Switzerland calling! START Summit in St. Gallen

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Switzerland is the home of several world market leaders and excellent universities which makes it the perfect country to start a venture. On 17th and 18th April, startups as well as investors will meet at the START Summit, organized by students from the University of St. Gallen. The main objective of this event is to motivate and support young people to found their own business and spread the entrepreneurial spirit.

Speed Dating, HackRun, Workshops
The START Summit offers innovative workshops as well as sessions with highly influencial speakers. Some of the names include: Former chancellor of Austria Alfred Gusenbauer, Y Combinator Partner Dalton Caldwell, Futurist Jose Luis Cordeiro, Hailo CEO Ryo Umezawa, Egomnia Founder Matteo Achili and Omid Scheybani, New Business Development Manager at Google. Another highlight is the HackaRun, in partnership with the Entrepreneurs Club ETH and SAP. In this event, technical and entrepreneural students will form interactive groups and present their projects in front of a Jury on Friday afternoon. On the same day during the ETH Startup Speed Dating startups will be given the chance to expose their idea in a 30-second pitch to a selection of highly skilled participants such as researchers or potential co-founders.

On Saturday founders will get the chance to meet investors. The event will be held in a similar format to speed dating, where each startup will aim to convince investors in four minutes. Chosen entrepreneurs and startups will get the chance to pitch their idea for a limited amount of time in front of a jury and the whole START Summit crowd. The winner will receive 10.000 CHF.

 

Venionaire at the START Summit

We are delighted that our Managing Partners Martin Steininger and Berthold Baurek-Karlic are invited to participate at the START Summit. With our new Venture Capital Fund, which aims for a First Closing beginning summer, we will invest heavily into hightech startups with disruptive business models from Germany, Austria and Switzerland. We are certain to see great investment opportunities in St. Gallen. Of course, we are also looking forward to the legendary START Summit Afterparty at the Trischli Club! 😉

More infos about the event on the official START Summit website or on Digjitale.com.

Martin Steininger ist neuer Partner bei Venionaire

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Mit dem Private Equity Experten Martin Steininger wechselt der ehemalige Vorstand der Mezzanin Finanzierungs AG (vormalige Mehrheitsbeteiligung der UniCredit Bank Austria) zum Beratungs- und Beteiligungsunternehmen Venionaire. Als Managing Partner ist der Wiener eine wichtige Stütze im Fundraising des entstehenden Venture Capital Fonds und verantwortet maßgeblich dessen Strukturierung. Im Tagesgeschäft bringt er zudem seine langjährige Erfahrung mit technologieorientierten Finanzierungsgeschäften sowie in der Restrukturierung, Sanierung und Veräußerung von Unternehmen ein.

 

Seit Anfang des Jahres ist Martin Steininger Senior Partner des Beratungs- und Beteiligungsunternehmens Venionaire Capital und Managing Partner der alternativen Investmentfondsgesellschaft Venionaire Investment. Er verantwortet maßgeblich das Fundraising des von Venionaire geplanten Venture Capital Fonds für deutsche und österreichische Unternehmen in der ersten und zweiten Wachstumsphase. Der 41-Jährige verfügt über ein exzellentes Netzwerk in der Finanzbranche und hat bereits zahlreiche Unternehmen erfolgreich restrukturiert, saniert und veräußert. Steininger war zuletzt rund dreizehn Jahre lang in verschiedenen Positionen bei der Mezzanin Finanzierungsgesellschaft tätig. Als Vorstandsmitglied der Mezzanin Finanzierungs AG wirkte er 2014 entscheidend beim erfolgreichen Verkauf der Gesellschaft an die Montana Tech Gruppe des Investors Michael Tojner mit. Als Geschäftsführer der Mezzanin Corporate Finance Unternehmensberatung verantwortete er zudem im Auftrag der UniCredit Bank Austria die Akquise und Umsetzung von Mezzanininvestments in Deutschland und Österreich. Davor erwarb er sich Know-how in Due Diligence, Steuerfragen und Sanierungskonzepten bei zwei Unternehmen in der Wirtschaftsprüfung und Unternehmensberatung.

 

Der begeisterte Bergsteiger schloss sein Studium an der Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien mit der Diplomarbeit über „Mezzaninkapital im Handels- und Steuerrecht“ ab. Er hält zudem einen „Executive MBA“ von der IMADEC University. Für Venionaire CEO Berthold Baurek-Karlic ist der Neuzugang ein wichtiger strategischer Gewinn: „Martin Steininger hat einen herausragenden Track-Record bei Investments und Exits im Technologiesektor. Sein Name steht für Qualität und Expertise und gemeinsam werden wir in den nächsten Jahren massiv in disruptive Technologien aus Österreich und Deutschland investieren. Wir konzentrieren uns dabei auf die Wachstumsphase von Unternehmen in verschiedensten High-Tech-Bereichen wie Automation, Analytics und Big Data, Scientific Computing und Robotik. Österreich hat weit mehr zu bieten, als nur Web und Mobile Startups!“

Courseticket goes Tel Aviv

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For startups in e-commerce it is essential to think, work and connect with people globally. Alexander Schmid (on the picture at the foreground) and Markus Kainz, founders of the education platform courseticket.com, are showing how it is done: After winning the first Pitching Days in London, they have been selected as one of nine Austrian startups for the next round from 8th till 11th february in Tel Aviv. The “Pitching Days” is an initiative organized by Junge Wirtschaft, Aussenwirtschaft Austria and the Austrian Wirtschaftsservice and offers young Austrian startups access to investors around the globe.

Besides a trip to Jerusalem and getting in contact with the Israeli culture, Alex and Markus visited Jerusalem Venture Partner (JVP), one of the most important startup accelerator in the region. Markus was fascinated by the company spirit: “The Israelian startup scene really embraces the culture of failing. If you have not failed at least with two startups before, JVP will not even consider to take you in their accelerator program. This mentality is probably a key factor why Tel Aviv is one of the most attractive places for building a startup worldwide.”

With their presentation at the pitching event Alex and Markus successfully got a step into this huge market and convinced investors and potential partners. Two leading Isreali investors are showing serious interest into courseticket and one of them already appointed a meeting in Vienna for more in-depth talks. Furthermore, Alex and Markus also found two new strategic partners for entering the Middle East markets.

“We really want to say thank you to the Austrian Economic Chamber  and the Austrian Wirtschaftsservice for this great opportunity and we also want to congratulate all the other fantastic Austrian startups pitching at this event”, Alex summed up. We also congratulate our portfolio company courseticket to the successful journey and are excited about the next steps ahead. See more great impressions from the Pitching Days on the Google+ profile of “Junge Wirtschaft Österreich”.

courseticket.com is Austria’s leading online marketplace for education and advanced training offers. Costumers are able to search for training offers from a wide variety of different providers. The company, co-founded 2011 by Venionaire CEO Berthold Baurek-Karlic, is still hungry for growth and gaining more and more traction every day.

Venionaire meets Vice Chancellor Reinhold Mitterlehner

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Today our Managing Partner Berthold Baurek-Karlic and our Investment Manager Alexander Rapatz visited the management club. Mr. Reinhold Mitterlehner, Vice Chancellor and Federal Minister of Science, Research and Economy talked with Airport Vienna chairman Mr. Günther Ofner und Mr. Anton Ofner, owner of MBB BioLab GmbH and member of the Vienna Chamber of Commerce and Industry, about the economic future of Austria and European developments.

We were delighted that Mr. Mitterlehner stressed out the importance of Venture Capital for Austria and that he welcomed developments of this financing field in Austria, namely Pioneers Festivals and a rising number of early-stage investors. Venture Funding is still underdeveloped in Austria, improvements would have positive implications on market competitiveness – also in terms of international ratings. Baurek-Karlic and Rapatz used the opportunity to briefly talk afterwards with the minister about this issue.

Vice Chancellor Mitterlehner was very positive towards Angel Investing and Venture Capital as a chance to vitalize the Austrian market. We gained additional motivation and feel confident that it was the right choice to establish our Venture Capital Fund Management in Vienna, which is about to setup a very well stocked Venture Capital Fund for cross-industry, early-stage investments in Europe with focus on Germany and Austria!

CONDA expands to Germany and Switzerland

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Great news from our partner! Yesterday CONDA launched its newly improved crowdinvesting platform www.CONDA.eu, where from now on, investors will find projects from Austria as well as Germany and Switzerland. Beside of the new and modern design, there are quite a few advantages for investors such as the improved transparency and comparablility of the projects or the possibility to discuss open questions with other investors, directly on the platform.

CONDA is a crowdinvesting platform and aims to connect investors with entrepreneurs by offering startups and SMEs an alternative to tradtitional roots of financing. By supporting projects with their consulting expertise, the broad business know-how of its mentors and the wide network of partners CONDA guarantees the success of local innovations. Investors from Austria, Germany and Switzerland participate – starting with an amount of 100 Euros – in the company’s profit and growth. Since 2013 the platform has closed 13 crowdinvesting projects that raised over 1.5 million euros from 1,500 crowd investors in total.

We concratulate our partner to the successful expansion and wish the best for the future!

Top 10 Tech Blogs

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The world is changing! Disruptive technology is popping out of garages and aiming to shake industries every day. Innovative first-timers are challenged with copy-cats around the globe. Almost every week there are news about companies being bought by leading market players for unbelievable valuations and you did not even know them?

Broken down to a simple definition, successful innovation depends on brains, money and awareness! Sometimes it is a “winner takes it all” and in other cases there is room for small set of players. It is very hard to figure out what happens next in the venture market, hence – if you want to be an extraordinary entrepreneur or a really successful early stage investor – it’s essential to develop a feeling for this.

It is not always the first product or the one which provides the most features, in most cases there is a product which fits the customer best. There is no DNA for success!

Following the most influential tech blogs will help you to understand, which technologies, business models and products are trending and which transactions happened. Most young entrepreneurs will follow their industry, peer competitors and market movements. The best investors are very well prepared to challenge founders on their home turf. Information is key. Investors need a good understanding of risks, competitors and premises of success.

Top 10 Tech Blogs (ranked by our team):

  1. TechCrunch
  2. Venture Beat
  3. Wired
  4. Mashable
  5. Huffington Post (TECH)
  6. TECHSPOT
  7. Gizmodo
  8. GIGAOM
  9. Bloomberg (TECH)
  10. The Next Web (TNW)

Working as a professional in such an environment, eventually leads to a lot of reading and research. We recommend to concentrate on international tech blogs to keep a good macro overview, but when it comes to a potential transaction it may be smart to challenge your ideas and thoughts with a professional advisor. Venionaire Capital has access to a number of professional databases, which provide deep insight in deal data, benchmarks and multiples. All these information are the foundation for a qualitative and quantitative company analyses, which is the key for an objective market valuation.

New Venture: Chatgrape

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We are proud to announce a new early stage investment, with chatgrape.com (Vienna, Austria). Entering a highly competitive market is difficult, unless you offer an extremely useful technology and a mind-blowing innovation. ChatGrape built an enterprise and team messaging service with a unique deep service integration and a super smart autocomplete technology. This service cuts wasted time for switching between services and such in half. The set of technological innovations makes a wonderful product and simply provides your company data under your fingertips.

Check out this little video and you will understand the revolutionary approach of chatgrape:

“Our aim is to eliminate the ‘look-up factor’; the time you lose whenever you interrupt whatever you’re doing to look something up,” co-founder and COO Leo Fasbender explained TechCrunch in an interview a couple of days ago.

ChatGrape is in a closed beta phase at this moment, with 300+ companies registered and 1.000+ clients waiting to get in. The team is hacking like crazy to release new integrations, features and improvements based on the received feedback and communicated demand of potential clients.

We are looking forward to the future development and wish a very welcome to our portfolio!

 

Related Stories:

https://kurier.at/karrieren/berufsleben/wir-muessen-reden/101.585.165

https://techcrunch.com/2014/12/08/chatgrape/

https://futurezone.at/produkte/chatgrape-soll-firmeninterne-e-mails-obsolet-machen/74.131.993

 

New Release: Erfolgsgründer – Made in Austria

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Starting a business takes guts, and in most cases this decision will be live changing. Startups are often the culmination of many years preparatory work, the beginning of an not just an adventure story. For the good of our wealth we all hope for the best, but in the end it is an uncertain and challenging future a brave founder decided to go for. What is it that drives this people? Why do so many fail with their promising ideas? What are the drivers of donors, consultants and co-founders and do they all follow the same goal? Often single founder personalities are essential for sustained success.

The book “Erfolgsgründer – Made in Austria” (Available for Kindle and in print – Language: German) looks behind the scene of 25 successful Austrian Startups, through interviews with inspiring personalities, who have led or are leading a startup at the moment.

The Authors: Helmut Pöllinger brought his over 25 years of experience in managing a fast-growing tech startup (Brainloop), start-up and exit experience, Berthold Baurek-Karlic his experience in Corporate Finance, Venture Capital, establishment and management of startups and Fabian Greiler his journalistic experience, see his blog post about the presentation of the book.

 

 

 

TV Celebrity Christian Clerici invests in courseticket.com

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The founders of courseticket.com proudly announced a first closing of a new funding round with a well-known celebrity in German speaking countries. Most people know Christian Clerici as a journalist, speaker, extreme sports athlete, hot-rod enthusiast and some do know him as a Business Angel. “Christian is active as an Angel since around 2 years and has digged himself into his role, as a supporter, connector, motivator – talking to him about changing the world together makes him smile – I really think being an Angel is a passion for him.” Alexander Schmid (CEO, courseticket.com).

courseticket.com offers a SaaS solution for vendors in the education industry and a transparent marketplace for potential clients, who look for the right training and would like to compare prices and quality. Courseticket is the leading marketplace for education and training in Austria, with more than 250,000 users visiting the platform monthly, a two digit-growth rate and more than 10,000 active deals offered at the marketplace. The company aims to go international within the next two years.

Christian Clerici underlines his decision to support coureticket, with a brief comment:  “The market for this kind of business is breath taking, with more than EUR 45 billion only in Germany, EUR 85 billion in UK and over 1,3 trillion in the US. On the other hand it is very fragmented, has some entry barriers and is very competitive. Courseticket is not my first tech investment, therefore I know we have some challenging and exiting years coming up! I am looking forward to change the world of education with this ambitions team!”

The investment took place shortly after, courseticket was awarded to be one of the most promising startups in London, at a pitch-event of the Austrian Trade Commission, where UK based Investors spend an inspiring evening with more than twenty startups of Austria.

Related stories / Media coverage:

https://www.deutsche-startups.de/2014/11/05/tv-moderator-clerici-investiert-courseticket-und-mehr/

https://diepresse.com/home/wirtschaft/economist/3893659/Auf-Investorenjagd-in-London

 

Alexander Rapatz

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Alexander Rapatz is Partner at Venionaire Capital and Compliance Officer at Venionaire Investment. This article consists of

  • a short description of his career in English
  • and pictures of Alexander Rapatz

 

Curriculum Vitae

ENGLISCH

The legal and financial expert is responsible for structuring and execution of private equity, venture capital and debt capital transactions at Venionaire Capital. He carries out due diligences, negotiates participation agreements and monitors investments. Furthermore he consults our clients on financially-critical transactions, such as exits, restructurings or mergers & acquisitions.

As Compliance Officer at Venionaire Investment, Alexander is responsible for the compliance with legal regulations (in particular the AIFM-Direction and EuVECA regulations), the legal documentation and the reporting to the respective Financial Market Authorities.

Alexander is also a board member of the European Super Angels Club and lecturer at the Business Angel Institute. Furthermore, he is an independent expert for “Horizon 2020” of the European Commission.

Prior to joining Venionaire in November 2014, Alexander worked as political advisor in the parliamentary club of NEOS, consulting on business law, national security policy, the European Stability Mechanism and financial matters in the course of the negotiations of the parliamentary budget board. Alexander gained his financial law expertise while working as Senior Associate for the Vienna based law firms Binder Grösswang and CHSH in the areas of Banking & Corporate Finance, Structured Finance, Project Finance, Acquisition Financing, PPP-Financing, Mergers & Acquisitions and Corporate Law.

Alexander gained international experience while working for the Austrian Trade Commission in Singapore and two top tier law-firms in New York and Kiev. Furthermore he reprocessed the role of rating agency’s in the financial crises 2008 and their (civil) liability under Austrian law in his thesis for the Vienna University of Economics and Business.

He holds degrees in law and business. His Curriculum Vitae is available on Xing and LinkedIn.

 

DEUTSCH

Der Rechts- und Finanzexperte ist verantwortlich für die Strukturierung und Durchführung von Private Equity-, Venture Capital- und Fremdkapitalgeschäften bei Venionaire Capital. Er führt Due Diligences durch, verhandelt Partnerschaftsvereinbarungen und überwacht Investitionen. Darüber hinaus berät er unsere Mandanten bei finanzkritischen Transaktionen wie Exits, Restrukturierungen oder Fusionen und Übernahmen.

Als Compliance Officer bei Venionaire Investment ist Alexander für die Einhaltung gesetzlicher Vorschriften (insbesondere die AIFM-Direction und EuVECA Vorschriften), die rechtliche Dokumentation und die Berichterstattung an die jeweiligen Finanzmarktaufsicht verantwortlich.

Alexander ist auch Vorstandsmitglied des European Super Angels Club und Dozent am Business Angel Institute. Darüber hinaus ist er ein unabhängiger Experte für “Horizon 2020” der Europäischen Kommission.

Vor seinem Eintritt bei Venionaire im November 2014 arbeitete Alexander als Berater in Politik und Wirtschaft im parlamentarischen Verein der NEOS. Er arbeitete für die Wiener Anwaltskanzleien Binder Grösswang und CHSH als Senior Associate und erwarb dabei Wissen in den Bereichen Banking & Corporate Finance, Strukturierte Finanzierung, Projektfinanzierung, Akquisitionsfinanzierung, PPP-Finanzierung, Mergers & Acquisitions und Gesellschaftsrecht.

Alexander hat bei der österreichischen Handelskommission in Singapur und zwei hochkarätigen Anwaltskanzleien in New York und Kiew internationale Erfahrungen gesammelt. Darüber hinaus hat er sich in seiner Diplomarbeit für die Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien, mit der Rolle der Rating-Agentur in der Finanzkrise 2008 und ihre (zivilrechtliche) Haftung nach österreichischem Recht, beschäftigt.

Er hat Abschlüsse in Rechtswissenschaften und Betriebswirtschaftslehre. Sein Curriculum Vitae ist auf Xing und LinkedIn verfügbar.

 

Pictures are permitted solely for editorial purposes
Alexander Rapatz, MBL

Mag. Alexander Rapatz, MBL – © Foto Wilke

 

2016-02-02_Alexander.Rapatz_1_medium © Fabian Greiler

 

2016-02-02_Alexander.Rapatz_2_medium © Fabian Greiler

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