Futury, the Startup Factory in Frankfurt
Futury calls itself "one of Germany's ten officially recognized Startup Factories". It brings scientists, founders, investors and companies together to turn research and ideas into startups in the Rhine-Main region, with the target of 1,000 new startups by 2030. Its shareholders are four universities: the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management, Goethe University Frankfurt, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz and TU Darmstadt. Futury works from its Startup Space at the Bertramshof in Frankfurt.
From incubator to Startup Factory
Futury's own history starts in 2015 with a startup platform and incubator for early-stage founders. In 2017 it became part of the Werte-Stiftung, a foundation, and in 2019 it launched The Mission, an innovation program with Handelsblatt, Bain & Company, Deutsche Bank and Schwarz Gruppe in which startups worked on industry problems such as waste, food, construction and cybersecurity.
The Frankfurt School of Finance & Management became a shareholder in 2023, and Goethe University, Johannes Gutenberg University and TU Darmstadt joined in 2025. In the same year the federal ministry for economic affairs named Futury one of ten Startup Factories in Germany, a program of the federal EXIST startup funding. Futury counts 37 corporate and foundation partners behind it.
Programs from the first idea to the funding round
Futury sorts its programs into stages. INNOVATE, with Makers of Tomorrow, Build Days and Lab2Market, helps students and researchers turn findings into a business model. CREATE connects young startups with industry partners and, where needed, with co-founders, mentors and investors. SCALE prepares the funding round: the Investment Camp is a two-day on-site camp for 10 to 20 pre-seed and seed startups, with term sheets, cap tables, pitch practice and hot-seat sessions in front of investors, and Pitch Hours follow.
Learning sessions (Masterclasses and Office Hours) cover legal setup, compliance, IP protection, product management and operations. Matching sessions pair technical founders with business co-founders and corporate mentors, and an IP toolbox helps researchers with their rights. In a press release (in German) Futury names more than 70 investors, more than 150 mentors, about 3,000 startups and 50 ecosystem partners in its network.
Banking and finance at Futury
Banking & Finance is one of five Futury focus areas. The others are life sciences and healthcare, aviation and aerospace, AI and cybersecurity, and deep tech and green tech. The focus area page brings startups, financial institutions, investors and technology experts together on banking, insurance and digital finance, in four steps: corporates and talents discuss current problems, startups test their products with financial institutions, founders meet venture capital firms, and the Rhine-Main region grows as a place for financial innovation.
Banks also take part in the funding of founders. The Nassauische Sparkasse (Naspa) is the first savings bank in the Hessen Ideen Stipendium, the state of Hesse's six-month grant for university founders, and Futury brokered that partnership (in German). Among the companies in the Startup Space, Futury lists Bankable and the Sustainable Finance Cluster. The wider Frankfurt scene is on fintech in Frankfurt.
Futury Capital and the fintechs in its portfolio
Futury Capital is the early-stage investor Futury works with. Futury writes that its three funds hold more than 125 million euros. The third fund closed in January 2026 at 47 million euros and is backed by Hesse, Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland, KfW Capital, corporate partners and 45 private investors. It invests 250,000 to 3 million euros per startup from pre-seed to Series A, and more than 30 percent of the fund goes to startups from the region. The first fund of 20 million euros started in 2018 as a public-private partnership, half of it from the state of Hesse.
Futury Capital names robotics, green tech, and data and AI as its fields, and its portfolio page lists several finance companies: APIAX, a regtech startup for compliance; BITA, which builds infrastructure for financial indices and investment strategies; Cashlink, the infrastructure for tokenized assets; Particula, a rating platform for tokenized assets; and Raisin Bank. More on tokenization is on tokenized assets, and the Frankfurt investor scene on venture capital in Frankfurt.
Startup Space and Event Space at the Bertramshof
The Futury Startup Space is at Am Steinernen Stock 1 in Frankfurt, on the Bertramshof campus of the Frankfurt School. The Frankfurt School (in German) gives it 2,000 square meters with fixed and flexible desks, team offices, meeting rooms and event areas. Founders choose between a hot desk, a flex desk, a fixed desk, a two-person office and offices for three to six people, and Futury counts more than 60 startups working there.
The Event Space takes conferences, workshops, meetups and panels. Futury runs it and an AI showroom together with Q and AI, the application center for AI and quantum computing of the House of Digital Transformation. With hessian.AI, the Hessian center for artificial intelligence, Futury agreed on a joint accelerator for AI startups at the Bertramshof.
Upcoming fintech events in Frankfurt
Is Futury the same as Futury Capital?
No. Futury GmbH runs the Startup Factory with its programs and the Startup Space. Futury Capital is a venture capital firm from Frankfurt that invests in startups, and Futury works closely with it.
Is Futury a fintech accelerator?
Futury is open to all sectors and has Banking & Finance as one of its five focus areas. A fintech founder uses the general programs, such as the Investment Camp, and the contacts to financial institutions that the focus area offers.
Where is Futury in Frankfurt?
Futury is at the Bertramshof, Am Steinernen Stock 1, 60320 Frankfurt am Main. The House of Digital Transformation has its office at the same address.
Futury and Finance Loop
Finance Loop is a professional network and has the goal of driving the adoption of emerging technologies in finance, such as AI, digital payments, cloud and blockchain solutions. Finance Loop helps its members build skills and personal networks in these fields: Investment & Digital Assets, Payments & Digital Money, Digital Infrastructure & Sovereignty, and Risk & Compliance.
Finance Loop connects the finance, IT and AI communities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, with events in Frankfurt, Munich, Berlin and Hamburg. Anyone who works in finance can join as a member, sponsor a meetup or host an event with Finance Loop. Companies that want to work with Finance Loop for longer find the formats under partnerships, and fintech growth shows how Finance Loop helps fintechs enter the German market.