International growth is both an opportunity and a challenge for many startups. When is the right time for expansion? What mistakes can be avoided and what is needed to be successful in international markets? We will talk about this now. I will bring the moderator to the stage. The Head of Corporate Partnerships at Plug and Play. Here is Christina Niedermeier. Hello, I hand over.
Welcome to the next panel. Now we have a small switch. Just now it was about football and startups and investing. Now we come back to startups and the topic of internationalization. And yes, when we talk about startups, sooner or later the question comes, how does it look with internationalization, global expansion, scaling? I come from the investor perspective. We definitely ask these questions. It seems somehow clear that if you want to be successful, you have to think globally sooner or later or as quickly as possible. And at the same time, we see founders who are very active and successful in their home market and perhaps do not necessarily have that as a direct goal. Exactly. The topic of global scaling or a global network, global ecosystem accompanies me every day. I will say a few words about myself again, but actually I would like to directly invite my panelists to the stage. And namely, that is Daniel Krauss, co-founder of Flix, I am very honored, Matthias Notz, CEO of Star 2 Group, Professor Dr. Klaus Seiler, Managing Director of the Strafcenter at Hochschule München, and Benjamin Domnik, founder of WoW urbane Utopien. Welcome again officially. Hello. Hi. Hi. Hello Matthias.
Yes, super. Nice that you are all here and maybe before we start with an intro round, I haven't taken my intro yet because then you'll hear it better. Maybe very briefly about me, Christina Niedermeier. I am Head of Partnerships at Plug and Play, Early Stage Investor from Silicon Valley, and we manage global innovation platforms. I lead partnerships in the health sector, so with companies like Lilli, Johnson and Johnson. But I have also worked with startups for many years in the health sector. What is Plug and Play? On the one hand, we are one of the most active Early Stage VCs, so we invest in startups. We make over 250 investments annually, also in Germany. I think that is still a bit under the radar sometimes, but we have over 130 investments in Germany, among others N26, Blockbrain here from Munich, Finn just became a unicorn, Virtonomie, Zelos, exactly, but also many more. Exactly, we have a strong global network of over 500 corporate partners that we accompany, now also many governments completely in this topic of innovation strategy, also AI and how they work with startups. Exactly, that's it briefly about me and now I hand over directly maybe Klaus, do you want to start?
Yes, you already said before, I am a professor at Hochschule München for Entrepreneurship, but I also lead the Straf Center for Entrepreneurship and it is an independent, yes, an independent center and it does, I think, the Hochschule quite good that we not only do teaching, but also get involved a bit in the ecosystem. We have now also a cooperative with 35 universities founded, because I believe and is the topic that founding is international and should be, and we have, similar to Plug and Play, only a small, also a small fund, in which we also invest in startups in a very early phase.
Well, I am Daniel, one of the three founders of Flix. We are coincidentally right next door at home. It is very convenient. We do green buses and green trains and yes, I have been doing this for almost 15 years. I'm afraid I still have to do it a bit longer because I can't do anything else anymore. Otherwise, they say that we have done the Go Global quite well, but I'm afraid you will still ask a few questions about that later.
Yes, we will definitely talk about that later, because that is definitely one of the success stories here from the Munich area and in general, and I have many questions about it.
Yes, my name is Benjamin. I am co-founder of the startup WoWin. We have existed for about 3 years and have specialized in how the cities of tomorrow will look, and I would say we are a bit of a contrast. We are from Munich, we produce locally, we try to involve a lot of local materials and thus also monitor our supply chains, and yes, we have mainly our customer base around Munich and Germany-wide, but we have already made it to Europe up to Finland. So I would say rather the home variant, but I mean with an analog product, it is sometimes a bit easier and advantageous.
Exactly, we will come to the title in a moment. Matthias has been here in Munich for 15, 17 years and from the Entrepreneurship Center at LMU, I remember we were next door many years ago, we built the German Entrepreneurship, now the Strop. The company that I lead is a global company now regarding internationalization of innovations and startups, 150 people worldwide, Silicon Valley, Sao Paulo, Singapore, Bangalore. Well, the running joke is always, if I now add Berlin and Düsseldorf, but roots in Munich and we see 6000-7000 startups we support per year and many corporates too, and the Financial Times recently ranked us second in Europe's Leading Startup Hubs, but only the European part of us was ranked, fairly speaking.
Super exciting. Thank you Matthias, and we actually know each other for a very long time, because my career actually started there at the LMU Entrepreneurship Center and the Strop. So I am very happy that we are on the panel together today and also have fundamentally very different perspectives, so startup, ecosystem, university perspective, and I wanted to structure it like this: that we start with what does global mean at all? So, when a startup expands globally, how can that look? What must one consider? How might it look in different industries? Maybe actually I start very gladly with you, Daniel, how your story also ran. So take us along from your path, from the Flix path from a German bus line to actually a global, let's say mobility group. So now you have grown really very quickly and very strongly. How did it go and how was for you also the point? When did you or you know that Germany was no longer enough? that it really had to be a bigger vision.
There are, I believe, two main strands in my experience. One is actually that you have to internationalize, almost because the home market is too small. That means the global is strongly determined by how big the home is. You can see that very nicely in Scandinavia. And there is the second strand where you say you want to internationalize because you see that what you do might be well received elsewhere. And such with us, after it developed in Germany that we had the chance to start consolidating the market after two years, two things happened. On the one hand, France as the next country liberalized the bus market. You must not forget that Flix emerged from a European Union legislative amendment, because before it was not possible in Germany, among others also not in France and in many other countries, and as the third country then Italy joined. And then we simply thought, well, it is very similar, they only have cars and trains, and why shouldn't buses work, and if the legal basis is similar, then let's do it. And we started in Italy and that actually only because our long-time Italy boss, he came with his wife to Munich, who then had a job at Stylight, also a former Munich startup, and he said, well, then I'll do an internship here somewhere. Ended up with us in the neighborhood, and it went so well that after half a year we said, ask your wife if you want to move back to Milan. And that worked for over 10 years, and that means we simply seized the chance that was there because we believed it would work well elsewhere. And so one thing led to another, and then it was first Europe and then the USA. The step was relatively simple in the mix of the two strands I described. Why? Because we believed the only one who could somehow become dangerous to us would be an American competitor, because the home market is so large that such big momentum can arise, that if we were to allow a Flix competitor to develop in the USA, then he could roll over us in the small-scale Europe. And to prevent that, we said, then we go first to the USA and establish ourselves there. And with that, we were, in my personal definition, the first time global and not just European or international. And yes, and now we just continue, because somehow as long as no one puts a stop sign in front of our nose, you can now, right? we have done a lot of South America lately. Now India is a big topic, Australia, as long as the regulator fits, so that we can carry out our business, our business model in this partnership, almost platform, I am not allowed to say more, say my press colleagues always, but in fact it is in the approach, then we simply do that, because I believe the rest is a question of the market. So there are enough people who want to travel by bus and so we took the chances as they lay. That is in principle like playing football, but not like the Germans.
Yes, definitely. Many thanks, Mega. I will come back later to possibly challenges on the way. But maybe first to you, Matthias. You are also very active to accompany startups in global expansion with ecosystems, with your platforms. So what is needed to strengthen startups internationally? Especially when the regulator in countries is very different, what topic plays perhaps also capital, the culture, the networks that one can build?
Yes, of course everything plays a role, yes, capital, regulator, networks, but I want to focus on the founding team. Total no-brainer, yes, it depends on the founders and the management. You already hinted at it. So if you really want to go global, of course you need people who understand what that means. is after my observation at least a quite hard and interesting journey world. The rest of the world ticks a bit differently than the home market and so you must really be on the road with a global mindset or scaling mindset and also understand that and also want it. Yes, so it is already pretty important, so intellectually understand what it means. particularly the big topic of product market fit, the assumptions that are in the home market are not necessarily in other markets, but also from mindset that you know what that means. And a global startup is, I believe, then when you have management on site or when you yourself, when Daniel does not have to be in Brazil or USA and it still works or colleagues from you, so that you really have the people who understand that and can carry the company philosophy and that is one of the core challenges of having the right people who do that on site and I also know from the Star itself, I also have to find a CEO in Asia, CEO in USA, who really do that well in their own accord and so it goes with companies and then you are global I believe when you have colleagues in management roles who can carry that and do it without you constantly hanging in and having to interfere and at the same time for that you have to do that quite a bit.
Yes, I also believe the team is decisive and how you set that up organizationally and structure it and depending on the industry many many more factors. Super. I go again to the rather local European thought perhaps Benjamin you develop innovative sustainable solutions for public space, so really again a very exciting topic. I was myself already in Singapore, there you also see many ideas somehow with green houses or yes yes green on the houses attached, really real trees. Yes, how was it for you? Is it an entrepreneurial or personal decision to focus more on the European space? You are also still a relatively small team. Exactly. Where do you stand there now?
Yes, I would say, fundamentally, globally it is very exciting to see what works where. But there are of course in every country, in every broad degree different challenges that come with it. in Barcelona or in Helsinki or also in the USA, I mean everywhere is a different habit and a different imprint also how people behave in public space and how public space is also valued and used and what is okay and what is not and that reflects naturally again in the one hand of course needs and what for what products are demanded, but also what are the regulations, what are somehow the public funds that go along with it. So, if we look at Holland, for example, is a significantly higher share of tax money is invested in bicycle infrastructure than now for example in Germany, also if we in Munich just building nice bicycle paths, but it is simply other priorities are set and that is especially in our field on the one hand a challenge, on the other hand but also a strength, because because we can focus very well on the local market and have an analog product and have taken all these values and norms and bureaucratic tricks to hand, it is also not so easy that now an American competitor can come and somehow push us out of the market or so. There are of course many others who are active in the area. It will change a lot soon in the entire structure of how cities function and also as soon as automated driving has somehow taken the next step again, a lot will simply change how cities are structured. But we still have there, that we also come from a background of ET Mobility, so of a European innovation platform, we are also very attached to this European thought and want to see, okay, if if we now somehow manage to find solutions, especially somehow in the Smart City area, in somehow in yes, it can also be digitized, there are also many interfaces in between, but if you find solutions there that are also DSGVO compliant, that fulfill certain standards, European standards, then of course a very large market opens up, because many products or projects that function in the USA are not allowed in Europe like this and do not function, even if Europe is the second largest market. But the other way around, if something works in Europe, from the regulations it is easier with that then to other markets. So, it is more regulated here, but at the same time can one then elsewhere perhaps perhaps come in easier. At the same time, the market in America is of course much more homogenized and there is very much on scale-up and this dominance on the market also present. I mean, that's why feels like every startup, every tech solution that we have in the end comes from Silicon Valley. Unfortunately, it would also be nice if one could see that more from a European perspective.
