Author: Tatjana Anderer

Munich — The Finnish eleva­tor manu­fac­tu­rer Kone is taking over its German compe­ti­tor TK Eleva­tor. The finan­cial inves­tors Advent and Cinven are recei­ving five billion euros in cash and Kone shares worth 15.2 billion euros for the company. The tran­sac­tion implies an enter­prise value of 29.4 billion euros inclu­ding debt. This makes the tran­sac­tion the largest majo­rity spon­sor-led private equity tran­sac­tion in Europe to date. 

The combi­ned company would gene­rate annual sales of around EUR 20.5 billion, of which around 65% would come from service and moder­niza­tion, achieve an adjus­ted EBIT of more than EUR 2.7 billion (exclu­ding syner­gies) and have a main­ten­ance port­fo­lio of around 3.2 million units.

Kirk­land & Ellis has advi­sed Advent and Cinven on the comple­tion of an agree­ment to combine TK Eleva­tor (“TKE”) and KONE in a tran­sac­tion invol­ving cash and KONE shares as consideration.

TKE is a global leader in the field of verti­cal trans­por­ta­tion and urban mobi­lity. The company has around 50,000 employees and over 1,000 loca­ti­ons world­wide. TKE became inde­pen­dent after the spin-off from Thys­sen­krupp AG in 2020. KONE is a global leader in the eleva­tor and escala­tor indus­try with more than 60,000 employees in around 70 count­ries. KONE’s Class B shares are listed on Nasdaq Helsinki Ltd. in Finland. 

Advi­sors to Advent and Cinven: Kirk­land & Ellis, Munich

Prof. Dr. Benja­min Leyen­de­cker (photo © Kirk­land), Dr. Philip Goj (both lead, both Private Equity/M&A), Dr. Michael Ehret (Tax); Asso­cia­tes: Dr. Marcus Comman­deur, Dr. Fried­rich Focke, Fabian Water­höl­ter, Lisa Müller, Dr. Sabrina Seitz, Chiara Schmid (all Private Equity/M&A), Emma­nuel Götz (Tax)
Kirk­land & Ellis, London:
Adrian Maguire, Dan Clarke (both Private Equity/M&A), Antoine Lebi­en­venu (Capi­tal Markets), Chris­to­pher Shield, Thomas Raftery (both Debt Finance), Mavnick Nerwal, Sivanti Deva­ku­mar (both Tax), André Duminy (Tech­no­logy & IP Tran­sac­tions); Asso­cia­tes: Charles Hébert, Bene­dict Wilson, Saniya Sidhu, Albert Planella i Obach (all Private Equity/M&A), Aram Vale­syan, Aman Nath, Zoe O’Log­bon (all Debt Finance), Ellen Ronayne (Tax), Asmita Singhvi (Tech­no­logy & IP Transactions)

About Kirk­land

With more than 4,000 lawy­ers in 23 cities in the USA, Europe, the Middle East and Asia, Kirk­land & Ellis is one of the leading law firms for high-cali­ber legal services. The German team specia­li­zes in private equity, M&A, restruc­tu­ring, corpo­rate and capi­tal markets, finan­cing and tax. For more infor­ma­tion, please visit kirkland.com.

Düssel­dorf — For the first time, NRW.BANK is inves­t­ing speci­fi­cally in South West­pha­lia toge­ther with Early­bird from Berlin and seve­ral family offices. At the current closing of the Early­bird VIII early-stage fund, EUR 15 million was mobi­li­zed for start-ups from the region. The aim is to streng­then the regi­on’s inno­va­tive power and competitiveness. 

“Inno­va­tions with which we shape the future are crea­ted all over the coun­try — even away from the major metro­po­li­tan areas. That’s why we support start-ups in all regi­ons of our state and thus actively drive change and progress,” says Johanna Anto­nie Tjaden-Schulte, Member of the Mana­ging Board of NRW.BANK (Photo: NRW Bank). “The fact that we are inves­t­ing in South West­pha­lia toge­ther with Early­bird and important family offices is a strong signal for the inno­va­tive strength and attrac­ti­ve­ness of South West­pha­lia as a loca­tion and for North Rhine-West­pha­lia as a whole.” 

First regio­nal closing in the Early­bird VIII fund

In addi­tion to the five million euros from NRW.BANK, private inves­tors also parti­ci­pa­ted in the current closing. These include, for exam­ple, the family offices of large family busi­nesses such as Viega and Krom­ba­cher. A total of EUR 15 million is thus available to turn young and promi­sing busi­ness ideas from South West­pha­lia, parti­cu­larly in areas such as arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence, robo­tics, new mate­ri­als, indus­trial digi­ta­liza­tion and sustainable tech­no­lo­gies, into viable compa­nies. This also streng­thens the inno­va­tive power and econo­mic deve­lo­p­ment of the region as a whole. 

For Early­bird, one of the most renow­ned early-stage finan­ciers in Germany, the current closing is the first targe­ted commit­ment in a region of North Rhine-West­pha­lia. The fund’s manage­ment had speci­fi­cally recrui­ted NRW.BANK as a part­ner in order to streng­then the commit­ment with addi­tio­nal exper­tise and expe­ri­ence for the start-up scene in NRW and South West­pha­lia. The part­ner­ship between Early­bird and NRW.BANK had alre­ady proven its worth in two previous funds. The Early­bird VIII fund has a total volume of EUR 360 million, which flows into start-ups throug­hout Europe. In South West­pha­lia, the Early­bird Inno­Ven­tures team pools capi­tal and know-how from the regio­nal economy to promote and finance tech­no­logy-driven start-ups from the region. 

About NRW.BANK — Deve­lo­p­ment Bank for North Rhine-Westphalia

NRW.BANK is the deve­lo­p­ment bank for North Rhine-West­pha­lia. In close part­ner­ship with its owner, the state of North Rhine-West­pha­lia, it helps to streng­then SMEs and start-ups, create afforda­ble housing and improve public infra­struc­ture. NRW.BANK offers people, compa­nies and muni­ci­pa­li­ties in NRW tailor-made finan­cing and advi­sory services. It works with finan­cing part­ners, in parti­cu­lar all banks and savings banks, on a non-compe­ti­tive basis. In order to streng­then the trans­for­ma­tion proces­ses, it provi­des targe­ted promo­tio­nal impe­tus — towards a sustainable, climate-neutral and digi­tal NRW.

Munich — The Munich-based Tech­Bio company mbio­mics has successfully expan­ded its Series A finan­cing round to a total of 30 million euros. The company intends to use the capi­tal to drive forward the clini­cal deve­lo­p­ment of its lead candi­date and further expand its scalable plat­form for micro­biome-based thera­pies. Inves­tors include the exis­ting inves­tors MIG Fonds and Bayern Kapital. 

mbio­mics GmbH from Munich/Neuried has comple­ted the third closing of its Series A finan­cing round of 12 million euros, raising a total of 30 million euros.

The company plans to use the addi­tio­nal funds to further expand its precli­ni­cal data packa­ges in prepa­ra­tion for an IND submis­sion and to acce­le­rate GMP deve­lo­p­ment and produc­tion. The focus will be on prepa­ring the clini­cal trial of the lead candi­date MBX-116, which is to be used as a co-therapy with immune check­point inhi­bi­tors in advan­ced mela­n­oma. The start of a phase 1b trial is plan­ned for 2027. 

mbio­mics deve­lops so-called Live Biothe­ra­peu­tic Products (LBPs) — oral thera­peu­tics based on live bacte­rial strains. The aim is to harness the func­tional and meta­bo­lic poten­tial of the gut micro­biome in a stan­dar­di­zed, phar­maceu­ti­cal format. While fecal micro­biota trans­plants have alre­ady shown the effi­cacy of micro­biome-based approa­ches, they are conside­red diffi­cult to scale up. This is where mbio­mics comes in with a proprie­tary tech­no­logy plat­form that enables the design, analy­sis and produc­tion of complex micro­bial consortia. 

The plat­form combi­nes AI- and machine lear­ning-based methods with proprie­tary analy­sis tech­no­lo­gies and scalable co-culti­va­tion and scree­ning approa­ches. In this way, the company aims to advance the deve­lo­p­ment of defi­ned micro­bial commu­ni­ties and use them speci­fi­cally for thera­peu­tic applications. 

“While the clini­cal poten­tial of the gut micro­biome is well unders­tood, the deve­lo­p­ment of micro­biome-based thera­peu­tics into scalable products has been a signi­fi­cant tech­ni­cal chall­enge. At mbio­mics, we are solving this problem by buil­ding a complete tech­no­logy stack for the design, analy­sis, scree­ning and manu­fac­tu­ring of complex micro­bial consor­tia. Our focus is now on brin­ging our lead candi­date MBX-116 into clini­cal trials,” says Dr. Johan­nes B. Wöhr­stein, CEO and Co-Foun­der of mbio­mics.

In addi­tion to onco­logy, mbio­mics is working on a broa­der pipe­line of micro­biome-based thera­peu­tics. The aim is to address other indi­ca­ti­ons in which the gut micro­biome plays a central role, inclu­ding auto­im­mune and neuro­de­ge­nera­tive diseases.

Berlin — YPOG provi­ded legal advice to Stutt­gart-based startup Seract on its Series B finan­cing round. The round has a total volume of USD 110 million and was led by Head­line. Other new inves­tors include Bull­hound Capi­tal, Daphni and Felix Capi­tal. Exis­ting inves­tors, inclu­ding Crean­dum, Point Nine and Air Street Capi­tal, parti­ci­pa­ted again. 

Sere­act was foun­ded by Dr. Ralf Gulde and Marc Tuscher in Stutt­gart and deve­lops AI models for robots that are used in the physi­cal world. The company does not build its own hard­ware, but supplies Cortex, an AI model that runs on a wide variety of robot plat­forms, whether one-armed, two-armed, huma­noid or statio­nary. The current Cortex 2 gene­ra­tion enables robots not only to react, but also to anti­ci­pate situa­tions and update them in real time. Sere­act is one of the worl­d’s most widely used provi­ders of AI picking robots, with over 200 systems in use in Europe and more than one billion produc­tion picks comple­ted. Its custo­mers include BMW, Daim­ler Truck, DHL, Merce­des-Benz, PepsiCo and Austrian Post. 

The fresh capi­tal will be used to scale Cortex 2 and enter the US market. Sere­act plans to open its first US office in Boston and build up a local sales, appli­ca­tion and engi­nee­ring team. The next stra­te­gic thrust is the area of cont­act-based work, such as the precise assem­bly of compon­ents or the inser­tion of sensi­tive compon­ents without dama­ging them. 

Sere­act had alre­ady closed a Series A round led by Crean­dum in Janu­ary 2025, on which YPOG also advised.

Consul­tant Sere­act: YPOG

Dr. Benja­min Ullrich/ Photo © Ypog (Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Berlin
Dr. Bene­dikt Flöter (IP/IT/Data Protec­tion), Part­ner, Berlin
Jörg Schr­ade (Tax), Part­ner, Munich
Anna Eick­meier (IP/IT/Data Protec­tion), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Berlin
Dr. Emma Peters (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Berlin
Silke Ricken (Corpo­rate), Asso­ciate, Berlin
Char­lotte Petrasch (IP/IT/Data Protec­tion), Asso­ciate, Berlin
Elmar Traut­mann (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­ciate, Berlin

www.ypog.com

The ICF’s Sustainable Inves­tor Summit (SIS) is the leading confe­rence series on sustaina­bi­lity and trans­for­ma­tion finance as well as impact inves­t­ing for insti­tu­tio­nal and semi-profes­sio­nal inves­tors in the entire DACH region. With over 230 spea­k­ers and 360+ orga­niza­ti­ons, concrete solu­ti­ons for sustainable trans­for­ma­tion will be discus­sed. Geopo­li­ti­cal and regu­la­tory chal­lenges require insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors to rethink their approach. 

The confe­rence takes place in three loca­ti­ons and covers topics such as tran­si­tion finance, private markets, regu­la­tory alpha and natu­ral capital.

The SIS supports the criti­cal role of inves­tors and asset mana­gers in promo­ting the tran­si­tion to a more sustainable economy. SIS brings toge­ther a broad range of stake­hol­ders — inclu­ding insti­tu­tio­nal and semi-profes­sio­nal inves­tors, asset mana­gers, corpo­ra­tes, policy makers, acade­mics, regu­la­tors, NGOs, banks, deve­lo­p­ment finance insti­tu­ti­ons and indus­try experts — to share insights and foster collaboration. 

The ICF Insti­tu­tio­nal Capi­tal Forum orga­ni­zes events for insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors in Germany, Austria and Switz­er­land. ICF confe­ren­ces, summits and round­ta­bles are held regu­larly, both as part of client events and as stand-alone events. 

Hans-Peter Dohr is the foun­der and Mana­ging Direc­tor of ICA Insti­tu­tio­nal Capi­tal Asso­cia­tes GmbH. Mario Weiss is Mana­ging Direc­tor at ICF Insti­tu­tio­nal Capi­tal Forum, c/o ICA Insti­tu­tio­nal Capi­tal Asso­cia­tes GmbH (Photo: ICF).

Frank­furt a. M. — Beyond Capi­tal Part­ners Fund III, advi­sed by Beyond Capi­tal Part­ners GmbH (“BCP”), has acqui­red a majo­rity stake in Munich-based SPCR Media GmbH (“SC Media House”) via its port­fo­lio company ECD Inter­na­tio­nal Holding GmbH (“ECD”). Signing and closing took place in April 2026. 

The influen­cer marke­ting agency SC Media House was foun­ded in 2018 by Oliver Huber and specia­li­zes in the concep­tion and imple­men­ta­tion of crea­tive and data-based campaigns for brands in order to achieve successful posi­tio­ning, target group-speci­fic reach and measura­ble results. With a broad network of content crea­tors, the agency combi­nes stra­te­gic consul­ting with authen­tic social media commu­ni­ca­tion and perfor­mance analysis. 

“Our goal is to connect talents, brands and compa­nies and help them tell unfor­gettable stories, create impres­sive events and share excep­tio­nal content. Toge­ther with our part­ners, we want to expand our service port­fo­lio in a targe­ted manner, tap into inter­na­tio­nal poten­tial and utilize and further deve­lop syner­gies with ECD Inter­na­tio­nal, one of the leading inter­na­tio­nal premium agen­cies for expe­ri­en­tial marke­ting,” says Oliver Huber, foun­der and Mana­ging Direc­tor of SC Media House.

With regard to the stra­te­gic importance of the part­ner­ship, Jörn Pfoten­hauer and Alex­an­der Oster­wald, foun­ders and Mana­ging Direc­tors of ECD Inter­na­tio­nal, explain: “With SC Media House, we are gaining a strong part­ner for the targe­ted expan­sion of our digi­tal marke­ting exper­tise in Germany. We were parti­cu­larly impres­sed by the struc­ture and posi­tio­ning of the company deve­lo­ped by Oliver Huber, which has crea­ted a strong foun­da­tion for sustainable growth in recent years. We see many syner­gies between our busi­ness areas and custo­mers, which we will conti­nue to deve­lop toge­ther. By pooling our respec­tive strengths, we are crea­ting the basis for expan­ding our offe­ring in a future-orien­ted manner and streng­thening our market posi­tion in the long term.” 

Chris­toph D. Kauter, foun­der and Mana­ging Part­ner of Beyond Capi­tal Part­ners, adds: “The influen­cer marke­ting sector in Germany is expe­ri­en­cing conti­nuous growth with a simul­ta­neous sharp increase in the use of social media, which is at an all-time high. With its broad network of micro-influen­cers and content crea­tors posi­tio­ned across Germany, SC Media House stands out as an attrac­tive stra­te­gic addi­tion to the ECD Group’s buy-and-build strategy.”

About SC Media House

SC Media House is an influen­cer marke­ting agency based in Munich. It deve­lops crea­tive, data-based campaigns and works with an inter­na­tio­nal network of content crea­tors to gene­rate targe­ted reach and measura­ble results for brands. — https://www.sc-mediahouse.com

About ECD Inter­na­tio­nal Holding

ECD Inter­na­tio­nal is a multi­di­sci­pli­nary and inter­na­tio­nally active full-service agency in the premium and luxury segment and offers first-class services such as brand manage­ment, live marke­ting, commu­ni­ca­tion, crea­tive work, custo­mer & guest rela­ti­ons and travel manage­ment for a deman­ding target group. — https://ecd-international.com/de

About Beyond Capi­tal Partners

Beyond Capi­tal Part­ners is an invest­ment company that acqui­res majo­rity stakes in profi­ta­ble medium-sized compa­nies from the DACH region with a focus on the asset-light sectors of services, IT, soft­ware, health­care, life­style and enter­tain­ment via the funds it advi­ses. This tran­sac­tion bene­fits from the support of the Euro­pean Union under the InvestEU fund. — https://beyondcapital-partners.com

HEUKING provi­ded compre­hen­sive support to the seller in struc­tu­ring and imple­men­ting the tran­sac­tion, inclu­ding the bidding process. The HEUKING team advi­sed SPCR Invest GmbH and the foun­der Oliver Huber during the entire sales process, inclu­ding the contract nego­tia­ti­ons as well as the signing and closing. 

Advi­sor SPCR Invest GmbH: HEUKING

Ulrich Weide­mann (lead), (M&A / Private Equity), Frankfurt,
Dr. Patrick Müller, LL.M. (Univer­sity of the West of England, Bris­tol), (lead), Laura Jochem, LL.M. (Univer­sity of East Anglia, Norwich), (all Private Equity / Venture Capi­tal), both Düsseldorf,
Moni­que Sandidge (Employ­ment Law), Klaus Weinand-Härer (Private Equity / Venture Capi­tal) Frankfurt;
Julian Rosen­feld (IP, Media & Tech­no­logy), Tors­ten Groß, LL.M. (Univer­sity of West­mins­ter), (Employ­ment Law), both Düsseldorf.

Helsinki (Finland) — Saxdor Yachts (foun­ded in 2019), a refe­rence brand in the entry-level small yacht segment, has been acqui­red by Malibu Boats, Inc (MBI). Foun­ded in 1982 in Loudon, Tennes­see, the Ameri­can manu­fac­tu­rer specia­li­zes in the design, produc­tion and marke­ting of small “fun-orien­ted” motor­boats (fishing boats, center conso­les, wake­board boats). Follo­wing the take­over worth around 150 million euros (175 million US dollars), Saxdor will operate as a subsi­diary of MBI, but will retain its brand iden­tity and full opera­tio­nal autonomy. 

Saxdor, which has recor­ded annual sales growth of 65% in recent years, rising from 109 million euros in 2024 to 180 million euros in 2025, has become one of the fastest growing boat manu­fac­tu­r­ers in the world. The fleet includes ten models from 20 to 46 feet and the company employs almost 1,000 people. 

The Finnish shipy­ard will now have access to signi­fi­cant resour­ces, a well-estab­lished infra­struc­ture and a shared vision of inno­va­tion — all key elements to support its inter­na­tio­nal growth. Saxdor will conti­nue to operate as an inde­pen­dent global brand with its own manage­ment team and foun­der Sakari Mattila in the role of Chief Desi­gner to ensure conti­nuity of crea­tive vision and product strategy. 

MBI has an annual turno­ver of more than 800 million dollars, employs over 2,000 people in eight produc­tion faci­li­ties and sells more than 5,000 boats every year. In this segment, this tran­sac­tion repres­ents a signi­fi­cant acqui­si­tion that promi­ses to open up new commer­cial and tech­no­lo­gi­cal oppor­tu­ni­ties in the small boat segment. 

By joining the Malibu Group, Saxdor aims to streng­then its inter­na­tio­nal presence and expand into the most dyna­mic markets, with a focus on North America. The leisure boating segment, which is expec­ted to grow at a CAGR of 15% accor­ding to SSI data (2023–2025), offers fertile ground for Saxdor’s expan­sion, also thanks to its adven­ture yachts and its ability to attract a young clientele year­ning for new expe­ri­en­ces at sea. 

Mali­bu’s port­fo­lio, which is known for boats for water sports, luxury runa­bouts and deep-sea fishing and alre­ady includes the Malibu, Axis, Cobalt, Pursuit, Cobia, Path­fin­der, Maverick and Hewes brands, is now further enri­ched by the Finnish shipy­ar­d’s inno­va­tive and effi­ci­ent production.

M&A Advi­sor Saxdor: Clairfield

About Clair­field

Clair­field Inter­na­tio­nal provi­des family-owned busi­nesses, multi­na­tio­nal corpo­ra­ti­ons and finan­cial inves­tors with high-quality advice on mergers, acqui­si­ti­ons and dives­ti­tures in the mid-market, as well as other corpo­rate finance services, parti­cu­larly in cross-border tran­sac­tions. The success of the Clair­field part­ner­ship is defi­ned by the success of our clients. We are reco­gni­zed by top rankings in the market. 

We use expe­ri­en­ced senior consul­tants for every assign­ment. Our clients receive expert advice, guidance and insight along­side effi­ci­ent process manage­ment. We achieve outstan­ding results based on each client’s prio­ri­ties, our corpo­rate values and sustainable success. — www.clairfield.com

Frank­furt am Main — Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG (DBAG) has acqui­red a mino­rity stake in Bug Bounty Switz­er­land AG (BBS). The invest­ment is part of a long-term parti­ci­pa­tion and is made exclu­si­vely with funds from DBAG’s balance sheet. BBS, based in Lucerne, is the Swiss pioneer for ethi­cal hack­ing, intel­li­gent secu­rity test­ing and the service-as-soft­ware model. DBAG, toge­ther with lead inves­tor Diret­tis­sima Growth Part­ners, is inves­t­ing as part of a capi­tal increase, which will be used exclu­si­vely for the further growth of the company. Diret­tis­sima is a Euro­pean growth equity inves­tor based in Zurich and Munich with opera­tio­nal scale-up expe­ri­ence in the B2B tech­no­logy sector. 

With the Cyber Resi­li­ence Shield secu­rity plat­form, BBS enables its custo­mers to carry out conti­nuous, scalable secu­rity assess­ments of their entire expo­sed attack surface without inter­nal specia­lists or frag­men­ted indi­vi­dual solu­ti­ons. Human+Machine: Bug Bounty Switz­er­land combi­nes 16,000 experts with AI tech­no­logy to provide orga­niza­ti­ons and compa­nies with a strong phalanx against poten­tial cyber­se­cu­rity risks. 

Stra­te­gic invest­ment in a fast-growing cyber­se­cu­rity provider

With its invest­ment in BBS, DBAG is expan­ding its port­fo­lio to include a profi­ta­ble, highly scalable provi­der in the struc­tu­rally growing cyber­se­cu­rity market. The company was foun­ded in 2020 by Sandro Nafzger, Florian Badert­scher and Lukas Hepp­ler in Lucerne and was built up enti­rely on its own without exter­nal finan­cing. BBS has successfully made the tran­si­tion from a project-based service model to the Cyber Resi­li­ence Shield subscrip­tion plat­form with a high propor­tion of recur­ring reve­nue. BBS now has around 52 custo­mers, inclu­ding the fede­ral govern­men­t’s Natio­nal Cyber Secu­rity Center (NCSC) and leading compa­nies in the finan­cial services, defense and criti­cal infra­struc­ture sectors. The foun­ding team conti­nues to hold the majo­rity of shares and plays a key role in shaping the stra­te­gic direction. 

Invest­ments from balance sheet funds enable long-term partnerships

DBAG’s long-term invest­ment stra­tegy focu­ses on mino­rity share­hol­dings for which funds are used exclu­si­vely from the company’s own balance sheet. This enables a holding period that extends beyond the usual term of a private equity fund invest­ment and offers grea­ter flexi­bi­lity in the stra­te­gic orien­ta­tion and growth support of the port­fo­lio compa­nies. To date, DBAG has inves­ted in six other compa­nies as part of this invest­ment stra­tegy, one of which has alre­ady been sold in full and another partially. 

Intel­li­gent secu­rity tests for the AI era

BBS addres­ses one of the most pres­sing struc­tu­ral chal­lenges of digi­ta­liza­tion: with the incre­asing use of AI, attack surfaces, attack speed and attack comple­xity are incre­asing simul­ta­neously. BBS meets this deve­lo­p­ment with a proprie­tary service-as-soft­ware approach that consis­t­ently combi­nes human and machine intel­li­gence: The plat­form orchestra­tes over 16,000 vetted ethi­cal hackers and AI agents in a closed loop that conti­nuously models, tests and evalua­tes each custo­mer’s attack surface. This provi­des compa­nies with long-term active protec­tion. The decisive compe­ti­tive advan­tage lies in the orchestra­tion level, the regu­la­tory work­flows and the accu­mu­la­ted insti­tu­tio­nal test­ing know­ledge. Combi­ned, this is a stra­te­gic advan­tage that is struc­tu­rally diffi­cult to repli­cate. In addi­tion, Bug Bounty Switz­er­land not only offers test­ing proce­du­res, but above all trans­pa­rency. Findings are conti­nuously trans­la­ted into the respec­tive corpo­rate context and the corre­spon­ding risk assess­ments. This means that all rele­vant demand groups remain capa­ble of acting. 

Tom Alzin, CEO, Deut­sche Betei­li­gungs AG, says: “BBS is addres­sing a market that is getting bigger, not smal­ler, thanks to AI. The company controls precis­ely the part of the value chain that no auto­ma­tion has been able to replace so far: the orchestra­tion of the entire secu­rity test­ing program, embedded in the speci­fic context of each custo­mer. The fact that BBS has built up this model comple­tely and profi­ta­bly on its own is a strong quality feature. We see this as a long-term part­ner­ship with considera­ble poten­tial for added value.” 

“BBS combi­nes three things that rarely come toge­ther: a diffe­ren­tia­ted product built on years of proprie­tary know-how and data, profi­ta­ble opera­ti­ons from the start without exter­nal funding, and a market where conti­nuous cyber­se­cu­rity test­ing of best prac­tice is beco­ming the stan­dard. The team has earned the privi­lege of rede­fi­ning and leading this cate­gory,” says Phil­ipp Bolli­ger, Part­ner at Diret­tis­sima Growth Partners. 

Growth poten­tial in a struc­tu­rally growing market

The global market for cyber­se­cu­rity test­ing is growing at an annual rate of 25% (USD 14.7 billion in 2024 to an expec­ted USD 43.9 billion in 2029). This is driven by incre­asing regu­la­tion, parti­cu­larly in the finan­cial services, defense and criti­cal infra­struc­ture sectors, as well as the expan­sion of attack surfaces due to AI and the struc­tu­ral shift from selec­tive to conti­nuous secu­rity solu­ti­ons. Accor­ding to a recent market study by Houli­han Lokey, 91% of the compa­nies surveyed plan to increase their spen­ding on cyber secu­rity in 2026. Cyber­se­cu­rity is conside­red to be one of the areas that will bene­fit struc­tu­rally from AI deve­lo­p­ment instead of being disrupted. 

“While AI is funda­men­tally rede­fi­ning cyber secu­rity, orga­niza­ti­ons need protec­tion that is conti­nuous, intel­li­gent and easy to use. That’s exactly what we’re alre­ady deli­ve­ring to some of Euro­pe’s most secu­rity-conscious orga­niza­ti­ons — and now we’re brin­ging it to market globally. With the support of Diret­tis­sima and DBAG, we are making intel­li­gent secu­rity test­ing the new stan­dard,” says Sandro Nafzger, CEO & Co-Foun­der of Bug Bounty Switz­er­land AG.

Inter­na­tio­na­liza­tion and scaling as the next growth phase

Toge­ther with the manage­ment and lead inves­tor Diret­tis­sima Growth Part­ners, DBAG plans to profes­sio­na­lize the orga­niza­tion, acce­le­rate growth in Switz­er­land and deve­lop inter­na­tio­nal markets. In parti­cu­lar, DBAG will contri­bute its access to the German-spea­king and Italian regi­ons and its exper­tise in scaling high-growth companies.

Korea/Stuttgart — Gleiss Lutz is advi­sing Hanwha Aero­space (“Hanwha”), a global leader in the defense and aero­space indus­try head­quar­te­red in South Korea, on its entry into the German defense market.

The core company of the Hanwha Group, one of South Kore­a’s largest indus­trial conglo­me­ra­tes and a Fortune 500 company, is plan­ning substan­tial invest­ments in Germany by estab­li­shing produc­tion faci­li­ties and part­ner­ships with the German secu­rity and defense indus­try and regio­nal suppli­ers. — The port­fo­lio includes artil­lery systems, armored vehic­les, precis­ion-guided muni­ti­ons, aircraft engi­nes and satel­lite and space technologies. 

With the estab­lish­ment of its German subsi­diary, Hanwha Defence Deutsch­land (HDD), Hanwha has reached a key mile­stone in its entry into the German market. This is part of a broa­der growth stra­tegy to posi­tion Germany as a Euro­pean hub for NATO-rela­ted defense acti­vi­ties and to streng­then the capa­bi­li­ties of the Bundes­wehr and its Euro­pean allies. 

Advi­sor Hanwha Aero­space: GLEISS LUTZ 

Dr. Anselm Chris­ti­an­sen (part­ner, corporate/M&A, lead) and Dr. Chris­toph Goller, photo © Gleiss Lutz (defense secu­rity, both Stuttgart);
Dr. Michael Burian (part­ner, Frank­furt), Jose­fine Wiegand, Sonja Hilgert (both Berlin) and Sumiko Sato (all corporate/M&A, Munich), Dr. Marc Ruttl­off (part­ner), Dr. Frie­de­rike Niemann, Simon Kaifel (all Public Law), Prof. Dr. Eric Wagner (Part­ner), Dr. Simon Wagner (Coun­sel, both Commer­cial, all Stutt­gart), Dr. Rut Stein­hau­ser (Part­ner), Dr. Sophie Bahr, Leon Werlitz (Employ­ment Law), Dr. Alex­an­der Molle (Part­ner, all Berlin), Chris­tian Eulen­pesch (Coun­sel, Stuttgart,
both IP/Tech).

Kitz­bü­hel (Austria) — Funds advi­sed by EMERAM have inves­ted in the tech­no­logy company Solar Mana­ger AG (“Solar Mana­ger”). Foun­ded in 2018 in Muri, Switz­er­land, the company deve­lops a Home Energy Manage­ment System (HEMS) that holi­sti­cally controls and opti­mi­zes energy flows in house­holds — from photo­vol­taics and storage to heat pumps and e‑mobility. The tran­sac­tion under­lines EMER­AM’s stra­tegy of part­ne­ring with high-growth tech­no­logy compa­nies in the fields of energy tran­si­tion, digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion and health & wellbeing. 

Solar Mana­ger has successfully estab­lished itself on the market with a scalable B2B2C sales model. The company works closely with whole­sa­lers and their instal­la­tion part­ners, offers white label solu­ti­ons for large instal­la­tion compa­nies, muni­ci­pal utili­ties and energy service provi­ders and is expan­ding OEM part­ner­ships with manu­fac­tu­r­ers of battery storage systems and heat pumps in order to inte­grate the soft­ware directly into hard­ware solu­ti­ons. Driven by advan­cing elec­tri­fi­ca­tion, the expan­sion of rene­wa­ble ener­gies and the incre­asing demand for energy effi­ci­ency and grid flexi­bi­lity, Solar Mana­ger has expe­ri­en­ced above-average growth in recent years. With the foun­ding of the German subsi­diary three years ago, the company took the next step and is now one of the leading play­ers in Switz­er­land and Germany. 

“Solar Mana­ger is alre­ady helping more than 50,000 house­holds to manage their energy intel­li­gently and maxi­mize self-consump­tion from rene­wa­ble sources,” says Andreas Kuhn, Mana­ging Direc­tor and co-foun­der of Solar Mana­ger along­side Corinne Kuhn and Hans Fischer. “With EMERAM, we have gained an expe­ri­en­ced growth part­ner who will support us with stra­te­gic exper­tise and a strong network in the energy sector. Toge­ther, we want to further expand our market posi­tion and actively shape the energy tran­si­tion. Our goal is to become the leading holi­stic energy manage­ment solu­tion in Europe and to play a decisive role in shaping future topics such as bidi­rec­tional char­ging and the seam­less inte­gra­tion of a wide variety of produ­cers and consu­mers into the energy system.” 

Matthias Ober­meyr, Part­ner at EMERAM, adds: “The market for intel­li­gent home energy manage­ment systems is in a strong growth phase. More and more property owners want to network their photo­vol­taic systems, battery storage systems and elec­tric vehic­les and actively parti­ci­pate in the energy market. The Solar Mana­ger team has quickly built up a tech­no­lo­gi­cally leading company with a convin­cing busi­ness model and estab­lished itself as a tech­no­logy leader. As a busi­ness deve­lo­p­ment part­ner, we want to further deve­lop the recur­ring soft­ware busi­ness, drive expan­sion in Germany and jointly deve­lop other Euro­pean markets. We are convin­ced that toge­ther we can deve­lop Solar Mana­ger into a Euro­pean champion.”

Advi­sors:
As part of the tran­sac­tion, EMERAM was advi­sed by Strategy& (commer­cial due dili­gence), Base Camp (ESG & tech­ni­cal due dili­gence), Radial (finan­cial due dili­gence) and Schel­len­berg Witt­mer (legal & tax).

The seller side was supported by Wenger Vieli (Legal & Tax).

About EMERAM — www.emeram.com

EMERAM is one of the leading invest­ment mana­gers for medium-sized compa­nies in German-spea­king count­ries. Funds advi­sed by EMERAM provide more than 700 million euros in capi­tal for the deve­lo­p­ment of growing compa­nies. The port­fo­lio includes tech­no­logy-driven compa­nies in the areas of digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion, energy tran­si­tion and health & wellbeing.
EMERAM acts as a long-term busi­ness deve­lo­p­ment part­ner and promo­tes the sustainable growth — both orga­ni­cally and through targe­ted acqui­si­ti­ons — of its port­fo­lio compa­nies. EMERAM also consis­t­ently focu­ses on the imple­men­ta­tion of holi­stic ESG concepts. The port­fo­lio curr­ently compri­ses nine plat­form invest­ments with a total of more than 3,000 employees. The compa­nies conti­nuously achieve double-digit orga­nic sales growth. More than 30 add-on acqui­si­ti­ons have also acce­le­ra­ted growth and enab­led inter­na­tio­nal expansion.

About Solar Mana­ger AG — www.solarmanager.ch

Solar Mana­ger is a leading and fast-growing provi­der of a home energy manage­ment system (HEMS) that helps homeow­ners to intel­li­gently control and opti­mize their energy consump­tion. To this end, local energy gene­ra­tion from photo­vol­taic systems is intel­li­gently networked toge­ther with elec­tri­city storage systems, heat pumps and char­ging stati­ons and other energy consu­mers as well as dyna­mic energy market prices. This signi­fi­cantly increa­ses the profi­ta­bi­lity of custo­mer systems and saves energy costs. The manu­fac­tu­rer-inde­pen­dent plat­form is compa­ti­ble with over 700 third-party devices — inclu­ding inver­ters, battery storage systems, heat pumps and elec­tric vehicle char­ging stati­ons The company offers specia­list trade busi­nesses and energy service provi­ders a manu­fac­tu­rer-inde­pen­dent system to supple­ment their exis­ting busi­ness or estab­lish a new one. The aim is to grow throug­hout Europe and further expand its posi­tion as a leading manu­fac­tu­rer-inde­pen­dent energy manage­ment system provider.

Munich/ Frank­furt a. M. — Bridge­point, one of the worl­d’s leading growth inves­tors in the mid-market, has acqui­red a majo­rity stake in iC Consult, the worl­d’s largest vendor-inde­pen­dent provi­der of iden­tity secu­rity services, head­quar­te­red in Munich. As part of this tran­sac­tion, Bridge­point is ente­ring into a part­ner­ship with the foun­der and CEO of iC Consult, Jürgen Bier­mann, and the manage­ment of iC Consult. Bier­mann and the manage­ment team will retain a stake in the company, while Carlyle will sell its entire holding.

The closing of the tran­sac­tion is subject to custo­mary condi­ti­ons, inclu­ding the neces­sary regu­la­tory appr­ovals, and is expec­ted to take place in the third quar­ter of 2026. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the purchase price or further details of the transaction. 

Foun­ded in 1997, iC Consult has grown to become the worl­d’s largest inde­pen­dent iden­tity secu­rity specia­list with more than 850 employees world­wide in North America, Europe and Asia. The company offers a compre­hen­sive port­fo­lio of consul­ting, imple­men­ta­tion, inte­gra­tion and mana­ged services to help orga­niza­ti­ons secure access to criti­cal IT systems and data. As a core compo­nent of modern cyber secu­rity archi­tec­tures, IAM ensu­res that the right users and systems have access to the right resour­ces at the right time. 

iC Consult supports major custo­mers from various indus­tries world­wide, inclu­ding finan­cial services, the auto­mo­tive and manu­fac­tu­ring indus­tries and the public sector. The services are firmly ancho­red in the custo­mers’ IT envi­ron­ments and form the basis for long-term custo­mer relationships. 

In recent years, the company has recor­ded strong growth — its Euro­pean busi­ness grew by around 20 percent annu­ally between 2020 and 2025. The company has also expan­ded its presence in the USA during this period. iC Consult opera­tes in a large and fast-growing market: The market for IAM services in Europe is esti­ma­ted at around €2.5 billion with expec­ted double-digit growth rates, driven by incre­asing cyber thre­ats, regu­la­tory requi­re­ments and the rapid proli­fe­ra­tion of digi­tal iden­ti­ties, inclu­ding those rela­ted to agen­tic AI. 

In part­ner­ship with Bridge­point and under the leader­ship of Jürgen Bier­mann, iC Consult will focus on driving its inter­na­tio­nal expan­sion, streng­thening its mana­ged services offe­ring and further inves­t­ing in AI-enab­led capa­bi­li­ties. In addi­tion, the company will moder­nize and further deve­lop its service port­fo­lio, conti­nue to grow through selec­tive acqui­si­ti­ons and build a scalable global IAM platform. 

Bridge­point has exten­sive expe­ri­ence in tech­no­logy and cyber secu­rity services and has assis­ted a number of specia­li­zed compa­nies, inclu­ding Infi­ni­gate, a value-added distri­bu­tor specia­li­zing in cyber secu­rity, and DataEx­pert, a specia­list in digi­tal foren­sics and cyber secu­rity services, and also has exten­sive expe­ri­ence in scaling inter­na­tio­nal tech­no­logy and services companies.

Jürgen Bier­mann, foun­der and CEO of iC Consult, said: “Today marks the begin­ning of an exci­ting new chap­ter for iC Consult. As an entre­pre­neu­rial part­ner, Bridge­point brings capi­tal, deep indus­try exper­tise and a strong track record in scaling busi­nesses inter­na­tio­nally. We share a clear goal of further streng­thening our posi­tion as the worl­d’s leading inde­pen­dent iden­tity secu­rity specia­list, expan­ding our global presence and trans­forming iC Consult into a truly AI-native company. Toge­ther, we will make targe­ted invest­ments in our people, our skills and our plat­form to deli­ver sustainable value to our clients — espe­ci­ally at a time when the rapid, AI-driven growth of digi­tal iden­ti­ties makes iden­tity secu­rity more important than ever.”

Chris­to­pher Brack­mann, Part­ner at Bridge­point and respon­si­ble for invest­ments in the DACH region, added: “iC Consult is an outstan­ding company in a struc­tu­rally attrac­tive and dyna­mi­cally growing market. Its leading posi­tion in the field of iden­tity secu­rity and its strong roots in Germany make the company an ideal part­ner for Bridge­point. We look forward to shaping the next phase of growth toge­ther with Jürgen and his team and to consis­t­ently driving forward the further expan­sion of a leading plat­form for iden­tity security.”

Maciej Chrys­tow­ski, Direc­tor in Bridge­poin­t’s tech­no­logy team, added: “iC Consult is charac­te­ri­zed in parti­cu­lar by its outstan­ding tech­no­lo­gi­cal exper­tise in a highly complex and busi­ness-criti­cal area of cyber secu­rity. With the growth acce­le­ra­ted by AI and the incre­asing comple­xity of digi­tal iden­ti­ties, iden­tity secu­rity is beco­ming even more important. We see considera­ble poten­tial to moder­nize and further deve­lop the plat­form in a targe­ted manner — inclu­ding by expan­ding capa­bi­li­ties for secu­ring agent-based AI. At the same time, we want to streng­then the mana­ged services offe­ring and selec­tively use M&A opti­ons to further streng­then the company’s inter­na­tio­nal presence.”

Consul­tant Bridgepoint:
Canac­cord Genuity and Piper Sand­ler (finance), Kirk­land & Ellis (legal), Altman Solon (commer­cial), EY Parthe­non (finance, tax, IT & cyber and ESG) and Marsh (insu­rance due diligence).

Consul­tant iC Consult and Carlyle:
Lincoln Inter­na­tio­nal (Finance), Latham & Watkins (Legal), McKin­sey & Company (Commer­cial) and PwC (Finance).

Consul­tant IC Consult: Poellath

Dr. Bene­dikt Hohaus (Part­ner, Manage­ment Parti­ci­pa­ti­ons, M&A/PE, Munich)
Silke Simmer (Coun­sel, Manage­ment Parti­ci­pa­ti­ons, M&A/PE, Munich)
Ida Süß (Senior Asso­ciate, Manage­ment Parti­ci­pa­ti­ons, M&A/PE, Munich)
www.pplaw.com

About Bridge­point

Bridge­point is one of the worl­d’s leading mid-market inves­tors specia­li­zing in private equity, infra­struc­ture, credit, secon­da­ries and private wealth. With over USD 98 billion in assets under manage­ment and a strong local presence in Europe, North America and Asia, Bridge­point combi­nes global reach with local market know­ledge and sector exper­tise to consis­t­ently deli­ver strong returns across cycles. 

About iC Consult

iC Consult is the worl­d’s largest inde­pen­dent provi­der of iden­tity secu­rity services. With over 850 experts and a global presence in North America, Europe and Asia — inclu­ding near­sho­ring and offs­ho­ring capa­bi­li­ties — we help the worl­d’s biggest brands protect and manage their digi­tal identities. 

We deli­ver custo­mi­zed iden­tity solu­ti­ons at the highest level — through in-depth exper­tise, conti­nuous inno­va­tion and state-of-the-art tech­no­lo­gies. As a trus­ted part­ner of over 30 leading iden­tity and cyber secu­rity vendors — and reco­gni­zed by leading analysts — we offer vendor-inde­pen­dent support to solve any iden­tity chall­enge. — Our end-to-end port­fo­lio includes all profes­sio­nal and mana­ged iden­tity secu­rity services: consul­ting, archi­tec­ture, imple­men­ta­tion, inte­gra­tion, support and opera­ti­ons. We help orga­niza­ti­ons drive key initia­ti­ves such as Zero Trust, Iden­tity Threat Detec­tion & Response and AI Secu­rity — inclu­ding the manage­ment and protec­tion of agen­tic AI envi­ron­ments and the use of GenAI to moder­nize their iden­tity infrastructure.

Lauterhofen/Nuremberg — Concen­tro Manage­ment AG has successfully advi­sed the share­hol­ders of Hein Verpa­ckun­gen GmbH on the sale of their company as M&A advi­sor. The buyer is Anta­lis S.A., a leading Euro­pean whole­sa­ler for paper, pack­a­ging and visual commu­ni­ca­tion solu­ti­ons. With the acqui­si­tion, Anta­lis S.A. is streng­thening its posi­tion in the fast-growing corru­ga­ted pack­a­ging segment and in the area of point-of-sale solu­ti­ons and is further expan­ding its value crea­tion in Europe. 

Since 2020, Anta­lis S.A. has been part of the Japa­nese Koku­sai Pulp & Paper Group, one of the worl­d’s leading paper and pack­a­ging groups. The stra­te­gic owner­ship struc­ture enables Anta­lis S.A. to have a very long-term invest­ment hori­zon, realize opera­tio­nal syner­gies across conti­nents and syste­ma­ti­cally expand its Euro­pean busi­ness — a decisive factor for the acqui­si­tion of Hein Verpackungen. 

Hein Verpa­ckun­gen GmbH, based in Lauter­ho­fen, is an estab­lished manu­fac­tu­rer of pack­a­ging and display solu­ti­ons. Foun­ded in 1928, the company is an estab­lished medium-sized company in the Nurem­berg metro­po­li­tan region. Its custo­mers include well-known compa­nies from the retail, elec­tro­nics and auto­mo­tive sectors. 

Concen­tro supported the sellers in the M&A process, from the prepa­ra­tion and struc­tu­ring of the tran­sac­tion to the acqui­si­tion of pros­pec­tive buyers and the successful closing with Anta­lis. “We are deligh­ted that we were able to support the share­hol­ders of Hein Verpa­ckun­gen with their company succes­sion. In Anta­lis, we have found a capa­ble part­ner who will ensure the stra­te­gic further deve­lo­p­ment of the company,” says Michael Raab, foun­der and respon­si­ble part­ner at Concen­tro. “We are parti­cu­larly plea­sed that we were able to realize a tailor-made solu­tion for the Hein family of entre­pre­neurs with an inter­na­tio­nally posi­tio­ned group of compa­nies,” adds project mana­ger Barbara Hamela. 

The tran­sac­tion under­lines the ongo­ing trend towards verti­cal inte­gra­tion in the Euro­pean pack­a­ging market, parti­cu­larly in the area of sustainable and custo­mi­zed pack­a­ging solutions.

Consul­tant Hein Verpa­ckun­gen GmbH: Project team Concen­tro Manage­ment AG

— Michael Rabb | Mana­ging Partner
— Emanuel Häuser | Senior Consultant
— Johan­nes Eisen­beiß | Senior Consultant

About Concen­tro Manage­ment AG

Concen­tro Manage­ment AG is a medium-sized consul­ting company specia­li­zing in trans­pa­rency (corpo­rate deve­lo­p­ment), tran­sac­tions (corpo­rate finance/M&A consul­ting) and turn­arounds. With over 45 employees at four loca­ti­ons in Germany, Concen­tro works in an imple­men­ta­tion and success-orien­ted manner. The aim is to gene­rate added value for the custo­mer through an indi­vi­dual consul­ting service. — www.concentro.de

Munich / Vienna / Amers­fo­ort (NL) — The listed indus­trial holding company Hydra­tec Indus­tries N.V. (“Hydra­tec”) has sold the Euro­pean mobi­lity busi­ness of its wholly-owned subsi­diary Helvoet Groep to Callista Asset Manage­ment 34 GmbH (“Callista”). The tran­sac­tion includes the Helvoet compa­nies in Belgium and Poland and is part of a stra­te­gic realignment of Hydra­tec. — MP Corpo­rate Finance advi­sed Hydra­tec exclu­si­vely and compre­hen­si­vely on the sale and in parti­cu­lar assis­ted in mana­ging the auction process and struc­tu­ring the tran­sac­tion. The tran­sac­tion marks the 78th successful tran­sac­tion in the auto­mo­tive & mobi­lity sector for MP Corpo­rate Finance. 

Dutch Helvoet Group stream­li­nes portfolio
Helvoet Groep is an inter­na­tio­nal supplier of precis­ion compon­ents made of engi­nee­ring poly­mers with a long-estab­lished market posi­tion in the mobi­lity sector. The Euro­pean mobi­lity busi­ness sold as part of the tran­sac­tion repres­ents around one third of Helvoe­t’s sales. The Group has strong engi­nee­ring exper­tise and an estab­lished produc­tion presence in Western and Eastern Europe. Hydra­tec, the listed Dutch parent company (Euron­ext Amster­dam, ticker: HYDRA), is dive­s­t­ing its Euro­pean Mobi­lity acti­vi­ties in order to focus more stron­gly on its core activities. 

Specia­li­zed carve-out inves­tor pursues growth stra­tegy at Helvoet

The buyer of the Euro­pean mobi­lity acti­vi­ties is Callista Asset Manage­ment 34 GmbH, an invest­ment vehicle belon­ging to the Callista Group. The Callista Group, based in Munich, is a private equity inves­tor specia­li­zing in carve-outs and trans­for­ma­tion. The compe­ti­tive posi­tion of Helvoet Belgium and Helvoet Poland is to be sustain­ably expan­ded through targe­ted opera­tio­nal measu­res and the streng­thening of exis­ting custo­mer relationships. 

Port­fo­lio stream­li­ning and carve-outs are defi­ning trends in auto­mo­tive M&A

The tran­sac­tion is an exam­ple of a deve­lo­p­ment that MP Corpo­rate Finance is incre­asingly obser­ving in the Euro­pean auto­mo­tive market: Indus­trial groups are making targe­ted use of dive­st­ments to shar­pen their stra­te­gic profile and sustain­ably increase share­hol­der value. MP’s team of experts navi­ga­ted through a complex situa­tion in the struc­tu­ral chal­lenges of the auto­mo­tive market. 

“The current M&A envi­ron­ment in the auto­mo­tive indus­try is charac­te­ri­zed by struc­tu­ral change, selec­tive acti­vity and a clear focus on port­fo­lio opti­miza­tion. Carve-outs have estab­lished them­sel­ves as a trend and are at the center of the stra­te­gic realignment of many OEMs and suppli­ers. In this chal­len­ging envi­ron­ment, we were able to achieve a very good result for Hydra­tec through intel­li­gent deal struc­tu­ring and tight manage­ment of the auction process,” explains Chris­to­pher Bräuer, Mana­ging Direc­tor & Share­hol­der at MP Corpo­rate Finance.

“MP provi­ded us with excel­lent support throug­hout the entire carve-out process from start to finish. MP’s in-depth auto­mo­tive exper­tise, combi­ned with its many years of carve-out expe­ri­ence, ensu­red a smooth process and led to the desi­red result,” commen­ted Bart Aangen­endt and Everien Slijk­huis, Co-CEOs of Hydra­tec.

About MP Corpo­rate Finance

MP Corpo­rate Finance is the leading inter­na­tio­nal M&A consul­tancy specia­li­zing in the indus­trial sector. As an expe­ri­en­ced part­ner, MP supports medium-sized compa­nies and manage­ment teams, private equity decis­ion-makers as well as entre­pre­neu­rial confi­dants in complex tran­sac­tions on both the sell and buy side and provi­des support in the context of capi­tal procu­re­ment, buy-and-build stra­te­gies, carve-outs or throug­hout the entire private equity life­cy­cle. MP was foun­ded in Vienna in the 1990s by Roman Göd and Gregor Nischer as the first Euro­pean M&A firm with a sector-focu­sed advi­sory approach. Today, the company employs more than 85 expe­ri­en­ced hands-on experts at five loca­ti­ons world­wide — in Vienna, Frank­furt, London, Istan­bul and Chicago — making it the largest indus­trial M&A team in Europe. With its unique sector focus, MP has successfully advi­sed on more than 700 indus­trial tran­sac­tions invol­ving invest­ment compa­nies, SMEs and corpo­ra­ti­ons. Further infor­ma­tion can be found at www.mp-corporatefinance.com

About Hydra­tec Indus­tries N.V.: https://www.hydratec.nl

About Helvoet: https://helvoet.com/

About Callista: https://www.callista-pe.de/

Munich / Lüne­burg — Liberta Part­ners has advi­sed on the acqui­si­tion of Arco Verrech­nungs­Sys­teme GmbH (“Arco”) by Medas facto­ring GmbH (“Medas”). With this acqui­si­tion, Medas conti­nues its stra­te­gic deve­lo­p­ment within the buy & build stra­tegy and streng­thens its posi­tion in the market for private medi­cal billing. 

Medas facto­ring GmbH acqui­res Arco Verrech­nungs­Sys­teme GmbH, ther­eby conso­li­da­ting its leading posi­tion in the market for private medi­cal billing. Toge­ther, Medas and Arco will serve more than 2,000 prac­ti­ces and faci­li­ties nati­on­wide. — Arco is an estab­lished provi­der of private medi­cal billing based in Lüne­burg. The company has a strong custo­mer base, high service quality and distinc­tive consul­ting exper­tise. Toge­ther, Medas and Arco will serve more than 2,000 prac­ti­ces and faci­li­ties nati­on­wide. The merger expands the Group’s regio­nal presence, comple­ments its service profile and crea­tes addi­tio­nal poten­tial for further growth. 

For Medas, the acqui­si­tion is a targe­ted step to further deve­lop the Group stra­te­gi­cally. Arco comple­ments Medas with a strong cultu­ral and profes­sio­nal fit as well as addi­tio­nal reach in the market. At the same time, the acqui­si­tion expands the basis for the further digi­ta­liza­tion of the busi­ness model, the scaling of proces­ses and the consis­tent imple­men­ta­tion of the buy & build strategy. 

Dr. Peter Franke, Part­ner at Liberta Part­ners, says: “The acqui­si­tion of Arco is a great success for Medas. It also under­lines how Liberta Part­ners, toge­ther with the manage­ment, is unlo­cking poten­tial through targe­ted acqui­si­ti­ons. In addi­tion to our digi­tal initia­ti­ves, this is a further step in the stra­te­gic deve­lo­p­ment of Medas. We would like to thank Mr. Ahrens for his trust.”

Vale­rie Zylka, Mana­ging Direc­tor of Medas facto­ring GmbH, and Ruvan Pili­ma­ta­l­auwe, Mana­ging Direc­tor of Medas Betei­li­gungs­ge­sell­schaft, add: “With Arco, we are gaining a company that perfectly comple­ments Medas both profes­sio­nally and cultu­rally. The acqui­si­tion broa­dens our custo­mer base, streng­thens our market presence and crea­tes an even better basis for the stra­te­gic deve­lo­p­ment of the group toge­ther with Liberta Partners. 

Klaus and Jens-Roland Ahrens, the foun­ders of Arco, explain: “It was crucial for us to find a part­ner who could further deve­lop Arco in our inte­rests and who also had the right stra­te­gic perspec­tive. With Medas and Liberta Part­ners, we have found exactly this constel­la­tion. From the outset, the discus­sions were based on trust, part­ner­ship and a solu­tion-orien­ted approach — and the imple­men­ta­tion was driven forward in a targe­ted manner in a short space of time.”

About Medas facto­ring GmbH

Medas facto­ring GmbH has specia­li­zed in private medi­cal billing for over 45 years and serves more than 1,500 clients throug­hout Germany. Medas combi­nes high billing quality and sound GOÄ exper­tise with effi­ci­ent proces­ses to relia­bly reli­eve practices. 

About Arco Verrech­nungs­Sys­teme GmbH

Arco Verrech­nungs­Sys­teme GmbH was foun­ded in Lüne­burg in 1998 and specia­li­zes in private medi­cal billing. The company stands for service-orien­ted support, high consul­ting quality and perso­nal custo­mer proximity. 

About Liberta Partners

Liberta Part­ners is an inde­pen­dent invest­ment company based in Munich that acqui­res and deve­lops medium-sized compa­nies in the DACH region over the long term. The focus is on succes­sion situa­tions and corpo­rate spin-offs. With a clear buy & build approach and its own corpo­rate deve­lo­p­ment team, Liberta Part­ners supports its port­fo­lio compa­nies in sustainable and successful corpo­rate deve­lo­p­ment. The main focus is on the digi­ta­liza­tion of the busi­ness model, the further deve­lo­p­ment of struc­tures and proces­ses and the imple­men­ta­tion of clear growth strategies.

Frank­furt am Main / Hano­ver — ox8 Corpo­rate Finance exclu­si­vely advi­sed the share­hol­ders of Vision­maxX Group (“Vision­maxX”) on the sale of a majo­rity stake to NORD Holding.

Vision­maxX was foun­ded in 2004 by Stef­fen Konrad and Jens Schlerf and has since deve­lo­ped into the leading IT part­ner for medi­cal prac­ti­ces with a focus on the dental sector in Germany. The compre­hen­sive service port­fo­lio ranges from IT infra­struc­ture and tele­ma­tics services to prac­tice soft­ware inte­gra­tion and IT secu­rity. With its sister company Vision­Care, the Group is alre­ady actively tapping into the care sector, ther­eby laying the foun­da­ti­ons for a cross-sector growth stra­tegy in outpa­ti­ent healthcare. 

Toge­ther with the foun­ders Stef­fen Konrad and Jens Schlerf, NORD Holding aims to deve­lop the Vision­maxX Group into the central digi­tal IT infra­struc­ture plat­form for the outpa­ti­ent health­care sector in the DACH region. Growth is to be driven both orga­ni­cally through expan­sion into neigh­bor­ing specia­list groups and care areas as well as through targe­ted part­ner­ships and acquisitions. 

“We are at the begin­ning of a new phase — for our company and for the digi­ta­liza­tion of the health­care sector as a whole. NORD Holding is a very entre­pre­neu­rial part­ner and gives us the means and reach to create what we had in mind from the outset: a company that makes ever­y­day life in medi­cal prac­ti­ces easier in the long term,” says Stef­fen Konrad.
Jens Schlerf adds: “We built Vision­maxX because we are convin­ced that doctors need a part­ner to whom they can fully entrust their IT — so that they can concen­trate on their pati­ents. With NORD Holding, we now have the support to bring this vision to the entire outpa­ti­ent health­care sector.”

Mario Sabljo (photo), Part­ner at NORD Holding, says: “Vision­maxX is exactly the kind of company that NORD Holding invests in: an inno­va­tive quality company with clear market leader­ship, a well-coor­di­na­ted foun­ding team and a market that is growing struc­tu­rally.” — Stef­fen Konrad empha­si­zes: “Throug­hout the entire process, the ox8 team showed excep­tio­nal commit­ment and dyna­mism, which gave us the feeling of being opti­mally supported at all times.”

About Vision­maxX Group

Vision­maxX was foun­ded in 2004 and is today the leading specia­li­zed mana­ged service provi­der for IT services in German medi­cal prac­ti­ces with a focus on the dental sector. The company offers a compre­hen­sive port­fo­lio of IT infra­struc­ture, tele­ma­tics, IT secu­rity and digi­tal prac­tice solu­ti­ons. With its sister company Vision­Care GmbH, the group is also active in the care sector. Vision­maxX employs around 150 people. — www.visionmaxx.net

About NORD Holding

NORD Holding is one of the first and most renow­ned German invest­ment compa­nies and has been successfully active as an equity part­ner for SMEs in the DACH region for over 55 years. The focus is on the Direct Invest­ments and Fund Invest­ments divisions.
The Direct Invest­ments divi­sion focu­ses on estab­lished medium-sized compa­nies that have a rele­vant market posi­tion or have the poten­tial to achieve this through joint further deve­lo­p­ment. NORD Holding curr­ently holds majo­rity inte­rests in more than 15 medium-sized compa­nies and mana­ges assets of around € 4.0 billion, inclu­ding the fund of funds busi­ness. The Fund Invest­ments divi­sion targets the micro and small-cap segment of SME-orien­ted private equity funds in Europe (primary, secon­dary and co-invest­ments) and regu­larly acts as an anchor investor.
— www.nordholding.de

About ox8 Corpo­rate Finance

ox8 Corpo­rate Finance was foun­ded in 2018 by expe­ri­en­ced M&A experts and is an inde­pen­dent corpo­rate finance boutique based in Frank­furt. ox8 supports tech­no­logy and growth-orien­ted SMEs in the DACH region in finan­cing and sales proces­ses and advi­ses on the sell-side and buy-side in mergers and acqui­si­ti­ons (M&A) and on raising capi­tal (growth capital).
ox8 sees itself as a consul­tant at eye level for visio­nary entre­pre­neurs, passio­nate mana­gers, stra­te­gic buyers and finan­cial inves­tors. In-depth indus­try exper­tise, an inter­na­tio­nal network and first-class tran­sac­tion proces­sing form the basis for high stan­dards of client orien­ta­tion and quality.
— www.ox8-cf.com

Munich — The Euro­pean defense tech sector is rapidly deve­lo­ping into one of the most dyna­mic segments for venture capi­tal invest­ments. Driven by geopo­li­ti­cal tensi­ons and increased secu­rity aware­ness, the invest­ment volume has increased more than eight­fold since 2021, from €344 million to €2.8 billion (2025). At the same time, the first leading compa­nies — parti­cu­larly from Germany — are estab­li­shing themselves. 

In 2025, the volume of venture capi­tal inves­ted in Euro­pean defense tech start-ups and scale-ups reached around 2.8 billion euros. In compa­ri­son: in 2021, the volume was still at 344 million euros. At the same time, the number of tran­sac­tions rose from 52 to 154 deals (source: FCF Defen­seTech Venture Capi­tal Report 2026). 

“We are seeing a clear struc­tu­ral shift in inves­tor beha­vior. Defense and dual-use topics are now an inte­gral part of many venture capi­tal stra­te­gies,” says Florian Theyer­mann, Mana­ging Direc­tor Venture&Growth I DeepT­ech at FCF. Germany is the leader in Europe with around €2.2 billion in invest­ments (2021–2025); at the same time, a first wave of conso­li­da­tion is begin­ning and IPOs of VC-finan­ced defense tech compa­nies are also expec­ted in the future. 

Start-ups drive inno­va­tion in the defense sector

Market dyna­mics are incre­asingly being shaped by start-ups and scale-ups, which react faster and more flexi­bly to tech­no­lo­gi­cal requi­re­ments than estab­lished defense compa­nies. Topics such as tech­no­lo­gi­cal sove­reig­nty, mili­tary resi­li­ence and digi­tal secu­rity have been incre­asingly in focus since the start of the Ukraine-Russia war. 

At the same time, a large propor­tion of invest­ments are concen­tra­ted on a small number of leading compa­nies. Start-ups such as Helsing, TEKEVER, Quan­tum Systems, Iceye and Desti­nus account for around 60% of the venture capi­tal inves­ted since 2021. 

“The market clearly follows a ‘the (early) winner-takes-it-all’ logic: capi­tal flows speci­fi­cally into compa­nies with proven scala­bi­lity,” says Arno Fuchs (photo), CEO & foun­der of FCF.

First wave of conso­li­da­tion begins

The leading Defen­seTech compa­nies are incre­asingly acting as conso­li­da­tors them­sel­ves. In the past three years, around 15 acqui­si­ti­ons have been made by these emer­ging cham­pi­ons — inclu­ding both start-ups and a few estab­lished compa­nies. The M&A acti­vity of estab­lished play­ers remains mode­rate in comparison. 

There are also signs of move­ment on the capi­tal market: While IPOs have so far mainly been carried out by estab­lished compa­nies such as Renk, Hensoldt or TKMS, IPOs by VC-finan­ced Defen­seTech compa­nies can also be expec­ted in the medium term.

Germany at the top in Europe

Germany plays a leading role in the Euro­pean defense tech ecosys­tem. With around 2.2 billion euros in venture capi­tal finan­cing between 2021 and 2025, Germany leads Europe in terms of invest­ment volume. Compa­nies such as Helsing and Quan­tum Systems are making a signi­fi­cant contri­bu­tion to estab­li­shing the loca­tion as an inno­va­tion hub for DefenseTech. 

View the FCF Defen­seTech Venture Capi­tal Report 2026 –> here.

About FCF

FCF Fox Corpo­rate Finance (FCF) is “The Finan­cing Specia­list” for advi­sing, struc­tu­ring and placing debt and equity finan­cing in German-spea­king count­ries. — FCF is active in the two busi­ness divi­si­ons FCF Mittel­stand and FCF Venture & Growth: 

- FCF Mittel­stand advi­ses clients from the upper mid-market, in parti­cu­lar family busi­nesses and their share­hol­ders, on the deve­lo­p­ment and imple­men­ta­tion of finan­cing proces­ses in the context of (re-)financing, invest­ment and acqui­si­tion situa­tions as well as chan­ges in the share­hol­der structure.
— FCF Venture & Growth advi­ses clients in German-spea­king and Euro­pean count­ries, in parti­cu­lar compa­nies from the deep & clean tech and health­care & life scien­ces sectors, on the deve­lo­p­ment and imple­men­ta­tion of capi­tal increa­ses, share place­ments, venture debt, promo­tio­nal and asset-based financing.

FCF main­ta­ins close rela­ti­onships with all rele­vant lenders, finan­ciers and insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors in Germany, Europe and world­wide. Special exper­tise lies in the coope­ra­tion with family offices and high-net-worth inves­tors. — FCF was foun­ded in 2005 by Arno Fuchs and has one of the largest and most crea­tive teams with over 30 employees. Since its foun­da­tion, FCF has comple­ted more than 250 tran­sac­tions with a volume of over EUR 15 billion. — www.fcf.de

Munich/ Berlin/ Foster City, Calif. (USA) — YPOG, with two sepa­rate teams, provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal advice to the share­hol­ders Venrock Health­care Capi­tal Part­ners and Evotec SE on the sale of the biotech company Tubu­lis to Gilead for a total purchase price (inclu­ding all earn-out payments) of USD 5 billion. — The purchase price consists of an imme­dia­tely paya­ble cash compo­nent of USD 3.15 billion and perfor­mance-based payments of up to USD 1.85 billion. The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to close in the second quar­ter of 2026. 

Munich-based Tubu­lis is a clini­cal-stage biotech­no­logy company focu­sed on the deve­lo­p­ment of next-gene­ra­tion anti­body-drug conju­ga­tes (ADCs). The company’s proprie­tary plat­form tech­no­lo­gies enable the targe­ted deli­very of highly potent drugs to tumor cells. Leading deve­lo­p­ment programs include TUB-040, an ADC for the treat­ment of ovarian cancer and other solid tumors, which is curr­ently in clini­cal deve­lo­p­ment. In addi­tion, Tubu­lis has a tech­no­logy plat­form that is geared towards the deve­lo­p­ment of new ADC gene­ra­ti­ons and offers broad appli­ca­tion poten­tial in oncology. 

“The agree­ment to acquire Tubu­lis is a signi­fi­cant mile­stone for Gilead in the field of onco­logy. The company brings a clini­cal-stage drug candi­date that repres­ents a poten­tial new treat­ment option for ovarian cancer, as well as a next-gene­ra­tion ADC plat­form and a promi­sing early-stage pipe­line,” said Daniel O’Day, Chair­man and Chief Execu­tive Offi­cer of Gilead Sciences.

Evotec first inves­ted in Tubu­lis in the Series B finan­cing round in May 2022 and then again in the Series B2 finan­cing round in March 2024. Venrock most recently supported the company as lead inves­tor in the Series C finan­cing round.

“The sale of Tubu­lis marks another important mile­stone for the Euro­pean biotech­no­logy indus­try. The tran­sac­tion under­lines the contin­ued high inte­rest of stra­te­gic inves­tors in inno­va­tive onco­logy plat­forms and shows that Euro­pean rese­arch can be successfully trans­la­ted into global tran­sac­tions,” says Dr. Martin Scha­per, Part­ner at YPOG.

Tubu­lis is deve­lo­ping custo­mi­zed anti­body-drug conju­ga­tes with outstan­ding biophy­si­cal proper­ties that have demons­tra­ted sustained tumor deli­very and long-lasting anti­tu­mor acti­vity in precli­ni­cal models as well as in initial clini­cal proof-of-concept studies in plati­num-resistant ovarian cancer. The two lead programs from the growing pipe­line, TUB-040, targe­ting NaPi2b, and TUB-030, targe­ting 5T4, are curr­ently being evalua­ted in the clinic in high-risk solid tumors. Tubu­lis will soli­dify its leader­ship posi­tion by conti­nuing to drive inno­va­tion in all areas of ADC design utili­zing its proprie­tary plat­form tech­no­lo­gies. — www.tubulis.com

About Venrock Health­care Capi­tal Partners

Venrock Health­care Capi­tal Part­ners (VHCP) is a health­care-focu­sed venture capi­tal fund group concen­t­ra­ting on late-stage invest­ments. It invests prima­rily in publicly traded small cap and priva­tely held late stage compa­nies — parti­cu­larly in the health­care and life scien­ces sectors, with a special focus on biotech­no­logy. VHCP focu­ses on compa­nies that deve­lop and commer­cia­lize inno­va­tive products and tech­no­lo­gies. — www.venrock.com.

About Evotec

Evotec is a life science company driving the future of drug disco­very and deve­lo­p­ment. By combi­ning scien­ti­fic inno­va­tion with AI-enab­led tech­no­lo­gies and advan­ced plat­forms, Evotec acce­le­ra­tes the deve­lo­p­ment of new thera­pies in a more effi­ci­ent, precise and scalable way.
Evotec’s capa­bi­li­ties span small mole­cu­les, biolo­gics, cell thera­pies and rela­ted moda­li­ties and are supported by proprie­tary plat­forms such as Mole­cu­lar Pati­ent Data­ba­ses, PanO­mics and iPSC-based dise­ase models. Evotec colla­bo­ra­tes with the worl­d’s leading phar­maceu­ti­cal compa­nies, nume­rous biotech compa­nies, acade­mic insti­tu­ti­ons and other health­care partners.
With a broad port­fo­lio of proprie­tary rese­arch and deve­lo­p­ment projects, Evotec focu­ses on key thera­peu­tic areas such as onco­logy, cardio­vas­cu­lar and meta­bo­lic dise­a­ses, neuro­logy and immu­no­logy. The Company employs more than 4,800 people world­wide at sites in Europe and the US. — www.evotec.com

Advi­sor Venrock Health­care Capi­tal Part­ners: YPOG

Dr. Benja­min Ullrich (Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Berlin
Dr. Emma Peters (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Berlin
Dr. Oliver Junk (Tran­sac­tions), Asso­cia­ted Part­ner, Cologne

Team Evotec: YPOG

Dr. Martin Scha­per (Co-Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Berlin
Dr. Johan­nes Janning (Co-Lead, Tran­sac­tions), Part­ner, Cologne
Ciro D’Ame­lio (Tran­sac­tions), Senior Asso­ciate, Berlin

YPOG advi­sed Venrock on this tran­sac­tion toge­ther with the US law firm Cooley LLP.

About YPOG

YPOG stands for You + Part­ners of Game­ch­an­gers and forward-looking tax and legal advice. The firm advi­ses compa­nies focu­sed on future tech­no­lo­gies with the aim of using change as an oppor­tu­nity and jointly crea­ting opti­mal solu­ti­ons. The YPOG team offers compre­hen­sive exper­tise in the areas of Funds, Tax, Tran­sac­tions, Corpo­rate, Banking, Regu­la­tory + Finance, IP/IT/Data Protec­tion, Liti­ga­tion as well as Corpo­rate Crime + Compli­ance + Inves­ti­ga­ti­ons. YPOG is one of the leading addres­ses in Germany for venture capi­tal, private equity, fund struc­tu­ring and appli­ca­ti­ons of distri­bu­ted ledger tech­no­logy (DLT) in finan­cial services. The firm and its part­ners are regu­larly reco­gni­zed by renow­ned publi­ca­ti­ons such as JUVE, Best Lawy­ers, Cham­bers and Part­ners, Leaders League and Legal 500. YPOG employs more than 180 expe­ri­en­ced lawy­ers, tax advi­sors and tax specia­lists as well as a notary in its offices in Berlin, Hamburg, Colo­gne, Munich, Cambridge and London. —- www.ypog.law

Mannheim/ Zug (CH) — The inves­tor Legian Invest­ment Part­ner AG has acqui­red the Health Dialog divi­sion from vita­group AG. As part of a respon­si­ble succes­sion plan for the previous main share­hol­der and SAP co-foun­der Dr. Hans-Werner Hector, vita­group AG has sold the Health Dialog divi­sion to Legian Invest­ment Part­ner AG, an inves­tor with exten­sive expe­ri­ence in the health­care sector. 

The aim of the tran­sac­tion is to secure the successful deve­lo­p­ment of Health Dialog in the long term and at the same time open up new growth oppor­tu­ni­ties. The company is consciously focu­sing on conti­nuity: the entire Health Dialog manage­ment team will remain on board and will conti­nue on its current course toge­ther with the new part­ner. The two estab­lished loca­ti­ons in Mann­heim and Chem­nitz will also remain central hubs for further deve­lo­p­ment, with Mann­heim remai­ning the company’s head­quar­ters. The previous Mana­ging Direc­tor Emek Altun is also sending a strong signal of trust and future viability. 

Gregor Hilver­kus and Dirk Mühl, Legian Invest­ment Part­ner AG, commen­ted: “We are very impres­sed by the perfor­mance of Health Dialog in recent years and look forward to support­ing Emek Altun and his team in the further deve­lo­p­ment of the company as shareholders.”

Kamilo Kolarz, CEO of vita­group AG, empha­si­zes: “I am very plea­sed for Health Dialog to have found a perfect part­ner for sustainable soli­dity and further growth in Legian. We deli­bera­tely opted for an expe­ri­en­ced inves­tor with proven exper­tise in the health­care indus­try. The decis­ion in favor of Legian — and not a direct market parti­ci­pant as a new share­hol­der — is a clear sign that we want to further expand our leading role as an inde­pen­dent service provi­der and inno­va­tor in healthcare.” 

The Health Dialog helps people to gain direct and easy access to their opti­mal outpa­ti­ent care. The sensi­ble combi­na­tion of analog and digi­tal services impro­ves pati­ent care regard­less of time and loca­tion. With over 300 medi­cal staff and conti­nuous avai­la­bi­lity, the Tele­me­di­cal Center (TMZ) offers compre­hen­sive services for statu­tory health insu­rance compa­nies and asso­cia­ti­ons of statu­tory health insu­rance physi­ci­ans — from the medi­cal emer­gency service to the medi­cal on-call service to the appoint­ment service. The health­Match care plat­form is the comple­men­tary digi­tal access for pati­ents to their opti­mal care, regard­less of time and place. 

About Legian Invest­ment Part­ner AG

Legian Invest­ment Part­ner is a medium-sized invest­ment advi­sory firm based in Switz­er­land. We offer compa­nies a good new home for succes­sion plan­ning or the sale of parts of a group. We invest in econo­mic­ally sound compa­nies in German-spea­king count­ries (DACH region) with a turno­ver of up to €100 million. Our goal is the sustainable and value-orien­ted further deve­lo­p­ment of our port­fo­lio compa­nies for the mutual bene­fit of share­hol­ders, employees and custo­mers. As long-term inves­tors, we act as a spar­ring part­ner for manage­ment in stra­te­gic corpo­rate deve­lo­p­ment, secure access to equity and debt capi­tal and provide support for follow-up acquisitions.
— www.legian.ch

Advi­sor Legian Invest­ment Part­ner AG: HEUKING

Mark Ross­broich, LL.M. (King’s College London), Dr. Oliver von Rosen­berg, LL.M. (George­town Univer­sity Law Center) (both lead), Chris­to­pher Klei­nert (all M&A / Private Equity), Dr. Lutz Martin Keppe­ler (IT / data protec­tion), all Cologne;
Fabian G. Gaffron, Simon Pommer, LL.M. (both tax law), Sandra Pfis­ter LL.M. (Sydney), Beli­ar­dis Ehlert-Gasde (both finance), all Hamburg;
Chris­toph Hexel (employ­ment law), Düsseldorf.
— www.heuking de 

Zug / Nurem­berg — Funds advi­sed by BU Bregal Unter­neh­mer­ka­pi­tal (“BU”) acquire a majo­rity stake in A.Eberle GmbH & Co KG (“A.Eberle”), a leading provi­der of measu­re­ment, regu­la­tion and control tech­no­logy for appli­ca­ti­ons in the field of elec­tri­cal energy infra­struc­ture. BU will support A.Eberle as a long-term part­ner to acce­le­rate its inter­na­tio­nal growth, drive product deve­lo­p­ment and further expand the company’s posi­tion as a tech­no­logy leader in grid stabi­lity and power quality. A.Eberle’s manage­ment team is re-inves­t­ing in the company as part of the tran­sac­tion and will drive the long-term growth stra­tegy toge­ther with BU. 

A.Eberle was foun­ded in 1980 and is head­quar­te­red in Nurem­berg. The company is a leading provi­der of measu­re­ment and control tech­no­logy for power grids and deve­lops specia­li­zed hard­ware and soft­ware solu­ti­ons for moni­to­ring, control­ling and opti­mi­zing power quality. In parti­cu­lar, the port­fo­lio includes solu­ti­ons in the areas of voltage regu­la­tion, earth fault loca­tion and power quality and makes a signi­fi­cant contri­bu­tion to the stabi­lity, effi­ci­ency and inte­gra­tion of rene­wa­ble ener­gies in power grids. Its custo­mers are prima­rily energy suppli­ers and medium-sized and large indus­trial compa­nies, mainly in Europe. A.Eberle is charac­te­ri­zed by a high level of tech­ni­cal exper­tise, prono­un­ced engi­nee­ring compe­tence and custo­mer-speci­fic solu­ti­ons and is an estab­lished part­ner with an inter­na­tio­nal presence. 

The market for grid tech­no­logy is bene­fiting from struc­tu­ral growth drivers such as the expan­sion and digi­ta­liza­tion of elec­tri­city grids, the incre­asing inte­gra­tion of rene­wa­ble ener­gies and rising demand for elec­tri­city, inclu­ding from elec­tro­mo­bi­lity and data centers. In this envi­ron­ment, A.Eberle is very well posi­tio­ned as an inno­va­tive tech­no­logy provi­der with long-stan­ding custo­mer relationships. 

Lothar Mayer, majo­rity owner of A.Eberle, comm­ents: “During the process, I got to know a part­ner in BU who shares my entre­pre­neu­rial values and has an under­stan­ding of our busi­ness. From the very begin­ning, the colla­bo­ra­tion was charac­te­ri­zed by trust and an open, cons­truc­tive exch­ange. I am convin­ced that BU, toge­ther with the manage­ment team, will provide the right impe­tus to further deve­lop A.Eberle sustain­ably and lead it successfully into the next phase of growth.”

Stefan Hoppert, CEO of A.Eberle, adds: “With BU, we are gaining a part­ner who will support us in driving forward our tech­no­lo­gi­cal deve­lo­p­ment in a targe­ted manner and further scaling our solu­ti­ons. Toge­ther, we want to streng­then our inno­va­tive power and conti­nue to offer our custo­mers effi­ci­ent and relia­ble solu­ti­ons for the chal­lenges of modern power grids.”

Felix Werdin, Part­ner at BU, says: “A.Eberle is an excel­lently posi­tio­ned company in a struc­tu­rally fast-growing market. The incre­asing requi­re­ments for stable and effi­ci­ent elec­tri­city grids offer considera­ble poten­tial. Toge­ther with A.Eberle’s expe­ri­en­ced manage­ment team, we would like to build on the company’s successful deve­lo­p­ment and support it in its next growth phase.”

The parties agreed on the main terms of the tran­sac­tion in April 2026; closing is expec­ted to take place during the second quar­ter of 2026 once the usual regu­la­tory and prac­ti­cal requi­re­ments have been met. The parties have agreed not to disc­lose the finan­cial terms. 

About A.Eberle

A.Eberle GmbH & Co. KG was foun­ded in 1980 and opera­tes in the field of measu­re­ment and control tech­no­logy for the energy sector as well as for medium-sized and large indus­trial compa­nies. Our products and services secure and improve the avai­la­bi­lity of the energy supply at all voltage levels and support the inte­gra­tion of rene­wa­ble energy sources into the grids. All of A.Eberle’s efforts can be summa­ri­zed by the term “voltage quality”. — https://www.a‑eberle.de/.

About BU Bregal Unternehmerkapital

BU Bregal Unter­neh­mer­ka­pi­tal (“BU”) is a leading private equity firm with offices in Zug, Munich, Amster­dam, Milan and London. With more than €7 billion assets under manage­ment (AUM), BU is the largest mid-cap inves­tor head­quar­te­red in the DACH region. The funds advi­sed by BU focus on invest­ments in mid-cap compa­nies in the DACH region and neigh­bor­ing markets. With the mission to be the prefer­red part­ner for entre­pre­neurs and family busi­nesses, BU focu­ses on part­ner­ships with market leaders and “hidden cham­pi­ons” with strong manage­ment teams and growth poten­tial. Since its foun­da­tion in 2015, the funds advi­sed by BU have inves­ted in more than 160 compa­nies with almost 32,000 employees. More than 11,000 jobs have been crea­ted in the process. BU supports entre­pre­neurs and fami­lies as a stra­te­gic part­ner to further deve­lop, inter­na­tio­na­lize and digi­ta­lize their compa­nies, helping them to create sustainable value respon­si­bly and with a view to the next generation.

Heidelberg/ Frank­furt a. M. — GÖRG has advi­sed the share­hol­der of zetVi­si­ons GmbH, a leading German soft­ware provi­der for company-wide invest­ment and master data manage­ment, on the sale of the company to the Vola­ris Group.

zetVi­si­ons GmbH is a specia­li­zed soft­ware provi­der based in Heidel­berg. The company has been deve­lo­ping and imple­men­ting solu­ti­ons for invest­ment and master data manage­ment for over 20 years. Its custo­mers include nume­rous DAX, MDAX and SDAX groups, medium-sized compa­nies and public legal enti­ties. Based on more than 400 successfully comple­ted projects in various indus­tries, zetVi­si­ons offers in-depth exper­tise in the field of inter­na­tio­nal legal entity management. 

With the acqui­si­tion of zetVi­si­ons, Vola­ris is further expan­ding its German port­fo­lio in a high-growth segment. As a subsi­diary of the Cana­dian company Constel­la­tion Soft­ware Inc., Vola­ris focu­ses on support­ing soft­ware compa­nies in verti­cal markets in their development. 

A GÖRG team led by part­ner Dr. Markus Söhn­chen compre­hen­si­vely advi­sed the share­hol­der of
zetVi­si­ons GmbH on legal issues rela­ting to the sale process.

Advi­sor to share­hol­der zetVi­si­ons GmbH: GÖRG Part­ner­schaft von Rechts­an­wäl­ten mbB

Dr. Markus Söhn­chen (Lead, Part­ner, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt am Main)
Dr. Gerhard Gündel (Coun­sel, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt am Main)
Dr. Andrea Kirsch (Part­ner, Data Protec­tion, Berlin) Dr. Florian Schmit­sch (Part­ner, IP/IT, Frank­furt am Main) Andrea Kirsch (Part­ner, Data Protec­tion, Berlin)
Dr. Florian Schmitz (Part­ner, IP/IT, Frank­furt am Main)
Dr. Valen­tin Zipfel (Asso­ciate Part­ner, IP/IT, Frank­furt am Main)
Timo Jans (Senior Asso­ciate, Corporate/M&A, Frank­furt am Main)

About GÖRG

GÖRG is one of Germany’s leading inde­pen­dent commer­cial law firms. With over 370 profes­sio­nals in the fields of legal advice, tax advice and audi­ting at our five offices in Berlin, Frank­furt am Main, Hamburg, Colo­gne and Munich, we advise well-known dome­stic and foreign compa­nies, medium-sized enter­pri­ses as well as finan­cial inves­tors and listed groups from all sectors of the economy and the public sector. — www.goerg.de

Munich — The commer­cial law firm LUTZ | ABEL has provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal advice to Alpha­Pet Ventures GmbH, a leading European
digi­tal brand plat­form for premium pet food, on the acqui­si­tion of the Berlin-based brand Tier­lieb­ha­ber. The acqui­si­tion streng­thens Alpha­Pe­t’s posi­tion in the fast-growing animal health segment and conti­nues its successful buy-and-build strategy. 

Tier­lieb­ha­ber was foun­ded in 2016 and has estab­lished itself as the leading German brand for nutri­tio­nal supple­ments and func­tional snacks for pets. The company stands for natu­ral, high-quality products for preven­tive animal health and distri­bu­tes its range via digi­tal chan­nels and B2B part­ner­ships. The previous share­hol­ders have sold their shares as part of the tran­sac­tion. The manage­ment team will remain on board and will drive the future deve­lo­p­ment of the company. 

For Alpha­Pet, the acqui­si­tion repres­ents an important stra­te­gic step in the targe­ted expan­sion of its exis­ting brand port­fo­lio to include the Health & Well­ness segment. Tier­lieb­ha­ber ideally comple­ments the exis­ting range and streng­thens the posi­tion in the func­tional animal health products segment in parti­cu­lar. With this acqui­si­tion, Alpha­Pet is conti­nuing its expan­sion stra­tegy and further expan­ding its leading posi­tion in the Euro­pean market for premium pet food and animal health. 

The tran­sac­tion was finan­ced through a combi­na­tion of equity and debt. Patria Invest­ments acted as lead inves­tor, supported by Venture Stars and exis­ting share­hol­ders of Alpha­Pet. The debt finan­cing was provi­ded by CVC.

Advi­sor Alpha­Pet Ventures GmbH: LUTZ | ABEL

Phil­ipp Hoene (lead, Munich), Constanze Hach­mann (Hamburg), Lars Dieball and Roman Krug (both Munich, all M&A) as well as Ute Schenn and Simon Kopp (Stutt­gart, Commer­cial), Corne­lius Renner and Jonas Klei­ne­b­rahm (Berlin, IP/IT) as well as Clau­dia Knuth and Jasper Barkow­ski (Berlin, Employ­ment). The advice covered all aspects of the tran­sac­tion, inclu­ding struc­tu­ring, contract nego­tia­ti­ons and implementation. 

Alpha­Pet was also advi­sed by A&O Shear­man (Debt Finan­cing Legal) and Deloitte and
SONNTAG (Tax) advised.

The seller, Tier­lieb­ha­ber, was legally advi­sed by GÖRG under the leader­ship of Dr. Phil­ipp Grzimek.

About LUTZ | ABEL

The commer­cial law firm LUTZ | ABEL advi­ses on all matters of commer­cial law with around 110 lawy­ers and offices in Munich,
Hamburg, Stutt­gart, Berlin and Frank­furt am Main. — www.lutzabel.com.

Milan/ Munich/ Osna­brück — KME Group has comple­ted the repurchase of Cunova with Morgan Lewis of Para­gon. Morgan Lewis has advi­sed KME Group S.p.A. on a €300 million finan­cing and restruc­tu­ring for the repurchase of Cunova GmbH from Para­gon Part­ners. The finan­cing was provi­ded by an affi­liate of Apollo Global Manage­ment, Inc. 

Since Janu­ary 31, 2022, Cunova has opera­ted under a new share­hol­der struc­ture in which the invest­ment company The Para­gon Fund III held 55% of the shares, while the KME Group remained a share­hol­der with a 45% stake in the newly foun­ded company.

The tran­sac­tion compri­ses a combi­ned equity and debt finan­cing and is part of a compre­hen­sive, multi-stage restruc­tu­ring of KME’s indus­trial busi­ness. The finan­cing consists of a five-year €150 million term loan and €150 million worth of prefer­red stock and the issu­ance of warrants to funds mana­ged by Apollo. The tran­sac­tion supports KME’s acqui­si­tion of the remai­ning shares in Cunova, the inte­gra­tion of certain aero­space and foundry assets into the company and the refi­nan­cing of exis­ting loans of appro­xi­m­ately €170 million. 

The tran­sac­tion, first announ­ced on Decem­ber 23, 2025, crea­tes an inte­gra­ted indus­trial plat­form for copper-based specialty products and streng­thens the Group’s capi­tal struc­ture and future growth opportunities.

KME is a global manu­fac­tu­rer of copper and copper alloy products for custo­mers in a wide range of indus­tries. — www.kme.com

Cunova GmbH, head­quar­te­red in Osna­brück, Germany, is a global indus­trial supplier of specia­li­zed copper and copper alloy products, parti­cu­larly for conti­nuous casting, mari­time appli­ca­ti­ons and indus­trial high-tech applications.

Advi­sor KME Group: Morgan Lewis (Munich)

Dr. Florian Harder (Lead), Dr. Chloé Lignier (both Corporate/M&A), Dr. Jann Jetter (Tax), Dr. Michael Masling (Frank­furt, Anti­trust), Steven Miller (Orange County, Finance), Ulises R. Pin (Washing­ton, TMT), Matthew Riehle (Pitts­burgh, Finance), Chris­tian Contardo (Of Coun­sel, Washing­ton, Inter­na­tio­nal Trade); Asso­cia­tes: Sven Opper­mann, Hein­rich Stirtz, Joice Zhang (all Corporate/M&A), Emma Drago­mi­rova (Tax), Jasmeen Bahous (Brussels, Anti­trust), Leetal Weiss (Los Ange­les, TMT), Paulina Gerling (Tran­sac­tion Lawyer).

About Morgan Lewis

Morgan Lewis stands for outstan­ding service, legal inno­va­tion and excep­tio­nal commit­ment to its clients. With more than 2,200 lawy­ers, the firm provi­des highly quali­fied legal advice to multi­na­tio­nal corpo­ra­ti­ons and start-ups in the United States, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. — www.morganlewis.com

GSK Stock­mann has advi­sed the Arsipa Group on the acqui­si­tion of Dr. med. Wörner Medi­zin-Diagnos­tik-Sicher­heit GmbH (MDS Wörner). MDS Wörner is merging with ascatu GmbH, which is part of the Arsipa Group. As a result, ascatu secu­res the succes­sion of an estab­lished occu­pa­tio­nal and company medi­cal prac­tice in the Rhine-Neckar metro­po­li­tan region and takes over the care of an estab­lished custo­mer base from indus­try, trade and the service sector. 

GSK Stock­mann provi­ded compre­hen­sive legal advice to the Arsipa Group on the tran­sac­tion with a team led by Berlin part­ner Robert Korn­dör­fer. With the merger , the occu­pa­tio­nal health provi­der ascatu is expan­ding its depth of support in the Rhine-Neckar region and will be able to support even more compa­nies locally in the future. MDS Wörner was foun­ded almost 20 years ago in Eppel­heim and offers a wide range of occu­pa­tio­nal health services in Heidel­berg and the surroun­ding area. The team of expe­ri­en­ced specia­lists and medi­cal assistants will be fully trans­fer­red to ascatu GmbH. 

The Arsipa Group is a group of compa­nies specia­li­zing in health, safety and well-being in the work­place. With curr­ently more than 1,100 employees at over 70 loca­ti­ons in Germany and Austria, the Arsipa Group supports around 35,000 companies. 

GSK Stock­mann has alre­ady advi­sed the Arsipa Group on various tran­sac­tions in the health­care sector in recent months.

Advi­sor ascatu: GSK Stockmann

Robert Korn­dör­fer (lead, part­ner, corpo­rate), Nicole Depa­rade, Foto (local part­ner, employ­ment law), Dr. Martin Hossen­fel­der (coun­sel, data protec­tion law), Clara López Hernando (senior asso­ciate, corpo­rate); asso­cia­tes: Ricarda Jost (corpo­rate law) Katrin Zukovs­kaja (employ­ment law), Dr. Maxi­mi­lian Schnebbe (data protec­tion law).
— www.gsk.de

Frank­furt — Kirk­land & Ellis has advi­sed Arse­nal Capi­tal Part­ners, a private equity invest­ment firm specia­li­zing in buil­ding market-leading indus­trial growth and health­care compa­nies, on the sale of ATP adhe­sive systems AG (“ATP”) to Henkel AG & Co. KGaA (“Henkel”), a German manu­fac­tu­rer of indus­trial and consu­mer goods.

The tran­sac­tion was comple­ted on April 1, 2026.

ATP was foun­ded in 1988 and specia­li­zes in the deve­lo­p­ment and manu­fac­ture of high-perfor­mance, predo­mi­nantly solvent-free adhe­sive tapes. Head­quar­te­red in Switz­er­land with produc­tion sites in Germany, the USA and the UK, ATP serves a wide range of indus­tries and deli­vers to over 60 count­ries world­wide. The company employs around 700 people and gene­ra­ted sales of around 270 million euros in the 2025 finan­cial year. 

Arse­nal first inves­ted in ATP in 2022. During Arse­nal’s owner­ship, the company expan­ded its manu­fac­tu­ring foot­print by inves­t­ing in addi­tio­nal specialty tape capa­city at its German site, stra­te­gi­cally acqui­ring Neschen Coating GmbH in Germany and estab­li­shing a new manu­fac­tu­ring faci­lity in the US. In addi­tion, ATP expan­ded its port­fo­lio of high-perfor­mance, water-based adhe­sive tech­no­lo­gies and inves­ted in inno­va­tion and manu­fac­tu­ring capa­bi­li­ties to support its contin­ued growth trajec­tory. —- www.arsenalcapital.com. Further infor­ma­tion can be found here.

Advi­sor to Arse­nal Capi­tal Part­ners: Kirk­land & Ellis, Frankfurt

Dr. Tobias Larisch (lead), Sebas­tian Pitz (both private equity/M&A); Asso­cia­tes: Dr. Mattias Prange, Alex­an­der Herzog, Jan Ditrich, Konstan­tin Huber, Chiara Schmid (Munich), Dr. Pablo Tretow (Munich), Elisa­beth Wolf (Munich, all private equity/M&A)

Kirk­land & Ellis, USA: Brendan Head (Chicago), Jason Grover (Salt Lake City, both Private Equity/M&A); Asso­cia­tes: Jake Moel­ler (Salt Lake City, Private Equity/M&A), Marshall Ring­wood (Salt Lake City, Transactional)

About Kirk­land

With more than 4,000 lawy­ers in 23 cities in the USA, Europe, the Middle East and Asia, Kirk­land & Ellis is one of the leading law firms for high-cali­ber legal services. The German team specia­li­zes in private equity, M&A, restruc­tu­ring, corpo­rate and capi­tal markets, finan­cing and tax. For more infor­ma­tion, please visit kirkland.com.

Zug (Switz­er­land) — INVISION VI (“INVISION”) has sold its stake in AK Group AG (“AK Group”), inclu­ding the subsi­dia­ries SkySale Schweiz GmbH (opera­tor of the e‑commerce plat­form Apfelkiste.ch) and Marein AG, to the listed company mobi­le­zone holding ag (“mobi­le­zone”). The tran­sac­tion under­lines the successful deve­lo­p­ment of the AK Group under the parti­ci­pa­tion of INVISION and gene­ra­tes an attrac­tive return for the INVISION VI Fund and its investors. 

The tran­sac­tion price (enter­prise value) is around CHF 180 million. The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to be comple­ted by the end of June 2026.

Value crea­tion during the INVISION invest­ment period

INVISION acqui­red a stake in the AK Group in 2021 and has supported the company as an active and entre­pre­neu­rial part­ner ever since. Working closely with foun­der Pierre Droigk and the rest of the manage­ment team, key stra­te­gic mile­sto­nes were achie­ved: the Apfelkiste.ch e‑commerce plat­form was syste­ma­ti­cally expan­ded and the product range exten­ded to over 60,000 imme­dia­tely available products. The plat­form was successfully diver­si­fied and expan­ded beyond the core busi­ness through targe­ted trend reco­gni­tion and product range expan­sion. The acqui­si­tion of Marein AG in 2024 was also a stra­te­gi­cally important step that signi­fi­cantly streng­the­ned the Group’s exper­tise in retail bran­ding and sourcing. INVISION actively promo­ted the further deve­lo­p­ment of the orga­niza­tion by recrui­ting Marc Isler as opera­tio­nal CEO and expan­ding the manage­ment team, among other things. In addi­tion, profes­sio­nal report­ing struc­tures were intro­du­ced and central value-added func­tions such as marke­ting and IT were inter­na­li­zed. The origi­nal busi­ness plan was signi­fi­cantly exceeded. 

The AK Group curr­ently employs around 100 people and gene­ra­ted sales of over CHF 100 million with EBITDA of around CHF 20 million in 2025. There are no plans for chan­ges in opera­tio­nal manage­ment, employees or locations.

Comm­ents on the transaction

Pierre Droigk, foun­der and former Group CEO of the AK Group, explains: “INVISION has been a valuable part­ner for us, provi­ding us not only with capi­tal, but above all with stra­te­gic spar­ring and opera­tio­nal support. Toge­ther we have deve­lo­ped Apfel­kiste into one of the leading e‑commerce plat­forms in Switz­er­land. With mobi­le­zone, we are now embar­king on an exci­ting new chap­ter in which we can combine our strengths and further expand the custo­mer experience.”

Chris­tian Hemm­rich, Part­ner at INVISION, comm­ents: “We are proud of the deve­lo­p­ment of the AK Group achie­ved toge­ther with Pierre and the entire team. A successful, foun­der-led e‑commerce company has become a profes­sio­nally posi­tio­ned and diver­si­fied group with sales of over CHF 100 million. The sale to mobi­le­zone repres­ents an excel­lent stra­te­gic fit and enables AK Group to realize its full poten­tial as part of a listed group. We would like to thank Pierre, Marc and the entire team for the great colla­bo­ra­tion over the past few years and wish them all the best for the future. 

About the AK Group

AK Group AG, based in Switz­er­land, compri­ses the e‑commerce plat­form Apfelkiste.ch and Marein AG, a specia­list in retail bran­ding and sourcing. Apfelkiste.ch is a leading Swiss online plat­form for smart­phone access­ories and life­style products with over 60,000 imme­dia­tely available products. Marein, foun­ded in 1979 and part of the AK Group since 2024, specia­li­zes in trend scou­ting, product sourcing and private labels in the craft, crea­tive and life­style sectors. The AK Group employs around 100 people. —- www.apfelkiste.ch

About Invi­sion

Since its foun­da­tion in 1997, INVISION has deve­lo­ped into one of the leading mid-market invest­ment compa­nies in the German-spea­king region. The focus is on succes­sion plan­ning and growth capi­tal. INVISION has inves­ted in over 80 compa­nies and helped to realize and sustain­ably secure value increa­ses for various invest­ments. INVISION sees itself as an entre­pre­neu­rial part­ner for foun­ders, entre­pre­neurs and manage­ment teams. When making invest­ments, INVISION places parti­cu­lar empha­sis on under­stan­ding the speci­fic needs of compa­nies and entre­pre­neurs and deve­lo­ping indi­vi­dual solutions.
The AK Group is an invest­ment from the INVISION VI fund. — www.invision.ch

About mobi­le­zone

Foun­ded in 1999, mobi­le­zone holding ag is the leading inde­pen­dent Swiss tele­com specia­list. The regis­tered shares of mobi­le­zone holding ag (MOZN) are traded on the SIX Swiss Exch­ange AG. mobi­le­zone employs around 600 people at its sites in Rotkreuz and Urnäsch and in around 125 of its own stores throug­hout Switz­er­land. —- www.mobilezoneholding.ch

Berlin, London, Milan, Luxem­bourg — Luxem­bourg-based Join Capi­tal has laun­ched its third fund with the aim of raising €235 million to support Euro­pean deep-tech start-ups working on defense, dual-use, secu­rity and space tech­no­lo­gies. The Euro­pean Invest­ment Fund (EIF) has commit­ted €50 million — its largest invest­ment in the defense sector to date. 

Foun­ded in 2017, Joint Capi­tal invests in pan-Euro­pean venture capi­tal funds from its offices in Berlin, London and Milan. The company focu­ses on start-ups that offer asym­me­tric tech­no­lo­gi­cal advan­ta­ges and thus streng­then Euro­pe’s stra­te­gic auto­nomy. The port­fo­lio spans the enter­prise, indus­trial, space and defense sectors, with 36 compa­nies funded to date. There have been five successful exits. 

Fund III will support around 25 start-ups, helping them to scale solu­ti­ons that enhance mili­tary capa­bi­li­ties while offe­ring commer­cial appli­ca­ti­ons. The invest­ment will be made through the InvestEU Defence Equity Faci­lity, a €175 million initia­tive co-finan­ced by the Euro­pean Defence Fund and aimed at mobi­li­zing private funding for disrup­tive defence tech­no­lo­gies. The faci­lity is expec­ted to mobi­lize more than 500 million euros for Euro­pean companies. 

“This invest­ment is not just about finan­cing. The EIF’s credi­bi­lity also acts as a seal of appr­oval, signal­ing to other inves­tors the rele­vance of the aero­space and secu­rity and defense sector. With this support, we are confi­dent that further invest­ments will follow, helping Europe to build a robust ecosys­tem for inno­va­tive defense solu­ti­ons,” explains Marjut Falk­stedt, Mana­ging Direc­tor of the EIF (Photo: EIF).

About EIF

The Euro­pean Invest­ment Fund (EIF) is part of the Euro­pean Invest­ment Bank Group. Its main task is to faci­li­tate access to finance for micro, small and medium-sized enter­pri­ses (SMEs) in Europe. Its offe­ring includes venture and growth capi­tal, guaran­tees and micro­fi­nance products tail­o­red to this market segment. In this way, it promo­tes EU objec­ti­ves in the areas of inno­va­tion, rese­arch and deve­lo­p­ment, entre­pre­neur­ship, growth and employ­ment. —www.eib.org

Munich, March 13, 2026 — The Berlin-based tech­no­logy company Qdrant has raised USD 50 million in a Series B finan­cing round. Qdrant intends to use the fresh capi­tal to acce­le­rate the further deve­lo­p­ment of its tech­no­logy plat­form and drive its inter­na­tio­nal expan­sion. The commer­cial law firm Green­Gate Part­ners advi­sed Qdrant on this transaction. 

Qdrant is deve­lo­ping a powerful open source vector data­base for arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence (AI) appli­ca­ti­ons. The tech­no­logy enables compa­nies to effi­ci­ently manage large amounts of unstruc­tu­red data — inclu­ding text, images, audio and video — and search it in the form of high-dimen­sio­nal vector embeddings. 

In recent years, vector data­ba­ses have become a central infra­struc­ture compo­nent of modern AI appli­ca­ti­ons. They form the basis for nume­rous areas of appli­ca­tion, inclu­ding seman­tic search, recom­men­da­tion systems, anomaly detec­tion and retrie­val augmen­ted gene­ra­tion (RAG).

The funds from the finan­cing round will be inves­ted in parti­cu­lar in the further deve­lo­p­ment of the plat­form, the expan­sion of the engi­nee­ring and product teams and the global distri­bu­tion of Qdran­t’s vector search infra­struc­ture. This will further posi­tion the company as an important buil­ding block in the rapidly growing global AI tech­no­logy ecosystem. 

Advi­sor Qdrant: Green­Gate Partners

René Spitz, LL.M., photo © Green­gate (Corpo­rate, Lead Part­ner, Munich)
Ricarda Neukam, LL.M. (IT/IP, Salary Part­ner, Munich)
Constan­tin Forst­ner (Corpo­rate, Senior Asso­ciate, Munich)
Carl von Sydow (Corpo­rate, Asso­ciate, Munich) 

About Green­Gate Partners

Green­Gate Part­ners and its corpo­rate team specia­lize in the M&A and venture capi­tal sector, among others. The legal advice is compre­hen­sive and ranges from the foun­da­tion, through the indi­vi­dual finan­cing rounds, to the exit. Green­Gate Part­ners repea­tedly provi­des bench­marks in the German market. The firm advi­ses dome­stic and foreign venture capi­tal funds, stra­te­gic inves­tors, busi­ness angels as well as foun­ders, start-ups and
mana­gers. — www.greengate.legal

Munich/ Frank­furt a. M. / Lithua­nia — ETNA Capi­tal, a Danish private equity firm focu­sed on invest­ments in defense, cyber secu­rity and criti­cal infra­struc­ture protec­tion, has acqui­red a majo­rity stake in Brolis Defence Group, UAB (“Brolis”). The tran­sac­tion is expec­ted to close in the second quar­ter of 2026, subject to regu­la­tory approvals. 

A WEIL team led by Dr. Kamyar Abrar advi­sed coun­sel Dr. Julia Schö­fer (Private Equity, Munich) toge­ther with part­ner Susanne Decker (Private Equity, Frank­furt) ETNA Capi­tal on this transaction.

On the Lithua­nian side, SERAINEN has the ETNA Capi­tal on the acqui­si­tion of a majo­rity stake in UAB Brolis Defense Group , on the Lithua­nian side. This is the largest private equity invest­ment in the defense sector in the Baltic States to date and the first invest­ment by ETNA Capi­tal, which was estab­lished last year. 

With the support of ETNA Capi­tal, Brolis intends to acce­le­rate product and tech­no­logy deve­lo­p­ment, expand its indus­trial capa­ci­ties and expand inter­na­tio­nally, ther­eby contri­bu­ting to Euro­pe’s tech­no­lo­gi­cal sove­reig­nty and resi­li­ence in the defense and secu­rity sector. Follo­wing the tran­sac­tion, the foun­ders will remain inves­ted with a signi­fi­cant mino­rity stake of around 40% and will conti­nue to run the company toge­ther with ETNA Capital. 

The tran­sac­tion unders­cores Weil’s strong private equity prac­tice in the defense and secu­rity tech­no­logy sector and demons­tra­tes the firm’s exper­tise in advi­sing on complex, stra­te­gi­cally signi­fi­cant invest­ments invol­ving sensi­tive tech­no­lo­gies and multi­na­tio­nal regu­la­tory issues.

ETNA Capi­tal, foun­ded in 2025 and backed by leading Danish pension funds, is a pan-Euro­pean private equity firm head­quar­te­red in Copen­ha­gen with an addi­tio­nal office in Munich. The company focu­ses on invest­ments that streng­then Euro­pean resi­li­ence in stra­te­gi­cally criti­cal sectors, combi­ning private equity exper­tise with deep indus­try know­ledge and opera­tio­nal experience. 

Head­quar­te­red in Vilnius, Lithua­nia, Brolis is a leading deve­lo­per and manu­fac­tu­rer of advan­ced sensor tech­no­lo­gies in the fields of elec­tro-optics, lasers and infrared. Foun­ded in 2011, the company opera­tes as a supplier to the defense sector and secu­rity agencies. 

WEIL acted as lead coun­sel to ETNA Capi­tal in all legal aspects of the tran­sac­tion, inclu­ding advice on regu­la­tory matters.

Team: Led by private equity part­ner Dr. Kamyar Abrar (Frank­furt) and coun­sel Dr. Julia Schö­fer (private equity, Munich) toge­ther with part­ner Susanne Decker (private equity, Frank­furt) and compri­sed part­ner Niklas Maydell (anti­trust, Brussels), part­ner Tom Richards and part­ner Kai Zhang (both finance, London), part­ner Neil Rigby (anti­trust, London), part­ner Shawn B. Cooley (Regu­la­tory, Washing­ton, D.C.), coun­sel Stef­fen Giolda (Regu­la­tory, Munich) and asso­cia­tes Alex­an­der Roth­stein (Private Equity, Frank­furt), Alex­an­der Reich (Tax, Frank­furt), Hans-Chris­tian Mick (Finance, Frank­furt), Álvaro Salgado and Lucy Peck­ham (both Anti­trust, London/Brussels). WEIL worked closely with Sorai­nen as Lithua­nian legal coun­sel. — www.weil.com

About Weil

Weil, Gotshal & Manges is an inter­na­tio­nal law firm with more than 1,200 lawy­ers. 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 Ameri­can law firm has two offices in Frank­furt and Munich. The focus here is on provi­ding specia­li­zed advice to natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal clients on cross-border private equity and M&A tran­sac­tions, high-profile liti­ga­tion manda­tes, complex restruc­tu­rings and finan­cings as well as tax structuring.

About ETNA Capital

ETNA (foun­ded 2025) is a private equity firm dedi­ca­ted to streng­thening Euro­pean resi­li­ence by inves­t­ing in defense, cyber­se­cu­rity and criti­cal infra­struc­ture protec­tion compa­nies. Our invest­ment mandate extends across Europe. — We bring leading indus­try exper­tise and an exten­sive network and have an in-house value crea­tion team to support and deve­lop the compa­nies we invest in — with the aim of buil­ding world-class busi­nesses. www.etna.capital