons, capi­tal markets tran­sac­tions, and equity and debt finan­cing. We advise both estab­lished and young compa­nies in a wide range of indus­tries. With our team of more than 20 employees at our offices in Düssel­dorf, Berlin and Frank­furt, we have estab­lished oursel­ves as one of the most successful inde­pen­dent corpo­rate finance consul­ting firms in Germany since our foun­da­tion in 2002. www.ncf.de

News

Hamburg/ Bonn — GeneQuine Biothe­ra­peu­tics GmbH, a biotech company deve­lo­ping gene therapy drugs for the treat­ment of muscu­los­ke­le­tal dise­a­ses, announ­ces the closing of a €5.4 million Series A finan­cing round and the raising of €3.65 million in conver­ti­ble loans and grants.

The Series A finan­cing round is led by Pacira BioSci­en­ces, Inc (Parsippany, USA), a US-based phar­maceu­ti­cal company focu­sed on pain manage­ment and rege­ne­ra­tive medi­cine. Other inves­tors include High-Tech Grün­der­fonds (Bonn), which has alre­ady inves­ted in GeneQuine, as well as Noshaq SA (Liège, Belgium) and Samum Vermö­gens­ver­wal­tungs GmbH (Hamburg). Pacira Biosci­en­ces, Inc. and Samum Vermö­gens­ver­wal­tungs GmbH also provide conver­ti­ble loans in the amount of €2.75 million. A further €0.9 million comes in the form of subsi­dies from the Inves­ti­ti­ons­bank des Landes Brandenburg.

GeneQuine will use the funds raised to deve­lop lead candi­date GQ-303 for the treat­ment of osteo­ar­thri­tis through to a Phase 1 clini­cal trial. Further­more, the deve­lo­p­ment of new gene therapy drugs for the treat­ment of inter­ver­te­bral disc dege­ne­ra­tion will be advan­ced, and GeneQuine’s gene therapy vector plat­form will be further expan­ded. GeneQuine alre­ady expan­ded its work­force last year and estab­lished a subsi­diary in Liège (Belgium). GeneQuine has its head­quar­ters in Hamburg and a rese­arch and deve­lo­p­ment labo­ra­tory in Lucken­walde (Grea­ter Berlin).

GeneQuine uses a gene therapy vector plat­form based on “Helper-depen­dent Adeno­vi­ral Vectors” (HDAd) to trans­form tissues and organs affec­ted by dise­ase into “facto­ries” for local produc­tion of thera­peu­tic prote­ins. A single, local injec­tion of a gene therapy drug could thus lead to protein produc­tion over seve­ral years without the need for repea­ted appli­ca­tion requi­red for most conven­tio­nal drugs.

GQ-303 is an HDAd vector that produ­ces the protein proteo­gly­can 4 and is curr­ently in precli­ni­cal deve­lo­p­ment. Proteo­gly­can 4 (also known as lubri­cin) has been shown to have a dual mecha­nism of action in the treat­ment of osteo­ar­thri­tis: On the one hand, it has a biome­cha­ni­cal effect due to lubri­ca­ting proper­ties, and on the other hand, it has effects on mole­cu­lar mecha­nisms that lead to the inhi­bi­tion of pain, inflamm­a­tion and carti­lage dege­ne­ra­tion. Ther­e­fore, GQ-303 has the poten­tial to have both sympto­ma­tic and dise­ase-modi­fy­ing effi­cacy in the treat­ment of osteo­ar­thri­tis, which has alre­ady been demons­tra­ted in seve­ral precli­ni­cal in vivo models.

GeneQuine is in advan­ced nego­tia­ti­ons with a suita­ble contract manu­fac­tu­rer for the produc­tion of GQ-303 for toxi­co­logy and clini­cal studies. Follo­wing produc­tion and formal toxi­co­logy studies with GQ-303, appr­oval for a Phase 1 clini­cal trial will be sought. GeneQuine’s former lead candi­date, an HDAd vector that produ­ces the protein interleukin‑1 (now refer­red to as FX201), was sold in 2017 to the phar­maceu­ti­cal company Flexion Thera­peu­tics, Inc. (Burling­ton, USA).

Flexion has since initia­ted a Phase 1 clini­cal trial and trea­ted multi­ple pati­ents in two dose groups with FX201. Because both GQ-303 and FX201 are HDAd vectors and both are injec­ted intra-arti­cu­larly (directly into the joint), GeneQuine esti­ma­tes that most vector-rela­ted deve­lo­p­ment risks for GQ-303 are mini­mi­zed. Although GQ-303 and FX201 are both being deve­lo­ped for knee osteo­ar­thri­tis, GeneQuine will focus on a speci­fic pati­ent popu­la­tion with GQ-303 that can poten­ti­ally bene­fit most from the dual mecha­nism of action of proteo­gly­can 4.

GeneQuine is also deve­lo­ping HDAd vector-based gene therapy drugs for the treat­ment of disc dege­ne­ra­tion. Despite the very high unmet medi­cal need in the treat­ment of disc dege­ne­ra­tion — one of the main causes of chro­nic low back pain — no dise­ase-modi­fy­ing drugs are available for this indi­ca­tion. GeneQuine’s data show that gene therapy with HDAd vectors has great poten­tial in the deve­lo­p­ment of sympto­ma­tic and dise­ase-modi­fy­ing drugs for this disease.

“We are very plea­sed to have closed this finan­cing round and will now use the capi­tal effi­ci­ently to bring GQ-303 into the clinic, expand our gene therapy program for the treat­ment of disc dege­ne­ra­tion, and expand our HDAd vector plat­form. We would like to thank all inves­tors in this finan­cing round for their trust and support. In parti­cu­lar, we are plea­sed to have Pacira as an inves­tor with their strong exper­tise in clini­cal drug deve­lo­p­ment in the muscu­los­ke­le­tal field,” Kilian Guse, CEO of GeneQuine (photo).

“Our equity invest­ment in GeneQuine repres­ents a signi­fi­cant oppor­tu­nity to parti­ci­pate in the deve­lo­p­ment of what we believe is an exci­ting dise­ase-modi­fy­ing gene therapy for osteo­ar­thri­tis. GeneQuine is conduc­ting precli­ni­cal work to support the initia­tion of human studies in appro­xi­m­ately two years. In addi­tion to our confi­dence in this tran­sac­tion as a sound invest­ment, we enthu­si­a­sti­cally look forward to the matu­ra­tion of data and for further oppor­tu­nity to parti­ci­pate in GeneQuine’s successful precli­ni­cal program and entry into the clinic. Importantly, this invest­ment is consis­tent with our mission to advance inno­va­tive pain manage­ment and rege­ne­ra­tive health solu­ti­ons,” Ron Ellis, Senior Vice Presi­dent, Corpo­rate Stra­tegy and Busi­ness Deve­lo­p­ment at Pacira.

“GeneQuine is a great exam­ple of a typi­cal HTGF invest­ment: a new gene­ti­cally engi­nee­red drug disco­very plat­form that broke comple­tely new scien­ti­fic ground when we made our seed invest­ment in 2012. That combi­ned with a strong team capa­ble of advan­cing gene therapy agents toward the clinic as effi­ci­ently as possi­ble. We look forward to support­ing GeneQuine toge­ther with the inter­na­tio­nal inves­tor consor­tium and Pacira’s exper­tise in deve­lo­ping their promi­sing pipe­line,” Martin Pfis­ter, Prin­ci­pal at High-Tech Gründerfonds

About GeneQuine Biothe­ra­peu­tics GmbH

GeneQuine Biothe­ra­peu­tics GmbH is a biotech company deve­lo­ping inno­va­tive gene therapy drugs for the treat­ment of muscu­los­ke­le­tal dise­a­ses. GeneQuine uses a gene therapy plat­form to turn tissues and organs affec­ted by dise­ase into “facto­ries” for local produc­tion of thera­peu­tic prote­ins. Lead candi­date GQ-303 is being deve­lo­ped as a topi­cally applied drug for the treat­ment of osteo­ar­thri­tis and has shown great poten­tial to have sympto­ma­tic and dise­ase-modi­fy­ing effi­cacy in multi­ple animal models. GeneQuine’s former lead candi­date for the treat­ment of osteo­ar­thri­tis, which is based on the same gene therapy vector tech­no­logy as GQ-303, was sold in 2017 to phar­maceu­ti­cal company Flexion Thera­peu­tics, Inc. (Burling­ton, USA) and is curr­ently being tested in a Phase 1 clini­cal trial. GeneQuine has a head office in Hamburg and branch offices in Lucken­walde (Grea­ter Berlin) and Liège (Belgium). www.genequine.com

About High-Tech Gründerfonds

The seed inves­tor High-Tech Grün­der­fonds (HTGF) finan­ces tech­no­logy start-ups with growth poten­tial. With a volume of around EUR 900 million spread across three funds and an inter­na­tio­nal part­ner network, HTGF has supported almost 600 start-ups since 2005. His 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. Over €2.8 billion in capi­tal has been inves­ted in the HTGF port­fo­lio by exter­nal inves­tors in more than 1,600 follow-on finan­cing rounds to date. In addi­tion, the fund has alre­ady successfully sold shares in more than 100 companies.

News

Bonn — DIV estab­lishes the inde­pen­dent infra­struc­ture fund Digi­tal Infra­struc­ture Vehicle (DIV) and acqui­res 38 percent of Cellnex Nether­lands for this purpose. SMP provi­ded compre­hen­sive tax advice on the estab­lish­ment of the inde­pen­dent funds vehicle (DIV) and tax advice on the anchor invest­ment in Cellnex Netherlands.

In the future, DIV will focus on invest­ments in digi­tal infra­struc­ture projects (fiber, towers and data centers) prima­rily in Europe. Deut­sche Tele­kom and Cellnex stand ready as anchor investors.

DIV’s anchor invest­ment is the acqui­si­tion of a 38% stake in Cellnex Nether­lands, in which Deut­sche Tele­kom and Cellnex combine their tower busi­ness in the Nether­lands. Upon comple­tion of the invest­ment, Cellnex Nether­lands will operate a total of 4,314 sites, inclu­ding 180 new sites to be built over the next 7 years. — Further infor­ma­tion is available in English on the Deut­sche Tele­kom and Cellnex websites.

Consul­tant DIV: SMP 
Jens Kretz­schmann (Lead Part­ner, Fund Forma­tion), Partner
Andreas Korten­dick (Lead Part­ner, Tax), Partner
Lenn­art Lorenz (Regu­la­tory Law), Partner
Dr. Stephan Bank (Fund Forma­tion), Partner
Matthias Enge (Fund Forma­tion), Asso­cia­ted Partner
Dr. Chris­tian Jois­ten (Taxes), Asso­cia­ted Partner
Michael Blank (Fund Forma­tion), Associate
Ramona Seufer (Taxes), Associate
David Wittek (Taxes), Associate
Dr. Niklas Ulrich (Regu­la­tory Law), Associate
Dr. Florian Wilbrink (Fund Forma­tion), Associate

About SMP

SMP is a law firm specia­li­zing in tax and busi­ness law, with core prac­tice areas in corpo­rate, funds, liti­ga­tion, tax and tran­sac­tions. SMP’s clients include emer­ging tech­no­logy compa­nies and family-owned mid-sized busi­nesses as well as corpo­ra­ti­ons and private equity and venture capi­tal funds. Since its foun­da­tion in 2017, SMP has become one of the leading addres­ses for venture capi­tal, private equity and fund struc­tu­ring in Germany. The firm and its part­ners are natio­nally and inter­na­tio­nally ranked by JUVE, Best Lawy­ers, Legal 500, Focus, and Cham­bers and Partners.SMP today employs over 60 expe­ri­en­ced attor­neys, tax advi­sors, and tax specia­lists in three offices in Berlin, Hamburg, and Cologne.

News

Darmstadt/Madrid/Lyon — Imaweb, a leading inde­pen­dent deve­lo­per and provi­der of soft­ware solu­ti­ons for auto­mo­tive dealer­ships and repair shops in Europe, today announ­ced the acqui­si­tion of Procar Infor­ma­tik AG (“Procar”), a leading provi­der of soft­ware solu­ti­ons for car dealer­ships in the DACH region. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the finan­cial details of the transaction.

Darm­stadt-based Procar Infor­ma­tik AG was foun­ded in 1998 and, with around 1,000 custo­mers, is one of the leading provi­ders of soft­ware solu­ti­ons for car dealer­ships in Germany. The company offers solu­ti­ons for dealers and work­shops of the most famous auto­mo­tive brands such as Toyota, BMW, Skoda, Seat, Volks­wa­gen, Audi, Ford and Renault.

Imaweb provi­des auto­mo­tive manu­fac­tu­r­ers (OEMs) and car dealer­ships with a compre­hen­sive range of soft­ware solu­ti­ons to help them digi­tize their entire proces­ses. The company is the market leader in custo­mer rela­ti­onship manage­ment (CRM), dealer­ship manage­ment and after­sa­les soft­ware. Since May 2019, Madrid-based Imaweb has been accom­pa­nied by funds advi­sed by PSG. PSG is an inves­tor specia­li­zing in soft­ware compa­nies that provi­des growth capi­tal to leading mid-market companies.

Through the acqui­si­tion of Procar, Imaweb estab­lishes a strong presence in the DACH region, the largest auto­mo­tive market in Europe. At the same time, the acqui­si­tion crea­tes a leading plat­form that will enable further conso­li­da­tion of the highly frag­men­ted soft­ware market for car dealer­ships. The two foun­ders of Procar, Volker Holt­haus and Karl-Heinz Schlapp, will conti­nue to manage the opera­tio­nal business.

“We are deligh­ted to have the Procar team support Imaweb. This tran­sac­tion repres­ents a leap forward in the deve­lo­p­ment of our company and is ther­e­fore an important mile­stone,” empha­si­zed Patrick Prajs, CEO, and Julian Ciccale, co-foun­der and deputy CEO, of Imaweb. “By combi­ning Procar’s posi­tion as market leader in the DACH region with our exis­ting offe­ring in other Euro­pean count­ries, we are initia­ting Imaweb’s next phase of growth towards beco­ming a leading pan-Euro­pean provider.”

Volker Holt­haus and Karl-Heinz Schlapp added: “We are very plea­sed to become part of Imaweb’s success story. Imaweb has a strong posi­tion in Europe and follows a part­ner­ship approach. This makes it exactly the right part­ner to take Procar to the next level of its development.”

PSG has been support­ing the foun­ders of Imaweb in the pan-Euro­pean expan­sion of the leading Spanish provi­der of CRM solu­ti­ons in the auto­mo­tive indus­try since May 2019. Imaweb’s strong growth in recent years has been both orga­nic and driven by M&A acti­vity. Imaweb had alre­ady acqui­red IDF/Datafirst, a leading soft­ware deve­lo­per for car dealer­ships in France, in Septem­ber 2019 and formed it into a strong plat­form with the subse­quent acqui­si­ti­ons of TMS and Adstra­tegy. In addi­tion, Imaweb was able to expand its posi­tion on the Iberian Penin­sula through the acqui­si­tion of Serin­fer in Spain and Portu­gal, and also estab­lished itself in the Bene­lux count­ries with the acqui­si­tion of IT Motive and Evolutive.

About Imaweb

Imaweb is a leading soft­ware provi­der for auto­mo­tive sales in Europe. The company resul­ted from the merger in 2019 of Imaweb, a Spanish company specia­li­zing in the deve­lo­p­ment of global CRM solu­ti­ons for sales, marke­ting and custo­mer service, with DATA­FIRST-I’Car Systems Group, the leading French provi­der of car dealer­ship soft­ware. www.imaweb.com

About Procar

Procar Infor­ma­tik AG is one of the leading German provi­ders of soft­ware solu­ti­ons for car dealer­ships. Foun­ded in 1998 by Volker Holt­haus and Karl-Heinz Schlapp, Procar today offers solu­ti­ons for around 1,000 car dealers and OEMs in the DACH region. The company’s custo­mers include dealer­ships of seve­ral global auto­mo­tive brands, inclu­ding Toyota, BMW, Skoda, Seat, VW, Audi, Ford, Renault and Nissan. www.procar.de

About PSG

PSG is a specia­list soft­ware company inves­tor, a subsi­diary of PSG Group of South Africa, which provi­des growth capi­tal to leading, fast-growing mid-market compa­nies. PSG works closely with foun­ders and manage­ment teams and supports them in imple­men­ting their stra­tegy. PSG provi­des opera­tio­nal and finan­cial resour­ces for this purpose to acce­le­rate growth. Since its incep­tion in 2014, PSG has assis­ted more than 65 soft­ware compa­nies and helped execute more than 275 add-on acqui­si­ti­ons. PSG has offices in London, Boston and Kansas City.

News

Pfäf­fi­kon (Switz­er­land) — Ufenau has made a first invest­ment in Spain and acqui­red a majo­rity stake in the company “Diseño y Manten­imi­ento de Plan­tas Frigo­rí­fi­cas” (“R&M”). R&M, previously known as APR, is a leading provi­der of inte­gral indus­trial refri­ge­ra­tion solu­ti­ons based in Valencia.

With more than 70 employees at loca­ti­ons in Valen­cia and Madrid and sales of appro­xi­m­ately EUR 30 million, R&M has execu­ted some of the largest projects for the design, instal­la­tion and main­ten­ance of indus­trial cooling systems in Spain. The well-known custo­mers are mainly active in the growing food and logi­stics sector.

The company has become a refe­rence in both sectors thanks to its own very high tech­ni­cal quality stan­dards and strong focus on service quality. Even in times of pande­mic, these services are essen­tial and in high demand

The foun­ders and previous owners of R&M have taken a signi­fi­cant equity stake and conti­nue to manage the busi­ness. In addi­tion, toge­ther they will conti­nue to drive the growth of the new group through a combi­na­tion of orga­nic and inor­ga­nic growth initiatives.

Ricardo Mayor, foun­der of R&M, belie­ves that “Ufenau is the right part­ner for R&M’s deve­lo­p­ment, as it allows us not only to expand our presence in Spain, but also to incor­po­rate new busi­ness areas into the company. It brings toge­ther two teams with high tech­ni­cal and finan­cial skills with a clear objec­tive: to provide our custo­mers with high quality services with added value. Toge­ther, we are setting out to conso­li­date a leading indus­try group that will undoub­tedly bene­fit the entire natio­nal industry.”

Ralf Flore, mana­ging part­ner of Ufenau (photo), comm­ents: “R&M has grown rapidly in recent years and has been able to work successfully and on a recur­ring basis with blue chip custo­mers in an enorm­ously deman­ding tech­ni­cal sector. The foun­ders have succee­ded in buil­ding a great team of highly quali­fied and moti­va­ted profes­sio­nals. We, and speci­fi­cally our two Spanish colle­agues, Joaquín Alcalde and Igna­cio Goded, are plea­sed to support the entire R&M team in this new phase of growth and to contri­bute our exten­sive expe­ri­ence in value crea­tion stra­te­gies, which has enab­led us to successfully execute more than 180 growth invest­ments in the DACH region. It is our first acqui­si­tion in Spain, reflec­ting our strong commit­ment to expand our reach and acti­vity in Spain as well, which has alre­ady star­ted in 2019.”

About Ufenau Capi­tal Partners

Ufenau Capi­tal Part­ners is a Swiss inves­tor group based on Lake Zurich. The company focu­ses on majo­rity share­hol­dings in service compa­nies in Switz­er­land, Germany and Austria that are active in the areas of Busi­ness Services, Educa­tion & Life­style, Health­Care and Finan­cial Services. With an exten­sive circle of renow­ned and expe­ri­en­ced indus­try part­ners (owners, CEOs, CFOs), Ufenau Capi­tal Part­ners pursues an active value-added invest­ment approach at eye level with entrepreneurs.

News

Munich — Ques­tel has acqui­red a majo­rity stake in innosabi GmbH, based in Munich. In addi­tion to their product port­fo­lios, the two parties will leverage their respec­tive market presence to serve a global custo­mer base. In the future, innosabi will conti­nue its busi­ness under the innosabi brand as part of the Ques­tel Group.

Ques­tel will inte­grate the innosabi soft­ware into its product port­fo­lio and offer it globally to both new custo­mers and its exis­ting base of over 6,000 custo­mers in 30 count­ries. By joining Ques­tel, innosabi posi­ti­ons itself for further rapid growth and inter­na­tio­na­liza­tion under the umbrella of a leading soft­ware plat­form with 50% of sales in North America, 30% in Europe and 20% in Asia.

The combi­na­tion of innosabi’s inno­va­tion soft­ware with Questel’s exten­sive range of intellec­tual property manage­ment and cura­ted data source solu­ti­ons is the answer to the chal­lenges compa­nies face in today’s
the fast-moving busi­ness world.

As digi­tiza­tion and tech­no­lo­gi­cal inno­va­tion conti­nue, the compa­nies that are able to drive their success are those that tap into their own inno­va­tion poten­tial. — The combi­na­tion of innosabi’s inno­va­tion tools and Questel’s data and work­flow manage­ment solu­ti­ons makes it easier than ever to mine tech­ni­cal, scien­ti­fic and busi­ness data for new insights and emer­ging oppor­tu­ni­ties, deve­lop them into marke­ta­ble inno­va­tions in direct colla­bo­ra­tion with all stake­hol­ders invol­ved, and conti­nuously manage the results as new IP assets. innosabi as the third acqui­si­tion in this area mani­fests Questel’s stra­te­gic focus on innovation.

For Catha­rina van Delden, co-foun­der and CEO of innosabi, the inte­gra­tion of their
company into the Ques­tel Group is the next logi­cal step in pursuing innosabi’s vision: “Since innosabi’s first day, we have always belie­ved that inno­va­tion happens where the right people, ideas and know­ledge come toge­ther. That’s exactly what’s happe­ning now that innosabi is beco­ming part of Ques­tel. Toge­ther, we will expand the way IP data is used in crea­ting inno­va­tion — and how it is in turn mana­ged as the IP of the enter­prise. We’re very exci­ted to turn this poten­tial into new, inno­va­tive tools for our customers.”

Charles Besson, CEO of Ques­tel, shares this view and empha­si­zes the importance of
Inno­va­tion solu­ti­ons for Questel’s growth plans: “Since intellec­tual property protec­tion is inter­wo­ven with all successful inno­va­tion initia­ti­ves, innosabi’s soft­ware is very syner­gi­stic to what we do best. All intellec­tual property starts with a great inno­va­tion process, and innosabi has an excep­tio­nal track record of support­ing their clients’ inno­va­tion programs and ensu­ring that inno­va­tion is about more than just ideas. This makes them a perfect fit for the Ques­tel Group.”

About innosabi
innosabi is one of the world’s leading provi­ders of soft­ware solu­ti­ons for colla­bo­ra­tive inno­va­tion and idea manage­ment. The Munich-based company was foun­ded in 2010 by Catha­rina van Delden, Jan Fischer, Hans-Peter Heid and Moritz Sebas­tian Wurf­baum. Today innosabi employs 55 people. Large inter­na­tio­nal corpo­ra­ti­ons rely on innosabi’s soft­ware and metho­do­lo­gi­cal exper­tise to trans­form their inno­va­tion proces­ses by enab­ling open colla­bo­ra­tion with custo­mers, employees, suppli­ers and other rele­vant stake­hol­ders. innosabi empowers orga­niza­ti­ons to leverage their entire ecosys­tem for inno­va­tion. In addi­tion to new forms of digi­tal, large-scale colla­bo­ra­tion, innosabi is conti­nuously deve­lo­ping inno­va­tive analy­sis and evalua­tion mecha­nisms to make more infor­ma­tion and addi­tio­nal data sources available for busi­ness inno­va­tions. Today, innosabi’s custo­mers include Siemens, Daim­ler, Post­bank, Deut­sche Tele­kom and Bayer. Since Janu­ary 2021 innosabi is part of the Ques­tel Group.

About Ques­tel
Ques­tel is an end-to-end intellec­tual property solu­ti­ons provi­der with over 900 employees and more than 6,000 custo­mers and 1 million users in 30 count­ries. Ques­tel offers a compre­hen­sive soft­ware suite for sear­ching, analy­zing and mana­ging inven­ti­ons and IP assets. Ques­tel also provi­des services for the entire intellec­tual property life­cy­cle, inclu­ding prior art sear­ches, patent draf­ting, inter­na­tio­nal filings, trans­la­ti­ons and rene­wals. These solu­ti­ons, when combi­ned with Questel’s IP cost manage­ment plat­form, deli­ver custo­mers an average savings of 30–60% across the entire Prose­cu­tion budget.

News

Munich / Mann­heim — As part of the majo­rity take­over of Bitter­Power GmbH (“Bitter­Liebe”) by ARCUS Capi­tal AG, BayBG also became invol­ved as a co-inves­tor with equity and mezza­nine. Both the foun­ders Andre Sierek and Jan Strat­mann as well as the previous share­hol­der Judith Williams will retain a signi­fi­cant stake in the company. The law firm Gütt Olk Feld­haus advi­sed ARCUS Capi­tal AG on the transaction.

Mann­heim-based Bitter­Power was foun­ded in 2018 and distri­bu­tes dietary supple­ments contai­ning bitter subs­tances under the brand “Bitter­Liebe”. The company quickly achie­ved a high level of reco­gni­tion and was able to posi­tion itself sustain­ably in the market. The product port­fo­lio curr­ently includes bitters in the form of drops, capsu­les, (cooking/baking) powder as well as tea, which are manu­fac­tu­red in Germany and contain only natu­ral ingredients.

“In this promi­sing envi­ron­ment, we want to make the Bitter­Liebe brand the market leader for prepa­ra­ti­ons contai­ning bitter subs­tances in Germany toge­ther with the commit­ted foun­ders and also gain a foot­hold in the inter­na­tio­nal market,” says Stefan Eishold, CEO of ARCUS, on the acqui­si­tion of Bitterliebe.

In its third finan­cial year, Bitter­Power GmbH recor­ded growth of over 120% with the Bitter­Liebe brand, sales of almost double-digit milli­ons and a profit in the seven-digit range. The successful parti­ci­pa­tion in the VOX TV show “Die Höhle der Löwen” in 2019 has signi­fi­cantly acce­le­ra­ted this deve­lo­p­ment. The products are available throug­hout Germany in more than 4,000 stores at dm, Ross­mann and Budni­kow­sky, as well as regu­larly in tele­shop­ping at HSE24.

Legal advi­sors to ARCUS Capi­tal AG: Gütt Olk Feld­haus, Munich
Dr. Sebas­tian Olk (Part­ner, Corporate/M&A), Dr. Tilmann Gütt (Part­ner, Banking/Finance, both Lead), Thomas Becker (Of Coun­sel, IP/IT), Matthias Uelner (Asso­ciate, Corporate/M&A), Domi­nik Forst­ner (Asso­ciate, Corporate/M&A)
— Alten­burg Fach­an­wälte für Arbeits­recht, Munich: Andreas Ege, Dr. Dirk Schnelle (both Labor Law)
— Blom­stein, Berlin: Dr. Max Klasse (anti­trust law)

About Arcus Capital

ARCUS Capi­tal is a Munich-based inde­pen­dent invest­ment company focu­sing on majo­rity invest­ments in medium-sized family-owned compa­nies in the DACH region. www.arcuscapital.de

About BayBG

With an inves­ted volume of more than 300 million euros, BayBG Baye­ri­sche Betei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft is one of the largest provi­ders of equity capi­tal, espe­ci­ally for Bava­rian SMEs. With its venture capi­tal and equity invest­ments, which it provi­des in the form of equity and mezza­nine, it enables medium-sized compa­nies to imple­ment inno­va­tion and growth projects, arrange for corpo­rate succes­sion or opti­mize the capi­tal struc­ture, as well as solve special situa­tions or diver­sify the assets of entre­pre­neu­rial fami­lies. BayBG opera­tes as an ever­green fund and is not subject to exit pressure.

News

Golßen/ Düssel­dorf — The share­hol­ders of the fruit and vege­ta­ble proces­sing company Spree­wald­kon­serve Golßen have sold all their shares to the French Andros Group, Biars-sur-Cère, as part of a stra­te­gic part­ner­ship. The tran­sac­tion compri­ses the two company divi­si­ons and produc­tion sites in Golßen/Germany and in Szigetvár/Hungary. Network Corpo­rate Finance exclu­si­vely advi­sed Spree­wald­kon­serve Golßen and its share­hol­ders on the transaction.

Tran­sac­tion

The share­hol­ders of the fruit and vege­ta­ble proces­sing company Spree­wald­kon­serve Golßen sell their shares to the Andros Group as part of a stra­te­gic part­ner­ship. Andros, with annual sales of more than EUR 2.2 billion in 2019 and head­quar­te­red in Biars-sur-Cère in southern France, is a leading manu­fac­tu­rer of jams, fruit and dairy products. Alre­ady since 1991, the company has been present in Germany through the fruit manu­fac­tu­rer of the Oden­wald brand in Breu­berg. Further­more, the Elster­werda dairy plant with the “Mark Bran­den­burg” brand belongs to the group. With the acqui­si­tion of Spree­wald­kon­serve, Andros streng­thens its posi­tion in Germany and in the fruit and vege­ta­ble proces­sing market and plans to leverage syner­gies in regio­nal sourcing and distribution.

About Spree­wald Preserve Golßen

In Golßen (Dahme-Spree­wald), canned goods have been produ­ced with local fruit and vege­ta­ble products since 1946. The owners of Spree­wald­kon­serve are the third gene­ra­tion to run the busi­ness and have a company history of over 100 years, which began in the Lower Rhine region at the end of the 19th century. Around 32 diffe­rent types of fruit and vege­ta­bles are proces­sed into various special­ties every year. The product range includes 250 items incl. private labels and is distri­bu­ted in over 30 count­ries. In eastern Germany, the “Spree­wald­hof” brand is the market leader for pick­les in jars. www.spreewaldhof.de

About Network Corpo­rate Finance

Network Corpo­rate Finance is an inde­pen­dent, owner-mana­ged advi­sory firm focu­sed on mergers and acqui­si­ti­ons, capi­tal markets tran­sac­tions, and equity and debt finan­cing. We advise both estab­lished and young compa­nies in a wide range of indus­tries. With our team of more than 20 employees at our offices in Düssel­dorf, Berlin and Frank­furt, we have estab­lished oursel­ves as one of the most successful inde­pen­dent corpo­rate finance consul­ting firms in Germany since our foun­da­tion in 2002. www.ncf.de

News

Munich — Digi­tal insu­rance mana­ger Clark successfully closed a EUR 69 million Series C finan­cing round. The round was led by the Chinese Inter­net company Tencent (known among other things for the messen­ger service WeChat). In addi­tion, Portag3, White Star Capi­tal, Yabeo and Finleap again participated.

The Frank­furt-based startup intends to invest the addi­tio­nal funds in the German market: The number of custo­mers as well as brand aware­ness are to be signi­fi­cantly increased through advertising.

LUTZ | ABEL advi­ses Clark on the Series C finan­cing round through the follo­wing team: Dr. Marco Eick­mann, LL.M., Phil­ipp Hoene and Dr. Sebas­tian Sumal­vico (all M&A/VC, Munich). BRP Renaud und Part­ner mbB provi­ded anti­trust and foreign trade law support with Dr. Martin Beutel­mann, LL.M. (Stutt­gart).

About LUTZ | ABEL

With around 80 lawy­ers and offices in Munich, Hamburg, Stutt­gart and Berlin, the commer­cial law firm LUTZ | ABEL provi­des advice on all aspects of commer­cial law. www.lutzabel.com.

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