Latest / Blockchain Germany – Web3 Startups, Crypto Innovation & Venture Capital by Startuprad.io™ / DACH News March 2026: Robotics, Defence & Bavaria

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DACH News March 2026: Robotics, Defence & Bavaria · Blockchain Germany – Web3 Startups, Crypto Innovation & Venture Capital by Startuprad.io™

• 0:15
  Speaker0: Interviews, and live events.
• 0:19
  Speaker1: Hello and welcome to StartupRay.io. My name is Chris, joining you from New York City.
• 0:25
  Speaker0: And this is Joe. If you're listening to this or watching this,
• 0:29
  Speaker0: you can tell it's spring because I am first shaved.
• 0:32
  Speaker0: And secondly, the hay fever already got me. So good to be back.
• 0:39
  Speaker1: Okay. So, okay. You shave once per year, apparently.
• 0:44
  Speaker0: No, I'm wearing a beard in the cold season, Chris.
• 0:47
  Speaker1: This is our March 2026 startup news. News cut is today, March 23rd, that is.
• 0:54
  Speaker1: We have a fully packed episode. We are talking about a billion euro robotics
• 0:58
  Speaker1: round backed by a stable coin treasury.
• 1:02
  Speaker1: We are going to be talking about
• 1:04
  Speaker1: Bavaria overtaking Berlin in startup funding for the very first time.
• 1:08
  Speaker1: We are talking about a Frankfurt IPO that could become Europe's largest fintech listing.
• 1:13
  Speaker1: Amazon is buying a Swiss robotics company and half a billion euros are coming
• 1:18
  Speaker1: from the Bundestag, the German parliament, for combat drones. Quite a month.
• 1:24
  Speaker0: Yeah, quite a month indeed. Let's get into it.
• 1:30
  Speaker1: Let's talk startups.
• 1:34
  Speaker1: So before we walk through our individual stories, let me give you a quick overview about the month.
• 1:41
  Speaker1: March 2026 was and is defined by industrial conviction, you could say.
• 1:47
  Speaker1: Capital is flowing into companies that are building physical things.
• 1:50
  Speaker1: So we are talking robots, reactors, drones, batteries, and into the financial
• 1:56
  Speaker1: infrastructure that underwrites all of this.
• 1:59
  Speaker1: Speculative AI narrative cycle has not disappeared though, but the checks being
• 2:04
  Speaker1: written in the DACH region, so Deutschland, Österreich, Schweiz,
• 2:09
  Speaker1: German, Austria and Switzerland, right now are going to companies with order
• 2:13
  Speaker1: books, procurement contracts, industrial customers, so people who have,
• 2:18
  Speaker1: and companies who have already made their case.
• 2:20
  Speaker1: That's quite a meaningful shift, I think.
• 2:23
  Speaker0: Yeah, the headline number is definitely Neuro Robotics raising roughly 1 billion
• 2:27
  Speaker0: euros at the 4 billion, yes, with a B, valuation backed by Tether.
• 2:33
  Speaker0: That is the largest single DACH startup around this cycle. And it's not alone.
• 2:39
  Speaker0: Amazon acquired River, spelled R-E-V-R, out of Surish, an ETH spin-out that
• 2:46
  Speaker0: built stair-climbing delivery robots.
• 2:49
  Speaker0: Two major robotics transactions in a single month. The DAX robotics cluster
• 2:55
  Speaker0: is no longer theoretical. It's attracting billion-euro capital and big tech
• 3:00
  Speaker0: acquisitions simultaneously.
• 3:03
  Speaker1: And we also see that defense continues to become a more and more normal venture category.
• 3:11
  Speaker1: German Bundestag approved 540 million euros for combat drones from Helsing and Stark Defense.
• 3:18
  Speaker1: Bavaria, the German state of Bavaria, committed $400 million toward Proxima
• 3:22
  Speaker1: Fusion's Stellarator reactor.
• 3:25
  Speaker1: Titan Technologies, with a Y instead of an I, raised $30 million from the NATO Innovation Fund.
• 3:33
  Speaker1: And this is all procurement money, not promised money.
• 3:36
  Speaker1: So it's structural also, reflecting geopolitical realities starting with the
• 3:43
  Speaker1: Ukraine war post-2022. and EU policy priorities and
• 3:49
  Speaker1: resulting, coming from that war, that are now being translated into actual budgets.
• 3:56
  Speaker0: The geography story is fascinating and I think a little bit underreported also.
• 4:02
  Speaker0: Bavaria has overtaken Berlin as Germany's top startup funding destination for the first time.
• 4:10
  Speaker0: The Bayern Startup and Unscale-Up Monitor shows Munich attracted 2.7 billion
• 4:17
  Speaker0: euros in venture capital in 2025 versus 2.4 billion for Berlin.
• 4:24
  Speaker0: Defense tech was a major driver in Munich. Over a billion euros flowed into
• 4:29
  Speaker0: the sector, much of it in Munich.
• 4:32
  Speaker0: That is not a one-quarter anomaly. It reflects structural change.
• 4:37
  Speaker0: Hange, Industrial Proximity, the TUM2 network, and a growing cluster of robotics
• 4:43
  Speaker0: and aerospace companies.
• 4:45
  Speaker0: Note, Bavaria and Berlin are comparable here because they are both states in
• 4:50
  Speaker0: Germany, admittedly, very different sizes.
• 4:54
  Speaker1: And we found two signals in Fintech too.
• 4:59
  Speaker1: Bitpanda is targeting a Frankfurt IPO at the stock exchange there at 4 to 5
• 5:04
  Speaker1: billion euros with Goldman and Citi as their main advisors.
• 5:10
  Speaker1: Upvest raised 125 million at a 640 million euro valuation backed by Tencent and BlackRock.
• 5:18
  Speaker1: And Delivery Hero is also a topic facing activist pressure from Aspex and Personio
• 5:26
  Speaker1: and pivoting their pricing model more towards profitability.
• 5:30
  Speaker1: So also here we see that there's something like a late-stage accountability cycle, you could say.
• 5:37
  Speaker1: Companies are being held to public market standards here, whether they are publicly
• 5:44
  Speaker1: traded already or not yet.
• 5:48
  Speaker0: We should add that for this episode we reviewed thousands of raw links,
• 5:53
  Speaker0: news in our newsletter scans.
• 5:55
  Speaker0: Actually, we get around 50 daily newsletters on the Dach, German,
• 6:00
  Speaker0: Austrian, Swiss ecosystem, and we filter aggressively.
• 6:04
  Speaker0: Those are the 10 signals that matter the most.
• 6:08
  Speaker1: Let's go. Let's walk through them. Number one, I will start.
• 6:11
  Speaker1: Signal number one. This is the headline of the month, I think.
• 6:15
  Speaker1: Neura Robotics, based in Metzingen, In my old hometown region near Stuttgart,
• 6:22
  Speaker1: Metzingen also famous for being the headquarter of Hugo Boss.
• 6:27
  Speaker0: And outlet shopping.
• 6:29
  Speaker1: And outlet shopping, yes. If you're so inclined to shop for Hugo Boss.
• 6:34
  Speaker1: So Neura Robotics, based in Metzingen, is raising roughly 1 billion euros backed
• 6:40
  Speaker1: by stablecoin issuer Tether.
• 6:42
  Speaker1: And that means that the company is valued at 4 billion euros. Tell me more about this.
• 6:49
  Speaker0: Yes, Noura builds AI-powered humanoid robots for industrial and household applications.
• 6:55
  Speaker0: CEO David Riga has an order book approaching $1 billion already.
• 7:02
  Speaker0: Kawasaki, Omron are amongst customers.
• 7:06
  Speaker0: The previous round was just, in a parenthesis here, 120 million years in January 2021, 2025. Sorry.
• 7:16
  Speaker0: So we are talking about roughly an eightfold step up in a little over a year.
• 7:21
  Speaker0: Barclays estimates the AI robotics market will reach one trillion,
• 7:26
  Speaker0: yes, with a T dollars by 2035.
• 7:29
  Speaker0: This is Germany's largest robotic deal and positions the country alongside figure
• 7:34
  Speaker0: AI and UpTronic in the global humanoid robotics race.
• 7:41
  Speaker1: Yeah, and here we also really see how the German market shifts a bit.
• 7:45
  Speaker1: Because if you had imagined like a billion euro round for a German robotics
• 7:51
  Speaker1: company backed by a stable coin treasury,
• 7:55
  Speaker1: that would have all been quite like science fiction a couple of years ago.
• 8:01
  Speaker1: And now, yeah, even the German market is investing in this or it's part of the
• 8:08
  Speaker1: German market and part of the deal flow there.
• 8:11
  Speaker1: Signal number two, Proxima Fusion moving on from Baden-Württemberg to its eastern
• 8:19
  Speaker1: neighbor state, Bavaria.
• 8:22
  Speaker1: Garching, not far away from Munich.
• 8:26
  Speaker1: And Bavaria is an interesting point here because Bavaria is also,
• 8:34
  Speaker1: as a free state, is also committing up to 400 million euros toward a demonstration stellarator reactor.
• 8:44
  Speaker1: So, yeah, this is the, dare we say, fantasy of having safe and small nuclear reactors.
• 8:54
  Speaker1: What is going on with this pledge here, which is what I think one of the largest
• 8:59
  Speaker1: government pledges to a fusion startup in the world, maybe, I guess?
• 9:04
  Speaker0: Yeah, correct. It's about fusion
• 9:07
  Speaker0: energy. A Memorandum of Understanding signed by the state of Bavaria,
• 9:12
  Speaker0: RWE, one of the large energy giants here in Germany, and the Max Planck Institute
• 9:18
  Speaker0: for Plasma Physics set out a roadmap for a 2 billion euro alpha demonstrator.
• 9:24
  Speaker0: After that comes Stellaris, a commercial fusion plant planned for Grundrämingen,
• 9:32
  Speaker0: the site of a former nuclear fission facility, now being decommissioned by RWE.
• 9:38
  Speaker0: Proxima is a Max Planck IPP, Max Planck Basic Research Institute,
• 9:43
  Speaker0: and the IPP is the Institute for Plasma Physics, spin-off founded in 2023.
• 9:49
  Speaker0: They raised already $130 million in a Series A last year, we reported about
• 9:56
  Speaker0: that, and the state is backing the utility involvement, the defined side.
• 10:02
  Speaker0: This was fusion from academic aspiration to industrial planning category.
• 10:08
  Speaker1: Yeah. And we also see here again, like 400 million euros. This is coming from
• 10:13
  Speaker1: the government. It's quite a commitment.
• 10:16
  Speaker1: And we also here see that, yeah, and there's a lot of things.
• 10:20
  Speaker1: There are a lot of things shifting in energy policies, I think, these days.
• 10:25
  Speaker1: Also, again, as a result of the war between Ukraine and Russia,
• 10:31
  Speaker1: or between Russia and Ukraine, one should say probably because Russia attacked,
• 10:35
  Speaker1: and also because of the ongoing environmental discussions. Signal number three.
• 10:41
  Speaker0: I would like to add that Germany really needs cheap energy, so this is essential,
• 10:48
  Speaker0: even though I assume fusion energy will not come around in the next few years.
• 10:54
  Speaker0: Sorry, signal number three, Bitpanda, Frankfurt IPO at four to five billion euros.
• 11:02
  Speaker0: Bitpanda, Vienna and Frankfurt, the crypto and investment platform,
• 11:07
  Speaker0: we talked about them quite frequently, is advancing plans for Frankfurt IPO
• 11:12
  Speaker0: at a valuation of four to five billion euros.
• 11:16
  Speaker0: Goldman Sachs, Citi and Deutsche Bank are advising. The platform is backed by
• 11:20
  Speaker0: Peter Thiel, serves more than 7 million users, and has rebranded its B2B arm
• 11:27
  Speaker0: to Bitpanda Enterprises.
• 11:29
  Speaker0: Deutsche Börse and Societal General are amongst the institutional clients.
• 11:33
  Speaker0: And our former Defense Minister, Karl Theodor Zuck-Guttenberg, has joined the board.
• 11:38
  Speaker0: Little disclaimer here. a valuation of four to
• 11:41
  Speaker0: five billion doesn't mean all the shares will
• 11:44
  Speaker0: be floated initially or at one point on the stock exchange it just means if
• 11:50
  Speaker0: you add up all the shares at the share price that'll be the total valuation
• 11:56
  Speaker0: and of course a lot of those shares will stay in institutional hands sorry here you go chris yeah.
• 12:02
  Speaker1: And it's a fact that like
• 12:04
  Speaker1: If completed, this would rank among Europe's largest fintech listings.
• 12:10
  Speaker1: Also meaning that whether they choose Frankfurt over London or the choice of
• 12:16
  Speaker1: Frankfurt over London is a signal.
• 12:18
  Speaker1: And if you look at companies like Goldman City and Deutsche Bank in the background,
• 12:24
  Speaker1: you can also see that the cap table and the listing value tell you that Frankfurt
• 12:30
  Speaker1: is making up some ground here.
• 12:33
  Speaker1: And, yeah, seeming to win the fight for European fintech gravity.
• 12:42
  Speaker1: Number four, back to me. The Bundestags Budget Committee, their Haushaltsausschuss,
• 12:50
  Speaker1: has approved 540 million euros for combat drones, which should be bought from
• 12:56
  Speaker1: German startups named Helsing and Stark Defense.
• 12:59
  Speaker1: It is going to be one of the largest defense tech procurement commitments to
• 13:04
  Speaker1: domestic startups in German history.
• 13:07
  Speaker1: And it's a decision that follows operational losses from the Ukraine conflict.
• 13:12
  Speaker1: So, yeah, this is a startup news that shows where the startup ecosystem as a
• 13:18
  Speaker1: whole is going, but also how much it's now more and more intertwined with politics.
• 13:24
  Speaker0: Yes, and there's a political dimension here, definitely.
• 13:30
  Speaker0: Peter Thiel's involvement at Stark Defense has prompted a debate with the Greens
• 13:36
  Speaker0: demanding protective measures against foreign influence in defense procurement.
• 13:41
  Speaker0: I've also been writing a LinkedIn post about it that went really crazy.
• 13:48
  Speaker0: The budget approval itself is the signal here. This is procurement, not promise.
• 13:55
  Speaker0: Half a billion euros of Bundestag-proof budget flowing to venture-backed startups.
• 13:59
  Speaker0: Defense tech is no longer knocking on the door. It's setting the procurement agenda.
• 14:06
  Speaker0: Signal number five, UpWest, $125 million in CRSD.
• 14:12
  Speaker0: UpWest, Berlin, $125 million in CRSD at 660 million euro valuation.
• 14:20
  Speaker0: Nearly doubling its previous mark.
• 14:23
  Speaker0: Sapphire Ventures, Tencent, Bessemer, and BlackRock are amongst investors.
• 14:28
  Speaker0: The company processes more than 100 million orders in 2025 through its API-first
• 14:35
  Speaker0: investment infrastructure.
• 14:37
  Speaker0: They are expanding into pension products, UK SIPPs, and Germans Altersvorsorge-Depots.
• 14:51
  Speaker1: Yes. So, yeah, also here we see 100 million orders processed.
• 14:58
  Speaker1: We see that Tencent and BlackRock are writing checks for them.
• 15:01
  Speaker1: And so we can really see that European retail investment is happening in Berlin.
• 15:09
  Speaker1: Pension expansion here is strategic, I would say. It's also strategically astute.
• 15:14
  Speaker1: It's regulated, recurring, aligned with demographic trends.
• 15:19
  Speaker1: And yeah, so that's Signal 5. Signal 6 is also me.
• 15:26
  Speaker1: We're moving on to Switzerland. Amazon has acquired the Zurich-based robotics
• 15:30
  Speaker1: startup River, without the E in the end, so R-I-V-R, at a reported valuation
• 15:36
  Speaker1: of approximately $100 million.
• 15:38
  Speaker1: This is a spin-out of the university in Zurich, the ETH, the Technical University,
• 15:44
  Speaker1: founded in 2023 under the name Swiss Mile before rebranding last year in 2025.
• 15:53
  Speaker1: The founder's name is Marko Bielonic, who previously worked at Boston Dynamics.
• 15:59
  Speaker1: The robots can climb stairs, can carry 30 kilograms of weight,
• 16:04
  Speaker1: can travel 15 kilometers per hour.
• 16:06
  Speaker1: So overall, they are much more productive than you and me.
• 16:11
  Speaker0: Uh, totally.
• 16:16
  Speaker0: Just looking up here, 50 kilometers per hour are something like a little bit
• 16:22
  Speaker0: above nine miles an hour.
• 16:25
  Speaker0: This is second major DACH robotics transaction this month, alongside Neura.
• 16:32
  Speaker0: Amazon came to Zurich for robots that climb stairs.
• 16:37
  Speaker0: The DACH robotics cluster is no longer theoretical for Swiss deep tech founders.
• 16:41
  Speaker0: This validates the ETH spin-out pathway and demonstrate that these companies
• 16:47
  Speaker0: are acquisition targets for the world's largest technology platforms.
• 16:52
  Speaker1: Signal number seven. This is a signal our audience rightfully is expecting from
• 16:58
  Speaker1: us because we're always rooting against Berlin, obviously.
• 17:03
  Speaker1: And Joe, you flagged this one specifically.
• 17:07
  Speaker0: Oh, it's not necessarily that we're rooting against Berlin, but there are so
• 17:12
  Speaker0: many very, very good companies out there, for example, Metzingen,
• 17:18
  Speaker0: that didn't get enough international attention.
• 17:21
  Speaker0: So it all got into Berlin. And that's the point we like.
• 17:25
  Speaker0: We're not rooting against any place here, but we want the world to see more
• 17:29
  Speaker0: and more interesting places. So, for the first time, Bavaria has overtaken Berlin
• 17:34
  Speaker0: as Germany's leading startup funding destination.
• 17:37
  Speaker0: The Bayern Startup und Scale-Up Monitor, 2026, shows Munich attracted 2.7 billion
• 17:45
  Speaker0: euros in venture capital in 2025, compared to 2.4 billion for Berlin.
• 17:51
  Speaker0: The Freistaat recorded 785 new startup formations, a 46% increase year-over-year,
• 18:00
  Speaker0: now accounting for more than a fifth of all German new ventures.
• 18:04
  Speaker0: Defense technology was a standout driver with over 1 billion Euro flowing into
• 18:10
  Speaker0: the sector, much of it concentrated in Munich.
• 18:14
  Speaker1: So, once again, Munich, 2.7 billion, Berlin, 2.4 billion, plus the surrounding states.
• 18:20
  Speaker1: But we see for the first time the Freistaat in the lead.
• 18:23
  Speaker1: It's not an anomaly just based on one quarter. It's really a reflection of a
• 18:30
  Speaker1: year-long, years-long, decades-long trend, probably.
• 18:33
  Speaker1: Because we see that Bavaria is in the lead because they have proximity to big
• 18:39
  Speaker1: industrial clusters in Bavaria. They have the network of the Technical University in Munich, the TUM.
• 18:47
  Speaker1: They have the growing defense and robotics clusters.
• 18:51
  Speaker1: And yeah, we really see here that geography is no longer destiny in a German
• 18:56
  Speaker1: static ecosystem, but it's more important that you are aligned with certain sectors.
• 19:03
  Speaker1: And right now, we see that Munich sectors are the ones that attract more capital right now.
• 19:08
  Speaker0: Number eight, Google has opened a new AI center in Berlin, housing DeepMind
• 19:13
  Speaker0: research and cloud teams under one roof at Museums Insel.
• 19:18
  Speaker0: This is part of a 5.5 billion euro investment program in Germany through 2029.
• 19:25
  Speaker0: Research partnerships with TU Munich and Helmholtz Munich are targeting medical
• 19:32
  Speaker0: and single-cell AI applications.
• 19:34
  Speaker0: A new data center in Dietzenbach near Frankfurt is also planned.
• 19:38
  Speaker1: DeepMind in Berlin, 5.5 billion euros through 2029.
• 19:43
  Speaker1: So yeah, we also see here that like talent gravity might be created,
• 19:49
  Speaker1: defining what will already be probably like the next generation of German AI startups.
• 19:56
  Speaker1: The co-location of the deep mind researchers with cloud and applied teams also
• 20:01
  Speaker1: signals that Berlin's AI ecosystem is probably maturing a bit more away from
• 20:08
  Speaker1: pure research toward more commercial deployment.
• 20:13
  Speaker1: So yeah, we will see if now there's a phase beginning in which more spin outs,
• 20:20
  Speaker1: talent mobility and partnerships with enterprises generate more venture-relevant deal flow, I guess.
• 20:30
  Speaker1: Number nine, Delivery Hero. I already hinted at it in the beginning.
• 20:35
  Speaker1: It's Berlin's largest listed tech company, but it is facing escalating pressure
• 20:41
  Speaker1: from activist investor Aspex Management.
• 20:45
  Speaker1: It's an investor that holds a 9.2% stake, so it's not nothing.
• 20:50
  Speaker1: And it's an investor that is pushing for asset disposals. The market capitalization
• 20:57
  Speaker1: of Delivery Hero has fallen more than 80% from the peak in 2021,
• 21:02
  Speaker1: which I guess was a bit pandemic-induced.
• 21:06
  Speaker1: They completed a $1.4 billion debt refinancing and are reportedly exploring
• 21:11
  Speaker1: a sale of their Latin American operations,
• 21:14
  Speaker1: which are generating quite significant 1.2 billion euros in revenue.
• 21:21
  Speaker1: But aspects warrant it may pursue leadership changes if the strategic review does not deliver.
• 21:27
  Speaker1: Get it? Deliver? Delivery hero.
• 21:30
  Speaker1: So, yeah. What do you think about this?
• 21:35
  Speaker0: Well, that's the clearest case study in the ecosystem of what happens when growth
• 21:39
  Speaker0: area capital structures meet the post-hype accountability.
• 21:44
  Speaker0: This is the activist playbook, as it says, operational focus, leadership pressure.
• 21:49
  Speaker0: It's imported from U.S. public markets and is now being applied to Berlin's
• 21:55
  Speaker0: largest listed tech company.
• 21:56
  Speaker0: The post-growth reckoning has arrived.
• 21:59
  Speaker0: Let's talk Signal 10, a little bit related here. Gropius, 100 million raised,
• 22:05
  Speaker0: 400 million total equity.
• 22:08
  Speaker0: Number 10, Gropius, founded by Markus Fuhrmann, who previously built Lieferheld,
• 22:14
  Speaker0: 100 million euros raised, bringing total equity to 400 million.
• 22:19
  Speaker0: The company builds digitized, factory-produced apartment buildings,
• 22:24
  Speaker0: 800 units across seven projects currently in execution.
• 22:28
  Speaker0: Simapa next added $35 million, becoming the second largest investor after Venovia.
• 22:34
  Speaker0: Profitability targeted in two to three years.
• 22:39
  Speaker1: Yeah, so also, I mean, to recap, 400 million euros of equity,
• 22:45
  Speaker1: 800 apartments in production.
• 22:47
  Speaker1: So, yeah, we also see here that construction tech is maturing and probably finally building.
• 22:54
  Speaker1: Venovia's involvement provides distribution, provides credibility here in a
• 22:59
  Speaker1: sector where incumbents have historically resisted disruption.
• 23:03
  Speaker1: So we also see a shift here.
• 23:06
  Speaker1: That's it for the 10 main signals. But we got a couple of what we call additional,
• 23:13
  Speaker1: but we got what we call a couple of quick hits, additional signals to round
• 23:20
  Speaker1: out the month. Joe, take us through them.
• 23:23
  Speaker0: Titan Technologies in Munich with Wai raised 30 million euros from the NATO
• 23:30
  Speaker0: Innovation Fund for Countertron Systems.
• 23:33
  Speaker0: Universal in Kiel raised 30 million for battery production using a proprietary tricoding process.
• 23:42
  Speaker0: Combo in Berlin raised 25 million from Voluntian Capital for HR tech API integrations.
• 23:49
  Speaker0: ReCare raised 37 million for AI-powered clinical operations agents.
• 23:55
  Speaker0: Personio, the music HR unicorn, is introducing a new pricing model in its push
• 24:01
  Speaker0: toward profitability after 11 years.
• 24:05
  Speaker1: And Personio is not a music HR tech unicorn, it's not a Munich HR tech unicorn. I'm so sorry.
• 24:12
  Speaker0: Yes, Munich. I am sorry.
• 24:14
  Speaker1: But we praise Bavaria so highly, so it's the place where the music plays, I guess.
• 24:19
  Speaker1: So, on the founder side, Julian Teike from WeFox and Jürgen Müller,
• 24:25
  Speaker1: the former SAP CTO, have joined forces on Agent F,
• 24:30
  Speaker1: which is an AI-native enterprise resource planning startup, one of the most
• 24:34
  Speaker1: closely watched founding teams in German tech right now, I guess.
• 24:38
  Speaker1: And then the European Commission is advancing EU Inc., a pan-European corporate
• 24:43
  Speaker1: legal form that would let founders incorporate once and operate across all member
• 24:49
  Speaker1: states. That sounds like a much-needed step against bureaucracy.
• 24:54
  Speaker1: Garage Ventures, with GH in the beginning, launched a 40 million euro travel
• 24:59
  Speaker1: tech fund anchored by Gebruida Heinemann.
• 25:02
  Speaker1: And KFW Capital deployed 748 million euros to startup backing VC funds in 2025.
• 25:10
  Speaker1: Since 2018, then this German bank has committed 2.9 billion euros across 153
• 25:18
  Speaker1: funds, indirectly financing approximately 2,900 startups.
• 25:25
  Speaker1: That's it for March 2021. So we talked robotics, we talked defense,
• 25:28
  Speaker1: we talked fintech insurance, and we talked Bavaria a lot.
• 25:33
  Speaker0: Chris, now I got you. It's fintech infrastructure, not fintech insurance.
• 25:39
  Speaker0: Like the music Munich. Oh.
• 25:43
  Speaker1: Fintech insurance. Yeah, there you go. Okay, well, the structural signals are
• 25:47
  Speaker1: clear. Our hosting probably is not.
• 25:50
  Speaker1: But do you have any final thoughts?
• 25:52
  Speaker0: We will work on the scripts, guys. Really sorry. It's almost 10 p.m.
• 25:58
  Speaker0: Here, so we're both tired.
• 26:00
  Speaker0: But for the startups, built where industrial procurement, regulatory mandate,
• 26:05
  Speaker0: and geopolitical urgency create durable demand for investors.
• 26:10
  Speaker0: The signals are structural, not thematic, and the winners are already visible.
• 26:14
  Speaker0: Robotics, defense, energy, fintech infrastructure. Those are board-level conversations of 2026.
• 26:21
  Speaker1: If you want more, subscribe to us on Substack for deep dives.
• 26:26
  Speaker1: Find us on LinkedIn, Ix, TikTok, YouTube. All the links are at linktree.com.
• 26:34
  Speaker1: And linktree is linktr.ee.com.
• 26:40
  Speaker1: As always, we are looking at hundreds, thousands of raw news links.
• 26:46
  Speaker1: These were the ones that matter.
• 26:47
  Speaker1: Thanks for listening. See you next month.
• 26:51
  Speaker0: See you next month.
• 26:52
  Speaker1: Let's talk startups.
• 26:54
  Speaker0: Tschüss. Tschüss.