Munich Startup: Who are you and what does Deepdrive do? Please introduce yourselves briefly!
Felix Poernbacher, Deepdrive: At Deepdrive, we have seven people in total, with two managing directors: Stefan on the technical side, and I on the commercial side. I'm the only non-engineer on the team. I studied business administration at TUM for my bachelor's degree and finance at Bocconi University for my master's degree. I've spent the last few years working in London as an investment banker at Rothschild, while my co-founders all worked for major companies in the e-mobility sector: Bosch, Infineon, and the Schaeffler subsidiary Compact Dynamics. This gave them a wealth of experience in large-scale production, including in very exciting positions such as project management for Bosch's largest e-machine project.
We've all known each other for almost ten years. We were together in Formula Student, the student motorsport team at the Technical University of Munich. Back then, we built electric racing cars and competed in various competitions, for example at the Hockenheimring, Spielberg, or Michigan. We truly grew together as a team before we all entered the industry. This marriage of motorsport spirit, prototype experience, and professional large-scale production is what defines us as a team.
Develop your own electric car with Deepdrive's plug-and-play platform
And what do we do? We've seen that there are many new players entering the market wanting to build their own electric cars, but they no longer differentiate themselves through driving characteristics. And that's exactly where we come in: We have developed an electric vehicle platform, meaning practically the entire underpinnings of an electric car, including all driving functions. It includes the battery, the motor, the steering, the chassis, and everything else that goes with it. Developers can build their own electric car on our plug-and-play platform. Furthermore, our platform is also tailor-made for the future of mobility: We use highly sustainable materials, have very simple series production, and are fully ready for autonomous driving and shared mobility.
Munich Startup: What problem does your startup solve?
Felix Poernbacher: The big problem these new players face is that developing their own vehicles is very costly and time-consuming. With our plug-and-play platform, they can save over half the development costs and two to three years of time-to-market.
And why does this only work with our platform? Our core technology is a highly efficient electric drive that is built into the wheel. This wheel hub drive means there isn't some kind of large motor installed on the platform, which would make the work of the hat builder, i.e. the person who builds the car, even more difficult. Our platform is completely flat, giving you maximum flexibility in the design and allowing you to build absolutely anything you want on it. And because the motor is in the wheel, our platform is completely scalable and flexible in both length and width. This means that any vehicle you can imagine could sit on our platform. That is the main USP of our platform.
“We are the only company that has developed a wheel hub motor platform”
Munich Startup: But that's been around for a long time!
Felix Poernbacher: There are other platform providers, but they all have a different strategic focus. Their basic concept is to offer their platform to larger OEMs. But none of them has a completely standardized platform on which many different players can sit. All of this is made possible by our in-wheel motor, and we are actually the only company to have developed such an in-wheel motor platform.
Munich Startup: What have been your three biggest challenges so far?
Felix Poernbacher: The most important thing for us is speed; that was probably the first big challenge. We had to be as fast as possible, especially at the beginning, because, on the one hand, we need financing, and, on the other hand, we need to be able to show for that financing. So, within the last five months, we've developed and built our core technology, the drive technology, validated it on the test bench at the Fraunhofer Institute, patented it, and built the first mobile platform. And that was truly the biggest challenge so far: getting everything on the road so quickly.
The second big challenge was finding the right entry market. What should we focus on, what direction should we go in, which players should we concentrate on? Fortunately, we've already received excellent customer feedback and customer interest, which is certainly helping us along the way. In fact, we've already spoken with over 40 players who are interested in our solution and who are helping us find the right entry market. We've now achieved that, but that was definitely the second big challenge.
“We are all first-time founders”
And the third major challenge is related to the fact that we are all first-time founders. And that comes with very different challenges: Who is the right tax advisor, how do you set up a GmbH, which tool do I use for my budget planning? We all have a lot of experience from our previous jobs, including on the commercial side, which I gained from investment banking, but these early-stage startup topics were simply a huge challenge. What really helped us was the UnternehmerTUM network. We were part of the Xplore program at the beginning of the year and are now part of Xpreneurs. We have great mentors there who support and help us. We also have close contact with many founders in the Munich scene, who also provide us with a lot of support.
Munich Startup: Where would you like to be in one year, where in five years?
Felix Poernbacher: Our goal is to have the first road-legal vehicle platforms on the road in customer projects in almost exactly one year. These will be individual prototypes that demonstrate that the technology also works on the road in customer projects. In five years, we will have already onboarded many customers who are using our platform and thus achieved significant volumes. We will then be in series production with several customers.
Munich is “perfect” for Deepdrive
Munich Startup: How do you rate Munich as a startup location?
Felix Poernbacher: We moved back to Munich because we see it as perfect for us: We're close to industry, we're deep tech, we're hardware, and the ecosystem here is very good for that. On the one hand, there are many industrial partners who help us with manufacturing and development, there are many VCs who are also active in the hardware sector, and there's simply this entire network. With one exception, the entire founding team studied at the Technical University of Munich; we have very good connections here and a large network. And, as I just mentioned, we've received a lot of support from UnternehmerTUM. Therefore, we see Munich as the right starting point for us.
Munich Startup: Quick exit or long breath?
Felix Poernbacher: We definitely believe strongly in our idea, and we know that Deepdrive has incredible potential. And we'd love to realize it.
