Author: Tatjana Anderer

Berlin — YPOG advi­sed the Berlin-based fintech company Moss on its Series C funding round. Upon comple­tion of the tran­sac­tion, Moss will be valued at 1 billion EUR, ther­eby achie­ving unicorn status. To date, the company has raised a total of more than 200 million EUR in funding. The Series C funding round was led by fintech specia­list Portage and included parti­ci­pa­tion from exis­ting inves­tor Cherry Ventures. 

Foun­ded in 2019, the company is deve­lo­ping an AI-powered finan­cial plat­form for Euro­pean small and medium-sized busi­nesses that offers compa­nies grea­ter trans­pa­rency and control over their finan­cial proces­ses. Among other things, the plat­form auto­ma­tes the issu­ance of corpo­rate credit cards, invoice manage­ment, and expense report­ing, and is curr­ently used by more than 5,000 compa­nies in Europe. 

Moss plans to use the funds from its Series C finan­cing round to further expand its “Finance AI” tech­no­logy plat­form. The goal is to support finance teams with key tasks such as expense and receiv­a­bles manage­ment, book­kee­ping, and monthly finan­cial state­ments. Users retain control over the AI appli­ca­ti­ons used at all times. 

“With this Series C funding round, Moss has reached an important mile­stone in its corpo­rate deve­lo­p­ment. Its unicorn status unders­cores the confi­dence inter­na­tio­nal inves­tors have in the company’s busi­ness model and tech­no­lo­gi­cal deve­lo­p­ment. It has been a great plea­sure to support Moss on this jour­ney since 2021,” comm­ents Dr. Johan­nes Janning, part­ner at YPOG. 

MOSS Consul­tant: YPOG

Dr. Johan­nes Janning (Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Cologne
Janic Salce­das (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­ciate, Cologne
Paul Haren­berg (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­ciate, Cologne
Laura Franke (Tran­sac­tions), Senior Project Lawyer, Cologne
Matthias Kres­ser (Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Berlin

The in-house team was led by Alex­an­der Hoff­mann (Mana­ging Direc­tor & Gene­ral Coun­sel).

Munich — The two long-estab­lished bake­ries, Bäcker Görtz GmbH and Bäcke­rei Pappert, are merging to form the Brot­Wert Group. With the support of the private equity fund FSN Capi­tal VI—advised by FSN Capital—the Brot­Wert Group has acqui­red a majo­rity stake in the long-estab­lished Frank­furt bakery Der Bäcker Eifler. This crea­tes a network of three family-run, long-estab­lished bakeries—Bäcker Görtz, Bäcke­rei Pappert, and Der Bäcker Eifler—with appro­xi­m­ately 500 loca­ti­ons in Nort­hern Bava­ria as well as in the Rhine-Main and Rhine-Neckar regions—one of the largest regio­nal bakery groups in Germany. 

As early as 2025, Bäcker Görtz—which was also recei­ving tax advice from POELLATH—had acqui­red the Pappert Bakery.

The goal of the Brot­Wert Group is to combine the shared strengths of the three long-estab­lished bake­ries, exch­ange expe­ri­ence and know­ledge, and conti­nue to grow with the support of FSN. At the same time, the group aims to preserve the regio­nal roots, artis­a­nal skills, and family tradi­ti­ons of the indi­vi­dual bake­ries for the long term. 

The Eifler Bakery, based in Frank­furt am Main, is one of the leading regio­nal bake­ries in the Rhine-Main area. The Eifler family will retain a stake in the company going forward; Gerhard Eifler and Michael Eifler will conti­nue to manage it. 

FSN Capi­tal, one of Nort­hern Europe’s leading private equity firms, was foun­ded in 1999 and has four offices in Oslo, Stock­holm, Copen­ha­gen, and Munich. The four funds advi­sed by FSN Capi­tal have more than four billion euros under manage­ment; for its most recent Fund VI, 1.8 billion euros were raised for invest­ments in Scan­di­na­via and the DACH region. The funds make majo­rity invest­ments in growth-orien­ted compa­nies to support them on their path to contin­ued success. 

In connec­tion with the acqui­si­tion of a majo­rity stake in Der Bäcker Eifler and the forma­tion of the Brot­Wert Group, POELLATH provi­ded tax advi­sory services in colla­bo­ra­tion with the follo­wing Munich-based team:

Dr. Nico Fischer (Part­ner, Tax)
Dr. Saskia Bardens (Senior Asso­ciate, Tax)

About POELLATH

POELLATH is a leading, inter­na­tio­nally networked busi­ness and tax law firm with over 180 legal and tax profes­sio­nals in Berlin, Frank­furt, and Munich. We are commit­ted to provi­ding excel­lent advice on tran­sac­tions and asset management—covering both legal and tax matters under one roof. Our specia­li­zed prac­tice groups don’t just know the law—together with our clients, we shape best prac­ti­ces in the market. —- www.pplaw.

Frank­furt / Pullach – Triton Fund 6, mana­ged by Triton Part­ners, has signed an agree­ment to acquire United Initia­tors, a manu­fac­tu­rer specia­li­zing in active oxygen solu­ti­ons, from funds mana­ged by Equis­tone Part­ners Europe. The tran­sac­tion is subject to custo­mary and regu­la­tory appr­ovals and is expec­ted to close in the fourth quar­ter of 2026. The terms of the tran­sac­tion will not be disclosed. 

United Initia­tors (“UI”) was foun­ded in 1911, is head­quar­te­red in Pullach, Germany, and is a manu­fac­tu­rer of specialty chemi­cals that serves a diverse custo­mer base of blue-chip compa­nies world­wide. UI’s products are used to initiate poly­me­riza­tion proces­ses and, due to their oxida­tive poten­tial, in a wide variety of appli­ca­ti­ons. The company employs more than 800 people and opera­tes nine produc­tion faci­li­ties and two warehou­ses in the EMEA, Ameri­cas, and APAC regions. 

The acqui­si­tion of United Initia­tors marks Triton Part­ners’ third acqui­si­tion of an indus­trial tech company this year and the seventh over­all for the Triton Fund 6.

Advi­sors to Triton: Kirk­land & Ellis, Frankfurt

, Dr. Fried­rich Schlott, Dr. Chris­tian Halàsz (both lead advi­sors), Ann-Kath­rin Zieg­ler (lead advi­sor, Munich, all Restruc­tu­ring), Dr. Alex­an­der Längs­feld (Munich, Debt Finance), Tim Nobe­reit (Munich, Tax); Asso­cia­tes: Dr. Paul Päfgen (Munich), Dr. Jona­than Hain, Caro­lin Paus (Munich, all Restruc­tu­ring), Mirjam Meyer, Michael Döpp­ner, Alice Treu­le­ben-von Gans (all Private Equity/M&A), Sebas­tian Trom­pler (Munich, Debt Finance)

About Triton Partners

Triton Part­ners was foun­ded in 1997, is owned by its part­ners, and is a leading Euro­pean inves­tor specia­li­zing in mid-market compa­nies. Triton Part­ners focu­ses on inves­t­ing in compa­nies that provide busi­ness-criti­cal goods and services in its three core sectors: busi­ness services, indus­trial tech­no­logy, and healthcare. 

Triton Part­ners employs over 150 invest­ment profes­sio­nals and value-crea­tion specia­lists across eleven offices and invests through three comple­men­tary stra­te­gies: Mid-Market Private Equity, Smal­ler Mid-Cap Private Equity, and Oppor­tu­ni­stic Credit. — www.triton-partners.com

About Kirk­land

With more than 4,000 attor­neys in 24 cities across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, Kirk­land & Ellis is one of the leading law firms provi­ding high-cali­ber legal services. The German team focu­ses on advi­sing clients in the areas of private equity, M&A, restruc­tu­ring, corpo­rate and secu­ri­ties law, finan­cing, and tax law. For more infor­ma­tion, please visit www.kirkland.com.

About United Initiators 

www.united-initiators.com/de

Paris / Frank­furt am Main — WEIL served as lead coun­sel to the Paprec Group in connec­tion with the acqui­si­tion of a majo­rity stake in Brant­ner Green Solu­ti­ons from the Brant­ner family. The tran­sac­tion is subject to custo­mary regu­la­tory approvals. 

The Paprec Group, head­quar­te­red in France, is one of Europe’s leading compa­nies in the circu­lar economy sector and covers the entire waste manage­ment value chain. The inter­na­tio­nal provi­der of compre­hen­sive solu­ti­ons for waste manage­ment and green energy gene­ra­tion will operate in fifteen count­ries by the end of the year, with appro­xi­m­ately 26,000 employees at 450 loca­ti­ons. With the acqui­si­tion of Brant­ner Green Solu­ti­ons, Paprec is ente­ring five new markets in Central and Eastern Europe—Austria, Slova­kia, the Czech Repu­blic, Roma­nia, and Serbia—thereby crea­ting a strong plat­form for further growth in the region. Brant­ner Green Solu­ti­ons, a family-owned company foun­ded in 1936, is a leading waste manage­ment company in Central and Eastern Europe. It employs appro­xi­m­ately 2,500 people at 65 loca­ti­ons and serves more than 28,000 muni­ci­pal, indus­trial, and commer­cial customers. 

The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the finan­cial details of the transaction.

Advi­sor to the Paprec Group: WEIL

The inter­na­tio­nal tran­sac­tion team was led by part­ners Andreas Holzgreve (Private Equity/M&A, Munich), Kamyar Abrar (Private Equity/M&A, Frank­furt), and Frédé­ric Cazals (Private Equity/M&A, Paris). The team also included part­ners Benja­min Rapp (Tax Law, Munich) and Ning-Ly Seng (Anti­trust Law, Paris), as well as coun­sel Julia Schö­fer (Private Equity, Munich), and asso­cia­tes Maxi­mi­lian Kucher­nig, Kevin Mägerle (both Private Equity, Munich), Maxi­mi­lian Schatz (Private Equity, Frankfurt/Munich), Ines Kova­ce­vic (Anti­trust, Paris), Daniel Reich (Tax Law, Frank­furt), Florian Strief­ler, and Nico­las von Wallis (both Tax Law, Munich).

The WEIL team was assis­ted on matters of Austrian law and other local legal regu­la­ti­ons by a Kinstel­lar team led by Horst Ebhardt and Hart­wig Kienast.

About WEIL

Weil, Gotshal & Manges is an inter­na­tio­nal law firm with more than 1,200 attor­neys. WEIL has offices in New York, Austin, Boston, Brussels, Dallas, Frank­furt, Hong Kong, Hous­ton, Los Ange­les, London, Miami, Munich, Paris, San Fran­cisco, Washing­ton, D.C., and Sili­con Valley. In Germany, the U.S.-based firm is repre­sen­ted by two offices in Frank­furt and Munich. Here, the firm focu­ses on provi­ding specia­li­zed coun­sel to natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal clients in cross-border private equity and M&A tran­sac­tions, high-profile liti­ga­tion matters, complex restruc­tu­rings and finan­cings, as well as tax planning.

Munich/Cologne – Funds advi­sed by Deut­sche Private Equity (DPE) have signed an agree­ment to acquire a majo­rity stake in FOGTEC Brand­schutz GmbH from the foun­ding share­hol­ders and the M Cap Finance Mittel­stands­fonds. As part of the tran­sac­tion, manage­ment will retain a signi­fi­cant stake in FOGTEC and will conti­nue to lead the company on its growth trajec­tory. The tran­sac­tion is subject to appr­oval by the rele­vant anti­trust autho­ri­ties. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the finan­cial details of the acquisition. 

Foun­ded in 1997 and head­quar­te­red in Colo­gne, FOGTEC Brand­schutz GmbH is a leading, inno­va­tive, and rapidly growing provi­der of fire protec­tion systems based on high-pres­sure water mist for buil­dings, indus­trial faci­li­ties, data centers, tunnels, train stati­ons, and rail vehic­les. In this process, water is atomi­zed under high pres­sure into a fine mist that quickly cools fires and requi­res up to 90 percent less water than tradi­tio­nal sprink­ler systems—without chemi­cal extin­gu­is­hing agents and with signi­fi­cantly less conse­quen­tial damage. FOGTEC’s range of services extends from nozz­les, pumps, and valves to sensor tech­no­logy and control systems, as well as engi­nee­ring, instal­la­tion, main­ten­ance, and spare parts for complete fire protec­tion systems. Its custo­mers include inter­na­tio­nal rail vehicle manu­fac­tu­r­ers and rail opera­tors, as well as opera­tors of data centers, indus­trial faci­li­ties, specia­li­zed buil­dings, and tunnels. With appro­xi­m­ately 255 employees at loca­ti­ons in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, the company is targe­ting reve­nue of around 70 million euros for 2026. 

DPE views FOGTEC as a highly attrac­tive group in a market where fire protec­tion is incre­asingly a deci­ding factor in terms of avai­la­bi­lity, value preser­va­tion, and sustaina­bi­lity. High-pres­sure water mist is growing signi­fi­cantly faster than the over­all market for fire protec­tion tech­no­logy, as new fire risks are emer­ging in data centers, battery storage faci­li­ties, power plants, and modern trains, and stric­ter safety and envi­ron­men­tal requi­re­ments are pushing chemi­cal extin­gu­is­hing agents out of the market. FOGTEC meets this demand through its own rese­arch and deve­lo­p­ment, expe­ri­ence gained from more than 1,500 large-scale fire tests, 102 regis­tered patents, and parti­ci­pa­tion in 13 natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal stan­dards committees—a combi­na­tion of certi­fi­ca­ti­ons, test data, and refe­ren­ces that clearly sets FOGTEC apart from the competition. 

Toge­ther with manage­ment, DPE intends to support the company’s further deve­lo­p­ment as a stra­te­gic part­ner. The focus is on expan­ding appli­ca­tion-orien­ted sales, streng­thening the company’s inter­na­tio­nal presence, driving growth in the service and spare parts busi­ness based on instal­led systems, and making further invest­ments in rese­arch, deve­lo­p­ment, and regu­la­tory appr­ovals. Selec­tive acqui­si­ti­ons that faci­li­tate access to new markets and custo­mers or expand the range of services are inten­ded to comple­ment orga­nic growth. 

FOGTEC will conti­nue to be led by its exis­ting manage­ment team: Foun­der Dirk K. Spra­kel as Chair­man of the Execu­tive Board, Rüdi­ger Kopp as Mana­ging Direc­tor for Statio­nary Systems, and Roger Dirks­meier as Mana­ging Direc­tor for Rail Systems.

Dirk K. Spra­kel, foun­der and CEO of FOGTEC, says: “Since its foun­ding, FOGTEC has grown inter­na­tio­nally and has conti­nu­ally pionee­red new appli­ca­ti­ons for water mist tech­no­logy. For the next stage of our deve­lo­p­ment, we were looking for a part­ner who thinks long-term, under­stands our tech­ni­cal focus, and supports our growth plans. DPE perfectly meets these requirements.”

Fabian Rücker, a part­ner at DPE, empha­si­zes: “As a pioneer in the field of high-pres­sure water mist, FOGTEC combi­nes a high level of tech­ni­cal exper­tise with a strong posi­tion in a growing market, making it a perfect fit for our invest­ment approach. We were parti­cu­larly impres­sed by the quality of the manage­ment team and its ability to trans­late tech­no­lo­gi­cal leader­ship into new applications.”

Fabio Adjou­dani, Direc­tor at DPE, adds: “FOGTEC has built an inter­na­tio­nal custo­mer base based on its tech­no­lo­gi­cal strength—and we intend to build on that speci­fi­cally. We see signi­fi­cant poten­tial in the service and spare parts busi­ness, driven by the large instal­led base of systems, in rapidly growing end markets such as data centers, and in further inter­na­tio­nal expan­sion. To this end, we are inves­t­ing in sales, addi­tio­nal certi­fi­ca­ti­ons, and an orga­niza­tio­nal struc­ture capa­ble of sustai­ning this growth over the long term.”

Debt Finan­cing: Ares is provi­ding debt finan­cing for the transaction.

Consul­tant DPE:

DPE was advi­sed by Strategy& (Commer­cial), Alva­rez & Marsal (Finan­cial & Tax), PwC (ESG), CMS (Legal), Pöllath + Part­ners (Struc­ture), Gleiss Lutz (Anti­trust), Howden (W&I), Harris Williams (M&A), and Pava Part­ners (Debt).

About FOGTEC

The company deve­lops and supplies fire protec­tion systems for statio­nary faci­li­ties and rail vehic­les. Its tech­no­lo­gi­cal focus is on high-pres­sure water mist, in which water is finely atomi­zed under high pres­sure. Its product port­fo­lio also includes sensors, elec­tro­nic control systems, soft­ware, engi­nee­ring, instal­la­tion, main­ten­ance, and repla­ce­ment parts. These solu­ti­ons are used in buil­dings, indus­trial faci­li­ties, data centers, tunnels, train stati­ons, and trains, among other loca­ti­ons. The company holds 102 regis­tered patents and employs 255 people. FOGTEC was foun­ded in 1997 and is head­quar­te­red in Colo­gne. — www.fogtec-international.com.

About Deut­sche Private Equity

Since 2007, Deut­sche Private Equity (DPE) has been a growth part­ner for mid-sized compa­nies in the German-spea­king region (DACH). DPE supports port­fo­lio compa­nies in reali­zing their full future poten­tial by provi­ding capi­tal, exper­tise, and respect for entre­pre­neu­rial initia­tive. Its invest­ment focus is on five core sectors: Busi­ness Services, Energy & Envi­ron­ment, Health­care, Indus­trial Tech­no­logy, and Soft­ware & IT Services. DPE curr­ently mana­ges assets of appro­xi­m­ately three billion euros. For more infor­ma­tion, visit www.dpe.de.

Frank­furt / London — Advent, a leading global private equity inves­tor, toge­ther with a consor­tium that includes Harbour­Vest Part­ners (“Harbour­Vest”), has reached an agree­ment to acquire FNZ Bank from FNZ. Upon comple­tion of the tran­sac­tion, the inves­tors plan to support FNZ Bank in its next phase of growth—through long-term invest­ments in tech­no­logy and opera­tio­nal capa­bi­li­ties, as well as by further enhan­cing the range of products and services offe­red to its partners. 

Gibson Dunn advi­sed funds mana­ged by Advent Inter­na­tio­nal L.P. and the co-inves­tors on the acqui­si­tion of FNZ Bank.

FNZ Bank is a leading inde­pen­dent provi­der of asset manage­ment, banking, and infra­struc­ture services in Germany, with a focus on banking, cust­ody, tran­sac­tion proces­sing, and regu­la­tory services. It connects more than 50,000 finan­cial advi­sors, 200 asset mana­gers, and over 400 sales part­ners, and serves more than 2.1 million end custo­mers with assets under cust­ody tota­ling 155 billion euros. 

Given Germany’s aging popu­la­tion and the widening gap in reti­re­ment savings, private reti­re­ment plan­ning is beco­ming incre­asingly important. FNZ Bank provi­des the essen­tial infra­struc­ture that enables finan­cial advi­sors and finan­cial insti­tu­ti­ons to support house­holds in buil­ding long-term wealth. Advent is convin­ced that these struc­tu­ral trends form a solid foun­da­tion for growth and will help FNZ Bank expand access to capi­tal market invest­ments throug­hout Germany. 

Ranjan Sen, mana­ging part­ner at Advent, said, “We are grateful for the trust that Blythe Masters, Group CEO of FNZ, and the entire FNZ team have placed in us in connec­tion with the acqui­si­tion of FNZ Bank in Germany.”

Advi­sors to Advent Inter­na­tio­nal L.P.: Gibson Dunn

Lead coun­sel: part­ners Dr. Wilhelm Rein­hardt (Frank­furt), Will Summers, and Michael Skou­ras (both London); asso­cia­tes Lucy Carr, Oliver Hill, Amith Damerla, and Char­lotte Deans (all London).
Munich part­ner Dr. Dennis Seif­arth led the German team, which included coun­sel Anne­kat­rin Pels­ter and asso­ciate Simon Stöhl­ker (both in Frank­furt). Frank­furt coun­sel Dr. Peter Gumnior advi­sed on employ­ment law matters. In London, Part­ner James Chand­ler advi­sed on tax matters; Part­ner Alison Beal and Asso­ciate Libby Pica advi­sed on the spin-off aspects of the tran­sac­tion; and Part­ner David Irvine and Asso­ciate Jona­than Griggs advi­sed on financing. 

About Gibson Dunn
Gibson Dunn is one of the leading inter­na­tio­nal law firms and is ranked among the world’s top firms in indus­try surveys and by leading publi­ca­ti­ons. With more than 2,200 attor­neys in 23 offices, the firm has a global presence in all major econo­mic regi­ons. Gibson Dunn’s offices are loca­ted in Abu Dhabi, Brussels, Century City, Dallas, Denver, Dubai, Frank­furt, Hong Kong, Hous­ton, London, Los Ange­les, Madrid, Munich, New York, Orange County, Palo Alto, Paris, Beijing, Riyadh, San Fran­cisco, Singa­pore, Washing­ton, D.C., and Zurich. — www.gibsondunn.com

Munich — The commer­cial law firm Gütt Olk Feld­haus advi­sed NORD/LB, acting as lead arran­ger, on the compre­hen­sive refi­nan­cing of KEBOS Group GmbH. The finan­cing is being provi­ded by a banking consor­tium and includes term credit lines as well as a working capi­tal credit line. 

KEBOS has been a specia­list in water and air hygiene for over 50 years. With two main offices and 10 service loca­ti­ons in Germany, Austria, and Switz­er­land, the company offers custo­mi­zed services—ranging from Legio­nella eradi­ca­tion and the clea­ning of HVAC systems to the desca­ling of water pipes. 

NORD/LB is one of Germany’s leading commer­cial banks and is part of the S‑Finanzgruppe. As an estab­lished bank serving small and medium-sized enter­pri­ses with a focus on struc­tu­red finan­cing, it offers tail­o­red solu­ti­ons for invest­ment, corpo­rate, and acqui­si­tion finan­cing. In the private equity busi­ness, NORD/LB has many years of exper­tise in struc­tu­ring and arran­ging finan­cing. With a track record of over 200 tran­sac­tions in the small- and mid-cap segment—often as lead arranger—it is one of the most active banks in the German private equity market. 

Legal Coun­sel for NORD/LB: Gütt Olk Feld­haus, Munich

Dr. Tilmann Gütt, LL.M. (London) (Part­ner, Lead Coun­sel), Dr. Lucas Lengers­dorf (Coun­sel, Lead Coun­sel), and Hans-Joachim Englert (Senior Asso­ciate), all specia­li­zing in banking and finance law 

About GOF
GOF is a leading inter­na­tio­nal law firm based in Munich. We provide compre­hen­sive advice on commer­cial and corpo­rate law. Our prac­tice areas include corpo­rate law, M&A, private equity, and finan­cing. — www.gof-partner.com

Munich –– McDer­mott Will & Schulte advi­sed the funds advi­sed by NORD Holding and their port­fo­lio company, 1Q Health Group, on the acqui­si­tion of the Swiss company Gelpell AG.
Gelpell specia­li­zes in the deve­lo­p­ment and contract manu­fac­tu­ring of soft gela­tin capsu­les, hard capsu­les, and vege­ta­rian capsules.

Head­quar­te­red in Switz­er­land, Gelpell offers services across the entire value chain—from product deve­lo­p­ment and contract manu­fac­tu­ring to regu­la­tory support and pack­a­ging solu­ti­ons. The company also has specia­li­zed exper­tise in the field of its paten­ted GELPELL Beads tech­no­logy. — Gelpell AG deve­lops and manu­fac­tures soft gela­tin capsu­les (soft­gels), hard capsu­les, and vege­ta­rian capsu­les on a contract basis. It offers a full range of services, from product deve­lo­p­ment and regu­la­tory support to pack­a­ging solu­ti­ons and flexi­ble batch sizes. 

The 1Q Health Group is a leading Euro­pean CDMO and deve­lo­p­ment part­ner for premium phar­maceu­ti­cals and dietary supple­ments. With the acqui­si­tion of Gelpell AG, the Group is streng­thening its presence in the DACH region and expan­ding its port­fo­lio to include soft gela­tin capsu­les. In addi­tion, exis­ting share­hol­ders Kris­tina Edvins­son and Tomas Edvins­son, as well as CEO Thomas Jager, are taking an equity stake in 1Q Health Group. 

NORD Holding is a private equity and asset manage­ment firm with appro­xi­m­ately 4 billion euros in assets under management.

McDer­mott has been advi­sing NORD Holding since the estab­lish­ment of the 1Q Health Group and, among other things, assis­ted with the acqui­si­tion of ABJ alive GmbH and HKS health solutions—which were used to create the platform—as well as the subse­quent add-on acqui­si­ti­ons of Viva­Cell Biotech­no­logy GmbH, Beauty Produc­tion GmbH, EHF Produc­tion B.V., and now Gelpell AG.

Bär & Karrer provi­ded legal coun­sel on matters of Swiss law.

Advi­sor NORD Holding: McDer­mott Will & Schulte, Munich

Holger H. Ebers­ber­ger, LL.M., Dr. Thomas Diek­mann (both lead coun­sel, Private Equity); Asso­cia­tes: Dr. Svenja Hefner, Tobias Thie­mann (both Private Equity)

Munich/Frankfurt am Main – Fort­ino Capi­tal, one of Europe’s leading buyout inves­tors in B2B soft­ware compa­nies, is inves­t­ing in Operations1, ther­eby driving the deve­lo­p­ment of one of Europe’s leading plat­forms for produc­tion workers in the manu­fac­tu­ring indus­try. The three founders—Daniel Grobe, Benja­min Brock­mann, and Anian Ziegler—will remain on board and actively shape the company’s future direction. 

Operations1 was foun­ded in 2017 and has since become a tech­no­logy leader in soft­ware solu­ti­ons for produc­tion workers in German-spea­king count­ries. The AI-powered B2B SaaS plat­form digi­ti­zes employee-led produc­tion proces­ses end-to-end: from task plan­ning to know­ledge sharing and intui­tive process guidance, all the way to docu­men­ta­tion, real-time analy­sis, and colla­bo­ra­tive inci­dent management. 

With one of the largest custo­mer bases in the industry—comprising a total of over 160 leading indus­trial compa­nies, inclu­ding global market leaders such as ABB, Daim­ler Truck, Trumpf, Lieb­herr, and Thys­sen­krupp, as well as fast-growing tech­no­logy compa­nies such as Quan­tum Systems—Operations1 is one of Europe’s leading soft­ware provi­ders for produc­tion workers.

A Billion-Dollar Market in Flux – Struc­tu­ral Drivers for Sustainable Growth

With its invest­ment in Operations1, Fort­ino Capi­tal is conti­nuing its stra­tegy of inves­t­ing in Euro­pean B2B SaaS compa­nies that offer solu­ti­ons for busi­ness-criti­cal proces­ses and possess excel­lent prere­qui­si­tes for lever­aging AI to deli­ver even grea­ter value to custo­mers in the future. With this move, Fort­ino Capi­tal posi­ti­ons Operations1 at the center of a highly dyna­mic, future-orien­ted market within the manu­fac­tu­ring indus­try. The market for soft­ware desi­gned for produc­tion workers is under­go­ing profound struc­tu­ral chan­ges. A shortage of skil­led workers, rising compli­ance requi­re­ments, and the indus­try-wide shift away from paper-based proces­ses are driving demand for scalable, digi­tal solu­ti­ons for produc­tion workers. In this compe­ti­tive land­scape, the platform’s product depth stands out: Operations1 covers work instruc­tions, main­ten­ance, quality assu­rance, and process analy­tics in a single, end-to-end solu­tion, with an imple­men­ta­tion time of just a few weeks. 

Phil­ipp Remy, Mana­ging Part­ner at Fort­ino Capi­tal, commen­ted: “It’s impres­sive what Daniel, Benja­min, Anian, and the entire Operations1 team have built since the company was foun­ded. What star­ted as a bold idea has grown into a leading plat­form in the German-spea­king world for produc­tion workers in the manu­fac­tu­ring indus­try. We’ve been follo­wing this deve­lo­p­ment for a long time and are convin­ced that, with an end-to-end plat­form that maps the entire spec­trum of shop floor proces­ses, Operations1 is not just another tool, but the central plat­form for day-to-day work on the shop floor. We see a key market trend here: AI is incre­asingly taking on the work itself, rather than merely support­ing people, and Operations1 is actively shaping this very transformation—from a docu­men­ta­tion system, through a decis­ion-making system, to an action-orien­ted system. The Future Manu­fac­tu­ring Summit 2026, which Operations1 hosted with over 200 parti­ci­pa­ting compa­nies, recently demons­tra­ted just how much enthu­si­asm the indus­try alre­ady has for this tech­no­logy. A signi­fi­cant expan­sion of the event’s format is alre­ady plan­ned for 2027. In Germany alone, the addressa­ble market amounts to around 800 million euros; across Europe, the poten­tial is many times grea­ter. We are extre­mely exci­ted to write this next chap­ter toge­ther with the entire team and to actively help shape the future of connec­ted manufacturing.”

Stra­te­gic Part­ner­ship on the Path to Beco­ming a Euro­pean Champion

With the support of Fort­ino Capi­tal, Operations1 aims to consis­t­ently conti­nue its successful course and set the stage for Euro­pean market leader­ship. The focus is on three areas: further streng­thening its posi­tion in its core German-spea­king market, targe­ted expan­sion into other Euro­pean count­ries, and the conti­nuous deve­lo­p­ment of the platform’s AI capa­bi­li­ties. In its home market, the company aims to acquire new custo­mers and further expand exis­ting custo­mer rela­ti­onships, parti­cu­larly with medium-sized and large indus­trial compa­nies. At the same time, Operations1 is driving targe­ted expan­sion into attrac­tive Euro­pean growth markets and syste­ma­ti­cally expan­ding its AI-powered features. These capa­bi­li­ties build on the platform’s exten­sive opera­tio­nal data base and are desi­gned to support custo­mers even more effec­tively in opti­mi­zing their produc­tion proces­ses in the future—a key buil­ding block on the path to beco­ming the Euro­pean cham­pion in soft­ware for produc­tion workers. 

Daniel Grobe, CEO of Operations1, says: “With Fort­ino Capi­tal, we’re gaining a part­ner that perfectly aligns with our vision of shaping the future of indus­trial produc­tion as a Euro­pean soft­ware cham­pion. Since Operations1 was foun­ded, we’ve been driven by one goal: to make people’s work in manu­fac­tu­ring easier, safer, and more digi­tal, ther­eby incre­asing the produc­ti­vity and flexi­bi­lity of manu­fac­tu­ring compa­nies. Today, over 160 indus­trial compa­nies alre­ady trust us—we want to build on that and, with Fort­ino Capital’s support, take our success story to the next level. In addi­tion to their tech­ni­cal and opera­tio­nal exper­tise, the “fit” on a perso­nal level was a key factor in our decis­ion to choose Fort­ino Capi­tal as our new part­ner. We are very much looking forward to this colla­bo­ra­tion and to conti­nuing Operations1’s incre­di­ble jour­ney. At the same time, we would like to take this oppor­tu­nity to thank our entire team, our custo­mers, and our exis­ting inves­tors and part­ners for their trust and for ever­y­thing we have achie­ved so far.” 

About Fort­ino Capital

Fort­ino Capi­tal, foun­ded in 2013, is one of Europe’s leading buyout inves­tors in B2B soft­ware compa­nies. Fort­ino invests in soft­ware compa­nies that provide solu­ti­ons for busi­ness-criti­cal proces­ses and supports their foun­ders and CEOs in acce­le­ra­ting the growth of their compa­nies. Fort­ino has offices in Antwerp, Amster­dam, and Munich. Its assets under manage­ment total more than 1.3 billion euros. Its private equity port­fo­lio includes compa­nies such as SIMCON (DE), mpmX (DE), Ariadne (DE), Worklinq (DK), Addac­tis (BE), VanRoey (BE), Bizz­mine (BE), Efficy CRM (BE), Seenons (NL), InTouch (NL), SpeakUp (NL), Maxx­ton (NL), and Boni­ta­soft (FR). For more infor­ma­tion, visit fortinocapital.com.

About Operations1

Operations1 was foun­ded in Augs­burg in 2017 and has become the leading plat­form for produc­tion workers in the manu­fac­tu­ring indus­try across German-spea­king count­ries. Using AI-powered B2B SaaS solu­ti­ons, Operations1 digi­ti­zes employee-driven produc­tion proces­ses end-to-end—from task plan­ning, know­ledge sharing, and process manage­ment to docu­men­ta­tion, real-time analy­sis, and colla­bo­ra­tive inci­dent manage­ment. More than 160 well-known indus­trial compa­nies, inclu­ding ABB, Daim­ler Truck, Trumpf, Lieb­herr, and Thys­sen­krupp, rely on the Operations1 plat­form. Toge­ther with Fort­ino Capi­tal, the company is pursuing its vision of beco­ming the leading Euro­pean cham­pion in soft­ware for produc­tion workers. For more infor­ma­tion, visit www.operations1.com

Heidel­berg — The Euro­pean startup kausable has raised 12 million euros in its seed funding round to deve­lop causal AI that adapts effi­ci­ently and robustly to chan­ging contexts without the need for retrai­ning. The deep-tech startup has ties to Heidel­berg Univer­sity and Black Forest Labs (BFL), one of Europe’s most promi­nent AI compa­nies, among others. 

Inves­tors

German and Belgian inves­tors UVC Part­ners and Entou­rage are leading the round, with addi­tio­nal support from German inves­tors HTGF and Mätch VC. kausable is also backed by various private busi­ness angels from the AI indus­try and acade­mia, who work at compa­nies such as Black Forest Labs, OpenAI, Google Deep­Mind, Noxtua, and the Euro­pean Labo­ra­tory for Lear­ning and Intel­li­gent Systems (ELLIS). This funding round comes at a time when, due to geopo­li­ti­cal insta­bi­lity, stra­te­gic digi­tal sove­reig­nty and AI deve­lo­ped in and for Europe are beco­ming incre­asingly important. 

Fron­tier AI – Deve­lo­ped and Supported in Europe

“The world is evol­ving at a rapid pace, and AI should do the same. Yet even the most powerful AI systems are curr­ently still very static and require frequent, time-consum­ing, and costly retrai­ning. With kausable, we’re solving this problem by deve­lo­ping a new type of causal world model that adapts effi­ci­ently and robustly to the ever-chan­ging world. This offers enorm­ous oppor­tu­ni­ties in highly dyna­mic fields such as robo­tics, the energy sector, and finance. “We are exci­ted to work with our investors—UVC Part­ners, Entou­rage, HTGF, and Mätch VC—to advance Euro­pean AI at a pivo­tal moment,” explains Johan­nes Haux (CEO and co-foun­der of kausable). 

“The poten­tial we see here is enorm­ous: Virtually every indus­trial company relies on complex systems whose deve­lo­p­ment and opera­tion are diffi­cult to predict and control, and curr­ently, the use of AI in each of these systems is time-consum­ing and costly. kausable drasti­cally redu­ces this effort. This trans­forms AI from a series of costly indi­vi­dual projects into a solu­tion that can be scaled across the entire indus­trial land­scape; and that is precis­ely why we are leading this funding round,” empha­si­zes Andreas Unseld (part­ner at UVC Partners). 

“Most AI models are trai­ned to remem­ber the past. kausable is deve­lo­ping AI that can think about the future. Instead of rely­ing on ever-larger data­sets and constant retrai­ning, they’re taking a funda­men­tally diffe­rent approach: systems that adapt, infer causal rela­ti­onships, and solve problems they’ve never encoun­te­red before. This is an ambi­tious scien­ti­fic endea­vor and exactly the kind of ground­brea­king AI company we’re eager to support,” empha­si­zes Pieter­jan Bouten (co-foun­der of Entourage). 

From Heidel­berg Univer­sity to Pionee­ring AI Research

Johan­nes Haux (CEO), Dr. Benja­min Herde­anu (CTO), and Gregor Ramien (COO) foun­ded kausable in 2025, drawing on their rese­arch at Heidel­berg Univer­sity as well as their profes­sio­nal expe­ri­ence in start­ups and highly regu­la­ted indus­tries such as cyber­se­cu­rity and banking. That same year, they closed their pre-seed funding round at 1.5 million euros and recently deve­lo­ped TipPFN, a zero-shot-capa­ble fore­cas­ting model for complex, dyna­mic systems that predicts “black swans” (rare but far-reaching events) in various fields of appli­ca­tion, such as medi­cine or the energy sector. kausable’s “reaso­ning-first” AI learns in a way simi­lar to humans: A robust, univer­sal set of intui­ti­ons (the “world model”) helps the AI adapt quickly to chan­ges in its envi­ron­ment with mini­mal new infor­ma­tion. Toge­ther with rese­ar­chers from Colum­bia Univer­sity, the team recently published a rese­arch paper vali­da­ting their approach. 

kausable plans to use the invest­ment to expand its nine-person team and further deve­lop its Fron­tier model.

About kausable
The Heidel­berg-based AI startup kausable deve­lops causal AI that adapts auto­no­mously to new contexts without trai­ning and using mini­mal amounts of data. kausable was foun­ded in 2025 by Johan­nes Haux (CEO), Dr. Benja­min Herde­anu (CTO), and Gregor Ramien (COO), three physi­cists with ties to Heidel­berg Univer­sity and Black Forest Labs. kausable has alre­ady published a paper in colla­bo­ra­tion with experts from Colum­bia Univer­sity and deve­lo­ped TipPFN, a zero-shot-capa­ble model for predic­ting rare, high-impact events in complex dyna­mic systems. 

In 2026, kausable recei­ved 12 million euros in seed funding from Euro­pean inves­tors UVC Part­ners, Entou­rage, HTGF, and Mätch VC. In addi­tion, kausable is supported by private busi­ness angels from the AI indus­try and the acade­mic commu­nity. — www.kausable.ai

About UVC Partners

UVC Part­ners supports Europe’s most ambi­tious B2B tech foun­ders in buil­ding new market leaders. From deep tech to AI, the firm has inves­ted in promi­sing start­ups, inclu­ding Isar Aero­space, Proxima Fusion, Q.ANT, Aleph Alpha, Tacto, Flix, and FINN. 

With more than 700 million euros in assets under manage­ment, UVC Part­ners initi­ally invests up to 15 million euros in compa­nies at various stages, from early-stage to growth-stage. Over the entire term of the invest­ment, up to 30 million euros can be provi­ded per company. 

Beyond capi­tal, the invest­ment team at UVC Part­ners is a “tech team for tech teams”—it supports foun­ders in buil­ding and scaling market-leading compa­nies. Through its unique access to UnternehmerTUM—Europe’s leading inno­va­tion center—the VC offers a high-performing ecosys­tem of entre­pre­neurs, key busi­ness decis­ion-makers, and top rese­ar­chers. UVC Part­ners’ value crea­tion team provi­des direct access to a network of over 1,000 companies—potential custo­mers and stra­te­gic part­ners. — www.uvcpartners.com

About Entou­rage

Entou­rage is an early-stage venture capi­tal firm foun­ded by Pieter­jan Bouten, co-foun­der of Show­pad. Built by prac­ti­tio­ners, Entou­rage supports the next gene­ra­tion of legen­dary foun­ders from the pre-seed to seed stages in the fields of AI, robo­tics, enter­prise soft­ware, and deep tech. Entou­rage brings more than just capi­tal to the table; the team has first­hand expe­ri­ence buil­ding and scaling global tech­no­logy compa­nies. Its port­fo­lio includes ground­brea­king compa­nies such as Aikido, Lexroom, and Conveo. 

About Mätch VC

Mätch VC is a Euro­pean venture capi­tal inves­tor based in Stutt­gart that focu­ses on deep tech in the pre-seed phase. As a part­ner from the very begin­ning, the fund is usually the first name on the foun­ders’ cap table. In addi­tion to capi­tal (€50 million in fund size), Mätch VC offers a unique network of 91 family-owned busi­nesses, indus­try execu­ti­ves, and founders—including names such as Trumpf, Ritter Sport, and Fest­ool. Follow-on finan­cing rounds for port­fo­lio compa­nies are regu­larly led by global Tier‑1 funds. The port­fo­lio includes, among others, Black Forest Labs (Fron­tier AI Lab), Block­brain (modu­lar AI plat­form), Atmos Space Cargo (space tech), and XOR (cyber­se­cu­rity).  — www.maetch.vc/

Berlin — PropTech company metr Buil­ding Manage­ment Systems has secu­red a new inves­tor in SBG — Säch­si­sche Betei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft mbH. In addi­tion, Kachel GmbH (a subsi­diary of WIKA Alex­an­der Wiegand SE & Co. KG), IBB Capi­tal GmbH, BRAWO Capi­tal GmbH, Next Big Thing AG, and exis­ting busi­ness angels once again parti­ci­pa­ted in the finan­cing round. 

Ariane Neubauer, an equity part­ner at HEUKING’s Berlin office, and Dr. Henrik Lay, an equity part­ner at HEUKING’s Hamburg office, provi­ded compre­hen­sive advice to metr Buil­ding Manage­ment Systems GmbH in connec­tion with its Series B finan­cing round tota­ling appro­xi­m­ately EUR 10.5 million.

In fiscal year 2025, metr increased its reve­nue by more than 80 percent compared to the previous year, achie­ved a net reten­tion rate of over 140 percent, and now serves more than 80 clients in the housing indus­try, asset manage­ment, and corpo­rate real estate sectors.

In addi­tion to the strong key metrics, the decisive factors for the invest­ment were, in parti­cu­lar, the proven product-market fit, the estab­lished tech­no­logy, and the growth poten­tial of the target market. metr is using the capi­tal to further deve­lop its tech­no­logy, expand its opera­tio­nal infra­struc­ture, and scale the plat­form further—including by estab­li­shing a hub in Saxony and prepa­ring for inter­na­tio­nal expansion. 

The Series B funding round thus marks an important mile­stone for metr

It provi­des the finan­cial foun­da­tion needed to further expand the company’s market posi­tion and initiate the next phase of growth. The company’s long-term goal is to become the leading Euro­pean plat­form for energy-effi­ci­ent exis­ting buildings. 

metr deve­lops AI-based soft­ware solu­ti­ons for opti­mi­zing energy consump­tion in exis­ting buil­dings. The plat­form combi­nes energy manage­ment and heating opti­miza­tion into a single inte­gra­ted solu­tion, enab­ling signi­fi­cant energy savings—without the need for costly retro­fits. Thanks to its univer­sal compa­ti­bi­lity with exis­ting heating systems, buil­ding owners and property mana­gers can improve the energy effi­ci­ency of their buil­dings, reduce opera­ting costs, and safe­guard property value over the long term. 

Consul­tant at metr Buil­ding Manage­ment Systems GmbH: HEUKING

Ariane Neubauer (Lead, Venture Capi­tal), Berlin,
Dr. Henrik Lay (Tax Law), Hamburg

London/Munich — The global busi­ness law firm Norton Rose Fulbright advi­sed Zenobē on its acqui­si­tion of sdp ener­gie GmbH and sdp ener­gie Austria GmbH. With the acqui­si­tion of sdp ener­gie, Zenobē is comple­ting its first corpo­rate acqui­si­tion in Germany and marking an important mile­stone in its Euro­pean growth strategy. 

London-based Zenobē is one of Europe’s leading provi­ders of energy infra­struc­ture and battery storage solu­ti­ons. The company deve­lops, finan­ces, builds, and opera­tes large-scale battery storage projects as well as solu­ti­ons for the elec­tri­fi­ca­tion of vehicle fleets. With appro­xi­m­ately 1,500 MW of storage capa­city alre­ady in opera­tion or under contract, Zenobē is one of the leading inter­na­tio­nal play­ers in the battery storage sector. Since its foun­ding in 2017, the company has raised more than 3.2 billion British pounds in debt and equity finan­cing. Its share­hol­ders include KKR and Infra­ca­pi­tal, among others. 

sdp ener­gie, head­quar­te­red in Schäft­larn, Bava­ria, deve­lops battery storage projects across the entire value chain—from site selec­tion and secu­ring land to permit­ting and grid connec­tion proce­du­res, all the way through to the cons­truc­tion of the faci­li­ties. The company has projects in nume­rous German states and an exten­sive deve­lo­p­ment pipe­line in the field of battery storage. 

Lead Part­ner Dr. Klaus Bader (Corporate/M&A, Munich; Head of Energy Europe) comm­ents: “With the acqui­si­tion of sdp ener­gie, Zenobē is comple­ting its first corpo­rate acqui­si­tion in Germany, marking an important mile­stone in its Euro­pean growth stra­tegy. We are very plea­sed to have advi­sed Zenobē on this signi­fi­cant step in the German market. Thanks to our many years of expe­ri­ence with battery storage and energy infra­struc­ture tran­sac­tions in Germany, as well as the close inte­gra­tion of our corporate/M&A and energy regu­la­tory exper­tise, we were able to provide Zenobē with compre­hen­sive support in this stra­te­gi­cally important acquisition.” 

Advi­sor to Zenobē: Norton Rose Fulbright

Led by Dr. Klaus Bader ( Corporate/M&A, Munich), the team also included part­ners Dr. Vale­rian von Richt­ho­fen (Energy Law, Düssel­dorf), Dr. Tim Scha­per (Anti­trust Law, Hamburg), Clau­dia Poslu­schny (Labor Law, Munich), and Dr. Heiko Bertel­mann (Corporate/M&A, Hamburg), senior asso­cia­tes Sebas­tian Eisen­hut (Corporate/M&A, Munich), Dr. Tobias Teich­ner (Anti­trust Law, Hamburg), and Michaela Bach­meier (Labor Law, Munich), as well as the asso­cia­tes Dr. Jan Vogel­sang (Energy Law, Düssel­dorf), Dr. Markus Beil (Corporate/M&A, Munich), Marcel Gieß­ler (Corporate/M&A, Hamburg), Oliver Schmidt (Corporate/M&A, Munich), and Hannah Diete­rich (Employ­ment Law, Munich), as well as Tran­sac­tion Specia­list Kübra Teber (Corporate/M&A, Frankfurt).

About Norton Rose Fulbright

Norton Rose Fulbright is a global busi­ness law firm. With more than 3,000 attor­neys across over 50 offices world­wide in Europe, the U.S., Canada, Latin America, Asia, Austra­lia, Africa, and the Middle East, we advise leading natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal compa­nies. We offer our clients compre­hen­sive advice across all major indus­tries. These include Finan­cial Insti­tu­ti­ons; Energy; Infra­struc­ture, Mining, and Commo­di­ties; Trans­por­ta­tion; Tech­no­logy and Inno­va­tion; and Life Scien­ces and Health­care. Our global Risk Advi­sory Group combi­nes this exten­sive indus­try expe­ri­ence with its exper­tise in legal and regu­la­tory matters, as well as in compli­ance and gover­nance. This enables us to offer our clients prac­ti­cal solu­ti­ons to the legal and regu­la­tory risks they face. Where­ver we operate, we act in accordance with our busi­ness prin­ci­ples of “Quality, Unity, and Inte­grity.” We provide legal advice of the highest stan­dard and main­tain this level of quality in every inter­ac­tion. The Swiss Asso­cia­tion of Norton Rose Fulbright helps coor­di­nate the acti­vi­ties of Norton Rose Fulbright members but does not provide legal advice to clients. Norton Rose Fulbright has offices in over 50 cities world­wide, inclu­ding London, Hous­ton, New York, Toronto, Mexico City, Hong Kong, Sydney, and Johan­nes­burg. For more infor­ma­tion, visit nortonrosefulbright.com/legal-notices.

Munich – Quan­tum­Dia­monds GmbH (QD), one of the fastest-growing semi­con­duc­tor equip­ment compa­nies in Europe, has closed a funding round tota­ling 91 million euros to expand produc­tion of its quan­tum-based semi­con­duc­tor test­ing tech­no­logy. The finan­cing consists of a €15 million equity round led by World Fund, as well as €76 million in non-dilu­tive funding appro­ved at the EU level under the Euro­pean Chips Act. 

“This is an important step toward estab­li­shing quan­tum sens­ing in semi­con­duc­tor fabs world­wide,” said Kevin Berg­hoff, CEO and co-foun­der of Quan­tum­Dia­monds. “The response from leading chip manu­fac­tu­r­ers is clear: they view our tech­no­logy as indis­pensable for solving yield chal­lenges that cannot be addres­sed with today’s systems. With deploy­ments alre­ady under­way in the U.S. and Taiwan, as well as the ramp-up of mass produc­tion in Munich, Europe is not only parti­ci­pa­ting in the next era of chip tech­no­logy but is also play­ing a key role in shaping it.” 

The non-dilu­tive finan­cing is being provi­ded jointly by the Fede­ral Minis­try for Econo­mic Affairs and Energy and the Free State of Bava­ria. — In addi­tion to QD’s exis­ting inves­tors —IQ Capi­tal, Early­bird, First Momen­tum, Unter­neh­mer­TUM, Crea­tor Fund, Onsight Ventures , and angel investors—Bayern Kapi­tal also parti­ci­pa­ted to a signi­fi­cant extent in the €15 million equity round led by World Fund.

The company plans to use the capi­tal to scale its technology

QD is well on its way to beco­ming the only startup to receive manu­fac­tu­ring grants under the Euro­pean Chips Act, which was crea­ted to streng­then the Euro­pean semi­con­duc­tor supply chain. This places the company among estab­lished indus­try play­ers such as Global­Found­ries and Carl Zeiss. 

The company was foun­ded in 2022 by Berg­hoff and Dr. Fleming Bruck­maier (CTO) as a spin-off from the Tech­ni­cal Univer­sity of Munich. The company will use the funding to supply labo­ra­tory systems to leading chip manu­fac­tu­r­ers and to further deve­lop its wafer-level capa­bi­li­ties for inspec­tion in high-through­put manu­fac­tu­ring faci­li­ties. QD, which curr­ently employs 70 people, plans to more than double its engi­nee­ring team over the next 12 months. 

Conven­tio­nal semi­con­duc­tor testers slow down deve­lo­p­ment and produc­tion because they have diffi­culty detec­ting buried defects in complex 3D chip archi­tec­tures, which redu­ces produc­tion yield and drives up costs for busi­nesses and consu­mers. The stakes are high: indus­try analy­ses show that a yield impro­ve­ment of just one percen­tage point for a mass-produ­ced product can be worth seve­ral million dollars per week. 

QD’s tech­no­logy addres­ses this key chall­enge in modern chip manu­fac­tu­ring by utili­zing defects in synthe­tic diamonds at the atomic scale to detect magne­tic fields with extreme precis­ion: Essen­ti­ally, it is a micro­scope that makes the current flowing through chips visi­ble. The company’s first commer­cial system, the QDm.1, enables non-destruc­tive 3D current mapping at the nanos­cale, ther­eby pinpoin­ting the exact loca­tion and depth of chip defects. — www.qd-st.com

Frank­furt am Main / Zurich — GÖRG advi­sed Ufenau Capi­tal Part­ners on the sale of the ebutec Group’s heating, venti­la­tion, air condi­tio­ning, and refri­ge­ra­tion divi­sion to the Nordic Climate Group. The partial sale compri­ses four compa­nies with a strong regio­nal presence in nort­hern and western Germany. Ufenau conduc­ted the tran­sac­tion through Ufenau VI German Asset Light, a fund advi­sed exclu­si­vely by Ufenau. 

ebutec is a full-service provi­der of smart buil­ding energy effi­ci­ency solu­ti­ons, specia­li­zing in buil­ding enve­lo­pes, roof retro­fits, heating, cooling, venti­la­tion, and photo­vol­taics. Since Ufenau’s acqui­si­tion in 2022, the Dort­mund-based provi­der has evol­ved from a regio­nal group into an inte­gra­ted, inde­pen­dent plat­form. Today, ebutec opera­tes with over 300 employees across twelve loca­ti­ons in Germany and the Netherlands. 

The sale includes HRW Gebäu­de­tech­nik GmbH, Fried­rich Reitem­eier GmbH, Versor­gungs­tech­nik Stüve GmbH, and Karl Busch Instal­la­tio­nen GmbH, all of which are part of the port­fo­lio company. These compa­nies focus on commer­cial and indus­trial buildings. 

Through their inte­gra­tion into the Swedish Nordic Climate Group, the four compa­nies will become part of a larger corpo­rate group specia­li­zing in cooling and heating tech­no­logy as well as energy-effi­ci­ent buil­ding solu­ti­ons. The group employs appro­xi­m­ately 2,300 people in nine count­ries, inclu­ding Belgium, Ireland, Denmark, and Finland. The tran­sac­tion also marks Nordic Climate’s entry into the German market. 

The Swiss invest­ment group Ufenau has regu­larly relied on the exper­tise of Dr. Tobias Fenck and his team for tran­sac­tions in the German market for many years. As early as 2022, GÖRG advi­sed Ufenau as part of its part­ner­ship with ebutec, and now, with a team led by Frank­furt-based attor­neys Dr. Tobias Fenck and Florian Mayer, it provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal support for the sale of the unit to the Nordic Climate Group. In addi­tion to corporate/M&A, the inter­di­sci­pli­nary advi­sory team also covered, in parti­cu­lar, the areas of tax, labor law, finan­cing, real estate law, anti­trust law, and IP/IT.

About Ufenau Capi­tal Partners

Ufenau Capi­tal Part­ners is an inde­pen­dent Swiss invest­ment group based on Lake Zurich that focu­ses on acqui­ring majo­rity stakes in service compa­nies in the DACH region, as well as in Spain, Portu­gal, Poland, Bene­lux, the UK, and the U.S., which operate in the sectors of busi­ness services, IT services, educa­tion & life­style, health­care services, and finan­cial services. Since 2011, Ufenau has inves­ted in appro­xi­m­ately 500 service compa­nies world­wide. Ufenau has over 5 billion euros in assets under management. 

Advi­sor to Ufenau Capi­tal Part­ners: GÖRG Part­ner­ship of Attor­neys mbB

Dr. Tobias Fenck (Lead Coun­sel, Part­ner, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt am Main), Florian Mayer, M.A. (Lead Coun­sel, Asso­ciate Part­ner, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt am Main), Phil­ipp Albert (Senior Asso­ciate, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt am Main), Dr. Adal­bert Rödding, LL.M. (Part­ner, Tax, Colo­gne), Dr. Karl-Georg Küsters, LL.B., LL.M. (Coun­sel, Tax, Colo­gne), Florian Knoll (Asso­ciate, Tax, Colo­gne), Florian Seidl (Asso­ciate Part­ner, Employ­ment Law, Frank­furt am Main), Thomas Lange (Part­ner, Finance, Colo­gne), Jannik Gese­kus (Asso­ciate, Finance, Colo­gne), Katha­rina Meeser (Asso­ciate Part­ner, Real Estate, Colo­gne), Mete­han Uzun­çak­mak, LL.M. (Asso­ciate Part­ner, Anti­trust, Colo­gne), Dr. Valen­tin Zipfel (Asso­ciate Part­ner, IP/IT, Frank­furt am Main)

London (UK) – Bain Capi­tal, a global private invest­ment firm, announ­ced the acqui­si­tion of Supp­lyOn, a supply chain colla­bo­ra­tion plat­form for the auto­mo­tive, aero­space, and defense indus­tries, as well as other advan­ced manu­fac­tu­ring sectors across Europe, from its share­hol­ders AUMOVIO, Bosch, Schaeff­ler, and ZF. Kirk­land & Ellis advi­sed Bain Capi­tal Tech Oppor­tu­ni­ties on this transaction. 

Supp­lyOn opera­tes a tech­no­logy plat­form that connects more than 200 major manu­fac­tu­r­ers and Tier 1 suppli­ers with over 140,000 suppli­ers world­wide. The plat­form supports manu­fac­tu­r­ers and suppli­ers in colla­bo­ra­ting across the entire supply chain and the entire procu­re­ment lifecycle—from sourcing and purcha­sing through quality manage­ment, logi­stics, and invoi­cing to ESG compliance—all on a single, inte­gra­ted plat­form. Supp­lyOn was foun­ded in 2000 and has since evol­ved into a market-leading plat­form serving the broa­der Euro­pean manu­fac­tu­ring ecosystem. 

Bain Capi­tal will work closely with SupplyOn’s manage­ment team to support the company’s next phase of growth. The invest­ment will bols­ter product deve­lo­p­ment, inclu­ding the intro­duc­tion of new AI capa­bi­li­ties to the plat­form to drive custo­mer outco­mes. In addi­tion, there will be an increased focus on sales and marke­ting to acce­le­rate custo­mer adop­tion among manu­fac­tu­r­ers and in the defense sectors, where Supp­lyOn curr­ently has a growing presence. 

Bain Capi­tal’s Tech Oppor­tu­ni­ties Investment

The firm’s busi­ness in Europe reflects its exten­sive expe­ri­ence in inves­t­ing in Euro­pean tech­no­logy and indus­trial compa­nies,combi­ned with its long-stan­ding exper­tise in the aero­space and defense sectors. The digi­tiza­tion of the Euro­pean supply chain remains signi­fi­cantly under­de­ve­lo­ped, parti­cu­larly in complex manu­fac­tu­ring, where supply chain coor­di­na­tion is criti­cal given the growing comple­xity of supply chains for produc­tion proces­ses. Bain Capi­tal is commit­ted to main­tai­ning SupplyOn’s Euro­pean opera­tio­nal presence, data resi­dency, and gover­nance struc­ture, ther­eby ensu­ring conti­nuity for custo­mers who rely on the platform’s sove­reig­nty and compli­ance stan­dards. SupplyOn’s product quality, estab­lished custo­mer base, and network reach posi­tion the company to capi­ta­lize on this opportunity. 

The tran­sac­tion is subject to the usual closing condi­ti­ons and regu­la­tory appr­ovals. The finan­cial terms of the tran­sac­tion were not disclosed. 

“Supp­lyOn offers a rare combi­na­tion of product quality, network strength, strong custo­mer repre­sen­ta­tion, and market leader­ship in supply chain coor­di­na­tion across Europe,” said James Stevens, a part­ner on Bain Capital’s Tech Oppor­tu­ni­ties team. “The company has built a deeply embedded plat­form that custo­mers rely on for their day-to-day opera­ti­ons. We see a real runway to expand into adja­cent sectors and invest in product capa­bi­li­ties that are criti­cal to both manu­fac­tu­r­ers and suppliers.” 

“Supp­lyOn builds on our long-stan­ding presence in Europe, and in Germany in parti­cu­lar. Through our indus­trial port­fo­lio, we are custo­mers of Supp­lyOn and under­stand the criti­cal role it plays. “We have long-stan­ding rela­ti­onships with SupplyOn’s share­hol­ders and look forward to conti­nuing to support their busi­ness in the future,” said Dr. Michael Siefke, Part­ner and Chair­man of Europe Private Equity at Bain Capi­tal.

“We are plea­sed to part­ner with Bain Capi­tal, which shares our long-term vision for Supp­lyOn as a stra­te­gic capi­tal provi­der in the supply chain ecosys­tem across Europe,” said Markus Quicken, CEO of Supp­lyOn. “This part­ner­ship will enable us to acce­le­rate our product road­map and expand our market reach.” 

Advi­sors to Bain Capi­tal Tech Oppor­tu­ni­ties: Kirk­land & Ellis, Munich

Maxi­mi­lian Liegl (Lead, Private Equity/M&A); Asso­cia­tes: Mirjam Meyer, Fabian Walter­höl­ter, Lisa Müller, Dr. Eric Scheu, Alice Treu­le­ben-von Gans (all Private Equity/M&A), Dr. Florian Schütte (Tax)
Kirk­land & Ellis, London: Jacob Traff (Lead Coun­sel, Private Equity/M&A), Sam Sher­wood, Chris­to­pher Shield (both Debt Finance), Erika Krum (Inter­na­tio­nal Trade & Natio­nal Secu­rity), Rebecca Perl­man (Sustaina­bi­lity), Peter Abott, Cosmos Fung (both Tax), André Duminy, Jenni­fer Wilson (both Tech­no­logy & IP Tran­sac­tions); Asso­cia­tes: Ben Egan (Debt Finance), Mark Shak­kour (Invest­ment Funds), Tiho­mir Svil­a­no­vic (Sustaina­bi­lity), Shareen Dhil­lon (Tech­no­logy & IP Transactions)

About Kirk­land

With more than 4,000 attor­neys in 24 cities across the United States, Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, Kirk­land & Ellis is one of the leading law firms provi­ding high-cali­ber legal services. The German team focu­ses on advi­sing clients in the areas of private equity, M&A, restruc­tu­ring, corpo­rate and secu­ri­ties law, finan­cing, and tax law. For more infor­ma­tion, please visit kirkland.com.

About Bain Capital

Foun­ded in 1984, Bain Capi­tal is one of the world’s leading private invest­ment firms. We are commit­ted to crea­ting sustainable impact for our inves­tors, port­fo­lio compa­nies, and the commu­ni­ties in which we live. As a private part­ner­ship, we operate with convic­tion and a culture of collaboration—advantages that enable us to inno­vate in our invest­ment approa­ches, unlock oppor­tu­ni­ties, and deli­ver excep­tio­nal results. Our global plat­form invests across five focus areas: private equity, growth and venture, capi­tal solu­ti­ons, credit and capi­tal markets, and real estate. We have 24 offices across four conti­nents, employ more than 2,000 people, and manage appro­xi­m­ately $225 billion in assets. For more infor­ma­tion, visit www.baincapital.com.

About Supp­ly­On­Sup­ply

On is a leading cloud-based supply chain colla­bo­ra­tion plat­form that connects manu­fac­tu­r­ers with their global busi­ness part­ners. Supp­lyOn was foun­ded in 2000 and is head­quar­te­red in Hall­berg­moos, near Munich. SupplyOn’s network connects over 140,000 compa­nies world­wide across the auto­mo­tive, aero­space, rail, and other manu­fac­tu­ring indus­tries. The plat­form enables struc­tu­red digi­tal colla­bo­ra­tion in the areas of purcha­sing, procu­re­ment, quality manage­ment, logi­stics, and finance—and helps manu­fac­tu­r­ers streng­then colla­bo­ra­tion, trans­pa­rency, and execu­tion in complex, multi-tiered supply chains. 

Frank­furt am Main — The global busi­ness law firm Norton Rose Fulbright has MDA Space Ltd, an inter­na­tio­nal part­ner for space missi­ons, in its acqui­si­tion of a majo­rity stake in Coll­ecte Loca­li­sa­tion Satel­li­tes (CLS) from Compa­gnie Natio­nale à Porte­feuille (CNP).

Upon comple­tion of the tran­sac­tion, MDA Space Ltd. will acquire appro­xi­m­ately 70 percent of the shares in CLS from CNP and other share­hol­ders of CLS’s parent company. The French space agency, the Centre natio­nal d’études spatia­les (CNES), will conti­nue to hold appro­xi­m­ately 30 percent of the shares in CLS. 

Subject to the neces­sary regu­la­tory appr­ovals, the tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to close in late 2026 or early 2027.

Advi­sors to MDA Space: An inter­na­tio­nal team from Norton Rose Fulbright based in Paris, Frank­furt, and Toronto 

The Frank­furt team consis­ted of part­ner Dr. Jens Steger and Senior Asso­ciate Sven Klüp­pel, who advi­sed on all anti­trust and merger control matters outside of France.

The Paris team was led by Corpo­rate Part­ner Jean-Claude Rivalland and also included Coun­sel Louis Frid­man and Asso­ciate Mathilde Juyol.

The expan­ded team included Part­ner Nadège Martin, Coun­sel Geoff­roy Coul­ouvrat, and Asso­ciate Laura Helloco in the Tech­no­logy Law prac­tice, Part­ner Laure Joncour and Coun­sel Marie-Thérèse Euge­nio in the Employ­ment Law prac­tice, EMEA Tax Head Antoine Colonna d’Is­tria, along with Asso­cia­tes Alex­an­dra Bloch Mani­kow and Jeanne Robart, on tax law matters; and Part­ner Isabelle Augais and Asso­ciate Marjo­rie Bodino on real estate law aspects. Advice on French anti­trust and foreign direct invest­ment (FDI) law was provi­ded by Part­ner Marta Giner Asins, along with Asso­cia­tes Cons­tance Chev­reste and Géral­dine Gaulard. 

The Toronto team was led by corpo­rate part­ner Bruce Sheiner.

About Norton Rose Fulbright: 
Norton Rose Fulbright is a global busi­ness law firm. With more than 3,000 attor­neys in over 50 offices world­wide across Europe, the U.S., Canada, Latin America, Asia, Austra­lia, Africa, and the Middle East, we advise leading natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal compa­nies. We offer our clients compre­hen­sive advice across all major indus­tries. These include Finan­cial Insti­tu­ti­ons; Energy; Infra­struc­ture, Mining, and Commo­di­ties; Trans­por­ta­tion; Tech­no­logy and Inno­va­tion; and Life Scien­ces and Health­care. Our global Risk Advi­sory Group combi­nes this exten­sive indus­try expe­ri­ence with its exper­tise in legal and regu­la­tory matters, as well as in compli­ance and gover­nance. This enables us to offer our clients prac­ti­cal solu­ti­ons to the legal and regu­la­tory risks they face. Where­ver we operate, we act in accordance with our busi­ness prin­ci­ples of “Quality, Unity, and Inte­grity.” We provide legal advice of the highest stan­dard and main­tain this level of quality in every inter­ac­tion. The Swiss Asso­cia­tion of Norton Rose Fulbright helps coor­di­nate the acti­vi­ties of Norton Rose Fulbright members but does not provide legal advice to clients. Norton Rose Fulbright has offices in over 50 cities world­wide, inclu­ding London, Hous­ton, New York, Toronto, Mexico City, Hong Kong, Sydney, and Johan­nes­burg. For more infor­ma­tion, visit nortonrosefulbright.com/legal-notices

Munich — HEUKING advi­ses Arte­che Group on the acqui­si­tion of SEG Elec­tro­nics GmbH from AURELIUS. A team led by Dr. Katha­rina Pras­uhn, a part­ner in HEUKING’s Munich office, advi­sed the Arte­che Group on its acqui­si­tion of all shares in SEG Elec­tro­nics GmbH from AURELIUS Private Equity Lower Midmarket. 

Foun­ded in 1969 and head­quar­te­red in Kempen (North Rhine-West­pha­lia, Germany), SEG Elec­tro­nics is an inde­pen­dent manu­fac­tu­rer of high-quality protec­tive relays for appli­ca­ti­ons in medium-voltage networks, with over 55 years of expe­ri­ence and an inter­na­tio­nal presence in more than 80 count­ries. The company serves a custo­mer base of over 350 clients, employs 80 people, and opera­tes a centra­li­zed produc­tion faci­lity in Germany, supple­men­ted by sales and procu­re­ment loca­ti­ons in the United States, Poland, and the Middle East. SEG was acqui­red by AURELIUS in 2020 from NASDAQ-listed Wood­ward Inc. and has since been deve­lo­ped into a high-performing global specia­list under AURELIUS’s ownership. 

Arte­che is a global leader in equip­ment, solu­ti­ons, and services for the elec­tric power indus­try, head­quar­te­red in Mungia, Spain. With the acqui­si­tion of SEG Elec­tro­nics, Arte­che is streng­thening its offe­ring in the field of trans­mis­sion and distri­bu­tion network auto­ma­tion and expan­ding its port­fo­lio of elec­tro­nics and auto­ma­tion solu­ti­ons to include specia­li­zed medium-voltage protec­tion relays. 

The tran­sac­tion is fully in line with Arteche’s 2024–2026 stra­te­gic plan, “Ener­gi­zing Futures Toge­ther,” and, in parti­cu­lar, streng­thens the Group’s auto­ma­tion pillar. The inte­gra­tion is expec­ted to create tech­no­lo­gi­cal syner­gies and expand the Group’s commer­cial reach in growth segments, parti­cu­larly in the data center market, which requi­res a highly relia­ble and stable energy infra­struc­ture. Further­more, the tran­sac­tion streng­thens Arteche’s presence in the DACH region (Germany, Austria, and Switz­er­land), a stra­te­gi­cally important market given its signi­fi­cance in indus­try and the energy sector. 

Arte­che Group’s Advi­sor: HEUKING
Dr. Katha­rina Pras­uhn (lead), Chris­tian Schild, LL.M. (Queen Mary Univer­sity of London), Dr. Ulrich Jork, Mari­lena Schöck (all M&A), all in Munich;
Dr. Henrik Lay (Tax), Hamburg,
Dr. Ruth Jung­kind (Distri­bu­tion Law, Anti­trust Law), Munich,
Kers­tin Deiters, LL.M., EMBA (Employ­ment Law), Cologne,
Dr. Julia Mattes (IP), Munich,
Julian Rosenfeld,
Georg Thomas, LL.M. (Univer­sity of Glas­gow), (both IT/Data Protection),
Markus Vlasic, LL.M. (Real Estate & Cons­truc­tion), all Düsseldorf,
Michael Kreis­ler, LL.M. (Foreign Trade Law), Berlin,
Dr. Chris­toph Schork, LL.M. (Compli­ance), Cologne 

About HEUKING

HEUKING has appro­xi­m­ately 450 specia­li­zed attor­neys, tax advi­sors, and nota­ries across a total of eight offices and provi­des advice in over 30 areas of law as a full-service law firm. Accor­ding to the Juve Reve­nue Ranking 10/2025, the firm ranks 17th among the highest-reve­nue law firms in Germany. Its natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal clients include medium-sized and large compa­nies in the indus­trial, commer­cial, and service sectors, as well as asso­cia­ti­ons, public enti­ties, and discer­ning private clients. 

— www.heuking.de

Berlin/Munich – Helsing, Europe’s leading AI company in the defense sector, has announ­ced a Series E funding round of $1.8 billion. The company is now valued at $18 billion. New and exis­ting inves­tors are parti­ci­pa­ting in the funding round, inclu­ding Drago­neer Invest­ment Group, Lightspeed Venture Part­ners, Disrup­tive, Iconiq, Growth Equity at Gold­man Sachs Alter­na­ti­ves, JPMor­gan Chase, Canada Pension Plan Invest­ment Board (CPP Invest­ments), Gene­ral Cata­lyst, Plural, and Stepstone. 

Inves­tor demand signi­fi­cantly excee­ded the available funding in this round. This unders­cores the high and growing confi­dence in AI-powered and soft­ware-based defense tech­no­logy. Helsing remains majo­rity-owned by Euro­pean inves­tors. The company’s board of direc­tors also remains unch­an­ged. Daniel Ek and Tom Enders serve as co-chairs. The other members are Jean­nette zu Fürs­ten­berg and Denis Mercier, as well as the foun­ders of Helsing. 

With its Series E funding round, Helsing is acce­le­ra­ting its mission to deve­lop enti­rely new AI plat­forms and inte­grate them into the defense capa­bi­li­ties of a growing number of part­ner count­ries. Helsin­g’s exis­ting inves­tors include Prima Mate­ria, Accel, and Greenoaks. 

YPOG provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal coun­sel to Helsing in connec­tion with its Series E finan­cing round tota­ling 1.8 billion USD. This finan­cing follows seve­ral previous funding rounds, in which YPOG also advi­sed the company. 

Helsing deve­lops AI-based capa­bi­li­ties for the defense sector and builds tech­no­lo­gies to protect demo­cra­tic socie­ties. The company combi­nes soft­ware, auto­no­mous systems, and AI appli­ca­ti­ons to streng­then Euro­pean tech­no­lo­gi­cal sove­reig­nty and defense capabilities. 

Helsing plans to use the fresh capi­tal to further expand its tech­no­lo­gi­cal capa­bi­li­ties across all domains and scale up its deve­lo­p­ment. The funding is inten­ded to help the company further deve­lop its plat­form, products, and indus­trial capa­bi­li­ties and conso­li­date its role as a Euro­pean defense tech­no­logy company. 

“YPOG has been advi­sing Helsing since its first funding round in Novem­ber 2021 and has been support­ing the company conti­nuously with its capi­tal initia­ti­ves ever since. “It’s impres­sive to see how consis­t­ently Helsing is expan­ding its stra­te­gic posi­tion and driving its tech­no­lo­gi­cal deve­lo­p­ment forward,” says Dr. Benja­min Ullrich, a part­ner at YPOG.

“We are plea­sed to have once again supported Helsing in the largest funding round in the country’s history, which serves as a beacon not only for the German ecosys­tem. The Series E round unders­cores the parti­cu­lar rele­vance of tech­no­lo­gi­cal inno­va­tions for the Euro­pean secu­rity and defense land­scape,” adds Dr. Johan­nes Janning, part­ner at YPOG.

Consul­tant Helsing: YPOG

Dr. Benja­min Ullrich (Co-Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Berlin
Dr. Johan­nes Janning (Co-Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Cologne
Dr. Matthias Schatz (Corpo­rate), Part­ner, Cologne
Paul Haren­berg (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­ciate, Cologne
Benja­min von Mangoldt (Tran­sac­tions), Senior Asso­ciate, Berlin
Dr. Chris­toph Lütten­berg (Corpo­rate), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Cologne
Dr. Oliver Junk (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Cologne
Dr. Emma Peters (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Berlin
Silke Ricken (Corpo­rate), Asso­ciate, Berlin
Ferdi­nand Bordes (Corpo­rate), Asso­ciate, Cologne
Danêl Buch­holz (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­ciate, Cologne
Richard Appfel (Corpo­rate), Asso­ciate, Berlin
Marthe Oester­rei­cher (Legal Opera­ti­ons), Senior Project Lawyer, Berlin

Munich/Halberstadt/London (UK) – Infle­xion, a leading Euro­pean private equity firm focu­sed on mid-market compa­nies, has agreed to acquire the Primed Group (“Primed”). Primed is a German specialty provi­der of high-quality medi­cal consu­ma­bles and steri­liza­tion services. The seller is Para­gon Part­ners, a private equity firm focu­sed on the DACH region. The invest­ment is being made through the Infle­xion Buyout Fund VI and marks Inflexion’s sixth invest­ment in the DACH region. 

Primed was foun­ded in 1946 and is head­quar­te­red in Halber­stadt. The company deve­lops, manu­fac­tures, and distri­bu­tes certi­fied single-use medi­cal supplies. Primed employs more than 450 people and opera­tes a verti­cally inte­gra­ted plat­form that covers the entire value chain—from the proces­sing of raw mate­ri­als to the sterile end product. The products, certi­fied in accordance with the Euro­pean Medi­cal Device Regu­la­tion (MDR), are used in hospi­tals and health­care faci­li­ties in over 70 count­ries. Primed also opera­tes HA2, one of Europe’s largest plat­forms for medi­cal sterilization. 

The global market for medi­cal consu­ma­bles is large and conti­nues to grow. For Primed, this provi­des a strong foun­da­tion for further expan­sion in Germany and inter­na­tio­nally. With Infle­xion as its new owner, Primed will conti­nue to invest in its core product line, acce­le­rate product deve­lo­p­ment, and expand its steri­liza­tion busi­ness. Infle­xion will also support manage­ment in its inter­na­tio­nal expansion—through targe­ted acqui­si­ti­ons and invest­ments in commer­cial capa­bi­li­ties to streng­then Primed’s direct access to custo­mers in key markets. The invest­ment unders­cores Inflexion’s commit­ment to part­ne­ring with leading health­care compa­nies in their local markets and support­ing their long-term success. 

For this tran­sac­tion, Infle­xion is colla­bo­ra­ting with health­care experts Wolf­gang Süßle and Justin Barnes; both will serve on Primed’s Board of Direc­tors. Wolf­gang Süßle has more than 25 years of expe­ri­ence in the health­care indus­try, inclu­ding 15 years as CEO and Presi­dent of Lohmann & Rauscher. Justin Barnes brings more than 25 years of expe­ri­ence in the medi­cal tech­no­logy sector. He has co-foun­ded seve­ral compa­nies and held execu­tive posi­ti­ons, inclu­ding as CEO of 30 Tech­no­logy and as a non-execu­tive direc­tor of Rayner. Toge­ther, they bring comple­men­tary exper­tise and a proven track record of growing health­care compa­nies to imple­ment Primed’s growth strategy. 

For Infle­xion, Primed is its third invest­ment in the health­care sector in the DACH region, follo­wing its mino­rity stake in Prote­ros and its invest­ment in Tier­arzt Plus Part­ner. Over­all, it is Inflexion’s sixth invest­ment in the DACH region. The acqui­si­tion further streng­thens Inflexion’s presence in the DACH region and follows the foun­ding of Mittel­stands-Asse­ku­ranz-Part­ner (“MAP”), the carve-out of Finanzen.net, and the invest­ment in dss+. 

Flor Kassai, Mana­ging Part­ner and Head of Buyouts at Infle­xion, said: “Primed enjoys an excel­lent repu­ta­tion thanks to its high-quality product port­fo­lio, its inte­gra­ted busi­ness model, and its long-stan­ding custo­mer rela­ti­onships. We look forward to support­ing the team as the company enters its next phase of growth.”

Martin Preuss, Part­ner and Head of DACH, said: “Primed is an excel­lent exam­ple of the inno­va­tive, inter­na­tio­nally compe­ti­tive compa­nies we seek to part­ner with in Germany. We look forward to support­ing the manage­ment team as they build on the company’s strong foun­da­tion in Germany and conti­nue to expand internationally.”

Daniel Schiel, CEO of the Primed Group, said: “We are very plea­sed to have Infle­xion as our new part­ner. Infle­xion shares our long-term vision for Primed and brings signi­fi­cant expe­ri­ence in support­ing ambi­tious compa­nies through their next phase of growth. Toge­ther, we aim to build on Primed’s strong German roots, conti­nue to expand inter­na­tio­nally, invest in inno­va­tion, and relia­bly supply hospi­tals and health­care faci­li­ties world­wide with high-quality products.”

Edin Hadzic, Senior Part­ner at Para­gon, said: “As Primed’s first insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tor, we supported the company’s evolu­tion from an owner-led to a manage­ment-led orga­niza­tion and estab­lished it as a true growth plat­form. We are proud of what the team has built and wish Primed contin­ued success in its next phase with Inflexion.”

The tran­sac­tion is subject to the usual regu­la­tory approvals.

About Infle­xion

Infle­xion is a leading Euro­pean private equity firm focu­sed on mid-market compa­nies, with €20 billion in assets under manage­ment. It invests in fast-growing, entre­pre­neu­rial compa­nies led by ambi­tious manage­ment teams and works in part­ner­ship with them to acce­le­rate their growth. Inflexion’s flexi­ble approach allows for both majo­rity and mino­rity invest­ments in compa­nies with an enter­prise value typi­cally ranging from €50 million to over €1 billion. 

With specia­li­zed teams and dedi­ca­ted capi­tal, Inflexion’s funds invest in six core sectors from offices in London, Manches­ter, Amster­dam, Frank­furt, Stock­holm, and New York. Every port­fo­lio company, regard­less of size or equity stake, recei­ves full access to Inflexion’s growth acce­le­ra­tion services in the areas of inter­na­tio­nal expan­sion, acqui­si­ti­ons, digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion, talent manage­ment, sales, and sustaina­bi­lity. In addi­tion, port­fo­lio compa­nies bene­fit from inter­na­tio­nal experts in South America, the Asia-Paci­fic (APAC) region, and India who are dedi­ca­ted to port­fo­lio deve­lo­p­ment and provide them with privi­le­ged access to these high-growth markets. 

Learn more at www.inflexion.com

Karlsruhe/Frankfurt am Main — LEA Part­ners (“LEA”), a leading inves­tor in soft­ware and service compa­nies in the DACH region, announ­ces the sale of refyne to Visual­Lo­gix, a port­fo­lio company of Insight Partners.

Head­quar­te­red in Frank­furt am Main, refyne combi­nes leading soft­ware and AI-powered solu­ti­ons for wood and metal cons­truc­tion into a unified plat­form that covers the entire process chain of manu­fac­tu­ring companies—from sales and quoting through design and engi­nee­ring to produc­tion and billing.

Since its incep­tion in June 2023, LEA has built refyne into the leading end-to-end soft­ware plat­form for wood and metal cons­truc­tion through a focu­sed buy-and-build strategy—in line with its stra­tegy to to invest in market-leading soft­ware compa­nies with a high propor­tion of recur­ring reve­nue. In a previously highly frag­men­ted soft­ware land­scape, five estab­lished specia­lists joined forces to form the refyne Group as part of a focu­sed buy-and-build stra­tegy and contin­ued their growth trajec­tory under the leader­ship of CEO Dr. Stefan Gutber­let. Key initia­ti­ves included the estab­lish­ment of a cross-group manage­ment struc­ture, the intro­duc­tion of the unified refyne brand, the acce­le­ra­tion of cloud migra­tion, and the expan­sion of inter­na­tio­nal sales. During the holding period, refyne more than doubled its reve­nue and evol­ved from a coll­ec­tion of indi­vi­dual specia­lists into one of the industry’s leading soft­ware groups—with more than 150 employees and over 25,000 users worldwide. 

Dr. Stefan Gutber­let, CEO of refyne: “Over the past few years, our team has trans­for­med a group of inde­pen­dent specia­lists into a unified plat­form and built refyne into a brand that our indus­try trusts. LEA has shared this vision from the very begin­ning and supported us as a true entre­pre­neu­rial part­ner. With Visual­Lo­gix and Insight Part­ners, we have now found the right part­ners to scale our end-to-end approach internationally—with the same commit­ment to our customers.”

Jan Huber, Prin­ci­pal at LEA Part­ners: “refyne is a prime exam­ple of our invest­ment focus: verti­cal soft­ware provi­ders with deep indus­try exper­tise and clear market leader­ship. The result is a plat­form that funda­men­tally simpli­fies the work­flows of an entire indus­try. We have thoroughly enjoyed working with Stefan and the entire refyne team—we wish them every success as they take their next step in inter­na­tio­nal growth along­side Visual­Lo­gix and Insight Partners.”

The tran­sac­tion marks the first exit from the Mittel­stands­part­ner II/II‑A Fund.

About refyne

refyne is a leading soft­ware plat­form for the digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion of wood and metal cons­truc­tion. Under the refyne brand, specia­lists CAD-PLAN, flixo, Triviso, N.CAD, and Trun­CAD bundle their solu­ti­ons and inte­grate CAD, CAM, and ERP into a seam­less process—from sales and design through produc­tion to billing. Head­quar­te­red in Frank­furt am Main, the group employs more than 150 people and serves over 25,000 users world­wide. www.refyne-group.com

About LEA Partners

With more than 2 billion EUR in commit­ted capi­tal, LEA—as an entre­pre­neu­rial equity partner—supports foun­ders and manage­ment teams at various stages of deve­lo­p­ment in their growth and in achie­ving a leading market posi­tion. Since 2002, the 40-member team based in Karls­ruhe has successfully supported more than 140 tech­no­logy companies.
Learn more at www.leapartners.de

About Insight Partners

Insight Part­ners is a global inves­tor that invests in high-growth tech­no­logy, soft­ware, and inter­net compa­nies driving change in their industries—from start­ups to scale-ups. As of Decem­ber 31, 2025, the firm had regu­la­tory assets under manage­ment of over $90 billion. Insight Part­ners has inves­ted in more than 900 compa­nies world­wide; over 55 port­fo­lio compa­nies have since gone public. Insight is head­quar­te­red in New York City and has a global presence with leader­ship teams in London, Tel Aviv, and the Bay Area. Insight’s mission is to iden­tify, fund, and successfully part­ner with visio­nary leaders—providing tail­o­red, hands-on soft­ware exper­tise throug­hout their entire growth jour­ney, from initial invest­ment to IPO. For more infor­ma­tion about Insight and its invest­ments, visit www.insightpartners.com or follow @insightpartners on X. 

Tübingen/Geleen (NL) — SHS Capi­tal has signed a binding agree­ment to acquire a majo­rity stake in Basic Pharma Holding B.V., a Nether­lands-based phar­maceu­ti­cal deve­lo­per and full-service CDMO (contract deve­lo­p­ment and manu­fac­tu­ring orga­niza­tion). The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to close shortly. 

Basic Pharma is a specia­li­zed deve­lo­per and manu­fac­tu­rer of nasal sprays and semiso­lid phar­maceu­ti­cals. The inte­gra­ted “License & Supply” model—which combi­nes in-house product deve­lo­p­ment, proprie­tary dossiers, regu­la­tory affairs, phar­ma­co­vi­gi­lance, and GMP manufacturing—sets the company apart in the Euro­pean market; in terms of produc­tion capa­city, Basic Pharma ranks among the leading Euro­pean nasal spray CDMOs. 

The company has grown signi­fi­cantly in recent years, driven by strong demand for its nasal sprays, creams, and newly laun­ched prescrip­tion products, and bene­fits from a very loyal custo­mer base consis­ting of white-label and private-label distri­bu­tors as well as gene­ric drug companies.

Succes­sion Plan for the Founders

The invest­ment by SHS Capi­tal provi­des a struc­tu­red succes­sion plan for foun­der and CEO Bob Kool, who is reinves­t­ing along­side SHS Capi­tal, and aims to acce­le­rate Basic Pharma’s next phase of growth through inter­na­tio­nal expan­sion, conti­nuous product deve­lo­p­ment, and selec­tive buy-and-build transactions.

Foun­ded in 2003 by phar­macist Bob Kool, Basic Pharma has evol­ved from a local contract manu­fac­tu­rer into an inte­gra­ted phar­maceu­ti­cal plat­form that combi­nes in-house product deve­lo­p­ment, regu­la­tory affairs, phar­ma­co­vi­gi­lance, and GMP manu­fac­tu­ring at its site in Geleen, the Nether­lands, and serves an inter­na­tio­nal custo­mer base across prescrip­tion (Rx) and over-the-coun­ter (OTC) drugs as well as inves­ti­ga­tio­nal products. A key diffe­ren­tia­tor is the company’s ability to deve­lop, regis­ter, and out-license product dossiers: Under the “License & Supply” model, intern­ally deve­lo­ped products are licen­sed to distri­bu­tors and phar­maceu­ti­cal part­ners, while Basic Pharma reta­ins exclu­sive manu­fac­tu­ring and dossier rights. This fosters long-term custo­mer rela­ti­onships and strong recur­ring reve­nue. Basic Pharma holds a leading posi­tion in the Dutch nasal spray market and, thanks to a lean and highly effi­ci­ent produc­tion struc­ture, offers its products at compe­ti­tive prices, inclu­ding internationally. 

SHS Capi­tal intends to support Basic Pharma as a growth part­ner in the coming years. The joint value-crea­tion plan focu­ses on streng­thening the highly successful core busi­ness, enhan­cing opera­tio­nal excel­lence, profes­sio­na­li­zing the orga­niza­tion, and acce­le­ra­ting inter­na­tio­nal expan­sion, parti­cu­larly in Euro­pean markets with attrac­tive pricing dyna­mics. Further­more, Basic Pharma is well-posi­tio­ned as a plat­form for selec­tive buy-and-build tran­sac­tions in the frag­men­ted Euro­pean CDMO land­scape. Foun­der Bob Kool will conti­nue to support the company and remain asso­cia­ted with it as a share­hol­der and member of the advi­sory board. 

“Over more than two deca­des, we have built Basic Pharma into an inte­gra­ted phar­maceu­ti­cal plat­form with a strong team and loyal, long-stan­ding custo­mers,” says Bob Kool, foun­der and CEO of Basic Pharma. “It was very important to me to place the future of my life’s work in the right hands. In SHS, we have found an extre­mely expe­ri­en­ced and specia­li­zed health­care private equity fund that truly under­stands our busi­ness, values our employees, and shares our ambi­ti­ons. I am very plea­sed that the next chap­ter of Basic Pharma will be writ­ten toge­ther with such a compe­tent part­ner, and I look forward to conti­nuing to support the company during this exci­ting phase.” 

“Basic Pharma is exactly the kind of company we’re looking for: a specia­li­zed Euro­pean health­care cham­pion with a diffe­ren­tia­ted busi­ness model, its own drug candi­da­tes, and signi­fi­cant, untap­ped inter­na­tio­nal poten­tial,” says Dr. Corne­lius Maas, a part­ner at SHS Capi­tal. “We look forward to support­ing the team in the next phase of growth—both orga­ni­cally and through selec­tive acquisitions.” 

About Basic Pharma

Basic Pharma Holding B.V. is a Nether­lands-based phar­maceu­ti­cal deve­lo­per and full-service CDMO compri­sing Basic Pharma Manu­fac­tu­ring, Basic Pharma Tech­no­lo­gies, and Inter­dos Pharma. The company deve­lops, regis­ters, and manu­fac­tures prescrip­tion and over-the-coun­ter (OTC) medications—including nasal sprays, creams, oint­ments, liquid dosage forms, and pre-filled syringes—as well as inves­ti­ga­tio­nal drugs for clini­cal trials. Through Inter­dos Pharma, the group also provi­des services in the areas of regu­la­tory affairs, phar­ma­co­vi­gi­lance, QA/QC, and Quali­fied Person for both inter­nal and exter­nal clients. All products are manu­fac­tu­red at the company’s GMP-certi­fied faci­lity in Geleen (Nether­lands). Basic Pharma employs more than 250 people and serves an inter­na­tio­nal custo­mer base of distri­bu­tors and phar­maceu­ti­cal compa­nies throug­hout Europe. — https://basicpharma.nl/

About SHS Capital

SHS Capi­tal is a private equity firm foun­ded in 1993 that invests in health­care compa­nies in Europe. Its invest­ments focus on expan­sion finan­cing, chan­ges in owner­ship, and succes­sion plan­ning. “Buil­ding Euro­pean Health­care Cham­pi­ons” is the invest­ment philo­so­phy that guides SHS in finan­cing and deve­lo­ping its port­fo­lio compa­nies. The Tübin­gen-based inves­tor takes both mino­rity and majo­rity stakes. The natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal inves­tors in the SHS funds include pension funds, fund-of-funds, foun­da­ti­ons, family offices, stra­te­gic inves­tors, entre­pre­neurs, and the SHS manage­ment team. The AIF’s equity or equity-like invest­ment amounts to up to €50 million. Volu­mes excee­ding this amount can be reali­zed through a network of co-inves­tors. In its invest­ment decis­i­ons, SHS places great empha­sis on ESG conside­ra­ti­ons and is ther­e­fore commit­ted to the UN PRI guide­lines. — http://www.shs-capital.eu

Berlin — The DeepT­ech startup NextGO Epi was advi­sed by the law firm V14 during its pre-seed funding round of over EUR 2 million. NextGO Epi is curr­ently the only company in Europe that manu­fac­tures indus­trial-grade gallium oxide epitaxial wafers (a semi­con­duc­tor mate­rial). Led by Vireo Ventures, Ultra­tech Capi­tal Part­ners, IBB Ventures, and busi­ness angel Boris Habets parti­ci­pa­ted in the funding round. 

With the new capi­tal, NextGO Epi aims to expand its sales opera­ti­ons inter­na­tio­nally, grow its team, and acce­le­rate product development.

NextGO Epi Advi­sor: V14

Florian Kozok, Sinje Clausen

The V14 Law Firm:

V14 is a Berlin-based law firm specia­li­zing in growth capi­tal, tech­no­logy and media. — www.v14.de

Munich/Frankfurt am Main — Will­kie Farr & Gallag­her LLP (“Will­kie”) advi­sed SMAG Mobile Antenna Masts AG (the “Company”) and the selling share­hol­der SMAG Group GmbH, a wholly owned subsi­diary of the Munich-based finan­cial inves­tor AEQUITA SE & Co. KGaA (the “selling share­hol­der”), in connec­tion with the Company’s initial public offe­ring with a total offe­ring size of appro­xi­m­ately 129.6 million euros, assum­ing full exer­cise of the green­shoe option.

The company, head­quar­te­red in Salz­git­ter, Germany, has a long tradi­tion in engi­nee­ring dating back to 1974 and is a leading Euro­pean manu­fac­tu­rer of mission-criti­cal mobile antenna mast systems for defense appli­ca­ti­ons, provi­ding connec­ti­vity solu­ti­ons for modern and next-gene­ra­tion batt­le­fields. The company gene­ra­tes virtually all of its net reve­nue from mili­tary appli­ca­ti­ons and has more than 2,000 mission-criti­cal mast systems in service in over 20 countries. 

Cantor Fitz­ge­rald served as the sole global coor­di­na­tor and sole bookrunner.

Follo­wing the successful initial public offe­ring of Gabler Group AG in March 2026, the company’s IPO is alre­ady the second listing in the defense sector this year in which Will­kie served as legal coun­sel. Toge­ther, these tran­sac­tions unders­core the signi­fi­cant momen­tum buil­ding across the Euro­pean defense sector—driven by rising NATO spen­ding commit­ments and growing inte­rest from capi­tal markets in compa­nies opera­ting in mission-criti­cal defense segments. 

The offe­ring compri­sed 650,000 new shares from a capi­tal increase and 1,800,000 exis­ting shares from the selling shareholder’s port­fo­lio, with an addi­tio­nal 367,500 shares available under a green­shoe option. The selling share­hol­der remains the company’s majo­rity share­hol­der even after the initial public offe­ring. The company’s shares were admit­ted to trading in the Scale segment of the Frank­furt Stock Exchange. 

Will­kie advi­sed the company and the selling share­hol­der on all capi­tal markets and corpo­rate law aspects of the transaction.

Tran­sac­tion Advi­sors at WILLKIE

The core team was led by part­ners Simon Weiß and Joseph Marx and included asso­cia­tes Martin E. Kalb­henn and Marius Reif (all Capi­tal Markets; Frankfurt/Munich). The team also included part­ners Jacob Ahme (Corpo­rate Law; Hamburg), Anne Kleff­mann (Employ­ment Law; Munich), and Dr. Bettina Bokeloh (Tax Law; Frank­furt); coun­sel Martin Waskow­ski (Employ­ment Law; Frank­furt) and Cathe­rine A. Harring­ton (Tax Law; New York), as well as asso­cia­tes Dr. Patrick Kemper and Nohman Raufi (both Corpo­rate Law; Frank­furt), Sascha Wink­ler (Labor Law; Frank­furt), and Dr. Maxi­mi­lian Schlutz (Global Trade/Defense; Munich). 

Pfäf­fi­kon (CH) — The fund “Ufenau VIII Asset Light, SLP,” advi­sed by Ufenau Capi­tal Part­ners, has acqui­red a majo­rity stake in Eco Kart GmbH. GÖRG Rechts­an­wälte provi­ded legal coun­sel to Ufenau Capi­tal on this transaction. 

Since its foun­ding in 2019, Eco Kart GmbH has been active in the indoor leisure and family enter­tain­ment sector. In the Rhine-Main region, the company offers private and corpo­rate custo­mers a wide range of recrea­tio­nal acti­vi­ties, inclu­ding e‑karting, bowling, billi­ards, darts, and arcade games. With estab­lished loca­ti­ons and stan­dar­di­zed opera­tio­nal struc­tures, Eco Kart is well-posi­tio­ned for further growth. 

Ufenau will work with Eco Kart’s exis­ting manage­ment team to support the company’s further deve­lo­p­ment and expan­sion of its market posi­tion. Plans include opening new loca­ti­ons, expan­ding the range of offe­rings, and making targe­ted acqui­si­ti­ons. In the long term, the goal is to build a Euro­pean leisure and enter­tain­ment plat­form on this foundation. 

The GÖRG team, led by Frank­furt part­ners Dr. Tobias Fenck and Markus Beyer, provi­ded multi­di­sci­pli­nary advice on all key legal issues rele­vant to the transaction.

For many years now, the Swiss invest­ment group Ufenau has regu­larly relied on the exper­tise of Dr. Tobias Fenck and his team for tran­sac­tions in the German market.

About Ufenau Capi­tal Partners

Ufenau Capi­tal Part­ners is an inde­pen­dent Swiss invest­ment group based on Lake Zurich that focu­ses on majo­rity stakes in service compa­nies in the DACH region, as well as in Spain, Portu­gal, Poland, Bene­lux, the UK, and the U.S., which operate in the sectors of busi­ness services, IT services, Educa­tion & Life­style, Health­care Services, and Finan­cial Services. Since 2011, Ufenau has inves­ted in appro­xi­m­ately 500 service compa­nies world­wide. — www.ucp.ch

Advi­sors to Ufenau Capi­tal Part­ners AG: GÖRG Part­ner­ship of Attor­neys mbB

Dr. Tobias Fenck (Lead Coun­sel, Part­ner, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt am Main)
Markus Beyer, LL.M. (Lead Attor­ney, Part­ner, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt am Main) 
Phil­ipp Albert (Senior Asso­ciate, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt am Main)
Larissa Jährig (Senior Asso­ciate, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt am Main)
Dr. Adal­bert Rödding, LL.M. (Part­ner, Tax, Cologne)
Dr. Karl-Georg Küsters, LL.B., LL.M. (Coun­sel, Tax, Cologne)
Florian Knoll (Asso­ciate, Tax, Cologne)
Dr. Simon Lentz (Asso­ciate, Tax, Cologne)
Florian Seidl (Asso­ciate Part­ner, Employ­ment Law, Frank­furt am Main)
Eva Geue­nich (Senior Asso­ciate, Finan­cing, Cologne)
Dr. Valen­tin Zipfel (Asso­ciate Part­ner, IP/IT, Frank­furt am Main)
Katha­rina Meeser (Asso­ciate Part­ner, Real Estate Law, Cologne)
Mete­han Uzun­çak­mak, LL.M. (Asso­ciate Part­ner, Anti­trust Law, Cologne)

Frank­furt am Main — Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG (DBAG) is inves­t­ing in the TNL Group (TNL), a leading specia­list in envi­ron­men­tal plan­ning and permit­ting consul­ting in the energy and trans­por­ta­tion infra­struc­ture sectors. DBAG ECF IV, a fund advi­sed by DBAG, is acqui­ring a majo­rity stake in TNL as part of a manage­ment buyout. The tran­sac­tion was initia­ted bila­te­rally through DBAG’s network and once again unders­cores the quality and relia­bi­lity of its access to attrac­tive mid-market tran­sac­tions. — RSM Ebner Stolz provi­ded finan­cial due dili­gence support to DBAG ECF IV, a fund advi­sed by Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG (DBAG), in connec­tion with its acqui­si­tion of a majo­rity stake in the TNL Group (TNL).

TNL foun­der and co-CEO Frank Berns­hau­sen, along with other members of manage­ment, will sell back a signi­fi­cant portion of their shares. The tran­sac­tion is subject to regu­la­tory appr­ovals. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the purchase price. 

DBAG, listed on the SDAX, is a private equity firm head­quar­te­red in Frank­furt am Main that focu­ses on invest­ments in well-posi­tio­ned medium-sized compa­nies. — www.dbag.de

TNL is a specia­li­zed provi­der of envi­ron­men­tal plan­ning, permit­ting, and cons­truc­tion services for complex infra­struc­ture projects. Foun­ded in 1994, the company supports chal­len­ging cons­truc­tion projects such as wind and solar farms, high- and extra-high-voltage power lines, and trans­por­ta­tion infra­struc­ture projects. TNL supports its clients throug­hout the entire project life­cy­cle: from preli­mi­nary envi­ron­men­tal assess­ments through regu­la­tory permit­ting proces­ses to subse­quent cons­truc­tion super­vi­sion and imple­men­ta­tion. The group employs appro­xi­m­ately 250 people across four loca­ti­ons and gene­ra­ted total reve­nue of appro­xi­m­ately EUR 30 million in 2025.

Market charac­te­ri­zed by struc­tu­ral growth

The invest­ment follows DBAG’s stra­tegy of making targe­ted invest­ments in compa­nies that operate in struc­tu­rally attrac­tive markets. The expan­sion of trans­port infra­struc­ture, the energy tran­si­tion and the expan­sion of the German trans­mis­sion grids as part of the Network Deve­lo­p­ment Plan (NDP) are driving a sustained high demand for quali­fied envi­ron­men­tal plan­ning services. This dyna­mic is also reflec­ted in TNL’s deve­lo­p­ment: the company’s core market has grown at an annua­li­zed double-digit percen­tage rate since 2020. 

Tom Alzin, Spokesper­son for the Execu­tive Board of Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG, says: “TNL is a true hidden cham­pion in a non-cycli­cal growth market. The company provi­des indis­pensable plan­ning services for projects that are abso­lut­ely essen­tial to the success of the energy transition.”

Munich — HTGF port­fo­lio company Proxima Fusion has closed a funding round of 411 million euros, valuing the company at 2.4 billion euros and marking a mile­stone for our multi-stage VC plat­form. Led by XTX Ventures and East X Ventures, with RWE and Google as stra­te­gic inves­tors, the round makes Proxima the best-funded fusion company in Europe. 

The round is led by XTX Ventures and East X Ventures —with RWE and Google joining as stra­te­gic inves­tors. Google’s parti­ci­pa­tion as an inves­tor shows just how seriously Big Tech is taking this issue—the AI data centers of the future will need exactly this kind of elec­tri­city, around the clock and, ideally, CO₂-free.
Planck Power: Invest­ment in fusion has nearly quadru­pled in four years ($2.6 billion in 2025 alone), and Proxima is buil­ding on the Max Planck Institute’s Wendel­stein 7‑X (think: deca­des of cutting-edge German rese­arch as a head start)

The capi­tal is being inves­ted in Alpha, Proxima’s net-energy demons­tra­tor near Munich, which is being deve­lo­ped in colla­bo­ra­tion with the Free State of Bava­ria, the Max Planck Insti­tute for Plasma Physics, and RWE on the site of a former nuclear power plant in Gund­rem­min­gen. Alpha is inten­ded to vali­date key tech­no­lo­gies and pave the way for Stel­la­ris, the world’s first commer­cial stel­la­ra­tor fusion power plant. 

HTGF has been support­ing Proxima since its pre-seed phase in 2023; DTCF joined during the seed phase and played a key role in the Series A finan­cing round in 2025.

From Rese­arch to Indus­trial Implementation

Proxima Fusion is deve­lo­ping commer­cial fusion power plants based on its QI-HTS stel­la­ra­tor concept, buil­ding on the scien­ti­fic breakth­roughs of the Wendel­stein-7‑X program. The funding will go toward Alpha, Proxima’s net-energy demons­tra­tor near Munich, deve­lo­ped in colla­bo­ra­tion with the Free State of Bava­ria, the Max Planck Insti­tute for Plasma Physics, and RWE. Alpha is inten­ded to vali­date key tech­no­lo­gies and pave the way for Stel­la­ris, the world’s first commer­cial stel­la­ra­tor fusion power plant. 

“This funding demons­tra­tes that Germany and Europe are capa­ble of mobi­li­zing inter­na­tio­nal capi­tal for stra­te­gic future tech­no­lo­gies,” says Dr. Fran­cesco Sciort­ino, co-foun­der and CEO of Proxima Fusion. “The inter­na­tio­nal inves­tor commu­nity has sent a strong signal: it has confi­dence not only in Europe’s scien­ti­fic excel­lence, but also in our ability to build globally compe­ti­tive indus­trial compa­nies based on that excellence.” 

Romy Schnelle (photo), Mana­ging Direc­tor of the DTCF and HTGF: “When we funded Proxima in the pre-seed phase, fusion was still just a scien­ti­fic ambi­tion for most people. Just three years later, with 411 million euros in funding and inves­tors like RWE and Google, it has become an indus­trial reality. Reco­gni­zing this shift early on and having the courage to fund it—that is exactly what our multi-stage VC plat­form stands for.” 

Johan­nes Weber, Part­ner at HTGF: “We’ve supported Proxima since the very first round—not in spite of, but because of its ambi­tion. Ground­brea­king deep tech that can spark a new econo­mic mira­cle in Germany and Europe is exactly what gets us out of bed in the morning. Proxima has a real chance to create an enti­rely new indus­try and supply chain with far-reaching econo­mic impli­ca­ti­ons. We couldn’t be prou­der to be part of this journey.” 

https://www.htgf.de/

Düssel­dorf — ARQIS provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal and tax advice to Constel­la­tion Capi­tal AG on the struc­tu­ring of the new faci­lity manage­ment plat­form, Altera Faci­lity Solu­ti­ons GmbH, as well as on its first acqui­si­tion, the purchase of DAV Gebäu­de­ser­vice GmbH. With this merger, Constel­la­tion Capital—through its Constel­la­tion VII fund—is laying the foun­da­tion for buil­ding a faci­lity manage­ment group in the DACH region. DAV will conti­nue to operate inde­pendently in the market and, as a foun­ding company of Altera, will play a central role within the group. DAV’s current mana­ging direc­tor and share­hol­der will remain invol­ved in opera­ti­ons and will acquire a stake in Altera as part of the transaction. 

CONSTELLATION CAPITAL AG is a Swiss invest­ment group foun­ded in 1992 and head­quar­te­red in Frei­en­bach on Lake Zurich. CONSTELLATION pursues a buy-and-build stra­tegy focu­sed on acqui­ring majo­rity stakes in mid-sized compa­nies in the busi­ness services, educa­tion & life­style, and health­care sectors within the DACH region. 

Altera Faci­lity Solu­ti­ons GmbH is set to become a leading faci­lity manage­ment services group in the German-spea­king world. The future compa­nies will bene­fit from shared struc­tures, proven opera­tio­nal stan­dards, and the profes­sio­na­liza­tion of proces­ses and systems. 

DAV Gebäu­de­ser­vice GmbH, head­quar­te­red in Biele­feld, is a leading regio­nal provi­der of infra­struc­ture-rela­ted faci­lity manage­ment services. Foun­ded in 1930, the company specia­li­zes in routine and specia­li­zed clea­ning, floor resto­ra­tion, and faci­lity services for indus­trial, commer­cial, and admi­nis­tra­tive properties. 

Dr. Laeger’s team regu­larly advi­ses Constel­la­tion on tran­sac­tions, most recently inclu­ding the acqui­si­tion of Abresch Indus­trie­ver­pa­ckung GmbH.

Advi­sor to Constel­la­tion Capi­tal AG: ARQIS (Düssel­dorf)

Core Deal Team: Dr. Lars Laeger (Lead Part­ner), David Hudde (Mana­ging Asso­ciate, both Tran­sac­tions); Part­ners: Johan­nes Landry (Finan­cing), Dr. Ulrich Lien­hard (Real Estate); Coun­sel: Chris­tian Judis (Compli­ance, Munich), Jens Knip­ping (Tax), Nora Strat­mann (Commer­cial, Munich), Martin Wein­gärt­ner (HR Law), Mana­ging Asso­cia­tes: Anselm Graf (Tran­sac­tions, Munich), Johanna Klin­gen (Tech.Law), Diana Pucho­wezki (Real Estate), Rolf Tichy (IP, Munich), Asso­cia­tes: Dr. Lina Alami (Munich), Dr. Phil­ipp Treß (Berlin), Dr. Tim Weill (all HR.Law), Rebecca Gester (Commer­cial, Munich), Lia Papis­me­dova (Real Estate), Dr. Julia Wild­gans (IP, Munich)  

About ARQIS

ARQIS is an inde­pen­dent commer­cial law firm that opera­tes inter­na­tio­nally. Around 80 lawy­ers and legal specia­lists advise dome­stic and foreign compa­nies at the highest level on German, Euro­pean and Japa­nese commer­cial law. With its focus groups Tran­sac­tions, HR Law, Japan, Tech Law, Risk and Regu­la­tory, the firm is geared towards provi­ding its clients with compre­hen­sive advice. The law firm was foun­ded in 2006 and has offices in Düssel­dorf, Munich and Tokyo as well as a talent hub in Berlin. Further infor­ma­tion can be found at http://www.arqis.com.

Berlin — Farming smar­ter. Stenon announ­ced an €18 million Series B funding round to drive the expan­sion of its proprie­tary “Soil Intel­li­gence” tech­no­logy. The round was led by Pymwy­mic, the Euro­pean impact inves­tor, toge­ther with the DeepT­ech & Climate Fund (DTCF). Atlantic.vc has been support­ing the team since 2018 and is also parti­ci­pa­ting in this round. 

Follo­wing the funding round, Stenon aims to expand commer­ci­ally in Brazil and throug­hout the South Ameri­can market, in Central Asia, and in select Euro­pean count­ries. The company plans to launch a fully machine-inte­gra­ted, real-time nutri­ent analy­sis system later in 2026. 

“Real-time soil data is the infra­struc­ture of modern agri­cul­ture. Stenon has laid the ground­work for deli­ve­ring it on a large scale. Today, farmers make ferti­li­zer decis­i­ons worth milli­ons of euros based on soil data that is alre­ady weeks old. Stenon closes this gap right in the field—backed by a sensor system that’s truly diffi­cult to repli­cate and a scalable hard­ware-as-a-service (SaaS) model. “This is exactly the kind of deep-tech company DTCF invests in, and we look forward to support­ing the team as it grows,” said Dr. Achim Plum, Mana­ging Direc­tor at DTCF.

“What convin­ced me is that the Stenon team didn’t just deve­lop a better measu­re­ment tool. Using AI-powered real-time analy­sis and a smart SaaS model, it has crea­ted a true plat­form business—one with the poten­tial to bring about a lasting change in agri­cul­tu­ral ferti­liza­tion prac­ti­ces. This combi­na­tion of tech­ni­cal depth and commer­cial clarity is rare,” explains Günther Bogen­rie­der, Invest­ment Mana­ger at DTCF.

Nitro­gen Ferti­li­zer: The Inven­tion of the Century

In 1909, Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch deve­lo­ped the Haber-Bosch process for produ­cing nitro­gen ferti­li­zer in a labo­ra­tory in Karls­ruhe. It is conside­red one of the most important disco­veries of the 20th century, as it drasti­cally increased crop yields and enab­led the planet to cope with a popu­la­tion explo­sion from 1.6 billion people at that time to over 8 billion today. Modern agriculture—the global food system—relies on nitro­gen ferti­li­zer; half of the entire food produc­tion system depends on it today. 

Nitro­gen ferti­li­zer has enab­led humanity’s unpre­ce­den­ted growth, but in doing so has caused syste­ma­tic envi­ron­men­tal damage. Today, the process consu­mes 2% of the world’s total energy and accounts for 1.3% of global energy-rela­ted CO₂ emis­si­ons. The produc­tion of nitro­gen ferti­li­zer is heavily depen­dent on natu­ral gas, which means that the global food supply is directly linked to one of the world’s most contro­ver­sial, vola­tile, and geopo­li­ti­cally sensi­tive commo­di­ties. Since 40% of global nitro­gen exports are control­led by just four count­ries (Russia, China, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia), the most vital part of our societies—food production—is expo­sed to extreme shocks. Just consider the Strait of Hormuz, the only mari­time corri­dor through which appro­xi­m­ately 30% of the global ferti­li­zer trade passes—a corri­dor that can alter the econo­mic viabi­lity of food produc­tion overnight. 

Syste­mic Depen­dence on Nitro­gen Fertilizer

And yet there is no way out. If synthe­tic nitro­gen were phased out without a repla­ce­ment, the global food system would collapse. Nitro­gen ferti­li­zer is one of the world’s most important raw mate­ri­als, as crop yields and food prices depend directly on it. 

The finan­cial pres­sure is alre­ady acute: Accor­ding to the Euro­pean Commis­sion, in April 2026, prices for nitro­gen ferti­li­zer across the Euro­pean Union were 71% above their 2024 average. In the first quar­ter of 2025, more U.S. farmers filed for bank­ruptcy than in any full year since 2021. A survey by the Ameri­can Farm Bureau Fede­ra­tion reve­a­led that 70% of U.S. farmers could not afford the ferti­li­zer they needed for the season. 

More than half of the nitro­gen applied is still lost due to subop­ti­mal utiliza­tion. The goal is not neces­s­a­rily to elimi­nate the need for nitro­gen ferti­li­zer enti­rely, but to mini­mize it. This can be achie­ved through the incre­asing profes­sio­na­liza­tion of agri­cul­ture. For deca­des, to deter­mine how much nitro­gen a field actually contai­ned, farmers had to take soil samples and wait weeks for the lab results. By the time the results were available, mois­ture and tempe­ra­ture had alre­ady alte­red the nitro­gen profile, and the data was outda­ted. Farmers had no choice but to apply ferti­li­zer based on gene­ral histo­ri­cal averages—the most expen­sive guess in modern agri­cul­ture, one that puts the entire econo­mic viabi­lity of their opera­ti­ons at risk. 

Incre­asing Yields and Redu­cing Risks in Agriculture

A century after Haber and Bosch brought their disco­very from the labo­ra­tory to the market in Germany, Stenon did the same, focu­sing on the problem of the effec­tive use of nitro­gen ferti­li­zer. Stenon began deve­lo­ping advan­ced sensor tech­no­lo­gies and data-driven solu­ti­ons for agri­cul­ture in 2018. Over the past ten years, the company has brought this tech­no­logy to market. Farms that use Stenon reduce their nitro­gen use by 20–40% while incre­asing their yields by 2–8%.

“While farmers have no control over the global supply of nitro­gen or its prices, they can control how precis­ely each kilo­gram is applied. By combi­ning real-time measu­re­ments of plant-available nitro­gen with insights into soil orga­nic carbon (SOC), we help our custo­mers make better short-term ferti­liza­tion decis­i­ons and deve­lop a longer-term perspec­tive on soil produc­ti­vity,” Niels Grab­bert, foun­der and CEO of Stenon.

About Stenon

Stenon was foun­ded in 2018 and is head­quar­te­red in Pots­dam. The company deve­lops real-time soil data infra­struc­tures for the agri­cul­tu­ral sector. Its Farm­Lab plat­form combi­nes proprie­tary opti­cal and elec­tri­cal sensor tech­no­logy, AI, and cloud soft­ware to measure key soil para­me­ters directly in the field and trans­late them into agro­no­mic decis­i­ons. The tech­no­logy is alre­ady being used in South America, Central Asia, and Europe, helping farmers increase their crop yields and reduce their use of nitro­gen fertilizer. 

About DeepT­ech & Climate Fund

The DeepT­ech & Climate Fund (DTCF) invests up to €50 million in high-growth deep-tech and climate-tech compa­nies in Germany and Europe. As an anchor inves­tor and part­ner of long-term orien­ted Euro­pean inves­tors, the DTCF supports compa­nies with long deve­lo­p­ment cycles and high finan­cing needs in imple­men­ting sustainable growth stra­te­gies and actively contri­bu­tes to the expan­sion of the tech­no­logy ecosys­tem. The fund acts as a bridge between inves­tors, medium-sized compa­nies, and inno­va­tive high-tech start­ups in the fields of climate, compu­ting, indus­try, and life scien­ces. Finan­ced by the German Future Fund and the ERP Special Fund, the DTCF plans to invest €1 billion in the coming years to streng­then the Euro­pean tech­no­logy ecosys­tem. — https://dtcf.de/

About Atlantic.vc

Atlantic.vc is a Berlin-based venture capi­tal firm that invests in outstan­ding teams and tech­no­lo­gies across Europe. Since its foun­ding in 2016, Atlantic.vc has supported over 150 teams as the lead inves­tor in their first funding rounds. — https://atlantic.vc/