Startuprad.io™ – Europe’s Voice on Startups, VC, Innovation & Growth

Meet Bitbond, the Berlin-based fintech behind Germany's first regulated security token offering — pioneering how companies raise capital using blockchain-based, regulated digital securities. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Tokenized securities could reshape how capital is raised and traded. Being first through the regulato...

DueDash wants to help startups become investable — combining readiness tools with a network that connects founders to potential investors, so raising is less of a black box. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Many good startups fail to raise simply because they're not 'investor-ready.' Tools and networks that close that gap w...

The Fintech Review — Joe's annual tradition since 2014 — gathers fintech entrepreneurs, event organisers, and thought leaders just before Christmas to look back on the year and ahead to the next across the sector. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Seven years of the same annual gathering is a longitudinal read on fintech itself...

Startuprad.io profiles High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF), which it calls Europe's most important seed investor. Over a decade, the German firm has become one of the region's leading sources of seed financing for startups. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Seed capital shapes which companies ever exist. HTGF's scale and track record...

In the "Chris-mas" edition, Chris in New York and Joe wrap up December 2020 in German startups — recorded early on December 15th around the holidays and Germany's lockdown. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: A year-end transatlantic read shows which German startup stories closed out an extraordinary 2020 with momentum. In this e...

Startuprad.io talks with Ulli Spankowski, CDO of Börse Stuttgart, about the BISON app — which set out to make buying and selling cryptocurrencies simple and reliable from your smartphone, and was the first to offer crypto trading backed by a German-licensed institution. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Trust and regulation are...

Startuprad.io meets Amazing Blocks, which helps tokenise any asset — legally. The conversation, tied to Frankfurt's Crypto Assets Conference, focuses on the legal scaffolding that makes real-world asset tokenisation actually work. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Tokenisation only matters if it's legally sound. Amazing Blocks'...

Carsten Borchert, co-founder of Sciflow, joins Startuprad.io with a pointed premise: Microsoft Word was never meant for writing scientific papers. Sciflow helps researchers write and format the best possible research paper, purpose-built for academic work. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Academic writing is stuck with tools d...

Startuprad.io talks with Maria Pennanen, a well-known startup investor and co-founder of Accelerator Frankfurt, who is invested directly and indirectly in renowned German startups including Solarisbank and Clark. She shares how she picks people and companies — and why startup investment is such a risky business. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why thi...

In a transatlantic recording with Chris in New York, Startuprad.io wraps up November 2020 in German startups — the funding, launches, and developments moving the scene that month. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: A steady monthly read shows which German startup stories carried momentum through the back half of 2020. In this ep...

(+)plural makes children's books for blind and visually impaired children affordable — using technology to bring accessible, inclusive reading to families that have long been underserved. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Accessibility is both a moral imperative and an underserved market. (+)plural shows how mission and prod...

A practical guide to setting up shop in Canada — what European founders should know about expanding into the Canadian market, from incorporation to go-to-market. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: North American expansion is a common but risky next step. Knowing the ground rules in Canada helps founders avoid costly missteps....

Startuprad.io meets Artificial Connect, which uses AI to generate automated local event announcements. In a city like Hannover — around 790,000 people with 40,000 to 60,000 events in a normal year — the challenge is gathering and publishing all that event information at scale. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Local media drown...

Scriptbakery taught an AI to analyze manuscripts — assessing not just quality but the emotions a text is likely to evoke in readers, giving publishers and writers a new lens on what will resonate. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Publishing runs on gut feel. AI that predicts emotional response could reshape how books are ac...

The October 2020 roundup of German startup news — the fundings, deals, and developments that shaped the scene during a pivotal pandemic-era month. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Revisiting a 2020 cut shows how far the ecosystem has come — and how startups navigated a period of deep uncertainty. In this episode, we cover:...

Questlog cracked individualized mass production — manufacturing customized products at scale, blending the economics of mass production with the flexibility of bespoke goods. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Mass customization has been a manufacturing holy grail. Startups solving it unlock new product categories and margins...

doks. innovation enables indoor drone flights that automate inventory and stocktaking in warehouses — bringing autonomous data capture to digital logistics. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Warehouse inventory is slow, manual, and error-prone. Autonomous indoor drones turn a painful process into continuous, accurate data. I...

Emporion Innovations helps startups and corporates test product ideas anonymously — validating concepts with real market feedback before committing time and money to build. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Building the wrong thing is the most expensive startup mistake. Anonymous, structured testing de-risks decisions early....

A practical primer on testing web applications for security loopholes — how founders and technical teams can find and fix vulnerabilities before attackers do. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Security debt is a silent startup killer. Knowing how to test for common web vulnerabilities is table stakes for any product team. In...

SleevesUp! sees a bright future for coworking beyond the big cities — building flexible workspaces in tier-2 and tier-3 towns that larger operators overlook. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Flexible work isn't just a metropolitan phenomenon. Serving overlooked smaller markets is a differentiated coworking bet. In this epis...

In a transatlantic recording with Chris in New York, Startuprad.io wraps up summer 2020 — July, August, and September — in German startups, gathering the season's developments into one cut. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Even across a pandemic summer, the ecosystem kept moving. This extended read captures how German startups...

Cyreen gives consumer brands brick-and-mortar analytics — bringing the measurement online retail takes for granted to physical stores, so brands can see what actually drives in-store behavior. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Physical retail is a data black box compared to e-commerce. Closing that gap is a large, under-addr...

Episode 200 of Startuprad.io — a milestone marked with three short conversations with past and current contributors, reflecting on the show's journey covering the DACH startup, tech, and VC scene. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Milestones are a chance to look back at how a community and a scene have grown. This one turns...

A follow-up with CoinAnalyst, the startup positioning itself as the 'Bloomberg of crypto' — building the data and intelligence layer for digital assets, with an update on its progress. Full article, links, and transcript: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Why this episode matters: Every maturing asset class needs its data infrastructure. Whoever owns crypto's Bloomberg-equivalent sits a...

Startuprad.io talks with Ramin Karbalaie, CEO and founder of NAIX Technology, a legal-tech AI startup that redacts contracts for companies in M&A transactions — and Frankfurt Forward's Startup of the Month for September 2020. Karbalaie notes companies long tolerated GDPR fines because manual redaction cost even more. Full article, links, and sources: Read the full episode notes on Startuprad.io Wh...