Record investment: Celonis receives one billion US dollars

This makes the start-up an eleven-time Unicorn. The Munich-based company also brings a Google manager on board.

Celonis from Munich receives one billion US dollars in Series D. There has never been a higher sum in start-up Germany before. This brings the value of the company to eleven billion euros. Celonis is thus a "Decacon" - at least a tenfold Unicorn - and the highest valued non-listed start-up in Germany.

Backers include U.S. VCs Durable Capital Partners and T. Rowe Price, as well as investment firm Franklin Templeton, San Francisco-based Splunk Ventures and a group of other investors. Existing investors, including New York-based Arena Holdings, are also participating again. "Celonis is a rare gem that is at the center of one of the biggest technology trends of our time - modernizing businesses through data-driven, intelligent business decisions," said Henry Ellenbogen, managing partner and chief investment officer of Durable Capital Partners LP. "Celonis has massive market potential to create a new and modern way of managing businesses."

The three TU Munich students Alexander Rinke, Martin Klenk and Bastian Nominacher founded Celonis in 2011. The company, which now has 1,300 employees, offers process mining: All of a company's IT system data is analyzed. According to the company, this helps to better identify weaknesses and optimization potential. The company talks about several thousand customers, including AstraZeneca, Bosch, Coca-Cola, Citibank, Dell, GSK, L'Oréal, Siemens, Uber and Vodafone.

"Celonis is a rare gem"

Henry Ellenbogen, Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer of Durable Capital Partners LP

Celonis is headquartered in Munich and New York and has 15 offices worldwide. Deutsche Bank plans to use the software to streamline 40 percent of its processes, saving more than €60 million. "Our customers were thrilled when they realized that with the Execution Management System they can now use their process data to run their business as efficiently as Amazon - without having to change anything in their underlying systems," said Bastian Nominacher, co-CEO and co-founder of Celonis.

The startup also announced that it has hired Carlos Kirjner as its new chief financial officer for its upcoming growth steps. Kirjner most recently served as vice president of finance at Google, where he led the finances of the company's core businesses - Google Ads, Google Search, as well as Google Maps - which generate approximately $150 billion in revenue annually and employ tens of thousands of people. "Carlos Kirjner is a visionary leader with an impressive track record," said Nominacher. "He identified some of the biggest industry trends long before others and has proven he can act with agility in a dynamic environment."