News › Win­ners of the Inves­tor Days Thu­rin­gia 2023 have been selected

UNDER THE MOTTO »WHERE INNOVATION STARTS« 32 STARTUPS PRESENTED THEMSELVES TO THE INNOVATION COMMUNITY ON THE FIRST DAY OF INVESTOR DAYS THURINGIA

From bio­tech to VR and auto­ma­tion solu­ti­ons to gre­en­tech – 32 future tech­no­lo­gies were pre­sen­ted by start­ups in Erfurt on today’s Inves­tor Days Thu­rin­gia Pitch Day. The most con­vin­cing five startup pro­jects were awarded pri­zes. In addi­tion, the foun­ders were able to hold num­e­rous dis­cus­sions with inves­tors and expand their net­works. As one of the lar­gest startup events in Ger­many, the Inves­tor Days Thü­rin­gen annu­ally bring tog­e­ther actors of the inno­va­tion eco­sys­tem, start­ups, growth com­pa­nies, inves­tors and indus­try to drive innovation.

On June 14, 2023, Olga Röder and Andreas Son­ne­feld from the Foun­da­tion for Tech­no­logy, Inno­va­tion and Rese­arch Thu­rin­gia (STIFT) ope­ned the 8th edi­tion of the event at the Stei­ger­wald Sta­dium in Erfurt and gui­ded the guests through the day. The atten­dees were then wel­co­med to the joint event by Chris­tiane Kilian, Exe­cu­tive Direc­tor of STIFT, and Kevin Ree­der, Mana­ging Direc­tor of bm|t betei­li­gungs­ma­nage­ment thü­rin­gen gmbh. Thuringia’s Minis­ter of Eco­no­mic Affairs Wolf­gang Tie­fen­see then addres­sed the audi­ence with a wel­co­ming speech.

»Foun­ders from Thu­rin­gia are regu­larly repre­sen­ted in the annual ran­king of Germany’s TOP-50 start­ups,« the minis­ter refer­red to the Free State’s suc­ces­ses as a startup state. Thus, since 2017, a total of ele­ven start­ups from the Free State have made it into this top group. This is also due to the fact that the state offers a wide range of fun­ding and finan­cing instru­ments for start-ups: »Thu­rin­gia has the best frame­work con­di­ti­ons for brin­ging good busi­ness ideas to mar­ke­ta­bi­lity quickly,« said Tie­fen­see. He refer­red in par­ti­cu­lar to bm‑t as the state’s invest­ment com­pany, which accor­ding to an ana­ly­sis by startupdetector.de is one of the most active public inves­tors for start-ups in Ger­many. In addi­tion, the »Inves­tor Days Thü­rin­gen« have become an inter­na­tio­nally suc­cessful pre­sen­ta­tion for­mat that allows foun­ders to quickly and effec­tively raise ven­ture capi­tal for their companies.

This year’s Inves­tor Days Thu­rin­gia again attrac­ted a great deal of inte­rest. Around 70 pitch appli­ca­ti­ons were recei­ved this year from all over Ger­many, Bel­gium, Aus­tria, Den­mark and Switz­er­land. From the appli­ca­ti­ons, 20 start­ups were finally sel­ec­ted to pre­sent their inno­va­tions on the big stage on today’s Pitch Day. As usual, the spec­trum of topics and indus­tries was broad: Med­Tech, Bio­Tech, Gre­en­Tech, Secu­rity and Auto­ma­tion Tech­no­logy, Vir­tual Rea­lity, Space­Tech, AI solu­ti­ons and much more. Five pro­mi­sing start­ups from the Thu­rin­gian Regio­nal Inno­va­tion Pro­gram (TRIP) also pre­sen­ted them­sel­ves among the pit­chers. As the Free State’s acce­le­ra­tor pro­gram, TRIP brings its par­ti­ci­pants to invest­ment rea­di­ness at full speed each year, crea­ting a solid foun­da­tion for mar­ket entry.

Pit­ches were held in two blocks. In bet­ween, the event offe­red ple­nty of space for sha­ring expe­ri­en­ces, inspi­ra­tion and net­wor­king. In addi­tion, guests and inves­tors were able to dis­co­ver the 20 pitch pro­jects and 12 other startup inno­va­tions at their booths in the adja­cent Inno­va­tion Arena and exch­ange ideas with the founders.

In addi­tion, there were exci­ting impul­ses around the topic of smart manu­fac­tu­ring as well as cou­rage to inno­vate and the startup spi­rit in Israel. After­wards, Mar­tha Wen­zel, co-foun­der of E‑Terry GmbH, told the story of her startup after the pitch on stage at Inves­tor Days Thu­rin­gia 2020 and which path E‑Terry is taking today to sus­tain­ably work on the company’s suc­cess story.

Applause for the pitch winners!

The pre­sen­ta­tion of the Pitch Awards was a high­light of the event. To honor the most con­vin­cing pit­ches, the jury of inves­tors and the audi­ence sel­ec­ted a total of 5 win­ners in a live vote. Con­gra­tu­la­ti­ons go to:

Prize of STIFT & bm|t: Xsight Optics GmbH
Cash prize: € 3.000

Prize from EY: openUC2 GmbH
Non-cash prize: € 2,000 con­sul­ting services

Prize from Leo­Blu Patent­an­wälte: plas­mo­tion GmbH
Non-mone­tary prize: € 2,500 con­sul­ting services

Prize of GRÜNDELPARTNER legal advice: Valoon
mate­rial prize: € 1.500 con­sul­ting services

Audi­ence Award of Apro­pro Haar­beck: FreeMOM
Mate­rial prize: € 1.500 con­sul­ting services

The second event day at Ega­park in Erfurt is dedi­ca­ted to the exch­ange bet­ween inves­tors and Thu­rin­gian growth com­pa­nies. Under the motto »Invest bey­ond the crowd«, 19 sel­ec­ted growth com­pa­nies will pre­sent them­sel­ves to an exclu­sive round of inves­tors. The com­pa­nies‹ pit­ches pro­vide the basis for an exci­ting exch­ange about future-ori­en­ted tech­no­lo­gies and allow inves­tors to take advan­tage of their invest­ment oppor­tu­ni­ties. The day also pro­vi­des ample space for networking.

Back­ground
The Inves­tor Days Thu­rin­gia are an initia­tive of the Foun­da­tion for Tech­no­logy, Inno­va­tion and Rese­arch Thu­rin­gia (STIFT) and betei­li­gungs­ma­nage­ment thü­rin­gen gmbh (bm|t) to bring tog­e­ther inno­va­tive start­ups and growth com­pa­nies with poten­tial coope­ra­tion part­ners as well as inves­tors and busi­ness angels every year in June. Since 1993, STIFT has been pro­mo­ting sci­ence, rese­arch and tech­no­logy along the entire edu­ca­tio­nal and eco­no­mic deve­lo­p­ment chain. In indi­vi­dual cases, STIFT its­elf also acts as a finan­cial backer and invests as an early-stage and side inves­tor in pro­mi­sing Thu­rin­gian start-ups. STIFT is invol­ved as a co-orga­ni­zer of the Inves­tor Days as part of the ThEx inno­va­tiv pro­ject, which is sup­ported by the Thu­rin­gian Minis­try of Eco­no­mics, Sci­ence and Digi­tal Society with funds from the Euro­pean Social Fund Plus. The bm|t betei­li­gungs­ma­nage­ment thü­rin­gen gmbh (bm|t), based in Erfurt, is the first address for ven­ture capi­tal invest­ments in Thu­rin­gia, Ger­many. bm|t curr­ently mana­ges ele­ven invest­ment funds with a total volume of EUR 415 mil­lion and invests in inno­va­tive com­pa­nies with strong growth poten­tial across all indus­tries and all pha­ses of the com­pany life cycle.