Darmstadt-based Genow, a German deep-tech startup that aims to transform enterprise knowledge with AI, has closed its seed funding round with €1.65M.
Darmstadt-based Genow, a German deep-tech startup that aims to transform enterprise knowledge with AI, has closed its seed funding round with €1.65M.
The round was led by High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF), with participation from BM H Beteiligungs-Managementgesellschaft Hessen and angel investors Markus Becker, Sebastian Mönnich, and Dr. Mario Lenz.
AI-driven knowledge processes
Many organisations continue to face difficulties in accessing internal knowledge despite ongoing digitalisation. Information is often spread across different systems, making it hard to find. At the same time, when experienced specialists retire, valuable expertise can be lost.
“Knowledge management remains one of the biggest hurdles to successful processes and decisions,” says Sara Jourdan, CEO and co-founder of Genow. “Many employees spend 20 to 30 per cent of their day searching for information in unstructured data sets.”
Genow’s founding team, drawing on years of research at TU Darmstadt, identified that traditional AI tools often lack sufficient context to function effectively in daily business use.
To address this, the company developed “Wingman”, a Knowledge Operations Platform designed to consolidate knowledge from platforms such as SharePoint, Confluence, Jira and document management systems.
By contextualising and integrating fragmented data, the platform aims to make knowledge accessible and usable across business environments.
Wingman is already used by large international companies, helping thousands of employees quickly find and use internal knowledge.
The platform not only understands content but also uses company-specific metadata, terminology, and relationships. This makes its answers accurate and reliable, even for complex questions.
It can also show where knowledge is missing in the organisation. Companies can set up custom AI tools for areas like HR, sales, compliance, customer service, or engineering. The aim is to change how knowledge management works and give organisations a lasting way to build, keep, and use their knowledge. The platform can run fully in the customer’s own cloud environment, ensuring data security, scalability, and control.
Genow was founded in 2023 by Dr. Timo Koppe, Adrian Glauben, Dr. Sara Jourdan, and Prof. Peter Buxmann.
Sebastian Schnell from BMH says, “With Genow, we are investing in a team that has developed an excellent research-based, scalable solution to one of the central problems of knowledge work. Wingman impresses with its technological depth, practical relevance, and significant market potential.”
Capital utilisation
Genow will direct the seed funding toward the continued development of its AI-powered Knowledge Operations Platform, ‘Wingman’.
The company aims to strengthen the platform’s agent-based knowledge processes and support market expansion efforts.
Felix Assion, Investment Manager at HTGF, says, “We are seeing a lot of startup activity in this promising market, but few teams understand the needs of large corporations as well as this one. After an impressive bootstrapping phase, we are excited to see what they will achieve with these new financial opportunities.”
Markus Becker and Sebastian Mönnich, Business Angels, adds, “The Genow founding team impressed us with their blend of technological expertise and strategic vision. With Wingman, Genow is setting new standards in corporate knowledge management, and we see great potential here for the future. We are delighted to be part of this journey.”
Brief about HTGF
HTGF is an early-stage investor in Germany and Europe. It finances startups in areas such as deep-tech, industrial tech, climate tech, digital tech, life sciences, and chemistry.
HTGF supports startups from the early idea stage through their growth into international companies. It invests mainly in pre-seed and seed rounds, but can also join later financing rounds.
Since 2005, HTGF has invested in more than 780 startups and achieved almost 200 exits. The fund has a total volume of over €2B.
The investors in this public-private partnership include the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy, KfW Capital, and 45 companies and family offices.
