SPRIND
German federal agency for breakthrough innovation; participated in Hypersonica's €23.3M Series A (February 2026).
SPRIND (Bundesagentur für Sprunginnovationen / SprinD GmbH) is Germany's federal agency for breakthrough ('jump') innovation, a GmbH wholly owned by the federal government and operating under the 2023 SPRIND Freedom Act. It funds and de-risks disruptive deep-tech ideas that fall outside conventional research-grant or VC criteria, using a mix of non-dilutive R&D/validation grants, direct equity investments, and convertible loans — typically as a pari-passu co-investor requiring at least 30% of a round to come from an independent private lead investor, with repayment or upside only triggered on exit or profit distribution. It has spun out roughly nine subsidiary companies from its most promising projects since founding.
Overview
- Firm
- SPRIND — Federal Agency for Breakthrough Innovation
- Headquarters
- Leipzig, Germany
- Founded
- 2019
- AUM
- ~€220M annual budget (2024); federal program budget for its ~10-year experimental period (from 2019) expected to reach ~€1 billion — a public appropriation/program budget, not a traditional fund AUM
- Stages
- Seed, Series A, Growth
- Thesis
- Website
- www.sprind.org
Portfolio companies1
Partners2
- FounderRafael Laguna de la VeraSerial German software entrepreneur (SUSE, Open-Xchange, Micado) who became founding Director of SPRIND, Germany's federal deep-tech/moonshot funding agency, in 2019.
- FounderBerit DannenbergCommercial/business-administration Managing Director of SPRIND, sharing agency leadership with Rafael Laguna de la Vera.
Frequently asked
- What is SPRIND?
- SPRIND (Bundesagentur für Sprunginnovationen / SprinD GmbH) is Germany's federal agency for breakthrough ('jump') innovation, a GmbH wholly owned by the federal government and operating under the 2023 SPRIND Freedom Act. It funds and de-risks disruptive deep-tech ideas that fall outside conventional research-grant or VC criteria, using a mix of non-dilutive R&D/validation grants, direct equity investments, and convertible loans — typically as a pari-passu co-investor requiring at least 30% of a round to come from an independent private lead investor, with repayment or upside only triggered on exit or profit distribution. It has spun out roughly nine subsidiary companies from its most promising projects since founding.
- How much does SPRIND manage?
- SPRIND manages ~€220M annual budget (2024); federal program budget for its ~10-year experimental period (from 2019) expected to reach ~€1 billion — a public appropriation/program budget, not a traditional fund AUM in assets, and was founded in 2019.
- What stages does SPRIND invest at?
- SPRIND invests at Seed, Series A, Growth.
Sources & citations5
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