Hesse receives ten million euros for start-ups

The money comes from an EU funding programme and is primarily intended to support young companies in their seed phase.

Hessen's start-up scene can rejoice: The Kapital III fund of the Beteiligungs-Managementgesellschaft Hessen (BMH) is receiving ten million euros from the EU REACT funding programme, which was set up to deal with the Corona crisis and its consequences. This brings the volume of the fund to 43 million euros. "The additional tranche of funding from Brussels increases our options in terms of support and demonstrates the EU's confidence in Hessen as a business location," says Economics Minister Tarek Al-Wazir.

The fund is aimed at SMEs, but explicitly also at start-ups, and gives the money primarily to structurally weaker parts of the state. With 100,000 to 1.5 million euros, the BMH participates quietly or openly in companies. The money now coming from the EU is exclusively earmarked for the support of start-ups in the seed phase. Start-ups can also benefit from cooperations with universities such as the HIGHEST in Darmstadt and incubators such as the Techquartier in Frankfurt.

"The investments in start-ups are intended to contribute to a sustainable, positive further development and diversification of the Hessian corporate landscape," says Michael Reckhard, part of the management team at Wirtschafts- und Infrastrukturbank Hessen (WIBank), through which the financial support from the state of Hesse runs. "The new seed tranche provides young companies with more financial freedom and is another important step towards strengthening the financing ecosystem for start-ups in Hesse," concludes Reckhard.