Next stops: Munich, Frankfurt, Cologne and Hamburg

HYGH AG is currently expanding its billboards from Berlin to the rest of Germany - despite the coronavirus pandemic. The founders have set themselves ambitious goals.

Fritz Frey is one of those people who would rather look to the future than the past. The 25-year-old doesn't even like to talk about the initial financing of his start-up. Things were quite turbulent back then.

Frey and his co-founders decided on a Security Token Offering (STO), a kind of crowdfunding on a crypto token basis. They were able to drum up 2,000 investors and promised them a nine percent share of sales. Such financing channels are still a rarity in cryptocurrency-shy Germany.

Frey's reluctance to talk about their financing method could also be due to the problems the founders had with it in 2019. The crypto forum "coinforum" was abuzz when they announced their STO. Some of the criticism there was harsh. Some users described the start-up's offering as dubious. The STO was not an STO at all, but rather an unregulated initial coin offering (ICO). The criticism became so intense that co-founder Vincent Müller apparently felt compelled to clarify a few things, and his post can still be read there today. The problem: Müller didn't even write this statement himself, someone was pretending to be him, says Fritz Frey today. That's just the way it is in these crypto forums. "We currently prefer to look to the future and want to be available with our service in all major German cities," says Frey. It all worked out well again.

HYGH wants to create a global network for digital outdoor advertising. They started in Berlin and quickly became partners with Samsung. They are currently setting up digital advertising spaces in all of the country's major cities. That doesn't sound very sexy at first, but digital outdoor advertising is a booming market. From 2012 to 2019, sales for digital outdoor advertising in Germany alone rose from 62 million euros to 229 million euros. Despite coronavirus, experts expect further growth in the coming years.

According to founder Fritz Frey, HYGH can already count Netflix, Universal, Fritz Kola and the food delivery service Wolt among its customers. HYGH wants to take a different approach to major competitors such as Ströer. The advantages that the start-up advertises are that it is faster, cheaper and more flexible than the competition. "It was important for us to build a platform that anyone can use to place outdoor advertising in just a few minutes," he says. The start-up sees itself more as a tech company than a marketing firm.

For example, HYGH promises on its website that it only takes five minutes from booking to campaign launch. Customers do not have to purchase prefabricated packages like other providers; they can choose exactly where their advertising should and should not appear. The idea is to make it hyperlocal, theoretically also attractive for the baker next door. Campaigns can also be pre-reserved for desired time periods. Customers can use an app to adjust them in real time whenever they want.

The start-up relies on its own stand spaces as well as those of potential partners such as hotels, restaurants or stores. Anyone willing to set up a screen in their store receives a monthly "rent" from HYGH in return.

If Corona hadn't intervened, they would already be profitable with their concept, says Fritz Frey. "Now we're stepping on the gas as much as we can." HYGH is currently ramping up in a big way; the start-up wants to install 1,050 screens in Cologne, Frankfurt, Munich and Hamburg by the end of the year. After that, the next smaller cities will follow.

"In the long term, we want to be represented in all European capitals," says Frey. Because he is convinced: "A lot will happen after corona, people will start spending money again and we want to be represented as widely as possible by then."

According to the founder, another round of financing is on the cards soon. "We are planning to start with Series A financing by the end of the year," says Frey. So this time it's going to be classic, without crypto financing and hopefully without lively discussions in various internet forums.