Record sum demanded on DHDL

The Swiss come to Germany and deliberately demand the highest amount ever heard on DHDL. But they have good arguments.

No one has ever asked for a higher sum on Die Höhle der Löwen: On Monday evening, the show was back on the screens and the three investors and one female investor were allowed to evaluate ideas and add them to their portfolio. In the case of Scewo, however, they all had to swallow. The start-up wanted five million euros for ten percent of the shares, which would mean a company valuation of 50 million euros.

The start-up has developed an electric wheelchair that can drive up and down previous barriers such as stairs. A small caterpillar is installed next to the wheels on the wheelchair for this purpose. It also compensates for the incline so that sitting upright is always possible. The wheelchair can manage a gradient of ten percent on its own, and up to 72 percent with the caterpillar. In addition, the entire chair can raise the seat to reach the top shelf in the supermarket or eye level during a conversation. It is controlled using a smartphone and a joystick. The price is over 30,000 euros, and Scewo has sold 30 power wheelchairs so far.

"We always say we're building the Tesla of wheelchairs!" says Bernhard Winter on the show. He is one of the founders of Scewo alongside Thomas Gemperle and Pascal Buholzer. In the end, it was not enough for an investment from Nico Rosberg, Carsten Maschmeyer, Ralf Dümmel or Dagmar Wöhrl. But it didn't do the Swiss any harm: after the recording, they raised eight million euros in a financing round to push ahead with expansion, as the local Cologne newspaper Express found out.