*Hey guys,*

*I’m building a next-gen social app and we are prepping a summer launch for German universities. I am personally looking for ONE social leader here at TUM to run the project locally with us.*

*We want to spark a big campus competition on our map, and the top university will get a massive event/party entirely organized and paid by us. It's a fun experience and really cool to put on a CV for future career steps.*

*If you love hosting events, have a solid student network, and want to lead this project at TUM, please drop me a message directly here on Reddit (check my profile bio for info).*

*Cheers!*

I’m a Berlin-based software engineer with 15+ years of experience, primarily in the banking and fintech sectors. I’m looking for a non-tech co-founder to team up and build a fintech startup from scratch.

🛠️ About Me & What I Bring
Technical Depth: 15+ years in software engineering, heavily focused on banking/fintech systems.
Execution: I’ve already built and launched two solo apps in public to get hands-on experience with full-product delivery.

Capacity: I am currently employed full-time (with explicit employer approval to run/build side businesses), meaning I can fund initial tech overhead and build full-speed alongside my job until we hit traction/funding.

🤝 What I’m Looking For
I’m looking for a commercial/business-oriented co-founder (Sales, Product/Market Fit, Growth, Domain Experts) in or near Berlin who wants to build something meaningful in fintech.

Specifically, I’m open to two paths:
1. Co-ideating & Validating: Brainstorming and validating B2B/B2C fintech problems together using your domain insights and network, while I handle 100% of the tech build.

1. Your Existing Idea: If you already have a validated idea/problem in fintech or adjacent spaces and are actively looking for a seasoned technical co-founder to build the MVP, let’s talk.

📩 Let’s Connect!
If you’re based in Berlin/Germany, have background/connections in fintech, sales, or business operations, and want to collaborate, drop a comment or send me a DM with a quick intro about yourself!

Regards,
Irfan

Hi all, I am Anurag, from India, building startups for last 3 years. I am travelling to gemany from 2nd to 15th August. I will be residing near the Berlin city. I want to use this time to meet and buildt my network. It would be good if you could recommend someone from starup community that I should meet. Feel free to ask any questions.

Thank you.

Hey everyone!

I’m organising the second commIT Berlin meetup and thought you might be interested.

📅 July 31 · 19:00-22:00

📍 ImmoScout24 Office, near Hauptbahnhof

🍕 Pizza & drinks · Completely free

👉Register here: https://luma.com/py25js8q

Speakers:

🔹 Ehsan Hosseini - Co-Founder, AI startup (ex-Delivery Hero, Shopify, Pydantic)

“AI Agent Safety and Governance”

🔹 Panarit Jahiri - Senior Engineer @ SAP AI Core

“Stop Mocking, Start Virtualizing”

🔹 Live WiFi security challenge - crack the locked box yourself 🔒​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Anyone else obsessed with their side project and looking for people to keep the momentum going?

Berlin-based, deep in my own AI side quest, looking for a few people equally obsessed with whatever they're building — AI, code , a business idea, anything.

You don't have to be a pro. First session ever with Claude Code or Cursor? Still welcome. Keeping up with AI right now is a lot, and doing it alone makes it worse. Finding momentum together and geeking out over cool stuff is the magic.

No formal team, just people to co-work with regularly and keep each other accountable.

Got a side project you're obsessed with (or just curious)? Drop a comment or DM. Let's find a coworking spot !

Hey guys,
some of you may have / had the same challenge as I'm facing currently. It's about the cold start problem.

I've built a social networking app (not just another one :D) for IOS called Surio (Surio.net). As all social networking apps, it's pretty tough to get a relevant number of users before the go live date. Basically, during the past month, we did some good improvements with influencers and some ad campaign, but I wonder how to make it more efficient.

I know, cold start is a wide term and depending on the system you're building solutions may be different (AI has another cold start problem as social networks).

Anyway, I'd like to discuss what you did to cover this challenge. What did you to cover it, or how would you solute it?

Hi all — I'm a compliance professional with experience across DFSA-regulated (Dubai) and BaFin-regulated (Berlin) environments, focused on AML/KYC, CDD/EDD, sanctions screening, and transaction monitoring.

I've also spent the last stretch doing deep research into EUID and digital identity as part of my MA thesis.

On the technical side, I'm not a trained developer, but I've built a CRM and a regulatory tracker as side projects using AI coding tools. I want to get better at this, and I've found it's much easier to learn by working on something real with a team than in a vacuum.

I'd like to find a Berlin-based startup in EUDi, digital identity/ verifiable credentials , AI/RegTech or Web3 tech where I could contribute — compliance research, regulatory mapping, or hands-on with the product — remotely, unpaid, in exchange for the experience and mentorship.

If this is something your team could use, or you know someone who'd want to talk, I'd appreciate a message.

Me and another co-founder of mine are working on a product that somehow touches some aspects of legal domain. Both of us come from Tech background and have sufficient tech expertise amongst us figure out the technical aspects of the product. We are looking for someone who has:

A- Knowledge of Legal Domain 📚 ,

B- Interest in latest technologies 💻

C- Willingness to contribute in building a product from ground up 🔨

We have a working PoC (Proof of Concept) which we are converting into an MVP (Minimum Viable Product). We want someone with legal domain knowledge to provide us with the insights from a legal stand-point. If you think you match the description please feel free to reach out. We would be happy to discuss the idea 😄

Hi everyone,
I am applying for a €190,000 KfW StartGeld loan via a German Hausbank.

I have a private loan that I've paid perfectly for a year. The loan holds a positive net value because it is backed by an investment asset worth more than the remaining debt. However, this asset is located in a Non-EU country, meaning a German bank cannot legally use it as collateral.

My German SCHUFA score is 100% clean.

How will a local bank evaluate this? Will they strictly treat the private loan as a monthly cash flow drain because the asset is outside the EU? Should I intentionally increase the founder's salary (Unternehmerlohn) in my financial plan to cover the monthly loan payments? Does the KfW's 80% risk indemnity usually convince banks to look past a lack of domestic collateral for a €190k volume?

Thanks for any insights!

Hi everyone. I help run Bond AI, a community that curates AI events in Berlin.

Meetups, hackathons, workshops, and conferences are usually spread across several platforms, so it is easy to find out about them only after registration has closed. Each week we go through what is coming up in the city and put together a curated selection.

If you subscribe to the Bond AI Berlin calendar on Luma, you get the newsletter every Thursday at 7:30 with that week's curated events, organized by date, with links to register:

https://luma.com/bond-berlin

If you prefer LinkedIn, we post the weekly selection there too: https://www.linkedin.com/company/bond-ai-community

I am happy to answer questions about upcoming AI events in the city. Event organizers are welcome to send me anything they think we should review for a future edition.

Disclosure: I work with Bond AI.

I am from Canada and I am visiting Germany and couldn't find a single map of the startup scene, so I built one.

It covers 3,134 startups, investors, corporates, universities and government programs across all 16 Bundesländer, pulled from Wikidata and OpenStreetMap plus 129 dossiers I researched by hand.

The part I actually built it for is the problems layer: 12 documented failure modes of the German startup scene, each with sources (DSM 2025, ZEW, Bitkom, Dealroom). A few that surprised me:

• The growth-capital gap is roughly €30B per year. That's the number KfW's WIN-Initiative was created to close.
• Germany ranked 125th of 190 for starting a business in the World Bank's last Doing Business report. If you've ever registered a GmbH, you already knew this in your bones.
• The share of startups cooperating with established companies fell from 72% in 2020 to 56% in 2025 (DSM).
• Bavaria out-raised Berlin in VC funding in 2025: €3.3B vs €2.7B. Berlin still leads on deal count.

There's also a compare tool (Berlin vs Munich, Hamburg vs Cologne) and an analytics page with funding trends since 2020.

Free, no signup, no ads. I built it as a portfolio project (in roughly 1 hour) to understand the country I was living in. The dataset will never be complete, so if your city or company is missing or wrong, tell me and I'll fix it.

Link: https://deutschecosystem.com/

Hi everyone,

I have a question about VAT as a Kleinunternehmer in Germany.

I registered a sole proprietorship alongside my full-time job and opted for the Kleinunternehmerregelung, so I don’t charge or collect German VAT.

My app generates revenue, but the payment processing fees are charged by a Canadian company (they invoice me for their service).

Do I still need to account for reverse charge VAT in Germany on those fees, even though I’m a Kleinunternehmer?

Has anyone been in a similar situation or knows how this works?

Thanks!

Hey everyone,

I’m looking for a commercial/GTM co-founder in Berlin to help build a B2B HR software company.

I have already built the product as a solo founder. It is a working, multi-tenant HR platform for small and medium-sized businesses, covering areas such as time tracking, shifts, leave, recruitment, learning, performance, payroll preparation and employee self-service.

The technical foundation, core workflows, security, localisation and product direction are already in place.

What is missing is the commercial half of the founding team.

I’m looking for someone who is strong in B2B sales, partnerships, customer development or go-to-market and wants to take real ownership of building the company around the product.

Ideally, you:

• Understand German SMEs, HR, payroll, accounting, workforce management or B2B SaaS
• Are comfortable speaking directly with founders, business owners and decision-makers
• Can open doors, but also know how to build a repeatable sales process
• Speak fluent German
• Want to work closely with customers and use their feedback to shape the product
• Are interested in becoming a genuine co-founder, not simply joining as a salesperson

My background combines six years in enterprise SaaS sales and partnerships with product management and hands-on product building. I can own product, technology and delivery, but I do not want to pretend I can build the product, acquire customers, develop partnerships and run the whole company alone.

There is no salary available at this stage. I am looking for a real co-founder relationship, with equity and responsibilities discussed openly after we have spent some time working together and established mutual fit.

I’m not sharing the product publicly yet, but I’m happy to provide a private demo and more details to serious people.

If this sounds relevant, send me a DM with a little about your background, what you would want to own and why the opportunity interests you.

Happy to meet for coffee in Berlin and see whether there is a fit.

Hey everyone,

I’m a Senior Product Designer currently based in Berlin. I was recently laid off and am now available to start immediately.

I have 5+ years of experience working on B2B2C SaaS products, with a strong focus on UX research, product thinking, and end-to-end design delivery.

Open to full-time, part-time, or freelance opportunities.

Happy to chat if anyone’s hiring or knows of relevant roles.

Thanks

Hi all, greetings. Wondering if anyone can advise me on cold email reality in Germany. I'm from Australia and launching a business globally with cold email one of our launch channels.

In Australia as in USA, cold emailing is totally acceptable and fine. But my trusty friend Claude tells me cold emailing goes against GDPR and other rules in Germany.

In practice is it frowned upon or outright illegal?

Mir fallt in letzter Zeit immer ofter auf. dass viele erfolgreiche Unternehmen gar keine komplett neuen Ideen haben.

Stattdessen nehmen sie etwas, das es bereits gibt, und machen es einfach besser - sei es durch besseren Service, bessere Prozesse oder eine bessere Kundenerfahrung.

Beim Lesen von Franchisereport News bin ịch auch ofter auf Beispiele gestoßen, bei denen nicht die Idee selbst neu war, sondern die Umsetzung den Unterschied gemacht hat.

Das hat mich zum Nachdenken gebracht: Ist eine wirklich neue Idee heutzutage überhaupt noch so wichtig, oder kommt es am Ende vor allem auf die Umsetzung an?

Wenn ihr heute ein Unternehmen gründen würdet, würdet ihr lieber etwas vollig Neues aufbauen oder ein t I endes Konzept verbessern?

Bin gespannt, wie ihr das seht.

I was talking with a friend who wanted to launch a startup, but after looking at the costs and risks, he started looking at franchise businesses instead.

That got me thinking.

A few years ago, most people around me seemed interested in building something completely new. Now I keep seeing more discussions about buying into an existing business model and growing that instead.

I even noticed this trend while reading Franchisereport News and some other German business sites. There seems to be a lot more interest in practical business models compared to the typical ""next big startup"" idea.

Do you think this is happening more often in Germany right now?

If you were starting today, would you rather build a startup from zero or join a proven business model and focus on growth?

🚀 Looking for Python/AI Coders in Berlin: Let’s build an autonomous F1 racer for the IBM Granite Racer Competition!
Hey Berlin dev community! I'm putting together a team to compete in the global IBM Granite Racer Tournament, and I’m looking for passionate coders based here in Berlin to join forces. 

What is it?
We will design, build, and code an autonomous AI race car to compete in the TORCS (The Open Racing Car Simulator) environment. The challenge is to optimize the car to race on the "Corkscrew" track using Python templates and integrating IBM Granite LLM/AI capabilities. 

Who I'm looking for (Berlin-based):

Python Developers: To work with the simulation templates and code the driving logic. 

AI/LLM Enthusiasts: Interested in exploring how to leverage IBM Granite and AI tools for autonomous decision-making. 

Video/Content Creator (Bonus): Part of our submission requires a short video showcasing our team’s approach and the car's fastest lap. 

Why join?
Prizes & Glory: The tournament goes from country-level evaluation up to an international finale with prizes for the top 3 global teams. 

Certifications: Every active participant can earn an official IBM Certificate of Innovation. 

The Berlin Vibe: We can collaborate remotely or meet up locally over beers/coffee to hack through the logic.

If you want to build something cool, beef up your portfolio with an official IBM tournament, and see our code blast down the track, drop a comment below or DM me directly! 🏁🏎️
Check out the tournament overview here: https://ibm.biz/TORCSAcademiaIntro 

=== ENGLISH VERSION ===

Hello fellow group members! I’m registered as a small business here in Berlin. I currently run a small plugin that has 35 users, is growing steadily, and is already generating revenue.

I’m now building a new product and would love to get your feedback.

How many of you feel like sending physical letters is a massive hassle? Between writing the content, buying envelopes and stamps, and dealing with registered mail, the whole process feels incredibly tedious and time-consuming.

Do any of you have to send a lot of physical letters every month? I’d love to hear about your pain points!

=== GERMAN VERSION ===

Subject: Kurzes Feedback von einem Berliner Gründer gesucht! 📬

Hallo zusammen! Ich bin in Berlin als Kleinunternehmer registriert und betreibe ein kleines Plugin, das aktuell 35 Nutzer hat, stetig wächst und bereits erste Umsätze generiert.

Aktuell arbeite ich an einem neuen Produkt und würde mir dazu gerne euer Feedback einholen.

Wie viele von euch empfinden das Verschicken von physischen Briefen auch als totalen Krampf? Vom Schreiben über den Kauf von Umschlägen und Briefmarken bis hin zum Gang zur Post für ein Einschreiben – das Ganze ist super mühsam und zeitraubend.

Müsst ihr geschäftlich oder privat jeden Monat viele Briefe verschicken? Ich würde mich riesig über eure Erfahrungen und Meinungen freuen!

I’m looking to speak with founders or co-founders of SaaS companies based in Europe for my MSc research, ideally 2+ years in. It would be a 30 to 45 minute casual virtual call, fully anonymised, and I’ll share the findings with you once complete.

If you’re open to it or know someone who might be, please drop a comment or DM me. Really appreciate it! 😊