Smycles secures 2 million euros in seed capital

The startup Smycles, which specializes in data-based team composition and team mining, has successfully completed its first seed financing round. The lead investor is Seed Capital Dortmund III, with additional investors participating as part of a side investment. Smycles has secured a total of 2 million euros in capital.

Founding team combines corporate expertise and start-up experience

Founded by brothers Bernhard and Martin Zünkeler, the team brings together two perspectives:

• Bernhard Zünkeler: consulting for large companies such as Bosch, Telekom, Detekon and Bundesdruckerei
• Martin Zünkeler: Serial entrepreneur, already founder of several high-growth start-ups

Many organizations know a lot about roles and processes, but too little about actual skills, project experience and effective team combinations. We combine corporate reality with start-up execution and build a platform that makes teams measurably better

Martin Zünkeler, Co-Founder Smycles

From profiling to talent mining to team mining

Smycles follows a clear three-stage approach:

1. Profiling - creating visibility: recording skills, profiles and project experience in a structured way and keeping them up to date
2. Talent mining - leveraging potential: Deriving insights from profiles: Who can do what, where are skill gaps, which development paths make sense
3. Team mining - creating impact: focus on team combinations: Which setups deliver better results, which roles are missing, how can teams be put together more quickly and with a better fit

Agentic AI and hybrid teams

Smycles is expanding Team Mining to include Agentic AI, digital team members who carry out tasks within a defined framework. This creates hybrid teams of people and agents that work together and are managed instead of operating in isolation.

The company is also developing an evaluation approach for agents: Which agents are suitable for which use cases, how robust is their performance and how transparent are their decisions.

Soft skills as a competitive advantage

In the hybrid team context, soft skills are increasingly becoming a decisive differentiating factor: communication, empathy, trust, decision-making ability, feedback culture and team dynamics determine success. Smycles makes soft skills measurable and usable as a component of team mining.