creditshelf

Overview
creditshelf AG was a Frankfurt-headquartered German financial technology company founded in 2014 by Dr. Tim Thabe, Dr. Daniel Bartsch and Dr. Mark Währisch. It operated a digital SME lending marketplace that matched institutional investors with established German Mittelstand borrowers, listed on the Prime Standard segment of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in July 2018, entered protective-shield insolvency proceedings in early 2024, and had its operating business acquired by Teylor AG in an asset deal announced on 23 April 2024.

Why this entity matters
creditshelf is a landmark reference entity in the DACH SME lending narrative for four reasons. First, its July 2018 IPO on the Frankfurt Prime Standard made it one of the first pure-play German fintech companies to list on a regulated German main market, providing a public-market read on the economics of the online SME lending model. Second, its Goldman Sachs €100M institutional forward-flow partnership (announced 2020) was one of the earliest large institutional commitments to a German non-bank SME lender and helped establish the template later used by Teylor AG, iwoca and others. Third, its 2024 protective-shield insolvency proceeding and the subsequent asset-deal transfer to Teylor AG are the pivot event of the current DACH SME lending consolidation cycle. Fourth, the transfer of creditshelf's platform, team and BaFin-regulated footprint to Teylor AG in April 2024 is the direct antecedent of Teylor's subsequent grenke-factoring and CapeTec acquisitions and the emergence of a single pan-European SME lending consolidator.

Company history and product
creditshelf was founded in 2014 in Frankfurt am Main by three founders with prior senior careers in international banking and credit risk: Dr. Tim Thabe (previously at UBS and Credit Suisse) as Chief Executive Officer, Dr. Daniel Bartsch as Chief Operating Officer, and Dr. Mark Währisch (previously at Standard & Poor's). The company built and operated a proprietary online lending platform on which institutional investors — family offices, insurers, funds and credit institutions — financed digitally originated, unsecured working-capital and growth loans to established German Mittelstand borrowers. Loan tickets typically ranged from several hundred thousand euros up to several million euros; creditshelf handled origination, credit scoring, servicing and reporting through its own technology stack, and was regulated in Germany through its BaFin-supervised operational footprint. On 25 July 2018 creditshelf became one of the first pure-play German fintech companies to list on the Prime Standard segment of Deutsche Börse, with an initial public offering priced at €80 per share (ticker CSQ; ISIN DE000A2LQUA5). Over the following years the company built a portfolio of institutional funding partnerships, most prominently a €100M forward-flow commitment from Goldman Sachs announced in 2020. From 2022 onward, rising interest rates and tightening capital-market conditions weighed on the company's cost of funding and growth trajectory; the share price declined materially from IPO levels. In early 2024 creditshelf AG filed for and entered court-supervised protective-shield insolvency proceedings (Schutzschirmverfahren) — a corporate insolvency event, not a legal action against any individual. On 23 April 2024 Teylor AG announced that it had acquired the operating business of creditshelf AG in an asset deal from the insolvency administrator, absorbing the platform technology, the team, the customer base and the BaFin-regulated operational footprint.

Role in the DACH startup and technology ecosystem
creditshelf occupied a central position in the German FinTech SME lending peer set for the better part of a decade. Its listed status made it a public reference for institutional investors evaluating the economics of non-bank digital lending in Germany, and its Goldman Sachs institutional-funding partnership was widely cited as a proof point that global capital could be channelled into the German Mittelstand through a fintech platform. Alongside iwoca, auxmoney, Spotcap and Bitbond, creditshelf helped define the first generation of German digital SME lending, with a particular focus on larger tickets and institutional funding rather than consumer or micro-loan volume. The 2024 asset-deal transfer of creditshelf's business to Teylor AG converted what had been Teylor's most direct German competitor into the seed of Teylor's German operational footprint, and set the pattern for the debt-financed M&A strategy Teylor pursued in the seven-country grenke factoring deal (2025) and the CapeTec acquisition (2025).

Selected relationships and affiliations
Founded by Dr. Tim Thabe (CEO), Dr. Daniel Bartsch (COO) and Dr. Mark Währisch (2014). Public listing: Frankfurt Stock Exchange Prime Standard (IPO 25 July 2018; ticker CSQ; ISIN DE000A2LQUA5). Institutional funding partners disclosed publicly include Goldman Sachs (€100M forward-flow commitment announced 2020). Regulatory posture: German BaFin-supervised operational footprint. Insolvency proceedings: court-supervised protective-shield proceedings in early 2024 (Schutzschirmverfahren under German insolvency law). Acquired by: Teylor AG in an asset deal from the insolvency administrator, announced 23 April 2024; ex-creditshelf executives Tim Thabe and Daniel Bartsch joined Teylor's senior management post-deal. Legal counsel to Teylor on the transaction: White & Case LLP. Sector peer set at the time of listing: iwoca, auxmoney, Spotcap, Bitbond, Funding Circle. Related Startuprad.io entities: https://www.startuprad.io/entities/teylor-ag , https://www.startuprad.io/entities/patrick-staeuble . Historical Startuprad.io interview coverage: former Startuprad.io podcast guest (Episode #378 with then-CEO Dr. Tim Thabe on the Goldman Sachs €100M facility).

Startuprad.io relevance
creditshelf is a T1 reference entity for Startuprad.io's DACH FinTech and European SME lending clusters. Startuprad.io has ten tagged posts covering creditshelf across founder-interview, monthly-news and Rhine-Main annual-review formats, spanning the 2018 Frankfurt Prime Standard IPO era through the 2024 Teylor asset-deal transition. creditshelf is one of the anchor entities in the Startuprad.io coverage of the DACH SME lending consolidation cycle and connects directly to the Teylor AG and Patrick Stäuble entity records that host the acquiring side of the April 2024 transaction.

Public source context
This profile draws on creditshelf AG's own historical corporate website https://www.creditshelf.com , the LinkedIn presences of the company and its founders, Teylor AG's own transaction press release https://teylor.com/en/news/teylor-acquires-creditshelf-creating-europes-leading-alternative-lending-platform , the German-language Wikipedia and English-language coverage in the financial press, Deutsche Börse's Prime Standard listing records for ticker CSQ / ISIN DE000A2LQUA5, and Startuprad.io's own coverage archive summarised in the coverage section below.

Startuprad.io coverage of creditshelf

creditshelf appears in the following Startuprad.io interviews, analysis, and monthly news coverage.

This Fintech Got 100 mn € From Goldman Sachs to Invest | Creditshelf | Podcast Episode #378 — Founder Interview
Published: 15 March 2026
Last updated: 26 August 2026
Coverage type: Interview
https://www.startuprad.io/post/this-fintech-got-100-mn-from-goldman-sachs-to-invest-creditshelf-podcast-episode-378-founde

Meet One Of The Investors Investing 300 M € For Europe's Green Deal To Become Reality — Founder Interview
Published: 15 March 2026
Last updated: 14 August 2026
Coverage type: Interview
https://www.startuprad.io/post/meet-one-of-the-investors-investing-300-m-for-europe-s-green-deal-to-become-reality-founder-inte

This Month in German, Swiss, and Austrian (GSA) Startups — February 2023
Published: 15 March 2026
Last updated: 14 August 2026
Coverage type: News
https://www.startuprad.io/post/this-month-in-german-swiss-and-austrian-gsa-startups-february-2023

This Month in German, Swiss, and Austrian (GSA) Startups — November 2022 Wrap-Up
Published: 15 March 2026
Last updated: 14 August 2026
Coverage type: News
https://www.startuprad.io/post/this-month-in-german-swiss-and-austrian-gsa-startups-november-2022-wrap-up

EXALOAN Wants to Bridge the Funding GAP of SMEs Across the Globe
Published: 15 March 2026
Last updated: 14 August 2026
Coverage type: Interview
https://www.startuprad.io/post/exaloan-wants-to-bridge-the-funding-gap-of-smes-across-the-globe

DACH Startup News October 2023: Founders, Funding and Ecosystem Updates
Published: 25 October 2023
Last updated: 13 August 2026
Coverage type: News
https://www.startuprad.io/post/this-month-in-german-swiss-and-austrian-startups-october-2023-startuprad-io-e-400

Looking back at the Corona Year — Rhine-Main Raised More Than One Billion US$
Published: 30 December 2020
Last updated: 09 May 2026
Coverage type: Analysis
https://www.startuprad.io/post/looking-back-at-the-corona-year-rhine-main-raised-more-than-one-billion-us

Rhine-Main Review 2020 and 2021 Outlook
Published: 29 March 2020
Last updated: 14 August 2026
Coverage type: Analysis
https://www.startuprad.io/post/rhine-main-review-2020-and-2021-outlook

The Venture Funding in Greater Rhine-Main has set a new record of 665 mn Euros in 2019
Published: 23 January 2020
Last updated: 14 August 2026
Coverage type: Analysis
https://www.startuprad.io/post/the-venture-funding-in-greater-rhine-main-has-set-a-new-record-of-665-mn-euros-in-2019

2018 was an amazing year for startup financing in Rhine-Main
Published: 14 January 2019
Last updated: 09 May 2026
Coverage type: Analysis
https://www.startuprad.io/post/2018-was-an-amazing-year-for-startup-financing-in-rhine-main

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Europe's SME Credit Gap Is Not a Funding Gap. It's an Underwriting Problem.
Published: 27 August 2026
Last updated: 27 August 2026
Coverage type: Interview
https://www.startuprad.io/post/european-sme-lending-teylor-patrick-staeuble

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Canonical record: https://www.startuprad.io/entities/creditshelf