Lakestar

Overview
Lakestar is a European venture-capital firm founded in 2012 by Dr. Klaus Hommels, based in Zurich with offices in Berlin and London. It states over USD 6 billion in assets under management and more than EUR 2 billion raised across its vintages, in a portfolio spanning Revolut, Klarna, Spotify, Helsing, Isar Aerospace and GetYourGuide. In 2021 it sponsored the first tech SPAC listed in Frankfurt, which took HomeToGo public. In October 2025 Lakestar said it would raise no further generalist venture funds, and on 17 July 2026 it closed Lakestar Resilience I, a USD 300 million European defence and dual-use fund.

Why this entity matters
Lakestar is one of few Continental European venture firms whose record predates the modern European venture industry and whose strategy is now a deliberate bet against it. First, provenance: Hommels' pre-Lakestar positions are widely reported to include Skype, exited on Microsoft's USD 8.5 billion acquisition in 2011, and the Hamburg network Xing, while his 2009 Spotify investment came with a board seat Spotify itself announced — a founding narrative most European funds cannot claim. Second, domicile: Lakestar is Swiss-headquartered with Berlin and Munich presence and a German-weighted portfolio, making it one of very few large-cheque investors structurally inside DACH rather than visiting it, and its Frankfurt SPAC placed it inside German capital-markets structure too. Third, direction of travel: the October 2025 exit from generalist fundraising and the July 2026 Resilience I close are a clean read on where European venture capital is repositioning, away from broad technology exposure toward sovereignty, defence and industrial resilience, expressed in the firm's own principle that neutrality is no longer a strategy.

Company history and product
Hommels invested privately through and after the dot-com period and founded Hommels Holding in 2007. In 2009 he invested in Spotify and joined its board, an appointment Spotify announced on 21 September 2009. He founded Lakestar in Zurich in 2012, launching a first institutional fund of roughly EUR 135 to 150 million in 2013, a second reported at USD 385 million in 2015 and a vintage reported at about USD 700 million in 2019; those sizes rest on press reports rather than fund filings. In February 2021 Lakestar SPAC I raised EUR 275 million into trust in Frankfurt, the first European venture-sponsored technology SPAC, and on 14 July 2021 signed a business combination agreement with the Berlin marketplace HomeToGo — the first European de-SPAC with a German target — at an expected combined market capitalisation of about EUR 1.2 billion, supported by a EUR 75 million PIPE from European tech family offices and entrepreneurs including Hommels. The combination completed on 21 September 2021 and HomeToGo traded from that month. In October 2025 Hommels published a letter stating that Lakestar would raise no new generalist venture funds and would concentrate on the existing portfolio, investing larger, more concentrated cheques from its own capital; he put cumulative fundraising at more than EUR 2 billion over twelve years. On 17 July 2026 Lakestar closed Lakestar Resilience I at USD 300 million, reported by EU-Startups at about EUR 262.2 million, oversubscribed and raised entirely from private capital, for dual-use and defence technology across Europe and NATO-allied markets.

Role in the DACH startup and technology ecosystem
Lakestar is among the largest venture platforms headquartered in DACH and is routinely counted among the most active investors in German, Swiss and Austrian technology. Its exposure is direct rather than opportunistic: Isar Aerospace and Helsing in Munich, GetYourGuide and HomeToGo in Berlin, ARX Robotics and Constellr in the German deep-tech and space cluster. The HomeToGo transaction was the first European de-SPAC with a German target, giving Frankfurt its first technology SPAC listing and making Lakestar a participant in German capital-markets structure and not only in private rounds. The resilience portfolio, which Lakestar says it has built since 2017, is weighted to German and northern European companies whose founders, the firm states, have raised more than USD 5 billion in private capital and employ more than five thousand specialists. Hommels has advocated for European technology sovereignty since well before it became consensus, sitting on the board of the Internet Economy Foundation since 2016 and the Munich Security Conference Security Innovation Board since 2021.

Selected relationships and affiliations
Founder and chairman: Dr. Klaus Hommels. Offices: Zurich, Berlin, London and Munich. Selected portfolio: Revolut, Klarna, Spotify, SumUp, Helsing, Isar Aerospace, Neko Health, GetYourGuide, Sennder and Glovo. Vehicles: the Lakestar venture and growth funds from 2013 onward, Lakestar SPAC I (Frankfurt, 2021) and Lakestar Resilience I (2026). The Resilience I advisory board comprises General Sir Nicholas Carter (retired), former Chief of the Defence Staff of the United Kingdom; General Volker Wieker (retired), former Generalinspekteur of the Bundeswehr; Baroness Martha Lane Fox; and former United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Startuprad.io relevance
Lakestar sits at the centre of Startuprad.io's DACH venture-capital cluster and appears in five tagged posts: the ranking of the most active VC firms investing in DACH tech startups, the two pillar guides to venture funding and to Series A and B rounds in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, an analysis of technical founder journeys from the region, and a 2023 monthly DACH news episode. Two of the five are pillar pages rather than news items, so Lakestar functions as a structural reference for how DACH growth rounds get funded.

Public source context
Sources: Lakestar at https://www.lakestar.com , including its October 2025 letter, its stated assets under management, and the 17 July 2026 Resilience I press release with the advisory board and portfolio list; Tech.eu at https://tech.eu and the Financial Times at https://www.ft.com on the October 2025 decision to stop raising generalist venture funds; EU-Startups at https://www.eu-startups.com on the EUR 262.2 million equivalent of Resilience I; Clifford Chance at https://www.cliffordchance.com on the HomeToGo combination as the first European de-SPAC with a German target; CNBC at https://www.cnbc.com on the February 2021 SPAC launch; and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaus_Hommels on the pre-Lakestar record. Pre-2024 fund sizes rest on press reports only. The figure of over USD 6 billion in assets under management is a company statement.

Startuprad.io coverage of Lakestar

Lakestar appears in the following Startuprad.io interviews, analysis and long-form profiles.

The 10 Most Active VC Firms Investing in DACH Tech Startups
Published: 23 July 2025
Last updated: 27 August 2026
Coverage type: Analysis
https://www.startuprad.io/post/the-10-most-active-vc-firms-investing-in-dach-tech-startups

Venture Capital and Startup Funding in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland
Published: 04 March 2026
Last updated: 27 August 2026
Coverage type: Pillar Profile
https://www.startuprad.io/post/startup-funding-venture-capital

Series A & B Funding: Germany, Austria & Switzerland
Published: 10 March 2026
Last updated: 09 May 2026
Coverage type: Pillar Profile
https://www.startuprad.io/post/series-a-and-b-funding-for-startups-in-germany-austria-and-switzerland

Technical Founder Journeys from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland
Published: 10 March 2026
Last updated: 27 August 2026
Coverage type: Analysis
https://www.startuprad.io/post/technical-founder-journeys-from-germany-austria-and-switzerland

Startup News Germany (and GSA) — May 2023
Published: 15 March 2026
Last updated: 27 August 2026
Coverage type: News
https://www.startuprad.io/post/this-month-in-german-swiss-and-austrian-gsa-startups-may-2023-episode-385

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