On deep tech startups in the Munich-Dresden corridor

Markus Bohl, CEO of Ignite Next (right)
with Energy Analyst Gaurav Sharma,
in Munich, Germany.

For much of the year, the Oilholic has been researching how emerging deep tech startups in the energy and industrials space appear to find a natural home in Germany's Munich-Dresden corridor. 

This concluded with a Forbes feature on the subject available here, should you wish to read it. The initial focus of the research was on purely on the Munich's startup ecosystem. 

But scale-up and mentoring experts Markus Bohl and Alois Eder - the co-founders of Ignite Next - were pretty instrumental in convincing yours truly that Dresden should figure in the mix too, as part of an innovative 400 km-wide corridor. 

For context, Ignite Next helps startups connect, work and scale-up with multiple partners across a broad range of frontier technologies, from semiconductors, photonics, advanced manufacturing, robotics and artificial intelligence, through to quantum computing. Bohl and Eder believe the Munich-Dresden region provides the ideal setting for it. "The overarching idea has always been to give founders direct access to technical expertise, market insight, and investor readiness support in a wider deep tech ecosystem that we’re all a part of in Munich and Dresden," Bohl added. 

Quite frankly, as The Oilholic noted in the Forbes feature, the numbers speak for themselves. Munich remains the primary driver of valuation in Germany - outside of Berlin - securing around the €3 billion ($3.5 billion) mark in raises per year, with a total registered startup enterprise value of over €101 billion ($115 billion), according to Dealroom data.

That’s over a fourth of the combined enterprise value of all VC-backed German startups founded since 1990. The market in Dresden operates on an intertwined scale that’s a fifth smaller than Munich’s each year, but one that’s highly targeted.

As the region marches onwards and upwards, over a fourth of these startups describe themselves as energy, industrial, clean technology or zero-carbon mobility outfits and consider themselves to be increasingly instrumental in driving a Europe-wide "energiewende" or energy transition as their numbers continue to rise. 

(Left to right) Energy Analyst Gaurav Sharma, Kevin Berghoff, CEO and Co-founder of Quantum Diamonds, Alois Eder, CTO of Ignite Next and Fleming Bruckmaier, CTO and Co-founder of Quantum Diamonds, at the company's laboratory in Munich.

Via the good folks at Ignite Next, the Oilholic also met the founders of a couple of these startups. The first was Proxima Fusion, who's CEO Francesco Sciortino explained how his energy startup is developing commercial nuclear fusion power plants. 

Its core offering banks on commercialising "stellarator-based" magnetic confinement fusion technology. So far it has raised over €200 million ($230 million) in equity and grants. In simple terms, a stellarator is a fusion power device that confines plasma using external magnets.

And the second was Quantum Diamonds, a startup developing atom-sized quantum sensors carrying the potential to "redefine" measurement in various high-tech industries like semiconductors, according to CEO Kevin Berghoff. 

Both Berghoff and fellow co-founder Fleming Bruckmaier, also invited The Oilholic for a fascinating and informative tour of their laboratory and operational site in Munich, where their team is attempting to commercialise synthetic diamond-based quantum sensors with nitrogen-vacancy centers to provide non-destructive, high-resolution magnetic imaging of semiconductor chips. In today's fraught geopolitical climate that'll probably be deeply appreciated. 

Well that's all for the moment folks! Sincere thanks to Ignite Next, Quantum Diamonds and Proxima Fusion for their time for The Oilholic's wider research into the region, and here's wishing them all every success for the future. More musings to follow soon. Keep reading, keep it here, keep it 'crude'! 

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To email: journalist_gsharma@yahoo.co.uk  

© Gaurav Sharma 2026. Photo I: Markus Bohl, CEO of Ignite Next (right) with Energy Analyst Gaurav Sharma. © Ignite Next, June 2026. Photo II: (Left to right) Energy Analyst Gaurav Sharma, Kevin Berghoff, CEO and Co-founder of Quantum Diamonds, Alois Eder, CTO of Ignite Next and Fleming Bruckmaier, CTO and Co-founder of Quantum Diamonds, at the company's laboratory in Munich, Germany. © Quantum Diamonds, June 2026.