Yoom.de, an innovative online platform for tenant-to-tenant residential real estate transactions, has raised further growth capital from Earlybird Venture Capital. Currently, Earlybird manages over 430 million Euros of assets for an international investor base investing in innovative, fast growing companies with outstanding management teams and high growth potential in international markets. Earlybird’s portfolio currently includes more than 25 companies in seven countries, they invested in over 70 companies and scored several successful trade sales and IPOs.

The company received seed financing from angel investors in spring 2009 while the new round is rumored to be in the single-digit million Euro amount,  following its successful market entry.

Hopefully they will use the money to put up an english version and enter other european markets.

Malte Niebuhr, Managing Director at Yoom.de, is delighted: ”Earlybird Venture Capital is a high-class investor who has already very actively supported us during our start-up phase and continues to do so in the growth phase we are now entering and very much looking forward to.

Yoom.de enables current and new tenants, landlords and asset / facility managers to efficiently execute the tenant changing process without involving real estate agents, whilst at the same time providing an economic benefit for all parties by revolutionising the value chain.

Dr. Christian Nagel, Managing Partner at Earlybird Venture Capital, comments: “Yoom.de is an innovative business model with the potential to eliminate a market inefficiency – namely high real estate agent commissions without agents providing a noticeable service or value-ad in return. The first transactions on the platform have proven that the model offers significant advantages not only to previous and subsequent tenants, but also to landlords and asset / facility managers compared to the estate agent-model. We are very convinced of the business idea.”

High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF), DuMont Venture and bAV Consult have sold their stakes in northworks Software to games provider Travian Games in early March.

Now, the same High-Tech Gründerfonds, now together with RapidTainment, have also made a seven figure seed round in online game company UP Web Game GmbH.
“People enjoy playing with each other,” the founders Ibrahim Evsan and Thomas Bachem comment “and the Internet makes it possible to realize completely new concepts.” Evsan and Bachem have developed the idea behind the game since 2005, until they put it aside for some time in order to found the video platform sevenload. “However, we are entrepreneurs, and sometimes you can’t let an idea go. This game is one of those very special projects, and we are happy to finally implement it together with strong partners”.

Tobias Hartmann, who joined end of 2009 as co-founder: “Our two investors complement each other perfectly. RapidTainment AG is a very powerful partner with an exciting strategic vision, while HTGF contributes an excellent VC network and a high degree of professionalism”.

ClickandBuy is to become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom AG. Via its venture capital company, T-Venture, Deutsche Telekom has held shares in ClickandBuy since 2006 and currently owns 20.2 per cent of its shares.

Other investors included Intel Capital and 3i. Deutsche Telekom has now acquired all remaining shares in the internet payment service provider ClickandBuy. The agreement was finalized yesterday. The supervisory bodies of the companies concerned and the UK’s Finacial Services  Authority (FSA) have already approved the process.

Klaus Konrad, Investment Director of Intel Capital: “ClickandBuy has become one of the top three online payment providers in the world and is a European investment success story.This shows that even in challenging economic periods, it is possible to grow top performing organizations through great management and the right investment strategy.”

ClickandBuy’s CEO, Charles Fraenkl, welcomed the deal: “Our minority shareholders T-Venture and Intel Capital with their dedication and commitment have contributed a lot to the success and growth of ClickandBuy.With the support of our new shareholder, ClickandBuy, already one of today’s leading providers of online payments solutions, will continue to strengthen and expand its market position in the future. ClickandBuy is in an exceptionally good position and is very happy about the huge advantages this synergy contains regarding the realisation of its global strategic goals which will be made possible through the involvement of Deutsche Telekom.”

ClickandBuy is one of the leading payment services in the internet.Certified by McAfee and tested by Germany’s Technical Inspection and Testing Association (TUV), this online payment system is used for internet purchases by over 13 million people. Having doubled its turnover generated by traders and end customers to EUR 922 million (TTV) in 2008, the ClickandBuy Group first crossed the billion euro threshold in 2009.

Over 16.000 online traders use ClickandBuy’s e-payment system for their e-commerce, retail, online entertainment, and paid content & services billing, including Deutsche Telekom, Scout24 Group, Apple iTunes, Napster, Orange, msn, AOL, Meetic, Parship, Electronic Arts (EA), Codemasters, McAfee, Panda, RTL, Playboy, Financial Times Deutschland, Foto.com, Deutsche Boerse Group, KPMG, Yamaha, Digital River, Redcoon, bonprix (Otto Group).

Founded in 1999, ClickandBuy represents over 10 years of experience and expertise in the e-payment market. The online payment system is operated by ClickandBuy International Ltd. in London. As an e-money institution licensed by the UK’s Financial Services Authority (FSA), ClickandBuy’s complete service includes 120 currencies and offers 50 national and international modes of payment throughout 31 countries.

High-Tech Gründerfonds, which looks like is in an investment spree, and BBAF Business Angels Fondsgesellschaft have invested €550,000 into car diagnostics software startup Autoaid

German startup Yoochoose just closed its seed-round with High Tech Gruenderfonds and the Connected Life and Work Fund which is managed by T-Venture.

The Cologne-based company is a spin-off from Deutsche Telekom Laboratories and provides its customers with a high-end recommendation engine.

HTGF is a really impressive VC, they’re very active at the moment and are really pushing in this end-of-recession stage. The amount of the round was not disclosed, but we understand it will allow the company to improve their product in order to offer it to a diverse kind of customers such as e-commerce, media and publishing companies.

“It increasingly becomes a critical success factor for eCommerce companies to offer to its customers the right value at the right time. With a Recommender System as advanced as the YOOCHOOSE engine you know your customer and create a unique selling point,” says Oliver Fietz, Fund Manager T-Venture. “Besides the team we are convinced by the B2B-business model. This made our investment decision easy.”

The company was just founded last February by Dr. Alkemper as CEO and M. Friedmann as CTO.

“Personalized recommendations currently are among the hottest topics requested by customers. With Yoochoose we invest not only in a superior technology but also in highly professional team in this market.” says Holger Heinen, senior investment manager of High-Tech Gründerfonds.

• Germany: Earlybird has led a first round of financing for software company azeti Networks GmbH, alongside NRW Bank.
  Press release.
• France: Ventech and Auriga Partners have invested EUR 2m into software company BonitaSoft.
  Announcement.
• UK: Foresight Venture Partners and Octopus Group, via its Titan VCT fund, have invested, alongside private investors, in online CV and career profile provider iProfile, in a funding round worth more than £1.5m.
• Germany: A consortium of investors including Crédit Agricole Private Equity, Corporate Finance Partners CFP and Founders Investments GmbH & Co KGaA have invested an undisclosed amount into e-sports company Turtle Entertainment GmbH.
• France: Private equity firm Gimv has backed online furniture retailer Made in Design in a first institutional financing round worth EUR 4.5m.
  Press Release.

• Ariadne Capital has launched the Ariadne Capital Entrepeneurs (ACE) Fund, a new vehicle aimed at investing in technology start-ups (Techcrunch Europe post)
• DuMont Venture and seed investor Tiburon Partners have led an undisclosed seven figure funding round for online video technology company stream5, alongside KfW and business angel Klaus Wecken (Press release)
• IBB Beteiligungsgesellschaft invested in Affinitas, operator of the online dating portal edarling, in a second closing of the business’ first funding round

Note: This is a post I wrote for Techcrunch Europe as soon as the news broke.

High-Tech Gründerfonds and DuMont Venture has joined existing investors Draper Investment Company and the Business Angel Peter Schüpbach in a new round of financing for Plista. The deal is rumored to be in the low seven figures.

Recently Plista also rolled out OnSite Recommendations, its B2B operations providing businesses with the ability to target their content, products and advertisement more efficiently. The major market will be represented by site operators in the fields of content and e-commerce.

The Berlin-based startup, which was founded just last year and employs 23 people, has scored some large publisher distribution deals such as the Kölner Stadt Anzeiger of DuMont publishing house and Pro.de, a download portal.

The company plans on developing new features for its network of partners, the first one being a marketplace dedicated to trade content and traffic.

Co-founder and CIO Andreas Richter says the focus next is is the expansion of the self-service portal, which – similar to Google AdSense® – allows publishers to generate and individually customize recommendations widgets to be integrated into their websites.

Note: This is a post I wrote for Techcrunch Europe as soon as the news broke.

Scoreloop has just announced it closed its second financing round, with a $2.8 million / €2 million cash injection from new investors Earlybird and existing investor Target Partners, which was the seed funder for the Munich-based company. The funds will be used to fuel the growth of the company and to establish (or solidify) its position, especially in the realm of the iPhone. Since launching its technology in May 2009, Scoreloop has over 500 registered game developers that have published more than 40 Scoreloop enabled games in the iPhone App Store.

So one month after the release of its community application Scoreloop finds a great validation for its product, while Earlybird gets in on one of the most interesting new business areas around.

Scoreloop offers an SDK for mobile game developers that instantly adds social gaming to their applications with features such as challenges and a points system. The company offers its technology for free to developers and monetizes on the points system. To understand better how it works and I suggest you sign up on their community and challenge me (Plus: they have one of the most amazing facebook connect apps I’ve seen).

“We are continuously receiving excellent feedback from game developers and publishers, as Scoreloop offers a unique set of tools for social features and monetization strategies. We are thrilled to be working with two of Europe’s premier VCs with Earlybird as an additional partner beside our existing investor Target Partners.” said Marc Gumpinger, CEO of Scoreloop.

Marc Gumpinger, Scoreloop’s CEO is understandably pleased. Since launching its technology in May 2009, Scoreloop has over 500 registered game developers that have published more than 40 Scoreloop enabled games in the Apple App Store today.

Roland Manger says this is a new market for its fund and Scoreloop fills a gap in their portfolio. Earlybird was looking to get into the new mobile market, without a particular interest in gaming technologies until they found Scoreloop. He points at their significant growth potential: “Scoreloop’s technology and the community platform solve many problems both developers and users are facing in the mobile app-world. Scoreloop will help developers make their games more attractive while improving monetization and users will be able to find games relevant to them much quicker.”

Warburg Pincus, a US-based private equity firm, has acquired an 8.8% stake in Munchen-based Kontron AG, a designer and manufacturer of embedded computer systems.

The deal is valued at €38.6 millions.