New Venture company called Leitmotif For 16 months he was on a quiet lightning, financing about 20 startups widely focused on decarbonization. His portfolio includes EV, space and battery and 4 starts -fusion nuclear. But the company only said that its financing comes from “European industrial interests”.
Now Leitmotif told TechCrunch, where the money comes from: Volkswagen Group.
The German automotive giant has committed $ 300 million to the first Leitmotifa fund and is its only limited partner; Leitmotif has so far arranged about one third of this. During the conference on Tuesday, the general director of Volkswagen Group, Oliver Blume, said that Leitmotif’s investments can assist reduce the carbon trace of the manufacturer and develop “the economy with a closed circuit inside and outside”.
“Volkswagen culture is a team culture,” he said.
Leitmotif desires to go even further, in response to the managing partners of the young company Matt Trevithick and Jens Wiese. They hope that they’ll increase further funds that attract more European industrial interest outside Volkswagen.
This is an ambitious effort. Securing financing of hardware startups, especially with a serious production component, has been difficult over the past few years. But Trevithick thinks the right time has come to try to take a position in this type of company.
“Technology has always been the driving force of human progress and I think that the United States is to supply it,” said Techcrunch. “I think that the next few years in the United States have a number of technical possibilities that the rest of the world will delight.”
Leitmotif also builds a transatlantic fund, while the geopolitical environment is tense by the Trump administration.
Despite this confusion of Wiese – who was the head of the merger and acquisitions of the Volkswagen Group, investment consulting and the division of partnership before the start of Leitmotif – said that the overriding goal of the new company is “to create a bridge between the European industrial plant and the American innovation ecosystem.”
Priority: earn money
Trevithick and Wiese said that Volkswagen had the highest priority when he agreed to take a position in the fund: earn money.
“First of all, it’s about starting a successful company Venture,” said Wiese.
While the Volkswagen Group earns tons of of billions of dollars a 12 months, Wiese said that earning money is partly partly vital because “how the industry maintains the rating.”
Then VC announced that it plans to take a position in “category defining companies in our areas of interest”, in response to WIES, and also discover “new innovation pockets” that may benefit the Volkswagen group.
Wiese said that he was expecting about a quarter of the Leitmotif portfolio with time in interaction with Volkswagen and his countless brands.
EV EV Truck Startup Harbinger is one example. Leitmotif ran a Harbinger B series in the amount of $ 100 million in January, and Wiese said that in the startup she talked about cooperation with the Volkswagen automotive transport department.
Geographically, the Leitmotifa investment strategy is structured so that about 70% of its capital is implemented in the USA, and the remaining 30% shall be invested in the EU, which the company will keep the offices in Palo Alto and in Munich.
Trevithick said that 70% of Leitmotif’s global investments in the first fund shall be made in startups, which “solve today’s known problems” and exist in the markets “Billion dollars plus with clients ready to buy innovation”.
The remaining 30% of the fund focuses on the so -called “revolutionary innovation”, which is able to create “billions of dollars in the 1930s and later.”
Until now, this strategy has led to investing in the recycling of Redwood Materiens batteries, the compan of multiple use of Stoke Space, and even a round polyester startup. Until now, Leitmotif has publicly supported 13 startups, although there are more in his portfolio that have not been announced.
Leitmotif will ultimately have other funds; Trevithick and Wiese said that they especially look at robotics and then AI. Volkswagen will have the right to take a position in these, if he chooses, but Leitmotif is independent and for now focused on the end of the first fund.
Time is every little thing
At the end of 2023, it was probably the worst moment for startups in the latest memory to dam large funding rounds, especially focused on equipment or “deep technology” because of high rates of interest.
Trevithick said it was a great time to start out Leitmotif.
“It is in markets when strong corporations separate from the weak. Everyone is financed in the bubble – he said.
Trevithick said that the slowdown in collecting funds meant that other corporations took less risk except startups in which they were already invested.
“There were less new dollars to finance good companies that were there because everyone had myopia about their own portfolio,” he said. “I think that this is why we had a lot of incoming interest to take part in rounds, which we would not have access during the bubble.”
This interest was largely as a consequence of the origin of Wiese and Trevithick.
Wiese spent almost 8 years in the Volkswagen Group, where he conducted mergers, acquisitions and investments for the German automotive manufacturer. During this work in Volkswagen Wiese, he developed something that he called “a pretty deep network in the Venture community, both in Europe and in the USA”, which included establishing a relationship with a battery producer, where Wiese was a member of the board until 2024.
Meanwhile, Trevithick was a partner in Venrock for a decade. There, he focused on investing in green energy during the original pure technology boom at the starting of 2010, with his highest plant early on the battery manufacturer of Atiiva-Firma, which eventually became people.
Trevithick said that investing, advisory and management of corporations through the later bust of unpolluted technologies was a worthwhile experience in navigation with uncertainty harassing the industry.
While many corporate goals “net zero” are secured or abandoned directly, Trevithick said that the clean technology industry “this time begins in a much better position.”
In addition, Trevithick said that he believes that unpredictability can be a greater likelihood for corporations similar to Leitmotif – and startups.
“I think we are able to all agree, that it would simply be a very unstable environment. Which needs to be disproportionately favored by entrepreneurs, startups and investors of Venture Capital – he said.
“We feel very sure of our portfolio,” added Wiese. “Yes, [decarbonization] It is our primary topic. At the same time, we invest in companies where we are convinced that they have business justification to succeed, regardless of what, say, the subject of the day. “