Startup News Germany, Austria, Switzerland for May 2026

This podcast is supported by Mitty Health. Are you in midlife feeling dismissed, unheard, or just plain tired of the old healthcare system? You're not alone. In fact, even today, 75% of women seeking care for menopause and perimenopause issues are left entirely untreated. But it's time for a change. It's time for Mitty. Mitty's not just a healthcare provider, It's a women's telehealth clinic founded and supported by world-class leaders in women's health. Their clinicians provide one-on-one, face-to-face consultations where they truly listen to your unique needs. They offer a full range of holistic, data-driven solutions that isn't one-size-fits-all care. This is care uniquely tailored for you. At Mitty, you'll find that their mission is clear: to help all women thrive in midlife. Giving them access to the healthcare they deserve because they believe midlife isn't the middle at all. It is the beginning of your second act. Ready to feel your best and write your second act script? Visit joinmiddi.com today to book your personalized insurance-covered virtual visit. That's joinmiddi.com. Middi, the care women deserve. Welcome to startuprad.io. Your podcast and YouTube blog covering the German startup scene with news, interviews, and live events. Hello and welcome. This is startuprade.io. I'm Chris Varnbach, joining you from New York City. With me is Joe from Frankfurt am Main. Hey Joe, good to be here. Good to have you, Chris. One One more time. One more time. Yes, we'll talk about this a bit later. Before we start though, just a bit of housekeeping. Our news cut today runs from April 22nd to May 18th, 2026. Production date is today, May 18th, and our episode is going to go live on May 28th. This is also, now we have it, my last episode as co-host of the news. We will say more about that at the end. The end, but first there's a lot to cover. Yes, indeed, Chris, and the thesis of the month's write itself, I would say. Yeah, so, um, yeah, I mean, we've talked about it in the past couple of months already, but what we really see is that the DACH ecosystem— so once again, DACH meaning Deutschland, Austria, Switzerland, or GSA in English is the abbreviation— that the DACH ecosystem is no longer just catching up. It is producing itself frontier outcomes. It is making great progress. We see companies like Helsing, which has just raised $1.2 billion at an $18 billion valuation, um, making it actually Germany's most valuable startup. And I think that's really interesting too, again, seeing how much the military, um, industry is actually influencing startup culture by now. Then we have SAP, SAP committing over €1 billion to acquire an 18-month-old AI lab. And as we record this, ESA Aerospace, once again going to, um, yeah, military aerial, uh, industries, has a launch window open right now for its second orbital attempt. Yeah, last time we also covered this in the news, but the launch attempt didn't work out. The— let's go to the macro numbers. Germany has deployed $3.67 billion across 166 rounds through May, up almost 12% year on year. German acquisitions in 2026 have hit 142, up from a little bit over 100 through April. The defense budget is at 83 €1 billion, projected to reach €162 billion, almost double, by 2029. Capital is moving, and it's moving very fast, especially considering German government. Yeah, and, uh, I mean, since it's always fun to be wrong with predictions, let's just put like 3 on record. Uh, number 1, Helsingr, we just talked about it, is going to reach €25 billion within 12 months. SAP, P's PriorLab, number 2, that deal is going to trigger at least 2 more half-billion-euro corporate AI acquisitions within 18 months in the region. And number 3, at least 2 more DACH companies will choose Frankfurt over London for their IPO by the end of 2027. I think it's all doable. Why not? Yeah, let's get to it. Let's get to it. Okay, we've already teased it a bit. Let's talk a bit more about Helsing. Which is now Germany's most valuable startup. The lead signal is Helsing. It's a Munich-based company founded in 2021, now raising $1.2 billion, meaning they have an $18 billion valuation. Um, this time around, the round is led by Dragonier Investment Group and co-led by Lightspeed, which is an existing investor of the company. It was oversubscribed multiple times. Helsing remains roughly 80% European-owned. So yeah, as I said before, there's a lot of like changing in the markets, or it's— this company definitely is part of larger trends here that we can see. I vividly remember like a few years ago, €1.2 billion valuation would've made headline numbers across all of Europe, and now there's a startup raising Yeah, and now you have 1.2. Yeah, now it's the— it's what— race. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I mean, you looked at the valuation of Helsing anyway, right? So yeah, tell me about the trajectory. Yeah, let us put the trajectory a little bit in context. In September 2024, $5.5 billion. June 2025, $12 billion, with Daniel Ek of Spotify backing the round. We actually wrote about this back then. And May 2026, $8 billion. That's what, a tripling in under 2 years. And this is a company that makes kamikaze drones and battlefield AI software. Yeah, very desperately looking for kamikaze joke here, but I don't know one. So, um, yeah, and also, yeah, what we hear it in the news quite often, how, uh, much more of a role, um, drones are playing in warfare. Um, their flagship product is, uh, called the HX-2 drone. It's 12 kilograms, it has 100 kilometer range. It's AI-guided, as they say. It operates in GPS-denied environments. Um, the Bundeswehr framework that they have, the framework contract, is worth up to €1.46 billion. Um, and also Dragonir and Lightspeed on their cap table really signals that US growth equity is now more and more committed to European sovereign defense companies. Yes, €18 billion makes Helsing actually Germany's most valuable startup, taking the crown from learn is this is the largest single DACH round in 2026, again meaning Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, and likely the largest defense tech round so far. We have been saying for 3, uh, for 3 episodes indeed that defense procurement is creating venture-at-scale outcomes, and that's actually proof. Yeah, and there's a, um, there's also like a deeper structural point to this. So, um, as I said, Helsing, um, will— did all this while remaining majority European-owned. So we see here that it is a sovereign, um, defense company having sovereign ownership. And so the fact that they attracted US growth capital here without surrendering control to some entity in the US, um, might be a model for other European defense startups, or at least a model that they will try to replicate. Mm-hmm. The company Prior Labs was founded fewer than 15 months ago before the acquisition. The company built the Tabular Foundation Model, TFMS. The TabPFM model series was published in Nature, and the team includes researchers from Google, Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, and Jane Street, founded by Frank Hutter, Noah Hollman, and Suraj Gambier. Sorry for butchering the last name. Yeah. And now on May 4th, SAP announced that it will acquire the company, um, based in Freiburg, and it will commit over €1 billion over 4 years to build what SAP is calling, um, a globally leading frontier AI lab in Europe. So, um, yeah, as you said, they, um, as you hinted at with the details of the deal. The structure here is pretty significant. Pryalabs continues as an independent entity, still having offices in Freiburg, Berlin, and New York. SAP is not going to absorb the team into the existing R&D of SAP, but building a new frontier AI lab around structured and tabular data, which is the type of data that runs SAP's enterprise customer base. SAP always having been one of the, like, secret superheroes and probably, yeah, like the biggest IT success story in, um, Germany for decades now. And interestingly, an 18-month-old startup commanding a billion euro plus investment commitment, that's an extraordinary— that's actually extraordinary by any standard. And it signals something broader. European corporate acquirers are now willing pay frontier prices for sovereign AI capabilities. SAP is making its biggest AI bet, and it's making it actually in Germany. Yeah, and what we're looking at now is, uh, the question whether this will trigger a wave. So I mean, it's not hard to predict, as if SAP is spending €1 billion on AI sovereignty, that maybe other companies like Siemens, like Bosch, like BMW, um, are also wondering whether they should do the same. Um, and yeah, so there might be more big, large corporate AI acquisitions within the next couple of months or, um, 1 or 2 years. Moving on, as we record this, um, the launch window for Isar Aerospace's second orbital attempt is literally open. So because it's May 18th, uh, the launch window is May 18th to May 24th from Andoya Spaceport spaceport in Norway. Their Spectrum rocket is carrying 5 CubeSats and 1 experiment via the ESA Boost program, the European Space Agency, and headed for a sun-synchronous orbit. Keep your wellness routine going strong all summer. Kachava's new travel packs help you stick to your daily ritual even when you're on the go. Just 1 packet of Kachava's all-in-1 nutrition shake provides complete nutrition wherever you are with 25 grams of protein, 6 grams of fiber, greens, adaptogens, and more. Simplify your daily ritual. Go to kachava.com and use code NEWS for 15% off. That's k-a-c-h-a-v-a.com, code NEWS. The backstory. Yeah, sorry, it's just— Space is always good. Yeah, the backstory matters here. The first flight in March 2025 failed roughly 30 seconds after liftoff on March 22nd. And here, and here we really have to say, it's a very interesting thing about space. We really like, if you look at it from the outside, you would always think, oh my God, what a, what a failure. But actually in space, these like tiny, tiny incremental improvements and having a 30-second liftoff, then having like a 2-minute 30-second liftoff, this is what they consider a success. This is why there are so many tries. Yeah, typical startup approach, right? Incremental, incremental improvements. And March— yeah, a March 2026 attempt was scrubbed twice, one because of a boat in the danger zone and one because of a pressure tank leak. Uh, we talked about it, I think. ESA is seeking €250 million at a €2 billion valuation. Total raised exceeds €654 $1 million. And if Spectrum reaches orbit, it will also, yeah, validate European commercial space flight, or yeah, like the— in general, the, the standing of Europe as, um, um, an alternative to the US. Um, and, um, it almost certainly closes the €250 million round of the company. If it fails, again, the question becomes how much longer their investors will wait for, um, until the, like, this, like, very capital-intensive deep tech, um, will generate some revenue. And ESA is not the only space signal. Atmospace Cargo, based in Lichtenau, Germany, raised €24.7 million in a Series A led by Bajnord and Expansion Venture Capital. They are building Phoenix 2 orbital return burn vehicle with an inflatable atmospheric decelerator. Recovery operations is in the SOS. And since we're also always giving, um, some German geography classes here for free, this is, um, the state— the city of Lichtenau in what I think should be Bavaria. And the Azores are islands, not in Germany. They're actually in the Atlantic Ocean. Well, we are already at geography. Yeah. Oh, actually it's in Baden-Württemberg. So in the southwest, because there is also a Lichtenau only 10 kilometers away from where I grew up. But this is Hessen-Lichtenau. This is the Baden-Württemberg Lichtenau. Okay. Very interesting. Well, anyway, this is what we see here though, is This is now the third consecutive episode in which, um, we talk about like multiple DACH region space signals. Uh, last month we talked about ESA and Pavespace. Now we're talking about ESA and Atmos. Um, we are seeing more and more that Europe is building an end-to-end space logistics chain. We have like launches with ESA, in-orbit transfer with Pavespace, and now return with Atmos. Um, and yeah, we're just seeing that there's a whole ecosystem that is really maturing just beyond those companies that just have a very single, like, a very specific offering. Mhm. Also launching Atmos Works for government and defense customers. The dual-use pattern continues. Space and defense converging on the same cap table. Yeah, true. And again, like, very interesting over the years how we see companies on the startup scene moving away from IT stuff, from apps, towards really this like heavy real-life uses of like defense or space. Um, and yeah, being two industries that are even connected very much. Um, moving on, Bitpanda, um, Vienna-based, 7 million plus users, uh, no longer positioning itself as crypto only, but rather as a broad investment platform with a B2B rebrand to now called Bitpanda Enterprise. Um, we have Goldman Sachs, Citi, and Deutsche Bank advising Bitpanda on a Frankfurt IPO, and, um, on not only an IPO there but an IPO at a $5 billion plus valuation. The timing is actually strategic. The MiCA, Markets and Crypto Assets Compliance, deadline is June 30th. If Panda files before that, it becomes the third major MiCA-compliant crypto IPO in Europe. They choose Frankfurt over London, explicitly citing liquidity concerns. Sounds familiar. Yeah, yeah, well, I would say it does, because last month we had 1,5, um, the, um, environmental tech startup, uh, shelving its NASDAQ listing So signaling also that New York probably is not the place for them. And this month we see that Bitpanda picks Frankfurt over London. So yeah, we also see here that, um, things are shifting and we see that the like IPO geography, um, and landscape is a bit different and that, yeah, New York probably still might be everybody's dream, but there are viable paths in other trading places as well, says the person in New York City. And then there's Quantum, IQM Quantum Computers, Finnish-German, secured $50 million from BlackRock. They're preparing for a SPAC merger with RAAQ at a $1.8 billion pre-money valuation. Operations across Munich and Finland. BlackRock entering European Quantum Computing. That's also an interesting signal. Yeah, it is a signal also because BlackRock does not like speculate just at this big scale. So if they are in European Quantum, Quantum, then BlackRock here is seeing some kind of procurement pathway. Um, the spec route is unconventional for European Quantum company, but the pre-money valuation here suggests really, yeah, serious conviction from the backers. Um, moving on, Spread AI, a company in Berlin, uh, having had a $30 million Series B, IQT, the US intelligence community's, uh, venture arm, think CIA, is on the cap table alongside Salesforce, DTCP Growth, and HV Capital. Um, They are creating an engineering intelligence platform for product lifecycle data. They have a dual-use AI infrastructure being recognized by both defense and enterprise buyers. So also an interesting company here. Yeah, collecting money, $30 million in Series B is some serious signal. So Spread AI. Yes. We should add that this segment is the lightning round where Chris started and Primogen in Leipzig, 4.1 million euros seed for the biotech. XO Life in Munich, 4 million for digital health AI. ConX AI in Munich, 5 million euros Series A for construction AI. Repetium in Salzburg, Austria, 7-figure round for industrial additive manufacturing. And the Munich and Produtacht deep tech pipeline keeps producing. Yeah, I was just going to say we only have two lightning bolts, but it's not because you mentioned, uh, several others, uh, several other companies here. Yeah, so, um, yeah, once again, we think Helsing has a big— has a big future ahead. Um, we think SAP might start some kind of trend showing how established companies might buy, um, AI companies or companies in the AI field more and more. And, um, yeah, we think Frankfurt also has a bright future ahead as a tech-listing, um, stock exchange. The connecting thread across all three episodes we've done this year It's the same. DAX startups with sovereign customers— think defense, physical products, think also space— and procurement contracts are winning this cycle. The capital flows the budget line. It always has. Yes. And, uh, yeah, this is it for the startup news, more or less. But before we close, I have a little personal note. I mean, we were hinting at it, uh, last episode and at the beginning of this one. This is for now my last episode as co-host of the news. I started with— no, sorry, Joe started Startup Radio in 2004. I joined for the first time in May 2015, meaning 11 years, which is a bit crazy. So like, if someone would have had a child when I was on this podcast for the first time, this child probably might now move on from elementary school to middle school or something like that. And get into the difficult years. Yes, exactly. So yeah, we have covered hundreds of rounds, some unicorns in the beginning, now dozens in the last shows. And we watched the ecosystem in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland grow from like a little footnote in European, let alone worldwide venture— worldwide venture capital, very hard thing to say with a German accent— to something that now is really commanding global attention. Um, it has always been fun here in our podcast corner. Um, and yeah, I don't know what to say. Well, Chris, I could say it has been a privilege. Yeah, yeah, privilege and honor has been all mine. Uh, I will leave the show in your, uh, good hands, knowledge— knowledgeable hands. So you will continue the news for now as a solo host. The format is going to stay the same. Uh, our Our standards will stay the same. The thesis is going to stay the same. And I think I might keep on listening and have a little side note every once in a while, and maybe I would show up. And yeah, as we said, this is not because of some behind-the-scenes bickering. This has to do with me taking over a new job and having to focus on duties over there. And you'll stay on as advisor behind the scenes. For the schedule going forward, our next news episode covers the remaining period through late June and goes live on July 2nd. We move to biweekly publication for July and August, and in September we return with a summer wrap-up, likely 2 pieces, including our H1 2026 review. Yeah, so yeah, everybody take this as a hint being the right cadence for, uh, for your, for the upcoming months, because summer usually is a bit quieter in European ventures. And so use the biweekly format to just go deeply on fewer signals. And as always, this is when the best analysis happens, when you're not overly frantic. Mm-hmm. Chris, last word is yours. Okay. I will use the last words for something about our topics, I would say, um, Europe does not need permission to build frontier companies. It just needs to stop asking. Chris, my friend in far, far away New York, thank you for spending more than a decade with me covering the German DACH and European startup scene. We'll miss you very much and hope you come back, at least behind the scenes. You stay with startuprate.io. For some time to come. Goodbye. Goodbye. Keep your wellness routine going strong all summer. Kachava's new travel packs help you stick to your daily ritual even when you're on the go. Just one packet of Kachava's all-in-one nutrition shake provides complete nutrition wherever you are with 25 grams of protein, 6 grams of fiber, greens, adaptogens, and more. Simplify your daily ritual. Go to kachava.com and use code NEWS for 15% off. That's k-a-c-h-a-v-a.com, code NEWS.