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Berlin Drives Record Investment in German Startups in 2019

January 26th 2020

By Bloomberg

German startups raised a record 6.2 billion euros ($6.9 billion) in financing in 2019, up by more than a third on the previous year and with more than half flowing to the booming capital of Berlin.

While startups in the states of Bavaria and North-Rhine Westphalia also benefited, Berlin companies raised 3.7 billion euros, an increase of 41%, according to an EY report published Tuesday.

Startups in fintech and mobility received significantly more money, ending the dominance of e-commerce companies, the report found.

Last year’s most notable investments included 500 million euros for Munich-based transport services provider FlixMobility GmbH, EY said. GetYourGuide, a Berlin-based online seller of travel activities, scooped 428 million euros and used-vehicle platform Frontier Car Group got 361 million euros.

In November, Berlin’s Tier Mobility -- a primary competitor to U.S. e-scooter companies Lime and Bird -- raised $60 million in new financing, led in part by Mubadala Capital, one of the sovereign wealth vehicles behind Softbank Group Corp.’s Vision Fund.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. backed Raisin, an internet platform for bank-savings products, in July by investing 25 million euros in the Berlin company.

“Top startups again had little difficulty in obtaining fresh capital last year, and the number of German Unicorns has continued to rise in 2019,” said Peter Lennartz, a partner at EY.