Startup News for the Weekend of Week 29/26

European startups closed several sizable rounds this week: hydrop systems raised an oversubscribed seed round of €779,200, Project Q secured €15 million in Series A financing, Swiss space firm SWISSto12 closed $70 million in Series C funding, Czech medtech HTG Medical obtained CE certification and pushed its total funding past €1 million, and robotics newcomer microagi announced a $55 million seed round. Major M&A activity included Uber’s proposed €12.7 billion acquisition of Delivery Hero and Ardian’s purchase of a majority stake in Pflegia.

"vendor-neutral manner"

Project Q, a Munich-based DefenseTech company, led a headline funding round after closing €15 million in Series A financing. The round was led by Expeditions and saw participation from Project A, HENSOLDT, and Heliad. Project Q said the capital will be used to further develop its open-source platform HYDRIS, which is designed to enable armed forces and government agencies to integrate technologies, data sources, and existing IT systems in a "vendor-neutral manner". The company emphasized that the funding comes entirely from European investors and is intended to strengthen Europe’s technological sovereignty in the defence sector.

Seed and Series rounds that could reshape hardware, medtech and robotics

• hydrop systems: The water-technology startup closed an oversubscribed seed round at €779,200, topping an original target of €600,000. A total of 213 investors participated, with contributions ranging from crowd investments starting at €100 to equity investments up to €150,000. The company plans to begin series production in September, expand sales operations and drive international expansion to increase transparency in drinking-water consumption through digital solutions.
• SWISSto12: The Swiss space company closed a $70 million Series C and intends to expand production and integration capacities for satellite and payload solutions across multiple orbits. SWISSto12 reported $140 million in revenue in 2025 and order backlog exceeding $500 million. The firm is developing the HummingSat geostationary small-satellite platform, HummingLink payloads and antenna systems, and has secured funding from the European Space Agency for HummingSat development and testing.
• HTG Medical: The Czech medtech startup received CE certification under the European Medical Device Regulation (MDR) for HTG Urogram, its automated urine-analysis system for intensive care units, and closed a pre-seed round that pushed total funding above €1 million. Investors include Garage Angels, Electron Capital Partners and JIC Ventures. HTG’s system automates urine-output monitoring and transmits data directly to hospital information systems; the company plans to accelerate its European market launch and prepare expansions into Australia, Singapore and Saudi Arabia.
• microagi: Founded roughly ten months ago, the robotics startup closed a $55 million seed round led by Hummingbird with participation from Northzone, LocalGlobe, Village Global and redalpine. microagi is developing "Atlas," a platform intended to help industrial companies implement and optimise robotic systems. The new capital will be used to expand the platform and accelerate robotics adoption in European industry.

Deals, events and outlook

On the M&A front, Uber has offered €41.50 per share to acquire Delivery Hero in a deal valuing the Berlin-based company at about €12.7 billion; the acquisition is subject to shareholder and regulatory approvals. Private-equity activity included Inflexion’s agreed acquisition of the Primed Group from Paragon Partners, and Ardian’s majority stake purchase in Pflegia, the AI-powered reverse-recruiting platform serving over 900,000 registered candidates and more than 10,000 healthcare facilities.

Events and accelerator news rounded out the week: the Schwarz Group hosted the 36th Family-Owned Companies Career Day with more than 70 firms and roughly 700 professionals, while Startup Village Jülich’s Demo Day highlighted green and deep-tech winners such as recarbished and blixdata and announced a new ZEBRA Incubator launching in September 2026.