Eric Weber

🔎 Market Insights Venture Capital for climate tech: Have we reached the turning point? Two recent reports by the German Startup Association (Startup-Verband) and Bitkom reviewing H1 2024 show that fundraising in Germany remains challenging. However, climate tech related topics are on top of the agenda. The findings also show that startups struggle to achieve prominence in the broader market or create an impact. Despite this unused potentials we already see positive signals in Q3. According to KfW VC investments in German startups have been surpassing the benchmark of 2 bln EUR in Q3 – first time since more than a year ago. 💵 Fundraising is still challenging: More than half of the start-ups think that fundraising is difficult to realize. As we have highlighted already prior to this: Early stage founders should plan with longer gaps between Series A and Series B. 🤝 An increasing number of start-ups claim that the possibility for cooperation with the established economy is very poor. According to German Startup Association, only 37.5% perceive the link between the two as good. With Future Energy Ventures we have specialized to matchmake startups with corporate partners – arranging 44 partnerships for the startups in our first fund. 💡 In a challenging VC environment climate tech related business models have good chances to raise capital (compared to other verticals): Experts interviewed by German Startup Association estimate that among the health and the educational sector, energy (37,2%), industry (33,8%) and mobility (30,5%) are the most promising sectors for future innovation. Most of our portfolio business are in energy, industry or mobility! 🌱 The German Startup Association emphasizes that founders are primarily driven by social and ecological impact. Almost half of them identify as social entrepreneurs (45.6%). An increasing number of German start-ups identify with the green economy (48.1%), as reported by the German Startup Association. At Future Energy Ventures we go one step further and monitor the ESG impact of our portfolio businesses via a specific model per half year! 🌎 The huge challenge remains an environment of uncertainty, which is shaped by the huge macro-economic developments such as global wars and conflicts, interest rates and the upcoming US election The good news: Founders navigating their teams through these times may be well-positioned for growth once uncertainty passes. We must foster cooperation between emerging start-ups and the corporate economy to create impact! 🚀 #climatetch #startups #marketinsight #fev4climate

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🤔 𝗜𝘀 𝗶𝗻𝘃𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗼 𝗵𝗲𝗮𝗹𝘁𝗵𝗰𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗵 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗸? 🧬💊💉👩‍⚕️🧪🩻 This has been our topic at today‘s panel discussion at the invest.austria conference 2024. Together with my co-panelists Sophie Ehrlich (from EIT Health), Christian Bouda (from bloomblisser.com) and our moderator Markus Wanko (from xista) we‘ve been elaborating on: ✅ The various healthcare verticals and respective risk profiles ✅ Public vs. Private Funding and the need for a closer collaboration between these two ✅ Brining start-ups and SMEs closer to each other to accelerate innovation ✅ Current PE and VC environment ✅ Healthcare deal activity and outlook going forward Conclusion on the initial question: 𝗬𝗲𝘀, 𝗶𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗸𝘆 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘆𝗲𝘀, 𝗶𝘁 𝗶𝘀 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗵 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗿𝗶𝘀𝗸! 𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝗶𝘀 𝗶𝘁 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝘁𝗵?! 1️⃣ „𝗛𝗘𝗔𝗟𝗧𝗛 𝗜𝗦 𝗪𝗘𝗔𝗟𝗧𝗛“ - it is our „duty“ to allocate capital and to invest into our own health through supporting innovation and the relevant infrastructure 2️⃣ Healthcare investing is „𝗛𝗔𝗥𝗗 𝗦𝗖𝗜𝗘𝗡𝗖𝗘“ driven investing -> less emotions, more facts 3️⃣ Healthcare is only at the very beginning of it‘s innovative disruption and the convergence between disciplines (e.g. life sciences and (deep) tech) will turbocharge this upcoming disruption -> 𝗖𝗢𝗡𝗩𝗘𝗥𝗚𝗘𝗡𝗖𝗘 => 𝗗𝗜𝗦𝗥𝗨𝗣𝗧𝗜𝗢𝗡 Besides that, there have been great discussions and stimulating thoughts, mainly around the political environment and the „𝗗𝗔𝗖𝗛𝗙𝗢𝗡𝗗𝗦“ concept = TOPIC OF THE DAY And we also saw insightful discussions on the foodtech, space investing markets, discussions on the democratization of the investment industry and - since we‘re in #vienna - the CEE investment environment. Thanks Daniela Haunstein, Nikolaus "Niki" Futter, Arnaud Béasse for organizing. Fantastic event 👏 Ps.: the #privateequity asset class still remains a little underrepresented in Austria. 🇦🇹 Room to improve ↗️ PPs.: It‘s been a pleasure meeting and catching up with fantastic people like Bernadette Ules, Csanad Daniel, Niklas Pichler, Patrik Cesky, Rudolf Kinsky, Heinz Brasic, Floyd Plettenberg, Stephan Freudl, Florentina Spindler, Karl Lankmayr, Tim Lammar, Zuzana Jahodníková, Michael Hähnle, Christian Bacher, Günter Leonhartsberger, Johannes Cech, Marko Mitrovic … #healthcaredeals #mergersandacquisitions cc: VINC - Healthcare Advisory, ISP HEALTHCARE GmbH

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Start-ups in Europe: a light at the end of the tunnel - finally!    This article by Nadine Schimroszik in Handelsblatt gives reason for hope for the tech ecosystem, as it summarises a development that has been tentatively emerging for some time: The number of new #start-ups in Germany is growing again, by 17 per cent, as shown by a comparison of the first quarter of 2024 with the same quarter of the previous year.   💡It is particularly interesting to see that most investments are being made in AI. An unmistakable sign that they continue to be a driver of innovation for the German startup ecosystem.   We recently came to a similar conclusion with my team, as part of our analysis of the German startup landscape. Our conclusion: more and more funding are being mobilised for ♻️ #Greentech business ideas that are based on AI-based technologies and have a positive impact on our planet. More info on our research at IRIS can be found in Startup Insider`s Investors Report 2024: https://lnkd.in/dU-5AMPz More info on Nadine’s insightful article here: https://lnkd.in/depicwGA

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🔹 🔷 🔹 Can Industrial AI be a cure against the gradual deindustrialization of Germany? 🔹 🔷 🔹 The Pioneer, one of the leading German political and economic media, has released an article I wrote about the potential impact of Industrial AI yesterday. Germany with its rich tradition in engineering and industrial solutions is well placed to leverage AI to fuel the next wave of industrial innovation. A race that is still not run - as opposed to GenAI that is dominated by the large US tech giants and LLMs that are already commoditizing. A race that will likely leave room for several new German unicorns that can add to the industrial innovation process - ideally in a cooperation with established industrial players such as BMW, Mercedes, Siemens or Bosch. But it will require a significantly better availability of venture capital all the way from inception to a profitable business as well as a targeted industrial development policy to leverage this opportunity. Time for the industrial giant Germany to shed the sluggishness of recent years and remember the entrepreneurial spirit of its industrial forefathers such as Benz, Siemens, Bosch, Zeiss or Bayer. For those interested to read a little more - you can find the article on The Pioneer here (in German - have Google translate it for an English version): https://lnkd.in/eW9FWnzA (For those of you that do not yet have access to The Pioneer here is pdf-link: https://lnkd.in/er4_mVrV)

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EXIST - Existenzgründungen aus der Wissenschaft is the first big funding step into the right direction. We are happy that the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action sees the potential in using modern AI Agent approaches to transform large-scale text-based unstructured data by following a process into action points! Now it is up to us to deliver the impact 🚀 🎇 📈

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Thank you, Dr. Rapp, Julia Bahlmann, and FERI Cognitive Finance Institute, for challenging my perspectives on 2024's takeoff of tokenization. Your insights have been invaluable in exploring our future financial market infrastructure. The year 2024 marks an important milestone in the development of #tokenization and the transition to the #token economy. This is not least the result of the groundwork laid in 2023, which has created a solid foundation for concrete results on the blockchain. Major financial players are increasingly entering the market and driving the development of a token economy. Tokenization enables a sophisticated digital financial market infrastructure that overcomes numerous limitations of the existing economic and financial system. It goes beyond a simple technological upgrade and has the potential to fundamentally transform traditional financial markets and other economic sectors.

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Wow - thanks Simon Walter, Magdalena Maier and Charlotte Niklahs for the program you've put together for the #management hive of #pakcon24! 🔥 How to set up a 10x innovation culture by Nina Michahelles, Sarina Hergarten, Alexander Böhm, Nils Wagner How to build and scale high-performing companies by Friederike Reuter, Stefan Roebel, Martin Sondenheimer, Magdalena Maier Strategy is broken by Sebastian Herzog, Isabelle Schnellbuegel, Paul Becker, Simon Walter AI: The Biggest Opportunity for the German Mittelstand? by Dr. Alexander Mrozek, Dr. Sebastian Walter, Anna Franziska Michel, Dr. Alexandra Deichsel Why Digital Transformations often fail - particularly in Germany by Miriam van Straelen, Marc Schiekofer, Cecilie Hohlbein Hegelund, Moritz Trutschel Venture Clienting - Success Factors of Startup - Corporate Collaborations by Arno Baltruschat, Dr. Sophie Chung, Stefan Schmautz, Anne Decker Last ticket drop: https://lnkd.in/duPQg3Wc

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Beirat für Startups #34 Ein Beirat kann grundsätzlich für Startups von großem Vorteil sein. Wie immer, ist es eine Entscheidung, in der es auf den Einzelfall ankommt. 🛣 Einige Gründe hierzu behandele ich wöchentlich in meiner Beitragsreihe : Zum letzten Post der Reihe: https://lnkd.in/dfQsdEuf The Benefits of a Biotech Advisory Board 🧪🔬 As a leader in the biotech industry, I'm excited to share the advantages of having a strong advisory board with expertise in biotechnology. 💡 Cutting-Edge Insights 🔍 An advisory board composed of seasoned biotech professionals can provide invaluable, up-to-date insights into the latest industry trends, technological advancements, and regulatory changes. Their deep knowledge and experience can help guide your strategic decision-making and ensure your company stays ahead of the curve. 🧠 Specialized Expertise 🔬 Biotech advisory board members bring a wealth of specialized expertise across various disciplines, such as drug development, clinical trials, regulatory affairs, and commercialization. Their diverse backgrounds can help you navigate the complex and ever-evolving biotech landscape more effectively, ultimately driving your company's success. 🧪 Networking and Connections 🤝 A well-connected biotech advisory board can open doors to new partnerships, collaborations, and funding opportunities. Their extensive industry networks can introduce you to key stakeholders, potential investors, and strategic partners, expanding your reach and unlocking new avenues for growth. 🌐 Credibility and Validation 👍 Having respected biotech experts on your advisory board can significantly boost your company's credibility and validation in the eyes of investors, regulatory bodies, and potential partners. This can be particularly valuable when seeking funding, navigating the regulatory landscape, or engaging with industry leaders. 🏆 Objective Guidance 🧭 An advisory board provides an outside perspective and objective guidance, which can be invaluable in navigating complex business decisions. Their impartial insights can help you identify blind spots, mitigate risks, and make more informed choices that align with your company's long-term goals. 🧠 By leveraging the expertise and experience of a biotech advisory board, you can unlock a competitive edge, drive innovation, and accelerate your company's growth in the dynamic biotech industry. 🚀 #advisoryboard #board #scaleup

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It's the ecosystem, stupid. Building robust ecosystems is crucial for the success of startups. Max Meister’s article in Handelszeitung highlights the current exit challenges and the importance of strong financial health and market readiness. In the US, a well-established exit culture fuels continuous reinvestment, but in Europe and Switzerland, this is just emerging. As a serial entrepreneur and investor, I see it as both a privilege and responsibility to actively shape this ecosystem, fostering growth and innovation. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/er3Y3-84 #ecosystem #venturecapital #entrepreneurship #venturebuilding

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Jan Lozek, and I shed light on the importance of collaboration between climate tech start-ups and corporations in Business Insider last week. Here are the key takeaways: 1️⃣ Digitalization can slow down climate change: As our electricity grids transform, digital tools are crucial. In Germany alone, 2.6 million photovoltaic systems will be on residential roofs by summer 2023. This ecosystem can only be managed effectively with automated, digital tools, like Amperecloud, node.energy and metergrid GmbH are working on. 2️⃣ Unity for Climate Goals: To meet climate goals amid significant macroeconomic challenges, collaboration between startups and corporations is essential. Startups bring innovation and new technologies, while corporations provide resources, market access, and scaling capabilities. At Future Energy Ventures, we foster collaboration by bringing together innovative climate tech startups and experienced corporations to maximize impact in climate technology. 3️⃣  Decarbonization Goals: Decarbonization is still progressing far too slowly: According to a recent study by PwC, the world needs to decarbonize seven times faster to limit warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. Urgent action is needed. It's time to unite and collaborate! Together, we can spearhead impactful shifts towards a future devoid of carbon, guaranteeing value for every stakeholder right from the beginning. #ClimateTech #Innovation #Decarbonization #EnergyTransition 

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I recently came across an insightful article by ZDF on the growing importance of sustainability in investment decisions and will share some main takeaways on this with you: 📈 Growing Interest in Sustainable Banking: People are increasingly prioritizing sustainability in their financial choices. According to a Bankfachverband survey, one-fifth of German individuals consider sustainability when selecting their investments. However, I think we must stay vigilant and ask ourselves how we truly define sustainability. ❗ Beware of Greenwashing: Large conventional banks may superficially embrace sustainability while still engaging in environmentally harmful practices elsewhere. That’s not just misleading, it's hypocritical and dangerous. So, how can you tell if a company is truly sustainable and not just greenwashing? Look for transparency in their reporting - real numbers and clear impacts. Check if they have third-party verification and if they consistently follow through on their commitments. Let me know your thoughts in the comments! #SustainableFinance #GreenInvesting #Decarbonization #Greenwashing

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Currently preparing our trend report for corporate partners and alumni startups and found a very interesting, really remarkable statistic from BVK Bundesverband Beteiligungskapital. According to this, 80% of the funds raised in the (German) #venturecapital and #privateequity industry in 2023 came from the public sector (e.g. European Investment Fund (EIF), KfW Capital , Sächsische Aufbaubank - Förderbank - or NRW.BANK etc.). Remarkable in an industry that sees itself at the core of capitalism and the free market economy. So I took a closer look: - the investment volume of the public sector was even >20% down from 2022 and on the level of previous years - so it was no intented takeover by the public sector 😉 and not a result of overarching political initiatives - the true reason (at least according to BVK) is that corporates invested only 1% of the year before. Considering the current pessimism, often bad statistical economic data and uncertainty of markets, this seams very reasonable. It shows that an economic downturn has substantial, not obvious side-effects only visibile in long-term - also Family Offices, banks and institutional fund of funds invested significantly less than in the last 7 years - what is threatening as well is that neither insurances nor pension funds are even visible investors according to this statistics. Although these both would be the highest leverage for the whole PE/VC industry and although politicians want to give them more incentives for years now. Actually, I hope there is also some effect that not all data for 2023 is available yet and there will be some more positive updates in that charts. Attila Dahmann would you expect any changes ? Source: https://lnkd.in/gWT3S9JF

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Challenge* for you: "Künstliche-Intelligenz-Beratungsdienstleistungskooperationsentwicklungsstrategiekonzeptanwendungsfallanalyseumsetzungsoptimierungslösungsansätze." Forget AI implementation as complex as this absolute statement of beauty of the German language. We ship you one Generative AI Use case, 70% team adoption in 30 days with teams over 50 employees, no headaches. Done it with DAX, hidden champions and Fortune 500 with a product which got stresstested by millions. Send a DM for a free 15-Minute consultation. * Translation into English: "AI Consulting Service Cooperation Development Strategy Concept Use Case Analysis Implementation Optimization Solution Approaches" Thank you Baris Sen for finding this beauty.

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Do you wonder what kind of founders and topics we are looking for at Climate Founders? This is our investment thesis Lin Gong-Deutschmann, Franziska Ponick and I with some sparring from Philipp Herkelmann put together: 👩‍🔬 💚 📈 𝗪𝗲 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗹𝗼𝗼𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗺𝗶𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗱𝗿𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗻 𝗳𝗶𝗿𝘀𝘁-𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲 𝗳𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝘀𝗽𝗲𝗰𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗶𝗻𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁𝘀, 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗲𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗿 𝘁𝗼 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗿𝗻 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗼 𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱 𝘀𝗼𝗺𝗲𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗲𝘅𝗰𝗲𝗽𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹. We are here to support the ones who deeply care about our planet and have found their angle to contribute significantly to a brighter future. As we observed how incredibly fast open-minded, resilient, highly productive and intrinsically motivated people can grow personally, we naturally strongly believe in first-time founders who show these characteristics. We don't have a specific CV in mind, when we look for perfect founders, we look for people who gathered special insights in an industry, market, problem or technology. When you surprise the experts in your field with your thoughts, then we should talk. 💡 🌍 𝗪𝗲 𝗶𝗻𝘃𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗲𝗰𝗵𝗻𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝘆 𝗼𝗿 𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲𝘁 𝗯𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗸𝘁𝗵𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵𝘀 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗽𝗼𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗵𝘂𝗴𝗲 𝗰𝗹𝗶𝗺𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗰𝘁. We look for teams who discovered an unsolved problem and aim to break through the status quo. Those potential breakthroughs can be rooted in science or technology of new or improved deployment of existing climate solutions. We value transformational changes over efficiency improvements. Our greenhouse gas savings threshold is the potential to save 10 million tons CO2e per year after 10 years from now, but we love to see cases with even much higher impact potential. We are technology and business case agnostic: industrial hardware, biotech, nature-based solutions, data-driven software or renewables deployment, we look at high impact breakthroughs in all categories. 🤝 🏆 𝗪𝗲 𝗮𝗶𝗺 𝘁𝗼 𝗯𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗳𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀' 𝗳𝗶𝗿𝘀𝘁 𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝘀𝗶𝗴𝗻𝗶𝗳𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗹𝘆 𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗿𝗼𝘃𝗲𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲𝗹𝗶𝗵𝗼𝗼𝗱 𝗼𝗳 𝘀𝘂𝗰𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀. We are not the ones you start your fundraise with, we are the ones you prepare your fundraise with. Unlike most others we don't wait for inflection points, we anticipate them and we don't wait for traction, but we push you for crystal clear validation. We want to be your most favorable investor and even more we want to be your strongest ally even before we have invested. Interesting for you or someone you know? Have a look at our remote program and apply until tomorrow: https://lnkd.in/diWDSpnw Even if this thesis is quite new, our portfolio already and especially the investments in the last two years reflect it well:

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"The last 18 months have been brutal. Many startups that received high valuations during the 2021 boom are now struggling to survive." says Gina Domanig, Managing Partner at Emerald Technology Ventures in this Forbes Austria article. Yes, 2024 has been a tough year for many fledgling companies. But I am encouraged by some of the startups scaling disruptive technology and business models in service of accelerating the energy transition in India and across the Asia Pacific and Middle East. They will survive and thrive - with the support of a growing investor community who have come to appreciate that the global south possess truly innovative solutions. One of the highlights for me this year was the first Asia Climate Tech Venture Fair, held in Singapore in October. The brainchild of Gina and her team, it brought together a critical set of VCs, CVCs and PE firms to share insights and leads on startups in the region. Looking forward to more conversations in 2025. Read now: https://lnkd.in/dhEtFTbV #Cleantech #Venturecapital #Innovation #Startups #energytransition #Corporates #Climatetech #Entrepreneurship #Sustainability #Futureoftech #Cleantechventures #Startupgrowth #Corporatecollaboration #Techinvestment

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"We [Germany] are on the way to becoming a developing country...we’ve become a junk shop". - Theodor Weimer, CEO of Deutsche Börse. 😬 Everything seems totally normal and fine in Europe's largest economy. 😳 🤣 "Our reputation in the world has never been as bad as it is now. Never before." Well...I mean...come on...we at least know that's not true. It is Germany you're talking about after all. https://lnkd.in/eAzRyuXP 🇩🇪 🍺 🥨 #stocks #finance #banks #banking #money #business #tech #technology #innovation #startups #entrepreneurs #entrepreneurship #vc #venturecapital

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