Berlin — Through its tech­no­logy fund Vision Fund, Japa­nese tele­coms group Soft­Bank is inves­t­ing EUR 460 million in the Berlin-based used car plat­form “Wir kaufen Dein Auto” of Auto1 Group GmbH. Appro­xi­m­ately half of the invest­ment will flow directly into the company in exch­ange for newly issued shares. P+P advi­sed the exis­ting inves­tor DN Capi­tal on the new finan­cing round and on various share sales in connec­tion with the current finan­cing round.

With a valua­tion of EUR 2.9 billion, Auto1, whose best-known current offe­ring is the Wirkaufendeinauto.de plat­form, is now one of the most valuable tech start­ups in Europe. — Auto1 was foun­ded in 2012 by Hakan Koç and Chris­tian Berter­mann. Accor­ding to its own figu­res, the online market­place for the purchase and sale of used cars sold more than 300,000 vehic­les in 2016. Sales in 2016 amoun­ted to 1.5 billion euros.

The startup has recei­ved nearly EUR 900 million in funding so far from inves­tors inclu­ding DN Capi­tal, JP Morgan and Gold­man Sachs. In the last finan­cing round in May 2017, EUR 360 million was raised from VC Target Global and the Scot­tish invest­ment company Bail­lie Gifford, among others.

Soft­Bank had most recently inves­ted in tech­no­logy compa­nies such as the messen­ger service Slack via its $90 billion Vision Fund.

Advi­sor to the previous inves­tor DN Capi­tal: P+P Pöllath + Partners
Chris­tian Tönies, LL.M. Eur. (Part­ner, Lead, VC, Munich/Berlin)
Dr. Sebas­tian Gerlin­ger, LL.M. (Senior Asso­ciate, VC, Munich/Berlin)