Hamburg Despite the mood of crisis in the start-up scene, two Berlin venture capitalists are venturing onto the market with a new fund: David Rosskamp, who managed the June Fund in recent years, and Mario Lebherz, Managing Director at Atlantic Food Labs until summer 2021, are currently raising capital for their Magnetic project, Handelsblatt learned.
Target mark: Apparently initially around 220 million euros, which are to be used in two vehicles for both early-stage and growth financing. According to the information, the previous donors mainly include family offices and private individuals such as other start-up founders. The team did not want to give specific names on request.
The 37-year-old Rosskamp has been largely in the background with the June Fund so far. His partner there was Florian Schindler, brother of the Google Board member Philipp Schindler, who had invested privately in the fund. Other donors included, for example, the investment company SEK Ventures of the Flixbus founders. June invested, for example, in the electrical appliances subscription service Grover, the blood test developer Aware or the bicycle navigator Komoot.
Rosskamp’s new partner, Lebherz, 35, has worked at Food Labs, a fund specializing in food that is involved in the Gorillas fast food delivery service, for example. The Food Labs belong to Christoph Maires Atlantic Labs, one of the most famous investors in the Berlin start-up scene.
Among other things, Lebherz was involved in the investments in the milk substitute developer Formo or the Hamburg high-tech mushroom grower Mushlabs.
Overcoming dependence on established structures
The focus of Magnetic is relatively broad and should be linked to that of the June Fund. According to investor documents, it is about “systems of independence”, which apparently means technologies such as cryptocurrencies or synthetic food that could overcome dependence on established structures. The fund founders also understand this objective as a political mission. Among the first investments is a stake in Project Eaden, a start-up that is working on tasty meat substitutes.
It remains to be seen how Rosskamp and Lebherz will fill their theses with content in the future. The time horizon of the two “true millennial investors” (self-promotion) should be unusually long, it is said. In view of collapsing start-up valuations, there are currently favorable entry opportunities.
