+++ Tentris +++ altitude +++ Startup boom +++ Lucid Capital +++ pivio +++

#STARTUPTICKER

Tentris – STARTUPLAND – altitude
+++ STARTUPLAND pays off! The Bielefeld AI startup Tentrisoverall winner of this year STARTUPLAND Pitch Contestraises 925,000 euros from Bloomhaus Ventures, Vanagon Ventures, altitude10x Value Partners and business angel Pascal Wichmann. There is also 1 million euros in EXIST funding. Particularly exciting: The team met the SME tech investor altitude at our STARTUPLAND Conference. We are of course particularly pleased that this has now become an investment. Tentris, founded in 2024 as a spin-off from the University of Paderborn, is developing a new generation of graph databases that enable companies and AI systems to evaluate networked information more quickly and make better decisions. More about Tentris

Startups
+++ More start-ups than ever before! In the first half of 2026, 3,053 new startups were created in Germany – more than in the whole of 2024. This is according to the new report “Next Generation – startups in Germany” from the Startup Association and startupdetector. The first half of 2026 is therefore the most start-up period since the survey began in 2019. Compared to the second half of 2025, the number of new startups rose by 52%. What is particularly striking: 1,038 of the new startups are already relying on artificial intelligence – meaning that more than every third new startup is now working on and with AI. Remarkable: The start-up boom is affecting the whole of Germany. In More startups were created in all federal states than in the previous half year, Hamburg even increased by 83%. At the end of the day, the important finding remains: the general mood in the German startup scene is still much worse than the actual figures show. (Next Generation, PDF) More about Next Generation

Lucid Capital
+++ InvestorsToWatch! The Berlin investor Lucid Capitalwhich first appeared on our radar in the summer of 2023, is still not on many people’s radars. The young financier now regularly comes on board with exciting AI startups. Most recently, the team invested 3 million euros together with Possible Venture, Kvanted and Fortino Capital mkind. The startup from Munich, founded in 2026 by Michael Sauer, Christoph Willibald, Gabriele Tiboni and Paul Kröger, develops intelligent robot systems for industrial manufacturing processes. Lucid’s previous investments also include: bayshore, GeneralMind, Sonia and forward earth. The financier’s portfolio now includes a total of 18 companies, 11 of which are already publicly known. Seven other investments are still in stealth mode. Review: In February the investor announced around Johann Nordhus Westarp and Srecko Džeko the final closing of his first fund at 36 million euros. Lucid positions itself as an “AI Inception Fund” and sometimes invests in founding teams before a company even exists. The team that previously led the Flash Ventures incubator will likely be seen more often on the cap tables of emerging AI startups in the future. More about Lucid Capital

pivio
+++ “Our customers have shown us that they are not looking for the next consulting tool, but rather an infrastructure that makes existing processes more intelligent. That’s why we have developed an AI infrastructure for the pet health market,” says Katharina Bansemer, founder of pivio. More about pivio

Startup Radar
+++ New founders are on their way! Today we present the following selection of fresh startups that you should know: bayshore, INXM, Optohive, VPATH AI and senaya.AI. More on the startup radar

#DEALMONITOR

Investments & Exits
+++ Proxima Fusion collects 411 million (valuation: 2.4 billion) +++ ARC receives 4 million +++ Porelio receives 2.4 million +++ STARTUPLAND pitch contest overall winner Tentris collects almost 2 million. More in the deal monitor

#JOBS

Agile Robots
+++ Our job of the day! Agile Robots is looking for a Senior Customer Support Engineer (m/f/d). Agile Robots SE is an international high-tech company based in Munich, Germany with a production site in Kaufbeuren and more than 2300 employees worldwide. Our mission is to bridge the gap between artificial intelligence and robotics by developing systems that combine state-of-the-art force-moment-sensing and world-leading image-processing technology.