- 6
- September
2023
Smart green VCs you should know
There are many smart green VCs in Europe and the US that back startups in energy, mobility, buildings, cities, materials, food and circular economy to create impact as well as environmental, financial and strategic returns for their fund investors (LPs). In the VC food chain, early stage investors prefer to invest, at lower valuations and higher risk, in the Seed, Series A and Series B financing rounds of young startups working on product market fit and traction (users, customers, revenues). On the other hand, late stage VCs like shorter holding periods and time-to-exit and, consequently, advanced startups with more than €5M revenues, experienced management teams and fast growth. The existence of KPIs, ideally going up over time, makes the life of every investor easier. Facing climate change, technology revolution and global competition, the majority of corporates have adopted corporate venturing and open innovation strategies in order to invest in and do business with startups. The result are different investment strategies and sometimes competing portfolios that startups should know before pitching. Let’s co-invest and meet at Ecosummit Berlin 4-5 June 2024.
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- November
2016
Relayr raises $23M Series B from Munich RE/HSB Ventures, KPCB and Munich Venture Partners
The Internet of Things, Industry 4.0 and the insurance industry are coming together. Berlin-based IoT startup Relayr raises $23M (€20.7M) Series B from Munich RE/HSB Ventures, KPCB and Munich Venture Partners. It turns out that the industrial insurance company Hartford Steam Boiler (HSB), since 2009 part of Munich RE, has started to embrace IoT a while ago to make their life easier and insurance business smarter. In a nutshell, HSB insures manufacturing companies against the risk of equipment breakdown and other reasons for suboptimal factory performance. By making the machines smart and connecting them to the Relayr cloud, their health status can be monitored online. If the automated machine data analysis identifies any problems, the malfunctioning machines can be repaired or replaced before it is too late and the production line has to be put on hold without knowing why.
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