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Startup News Germany — Summer 2023 (July/ August) | Startupradio Episode #393

Updated: 2 days ago


What Is This About?

The summer 2023 DACH startup roundup covers July and August developments across Germany, Austria, and Switzerland — including notable funding rounds, founder exits, and ecosystem shifts that shaped Q3 of the year in the German-speaking startup world.


This article is part of our coverage of Monthly Startup News from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

Executive Summary

  • This blog post first appeared first on old medium publication (https://medium.

  • Welcome to our summer 2023 wrap-up with vital news from the startup scenes in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland in 30 minutes or less 🙂.

  • This time we wrap up July and August.

  • This summer has been a bit different and there has been a lot of news, so we focus more on the most recent ones and we have cut a lot of news here.

  • For everybody in the US who celebrates it: Happy Labor Day!




Welcome to our summer 2023 wrap-up with vital news from the startup scenes in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland in 30 minutes or less 🙂.

This time we wrap up July and August. We came up with the summer news because the September news has always been very long, overcrowded, and covered 3 months. That was a bit too much of a break and too much news in one piece. So we looked to wrap up summer and since the US is an important market and Labor Day is the unofficial end of summer it seems like a good fit.

This summer has been a bit different and there has been a lot of news, so we focus more on the most recent ones and we have cut a lot of news here.

For everybody in the US who celebrates it: Happy Labor Day!


We follow our top-down structure in the news.


Our startup news wrap-up for summer 2023 by Startuprad.io with Chris who just got back from New York City and Joe from Frankfurt. We recorded this news episode on August 30th, 2023. All news not yet included here will be published in our next news episode. Find all links to the quoted news on our Medium blog link below.


Note: We will be back on our weekly publication from today, until Christmas. Our next news will be regular September news, to be published on September 28th.


Our Highlights:

Binance has not — yet — gotten permission to operate in Germany from BaFin, Nextwind raises 750 m US$, Bitpanda surpasses 1 M customers in Germany and Germany sets a new record in new founders. We also shared that SAP wants to invest in Aleph Alpha, they confirmed this and two more.

Germany’s law for legalizing cannabis falls short of the expectations of cannabis entrepreneurs. Europe dominates climate fintech funding and the overall fintech funding shows a sign of life. Bafin also stops mini VC investments — trashing the business model of some fintechs — AND we found newly closed VC funds in excess of 2.8 bn US$ that are open to European founders.


Let’s talk startups:


The Video Podcast Will Go Live on Monday, September 4th, 2023




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Our Enablers


This recording is supported by HTAI and the Enterprise Europe Network Hessen




Top News


Du kommst hier ned rein 🙂 Is the usual saying in Frankfurt if a Bouncer won’t let you in a Club

Fintech blog Finance Forward reports German finance oversight BaFin signals no license for Binance for Germany https://buff.ly/3ptcN3S So they can neither advertise nor expand in Germany. To be clear, this is not a final NO, but rather a “Binance keeps trying, but BaFin signaled a No”


750 M US$ for Wind Energy

Wind Energy in Germany: StartUp Nextwind raises 750 M US$ Venture Capital investors include Sandbrook Capital, Canadian funds Public Sector Pension Investment Board (PSP Investments), and Imco https://buff.ly/443GwyE


Bitpanda — The Austrian Unicorn

Surpasses 1 million customers in Germany alone https://buff.ly/44mMyKP it is not sure how many of them are really active, but that is always a tough question, even for the startups. But the question is important, since one only makes money with active users.


Germany Sets a New Record in Founders

Despite the current economic situation, Germany has the highest share of founders in 24 years!!! https://buff.ly/3sudRpo According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor Germany had a larger than 9% founder quota, meaning people from 18–64 who (co) founded a new business within the last 3,5 years (Young Entrepreneurs). The highest value since 1999 when the monitoring started.Immigrants are especially willing to start new businesses. The founder quota of immigrants in Germany is 20% compared to 1,7% of non-immigrants.The founder quota of women (7,1%) is overall lower than the one for men (11%).


SAP Invests in AI Startups

We have shared before that German software giant SAP is rumored to be interested in investing in Aleph Alpha, now they confirmed the investment in three AI startups https://buff.ly/45OC6Nb This is quite a new strategy for SAP, in the past they wrote their own code. Now they intend to work with partnerships


Housekeeping & Time to Brag

There is much more reason to be here than just to keep you up to date and entertain you. We inspire entrepreneurs. I just talked to Alexander the founder of AwesomeQA. Our podcast was his major inspiration to quit his job and start his AI startup. Now they have raised 2,8 mn US$ in an oversubscribed seed round for their Web3 customer support solution! https://awesome-qa.notion.site/Press-release-3167f9b705d64e2b986108c24a96a689 Ain’t that cool Chris?


Publication Schedule:

We will get back to our regular weekly publication schedule from today until Christmas. This year is the first where we will not be publishing the fintech review on the 25th of December, but before the holidays — due to popular demand. Expect our last piece for the year to drop on December 21st. We will take a break around the holidays and be back in January 2024.


Business Culture in Germany:

Note that Germany has its only federal holiday in the fall on October 3rd and therefore this year many people will take off October 2nd and have a 4-day weekend (including Joe). If you are planning a business trip in early October in Germany, keep that in mind.


Just a bit of Bragging

ALSO: Our internet radio station startup.radio has surpassed 100,000 listeners in 30 days ending August 18th! Thank you everyone.


Ecosystem


Relevant News from the World

  • Lean times hit the vertical farming business https://buff.ly/3L2nBxh Energy costs are just too high in vertical farming to become profitable and some spent most of their money developing their own technology, which is expensive and may not be competitive.


Relevant news from Europe and the EU

  • Europe dominates in Climate Fintech funding despite overall funding slump in 2022 https://buff.ly/442wAX1

  • Investments in European solar startups quadruple in 2023 https://buff.ly/45IXvr4

  • Fintech startups in Europe raised less money in Q2 2023 (1,6 bn €) than in Q2 2022 (5,5 bn €), BUT still an increase from Q1 ’23 (1,4 bn €) https://buff.ly/45LlDcG


Focus on GSA

  • Swiss Fintech Funding Pulls Back 45% YoY — Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News — FintechNewsCH https://buff.ly/45xJMDG

  • 80% of Germany’s medical cannabis startups set to die a painful death https://buff.ly/47KQR5l To give you some background on this story, there was a large legalization of cannabis in the works for recreational use. We talked about it in our interview with cansativa (LINK) but the lawmakers made the law much more restrictive than expected. Now you need to be a member of a club.

  • German Finance Oversight BaFin is in the process of stopping VC investment for small investors writes FinanceFWD, killing the business model of a few fintech startups https://buff.ly/45uZ10k

  • Part of Germany’s plan to get ahead in the AI race is 150 additional professorships related to AI https://buff.ly/47RG8pQ


Hubs

Here we want to highlight some hidden gems and cities of general startup interest. Berlin and Munich are so large they are excluded here. You will find their news in the respective sections.


Frankfurt / Rhein-Main-Area


Sulzbach, Saarland

  • Kraftblock Raises €20M in Series B Funding https://buff.ly/3Otj7AR The company works on a High-Temperature Energy Storage System


Aachen


Metzingen


Austria

  • EET: Graz, Austria-based Solar Startup raises 6,5 M € #VentureCapital to grow to 100 employees https://buff.ly/44Yuh7L

  • Vienna-based #traveltech startup Midnightdeal files for insolvency, getting a customer shitstorm for allegedly not passing payments through to hotels. We hope the situation will be resolved soon https://buff.ly/45hIr3n

  • Vienna-based Trality offered a marketplace where one could place their crypto trading bots and charge others for using them. Now they have to file for insolvency https://buff.ly/45JrhMz

  • Austrian ebike startup Greenstrom has to file for insolvency after raising nine million Euros https://buff.ly/3Pg6QkG


Switzerland


General News / Tech News / Companies News Section


A little note here. Since we aim to inform you about the startup world in GSA, SMEs, and large enterprises are also active in the markets. Therefore we include some news of them here as well, where we believe they have an impact on our relevant segment of the GSA economy:


New VC Funds, If You’re Looking for Money


Our show notes will have more information on where to pitch these investors: medium.com/startuprad-io. Note here that we include all funds we find (mail or comment if you know about more) that are not excluding investing in GSA startups one way or another:

  • RTP Global goes big with new $1 billion fund https://buff.ly/3PCkqj1 with $660 million earmarked for new investments and $340 million for follow-ons. Looking to invest in startups from North America, Europe, India, and Southeast Asia, RTP Global says that its sector focus is broad, however, special mention was afforded to AI/ML, enterprise software, fintech, e-commerce, and tech.

  • Venture Firm QED Raises $925 Million for Fintech Investing https://buff.ly/44372ci

  • Yttrium raises over EUR 400 million for Digital Growth Fund II — One of the largest in Germany to date https://buff.ly/3L0pnyS

  • UK-based fintech VC firm Illuminate Financial closes third fund at €215.2M looking to invest in Series A fintech fundings https://buff.ly/45tdjOZ

  • Illuminate Financial Closes Third Fund, at $235M — The fund will invest in early-stage / Series A stage businesses solving problems for financial institutions. https://buff.ly/3snNb9x

  • European edtech VC Bright Eye VC closes second fund at €100 million looking to invest in seed and series s fundings of edtech startups https://buff.ly/43LIunX


Fintech News

  • German finance oversight BAFin extends limits for new business for N26, which have been in place since 2021 due to problems in anti-money laundry and fighting of terrorism financing https://buff.ly/3so5qf1

  • Fintech Solaris made 56 M € loss in 2022, but looking to break even in 2023 https://buff.ly/45QJ2t5 This is an increase of 33% compared to their loss in 2021. High costs for HR and compliance with BaFin orders drove the increase

  • Credit platforms: Auxmoney buys majority in Dutch competitor Lender & Spender, their first takeover ever. The author sees the start of the expected consolidation in the fintech market https://buff.ly/3Ea2IMV

  • From banking giants to lending up-and-comers — here are the world’s top 200 fintech companies https://buff.ly/3OEe2qv including @check24 rentablo @TradeRepublic @onecrowd

  • Dutch crypto exchange Bitvavo plans expansion to Germany, profiting from Binance’s retreat https://buff.ly/3ss7X81


General News


Schumpeters Schöpferische Zerstörung ⇒ Creative Destruction Still Ongoing: Chris


Schumpeter was one of the most influential economists of the 20th century and coined the term creative destruction in German Schöpferische Zerstörung as well as Entrepreneur. Learn more about him here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Schumpeter.


We introduced this section towards the end of Corona and it is still going strong.

  • Insolvency — even for startups — is not always the end: Founder of recommerce platform Momox buys insolvent second-hand marketplace Mädchenflohmarkt out of insolvency https://buff.ly/3Kshkur

  • German energy giant E.On buys insolvent charging column startup Elvah out of insolvency https://buff.ly/3Egfd9O

  • Future Stories a marketplace for sustainable cosmetics has to file for insolvency https://buff.ly/44tVqOO


End on a High Note: Successful Fundraisings and Exits:


Keep in mind this is a small selection. The news here and their total value show how resilient the startup scene is. We included only selected fundraisings above 5 million Euros or USD

  • metrofibre secures €120M debt financing to support ruhrfibre roll-out https://buff.ly/3OUDTd0 This is not really a startup investment, as we would understand it, so it is not making our top news.

  • AI startup deepset from Berlin raises 30 M US$ for: Next-level semantic search for enterprises fueled by latest NLP and open-source https://buff.ly/445lT55

  • beeOLED raises EUR 13.3m in Series A funding from world-class deep tech investors to solve the last big challenge of the OLED industry | HTGF https://buff.ly/45HiwCm

  • Berlin-based Mercanis raises $10M for AI-powered procurement platform https://buff.ly/3qHqEUK

  • Munich-based HOLOGATE bags €8.3 million Series A to expand interaction with virtual humans worldwide | EU-Startups https://buff.ly/3Qwb3Su

  • Battery startup Voltfang wins German company Viessmann (owned by Carrier Global) as investor https://buff.ly/3qpjKU8


Stay Ahead of the Curve



Key Takeaways

  • Germany set a new record in startup founders — the highest share in 24 years with over 9% founder quota (ages 18-64), according to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, showing ecosystem resilience despite economic headwinds.

  • Nextwind raised a massive $750 million for wind energy in Germany, backed by Sandbrook Capital, PSP Investments, and Imco — one of the largest cleantech fundraises in the DACH region for 2023.

  • Austrian unicorn Bitpanda surpassed 1 million customers in Germany alone, demonstrating strong cross-border fintech growth within the DACH region despite uncertainty around active user metrics.

  • BaFin continued to signal resistance to Binance's licensing efforts in Germany, maintaining its cautious approach to crypto exchange regulation even as traditional banks embrace digital assets.

  • SAP announced investments in AI startups, signaling corporate Germany's growing appetite for artificial intelligence and its integration into enterprise software ecosystems.


Featured Entities

Startups & Companies

  • Nextwind — Wind energy startup, raised $750M from Sandbrook Capital, PSP Investments, Imco

  • Bitpanda — Austrian crypto/fintech unicorn, 1M+ customers in Germany

  • Binance — Crypto exchange, BaFin licensing challenges in Germany

  • SAP — Enterprise software giant investing in AI startups


Cities & Regions

  • Frankfurt / Rhein-Main area, Berlin, Munich — German hub coverage

  • Berlin, Berlin

  • Munich, Bavaria

  • Austria — Bitpanda ecosystem

  • Swiss startups also covered


Regulators & Institutions

  • BaFin — German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority, Binance regulation

  • HTAI / Enterprise Europe Network Hessen — Recording enablers


Relationship Map

  • Nextwind → Sandbrook Capital + PSP Investments + Imco → $750M wind energy investment

  • Bitpanda (Austria) → German market expansion → 1M+ customer milestone

  • BaFin → Binance → Regulatory friction → German crypto licensing landscape

  • SAP → AI startup investments → Corporate-startup collaboration trend


Related Articles


Partner with Startuprad.io

Startuprad.io is the leading independent media platform covering startups, venture capital, and innovation across the DACH region (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) and Europe. We offer B2B partnership opportunities for companies looking to reach startup decision-makers, founders, and investors.


Subscribe to the Podcast


Frequently Asked Questions


What were the biggest startup funding rounds in Germany in summer 2023?

The headline deal was Nextwind's massive $750 million raise for wind energy in Germany, backed by Sandbrook Capital, PSP Investments, and Imco. SAP also announced investments in AI startups, and Austrian unicorn Bitpanda surpassed 1 million customers in Germany. The summer period saw continued activity despite broader economic uncertainty.


Is Bitpanda available in Germany and how many users does it have?

Yes, Bitpanda — an Austrian crypto and fintech unicorn — is active in Germany and surpassed 1 million customers in the German market alone as of summer 2023. However, the exact number of active users (vs. registered accounts) remains unclear, which is a common measurement challenge across fintech platforms.


What happened with Binance and BaFin in Germany?

As of summer 2023, Binance continued to face regulatory challenges with BaFin (Germany's Federal Financial Supervisory Authority). While it was not a final rejection, BaFin signaled ongoing resistance to Binance's licensing application. The situation highlights Germany's cautious approach to crypto exchange regulation, even as traditional banks like Deutsche Bank move into digital asset services.


How is the German startup founder rate trending?

Germany set a new 24-year record for startup founders in 2023, with over 9% of people aged 18-64 having co-founded a new business within the last 3.5 years, according to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor. This demonstrates strong entrepreneurial momentum despite macroeconomic headwinds and a challenging funding environment.


Is SAP investing in AI startups?

Yes, SAP announced investments in AI startups during summer 2023 as part of its strategy to integrate artificial intelligence into its enterprise software ecosystem. This aligns with a broader trend of German corporates increasing their involvement with startups through corporate venture capital and strategic partnerships.


About the Host

Joern "Joe" Menninger is the host of the Startuprad.io podcast and covers founders, investors, and policy developments across the DACH startup ecosystem. Through more than 1,300 interviews and nearly a decade of reporting, he documents the evolution of the European startup landscape. Follow Joern on LinkedIn.

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