Munich Startup: Congratulations on your tenth anniversary! For those unfamiliar with BayStartup: why should a future Munich startup have you on their radar?
Carsten Rudolph, CEO BayStartup: Thank you! Every Munich startup should have BayStartup on their radar because we offer one of the most comprehensive support programs for young companies in the early stage. With the Munich Business Plan Competition, which was the first of its kind and is regarded as a kind of seal of quality beyond Bavaria, founders have the opportunity to get individual expert feedback on their business idea very early on. Around 250 teams take advantage of this opportunity every year. Our goal is to support startups from the first idea through the growth phase. We connect founders with capital providers and industry partners, offer demand-driven coaching programs, and prepare them optimally for market entry. Our investor network, the largest of its kind in Europe, makes us the first port of call for startups looking for early-stage financing and strategic sparring.
Networking, financing, and individual coaching
Munich Startup: What specific role does BayStartup play in Munich’s funding and support landscape?
Carsten Rudolph: BayStartup’s offerings accompany founders comprehensively from start through the first five or more years of their entrepreneurial journey. We provide basic business know-how, networking, individual coaching, and more. There’s really only one thing we don’t offer: office space for startups. In this regard, we work closely with all startup centers in Munich (and throughout Bavaria).
The special highlight of BayStartup from a founder’s perspective is the unique access to a network of 400 business angels, family offices, and 200 venture capital firms, with whom we actively and strategically connect startups after investor-oriented preparation. A highlight is our exclusive VentureCons that take place several times a year – a conference format that regularly attracts over 100 investors.
Munich Startup: What were your most important milestones?
Carsten Rudolph: Undoubtedly the most significant was the merger into a network covering all of Bavaria ten years ago. Then came numerous others: with the introduction of the “Startup Demo Night,” we were the first to create an event format that presents startups to a broad public and regularly attracts 1,000 visitors. Another highlight was “cracking” the half-billion euros in capital that startups we supported were able to raise through our investor network, eight years after we founded it. In subsequent rounds, the startups then reached six billion euros!
Proud of successful startups
Munich Startup: What are you especially proud of when you look back on the last ten years of BayStartup?
Carsten Rudolph: I’m particularly proud when I see how far startups we’ve supported onto the market have come. When I board a Flixbus or learn about expansion to India, when I see students in lecture halls with their Air Up bottle on the desk, or – even though the topic itself is not a pleasant one – read about the support for Ukraine through surveillance drones from Quantum Systems. And of course about the developments of “our” founders in the healthcare sector who improve people’s lives: intensive care beds from Reactive Robotics, support for those in need of care through Navel Robotics and countless other medical applications.
Munich Startup: What has changed the most in the Munich startup landscape in your view?
Carsten Rudolph: The startup landscape has developed significantly. Startups today are much better prepared and better networked, and there is more capital available in the early stage. At the same time, however, the demands on startups have increased: the competition for investments is more intense and professionalism must be right from the start. Topics such as sustainability and social impact have also gained greater importance, influencing the priorities of many founders.
Creativity, sophistication, and perseverance
Munich Startup: What do startups request most? And what do they need most from your perspective?
Carsten Rudolph: Many startups first come to us wanting to raise capital as quickly as possible. Whether they always need it is a question we like to clarify in many coaching conversations. Often there are workarounds like frugality (!), vendor credits, first revenues, and other things that give a startup a better negotiating position in the capital market. This often requires creativity, sophistication, and perseverance. This is where we step in to develop the best overall package with the founders. After all, a financing round is not an end in itself, but rather serves to turn a startup into a company.
Munich Startup: In the future, you want to increasingly support startups that pursue sustainable growth. How do you define that?
Carsten Rudolph: We repeatedly see that founders have the ambition to develop their company steadily over many years. The exit orientation that VC financing inevitably brings is not suitable for this. Here, permanent and especially rapid growth is in the foreground. For such startups, we are building a complementary offering that supports this – quite complex – growth path. Often several types of financing are used simultaneously here, which need to be coordinated.
More sustainable growth for startups
Munich Startup: What is the goal of your additional new focus and what exactly can startups expect in terms of support?
Carsten Rudolph: The goal is to also enable such startups to get a solid start and to create access to funding sources suitable for more moderate – but perhaps more sustainable – growth. Ways to achieve this are of course equity financing, but also (promotional) loans, grants, or strategic investments from industry partners.
Munich Startup: What other projects are you planning?
Carsten Rudolph: We are working to further expand our offerings in the area of industry cooperations. This involves connecting startups with potential technology and distribution partners, particularly in the mid-market sector. We are also strengthening our internationalization program to support startups in their expansion, especially in Europe. Here we are creating offerings that support startups on nearby markets as early as possible.
Real European “champions”
Munich Startup: What will we be talking about when we travel ten years into the future?
Carsten Rudolph: We’ll be talking about how together we’ve managed to build real European “champions” that, in addition to their own business success, have helped Europe regain a prominent place on the “innovation world map.” And this with topics that address current social and environmental challenges.
