media + more venture Beteiligungs GmbH & Co. KG invest in High-Tech Gruenderfonds II

media + more venture Beteiligungs GmbH & Co. KG, a consortium of three publishers, has invested in High-Tech Gruenderfonds II bringing the total number of corporate investors in the fund to 17. With this investment, the consortium has sent a clear signal to the publishing world about the importance of innovative technologies to the future of this branch of industry.

media + more venture Beteiligungs GmbH & Co. KG brings together three publishers: Badisches Pressehaus GmbH & Co. KG (publishers of “Badische Zeitung”), the Druck & Medien Heilbronn GmbH (“Heilbronner Stimme”) as well as the publishing group Rhein Main GmbH & Co. KG (VRM) based in Mainz (“Allgemeine Zeitung”).

High-Tech Gruenderfonds II is Europe’s largest public/private partnership in the seed financing market and, with the consortium’s EUR 3 million investment, now contains a total volume of EUR 301,5 million in funds. Innovative high-tech start-ups identified for support from High-Tech Gruenderfonds receive up to EUR 500,000 in venture capital in the form of seed financing with up to EUR 1,5 million in further investment available to individual companies at subsequent stages.

“This investment by media + more venture Beteilingungs GmbH & Co. KG is the largest that HTGF II has received from the publishing world and it sends a positive signal from this sector to investment markets,” remarks Dr. Alex. V. Frankenberg, Managing Director of High-Tech Gruenderfonds. He continues, “The Heilbronner Stimme has been involved with kimeta, one of the companies held in our investment portfolio, and has used this relationship to open itself up to new, strategic business opportunities. The consortium’s investment in High-Tech Gruenderfonds II will now provide all its members with access to a variety of disruptive technologies and with that a host of new possibilities in a variety of areas such as the digital world. By bringing together these established publishers with young high-tech start-ups, we are confident that synergies will be created to the benefit all the involved parties.”

Tilmann Distelbarth, publisher of the Heilbronner Stimme and representative of media + more venture Beteiligungs GmbH & Co. KG, summarizes the publishers’ goals as follows: “We want to further strengthen and develop the publishing industry, and this is only possible through the use of innovative ideas and technologies. While the reach of our print products is largely stable, we need to redouble our efforts in the area of cross media in order to be able to offer our customers our content digitally on their smartphones or tablets, and not only in printed formats. Other digital services, for example online advertising or other retail sales platforms offer business opportunities which are of increasing importance to maintaining the competitiveness of the publishing industry. With our investment in HTGF II, we are securing direct access to exactly these sort of innovations.”

About High-Tech Gruenderfonds
High-Tech Gruenderfonds invests in young, high potential high-tech start-ups. The seed financing provided is designed to enable start-ups to take an idea through prototyping and to market launch. Typically, High-Tech Gruenderfonds invests EUR 500,000 in the seed stage, with the potential for up to a total of EUR 2 million per portfolio company in follow-on financing. Investors in this public/private partnership include the Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology, the KfW Banking Group, as well as seventeen commercial enterprises ALTANA, BASF, B. Braun, Robert Bosch, CEWE Color, Daimler, Deutsche Post DHL, Deutsche Telekom, Evonik, media + more venture Beteiligungs GmbH & Co. KG, METRO, Qiagen, RWE Innogy, SAP, Tengelmann and Carl Zeiss. High-Tech Gruenderfonds has about EUR 573,5 million under management in two funds (EUR 272 million HTGF I, EUR 301,5 million HTGF II).

About media + more venture Beteiligungs GmbH & Co. KG
media + more venture Beteilingungs GmbH & Co. KG is an associated company which brings together Badisches Presshaus (“Badische Zeitung”, Freiburg), Druck & Medien Heilbronn (“Heilbronner Stimme” among others) and Verlagsgruppe Rhein Main (“Allgemeine Zeitung”, Mainz, among others). All three partners have long demonstrated a willingness to embrace innovation and were quick to recognize the key role that cross medial presence would play in their future operations. Through their joint investment in High-Tech Gruenderfonds, the partners want to be part of efforts to invest in innovative new high-tech companies with the eye to identifying opportunities beyond their traditional areas of business.

Contact:
High-Tech Gruenderfonds Management GmbH
Stefanie Zillikens – Marketing & Communivations Manager
Schlegelstraße 2 – 53113 Bonn
Tel: +49 228 823001-07 – Fax +49 228 823000-50
s.zillikens@high-tech-gruenderfonds.de
www.high-tech-gruenderfonds.de