Exclusive: The 23-Unicorn List UnternehmerTUM Gave Us — and Where Its Role Is on Record
What Is This About?
On 8 October 2026, UnternehmerTUM's press office sent Startuprad.io the 23-company list behind the "23 TUM unicorns" figure. The list is maintained by the Technical University of Munich (TUM), not by UnternehmerTUM. We checked every company for a documented UnternehmerTUM role. We found one at two companies, Isar Aerospace and Lilium, and an indirect one at HappyRobot.
How the list reached us
In August 2026 we asked UnternehmerTUM which companies make up the 23 unicorns it and TUM talk about. The press office forwarded the request to TUM's press office, which keeps the list. On 8 October 2026, UnternehmerTUM's press office sent us the document, noting it had recently received it from TUM's press office.
The PDF is titled "Unicorns gegründet durch TUM Alumni" (unicorns founded by TUM alumni). It is dated 4 August 2026, carries the initials LW/PH, and lists 23 companies: 18 marked operational, four marked acquired, and Lilium marked insolvent (2025). It also names two companies that are explicitly not TUM unicorns: FINN and Proxima Fusion.
Neither institution has published the enumerated list. TUM had not as of our August 2026 audit, and UnternehmerTUM's website carries no list or count of its own as of 21 October 2026. To our knowledge, this is the first time the full roster has appeared in public. It also changes how this special reads in the Unicorn Atlas: it covers an institution, not a single company, and it sits in our map of Power Structures: Hidden Champions and Ecosystem Gatekeepers.
Key Takeaways
The list is TUM's, and it counts alumni. It measures where founders studied. It does not measure which companies UnternehmerTUM supported.
UnternehmerTUM's role is documented at two of 23 companies. At Isar Aerospace it came through the MakerSpace, the XPRENEURS incubator and UVC Partners. At Lilium it came through an accelerator at UnternehmerTUM and a 2023 UVC Partners investment.
One more has an indirect link. HappyRobot is listed as a team of TUM Venture Labs, which TUM and UnternehmerTUM run jointly.
The list leaves out companies UnternehmerTUM does back. Flix, in which UVC Partners invested in 2013, is not on it, and UVC portfolio companies FINN and Proxima Fusion are named as explicitly excluded.
Some rows need care. For six companies we found no public source naming a TUM-alumni founder. Four have no verified valuation of $1 billion or more. Three crossed $1 billion only as listed companies.
FAQ
Is this UnternehmerTUM's unicorn list?
No. It is TUM's list. UnternehmerTUM's press office forwarded it to Startuprad.io and said TUM's press office maintains it. UnternehmerTUM does not publish a unicorn count of its own.
What is the difference between TUM and UnternehmerTUM?
TUM is the public university. UnternehmerTUM GmbH is a separate, non-profit company in Garching, founded in 2002 by Susanne Klatten, who chairs its supervisory board. It describes itself as an "An-Institut" of TUM, meaning a legally independent affiliated institute. The two run some offers jointly, including TUM Venture Labs and TUM's start-up advisory service.
How many of the 23 did UnternehmerTUM support?
Public records document an UnternehmerTUM programme or investment at two: Isar Aerospace and Lilium. HappyRobot has an indirect link through TUM Venture Labs. UnternehmerTUM describes Celonis, Personio and Scalable Capital as part of its network, without naming a programme. For the other 17 we found no documented role.
Which companies are on the list?
Celonis, Capchase, Razor Group, Personio, Forto, Monzo, commercetools, Diamond Foundry, Scalable Capital, Synthesia, Trade Republic, Cellares, SiTime, Odyssey Therapeutics, FlexCar, EGYM, Isar Aerospace and HappyRobot are marked operational. GitHub, Wolt, Sinch and XING are marked acquired, and Lilium is marked insolvent.
What UnternehmerTUM is, and what it is not
UnternehmerTUM is a non-profit company registered in Munich (HRB 141703) and headquartered on the Garching research campus. Susanne Klatten founded it in 2002 and chairs its supervisory board. TUM's president sits on that board. Prof. Helmut Schönenberger is CEO.
Its offer is a stack of programmes. In June 2026, XPRENEURS was renamed the UnternehmerTUM Accelerator and XPLORE the UnternehmerTUM Incubator. The stack also includes the MakerSpace prototyping workshop, Manage and More, the Digital Product School and appliedAI. Next to it sits UVC Partners, which calls itself an independent venture capital firm "closely connected" to UnternehmerTUM. UVC's Fund IV was extended to €400 million in March 2026. TUM Venture Labs is described by UnternehmerTUM as an initiative of TUM and UnternehmerTUM together.
UnternehmerTUM has its own numbers. It says it supports more than 140 scalable start-ups a year, and the Financial Times ranked it Europe's leading start-up hub for a third year running in February 2026. Its June 2026 rebrand used the tagline "Home of Unicorn Founders." What it does not publish is a list of unicorns it counts as its own.
That is why the distinction matters. The Technical University of Munich counts companies founded by its alumni. UnternehmerTUM's record is the programmes and investments it ran. The two overlap, but they are not the same set.
The 23 companies on the list, checked one by one
The list's index numbers are not TUM's announcement order. TUM calls HappyRobot its 23rd unicorn, but the list puts it at 18. TUM called Lilium its second, and the list puts it last. Below, each entry gives the list status, the TUM link we could verify, the billion-dollar milestone with its date, and any UnternehmerTUM role on record.
1. Celonis (Munich; operational). All three founders studied at TUM. Unicorn in June 2018 at $1 billion; last primary round at $13 billion (August 2022). UnternehmerTUM calls Celonis "part of the UnternehmerTUM ecosystem" without naming a programme. TUM's own releases credit TUM's start-up advisory and TUM chairs instead.
2. Capchase (New York; operational). The CEO, Miguel Fernández Larrea, is reported to hold a TUM master's degree; we found only one weak source for it. We found no reliable valuation of $1 billion or more; its May 2026 round of $200 million in debt and equity did not disclose one. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
3. Razor Group (Berlin; operational). Co-founder Jonas Diezun is described as a TUM (CDTM) alumnus in the company's own founding post. Unicorn in November 2021 at $1 billion+ (Series B). Merged with Infinite Commerce in 2025. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
4. Personio (Munich; operational). Co-founder and CEO Hanno Renner is a TUM alumnus. Unicorn in January 2021 at about $1.7 billion; last priced at $8.5 billion (June 2022). UnternehmerTUM lists it as "part of the UnternehmerTUM ecosystem," with no programme named. The founders built the prototype at CDTM, which TUM and LMU run jointly.
5. Forto (Berlin; operational). Co-founders Michael Wax and Erik Muttersbach are TUM alumni. Unicorn in June 2021 at $1.2 billion; $2.1 billion in March 2022. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
6. Monzo (London; operational). Co-founder Jonas Templestein is reported to have studied at TUM. Unicorn in October 2018 at £1 billion; $5.9 billion in an employee share sale (October 2024). No UnternehmerTUM role found.
7. commercetools (Munich; operational). Co-founder Dirk Hörig is reported to have studied at TUM; we found one weak source for it. Valued at $1.9 billion in its Series C (September 2021). No UnternehmerTUM role found.
8. Diamond Foundry (San Francisco Bay Area; operational). CEO Martin Roscheisen holds a TUM bachelor's degree (1992). Valued at $1.8 billion in April 2021. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
9. Scalable Capital (Munich; operational). Co-founder Florian Prucker is a TUM alumnus. Unicorn in June 2021 at €1.4 billion; the valuation of its June 2025 round was not disclosed. UnternehmerTUM listed it among start-ups "from our network" in its 2025 funding review, without naming a programme. Today's Unicorn Atlas #8 on Scalable Capital has the full profile.
10. Synthesia (London; operational). Co-founder Matthias Niessner is a TUM professor; according to his published biography he studied at FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg, not at TUM. Unicorn in June 2023 at $1 billion; $4 billion in January 2026. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
11. Trade Republic (Berlin; operational). We found no public source showing that a founder studied at TUM. CDTM lists co-founder Thomas Pischke as an alumnus. Unicorn in May 2021 at $5 billion+; €12.5 billion in a secondary sale (December 2025). No UnternehmerTUM role found.
12. Cellares (South San Francisco; operational). CEO Fabian Gerlinghaus holds a TUM master's degree. The company has not disclosed a valuation. Only a database estimate puts it at $1 billion, and in June 2026 its CEO described it as approaching unicorn status. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
13. SiTime (Santa Clara; operational). Co-founder Markus Lutz holds a TUM engineering diploma. SiTime listed on Nasdaq in November 2019 and passed $1 billion in market value only as a public company, around August 2020. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
14. Odyssey Therapeutics (Boston; operational, listed on Nasdaq since May 2026). Scientific co-founder Florian Schmidt studied at TUM. The company was valued at about $900 million at its IPO (May 2026). We found no private valuation of $1 billion or more. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
15. FlexCar (operational). We could not establish which company this row refers to. The likeliest candidate is the Athens-based car-subscription company, for which only a database estimate exists. We found no TUM-alumni founder and no UnternehmerTUM role.
16. EGYM (Munich; listed as operational). Co-founder Florian Sauter studied at TUM. Unicorn in September 2024 at over €1 billion. On 31 March 2026, before the list's date, EGYM merged into Playlist at a combined valuation of $7.5 billion. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
17. Isar Aerospace (Ottobrunn; operational). All three founders studied aerospace engineering at TUM. Unicorn in June 2025 at over $1 billion. A June 2026 statement from the law firm advising the Series D investors puts the valuation above €2 billion; the company has not confirmed that figure. Documented UnternehmerTUM role: the founders built their first prototypes in the MakerSpace; UnternehmerTUM credits UVC Partners, its Initiative for Industrial Innovators and the XPRENEURS incubator; and UVC took part in the June 2026 Series D.
18. HappyRobot (San Francisco; operational). Founders Pablo Palafox and Luis Paarup met as TUM students. Unicorn in August 2026 at $1.2 billion. Indirect role: HappyRobot is listed as a TUM Venture Labs team, and TUM's release says the founders got "extensive support from the TUM Venture Labs and UnternehmerTUM." We found no UnternehmerTUM-authored record and no UVC investment.
19. GitHub (San Francisco; acquired by Microsoft). We found no public source linking a GitHub co-founder to TUM. Valued at about $2 billion in July 2015; Microsoft paid $7.5 billion (closed October 2018). No UnternehmerTUM role found.
20. Wolt (Helsinki; acquired by DoorDash). We found no public source linking any of the six co-founders to TUM. Unicorn status was confirmed with the Series E in January 2021. DoorDash's deal was worth about $8.1 billion when signed (November 2021) and $2.84 billion at closing (May 2022). No UnternehmerTUM role found.
21. Sinch (Stockholm; listed as "acquired (clx communications)"). The record shows the reverse: CLX Communications bought the original Sinch AB in 2016 and renamed itself Sinch in 2019. Sinch is listed on Nasdaq Stockholm, so its billion-dollar status is a market value. We found no TUM-alumni founder. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
22. XING (Hamburg; listed as "acquired (New Work SE)"). XING SE renamed itself New Work SE in 2019. Burda Digital took full ownership through a squeeze-out approved in June 2025. Founder Lars Hinrichs did not study at TUM. No UnternehmerTUM role found.
23. Lilium (Weßling; insolvent). All four founders studied at TUM. Unicorn in June 2020 at over $1 billion; the company went into insolvency in 2024 and 2025, and its patents were sold to Archer for about €18 million (October 2025). Documented UnternehmerTUM role: per TUM's 2020 release, the founders took part in the Climate-KIC Accelerator at UnternehmerTUM, and UVC Partners joined Lilium's $192 million raise in July 2023.
Where UnternehmerTUM's role is on record
Sorted by the strength of the evidence, the 23 companies fall into four groups.
Programme or investment on record (2): Isar Aerospace and Lilium. Both have named programmes, UVC Partners investments, and UnternehmerTUM's own pages or press releases describing them.
Joint TUM–UnternehmerTUM vehicle (1): HappyRobot, through TUM Venture Labs.
Network claim, no programme named (3): Celonis, Personio and Scalable Capital. UnternehmerTUM includes them in its network, and Celonis co-founder Bastian Nominacher is an investor in UVC Partners' Fund III. That makes him a backer of UnternehmerTUM's fund, not a graduate of its programmes.
No documented role found (17): the remaining companies, including the US, UK, Swedish and Finnish names that give the list its global reach.
Isar Aerospace is the strongest case. In September 2026, its second Spectrum rocket reached orbit, the first orbital launch from continental Europe. The MakerSpace, the incubator and UVC Partners are each on record in its history. We covered the launch and the valuation question in Isar Aerospace Reached Orbit — Now Two Ceilings Decide What It Is Worth.
The unicorns UnternehmerTUM backs that the list leaves out
Read the other way, the list misses UnternehmerTUM's own investments. UVC Partners invested in Flix in 2013, and UnternehmerTUM names Flix among the unicorns from its network. Flix is not on TUM's list. Our Flix edition of the Unicorn Atlas covers the company itself.
The two names the list explicitly excludes, FINN and Proxima Fusion, are both UVC Partners portfolio companies. UnternehmerTUM's 2025 funding review also counts Proxima Fusion among the alumni of its accelerator.
The likely reason is the counting rule. A list of "unicorns founded by TUM alumni" tests the founders' degrees, while UnternehmerTUM's record tests programmes and investments. Measured by founders' degrees, GitHub can make the list while Flix does not. Measured by programmes and investments, the order flips.
What the list does not establish
The document is a dated institutional list, and it is useful because it is specific. Some rows still do not hold up on public sources:
No TUM-alumni founder found (6 rows): Trade Republic, FlexCar, GitHub, Wolt, Sinch and XING. For Trade Republic, the closest link is CDTM, which TUM and LMU run jointly.
A TUM professor, not an alumnus: Synthesia's TUM link is Matthias Niessner, who teaches at TUM; his published biography places his studies at FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg.
No verified valuation of $1 billion or more (4 rows): Capchase, Cellares, Odyssey Therapeutics and FlexCar.
Billion-dollar value reached only as a listed company (3 rows): SiTime, Sinch and XING.
Status labels behind events: EGYM is marked operational although it merged into Playlist in March 2026, and the Sinch and XING labels describe a rename and a merger in reverse.
None of this shows the list is wrong. TUM may have records, such as exchange semesters, short programmes or early team members, that public sources do not show. These are questions for TUM's press office, and we will add any answer it gives. The point for readers is narrower: the "23" is a historical alumni count, applied generously. It does not measure the Munich start-up support system.
What this means for founders and investors
If you are choosing a programme, ask for the programme's own record. A university's alumni list and an incubator's portfolio answer different questions. The first tells you where founders studied, the second what the programme actually did.
If you are underwriting a deal, check the address. For HappyRobot, we separated four addresses: where it was formed, where it is incorporated, where it operates and which city claims it. The same test applies to every company on this list.
If you build in Munich, the documented path is clear. Isar Aerospace shows how UnternehmerTUM's support works when it is fully on record: prototype workshop, incubator, an affiliated fund, and follow-on investment eight years later.
HappyRobot: where our Atlas coverage started
This special began with HappyRobot. When TUM announced it as its 23rd unicorn in August 2026, we asked what "TUM unicorn" actually measures. Our episode E770 HappyRobot: The $1.2 Billion Unicorn Munich Formed and San Francisco Owns worked through the four addresses and ruled that HappyRobot belongs in the Atlas as a company Munich formed, not as a German company. The full list confirms that this is the pattern, not the exception: 12 of the 23 companies are headquartered outside Germany.
The same family of links runs through our earlier profiles of Celonis and Unicorn Atlas #7: Personio. Our 2022 interview with UnternehmerTUM, UnternehmerTUM Helps Entrepreneurs to Start World-Class Companies, reflected the institution's own description of its record. We hold ourselves to a stricter standard of evidence today.
Summary
On 8 October 2026, UnternehmerTUM's press office supplied Startuprad.io with TUM's list of 23 "unicorns founded by TUM alumni," dated 4 August 2026. The list is maintained by TUM, not UnternehmerTUM, and as far as we can establish neither institution has published it. Of the 23 companies, UnternehmerTUM's programme or investment role is documented at two (Isar Aerospace and Lilium) and indirect at one (HappyRobot, via TUM Venture Labs). Three more (Celonis, Personio, Scalable Capital) are network claims with no programme named. Flix, which UVC Partners backed in 2013, is not on the list, and UVC portfolio companies FINN and Proxima Fusion are explicitly excluded. For six listed companies we found no public source naming a TUM-alumni founder.
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About the Author
Jörn "Joe" Menninger is the founder of Startuprad.io, Europe's English-language startup media platform covering Germany, Austria and Switzerland. With 1,700+ podcast episodes across the franchise, Startuprad.io connects founders, investors and corporate innovators across the region. Connect with Joe on LinkedIn.
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