top of page


Beyond BioNTech: Inside the Strüngmann Portfolio in 2026 (Antheia, AAVantgarde, Doctolib, and the Next Decade)
What the Strüngmann brothers are funding now — Antheia, AAVantgarde Bio, Doctolib, Immatics, Tubulis — and what it signals about the next decade of DACH biotech.
Jörn Menninger
May 69 min read


Athos Service: The Munich Family Office That Out-Patient'd Venture Capital
Why Athos Service — the Strüngmann brothers' Munich family office — outperforms US-style venture capital on deep-tech bets like BioNTech.
Jörn Menninger
May 58 min read


The Hexal Exit Playbook: What Selling to Novartis for $7.5 Billion Taught the Strüngmanns About Patient Capital
The 2005 Novartis-Hexal deal made the Strüngmanns' fortune — but more importantly, it taught them how to recycle one exit into the next BioNTech.
Jörn Menninger
May 47 min read


How the Strüngmann Brothers Built Germany's Most Important Biotech Family Office
From Hexal's €5.65B Novartis exit to BioNTech's $50B+ peak — how Andreas and Thomas Strüngmann built the architect-class behind DACH biotech. Inside the Athos Service playbook.
Jörn Menninger
May 110 min read


Why Şahin and Türeci Are Starting Again: The Founder's Dilemma After a Global Breakthrough
Founders who reach platform-scale success face a structural problem: the company they built can no longer execute the science they want to do. Şahin and Türeci's planned 2026 spin into a new mRNA company is the engineered answer — separate frontier research from commercial discipline, retain agency, keep economic exposure through BioNTech's planned minority stake. It is the rarest move in European deep tech because it requires founders who own the cap table to design it. Intr
Jörn Menninger
Apr 265 min read


BioNTech Was Not a Fluke: The Long mRNA Bet Behind Germany's Global Biotech Breakthrough
The popular framing that BioNTech "got lucky with COVID" collapses under the timeline. The company was incorporated in Mainz in 2008 with cancer immunotherapy as the founding thesis, was anchored by Strüngmann patient capital years before any pandemic, and had already attracted a 2019 Gates Foundation investment for HIV and tuberculosis programs. The vaccine was the visible breakthrough; the bet was twelve years old. Introduction The anchor piece argues that BioNTech is a pow
Jörn Menninger
Apr 255 min read


From Scientists to Billionaires: Why the BioNTech Founder Story Is Bigger Than the Vaccine
Uğur Şahin and Özlem Türeci's planned 2026 transition out of BioNTech management to lead a new mRNA company is a rare European founder act-two — engineered with cap-table control, BioNTech as minority stakeholder, and patient German capital underneath. The vaccine was the visible breakthrough; the founder pattern is what DACH should be studying.
Jörn Menninger
Apr 247 min read
bottom of page
