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Early-stage businesses added to the OXO portfolio

News
Jánoska Rita 2023.04.17.

OXO Group has maintained its focus on financing early-stage innovative businesses over the past two years, in addition to acquiring and investing in more mature technology companies. OXO Labs has recently signed investment agreements with seven innovative companies and disbursed individual investment amounts totalling HUF 370 million.

In January 2021, OXO Labs received funding from the National Research, Development and Innovation Office under the Startup Factory competition, which was used to invest in addition to its own resources a total of HUF 370 million, in seven early-stage companies selected on the basis of its detailed investment criteria. It has successfully concluded investment negotiations with the BetMe Entertainment team for an investment of HUF 75 million, the founders of Vilhemp for HUF 36 million, the Festivize team for HUF 30 million, GreenDrops Farm for a total of around HUF 71.5 million, the founders of Golf On Chain for HUF 45 million, Appartman for HUF 70 million and the Sharity team for around HUF 42.5 million. 

The OXO Group’s early stage investment incubation team selected these companies from hundreds of applicants, met and worked with a broader range of candidates during the pre-investment incubation process and continued to work intensively with the portfolio companies on business development following the investment. This included workshops organised by OXO Labs, where teams could meet each other, share their experiences and dilemmas, and work with expert mentors on financial, business development, marketing and communication issues affecting their businesses.

OXO Group’s latest early-stage portfolio companies:

– Vilhemp has developed an innovative plastic substitute material composed of a blend of polylactic acid (PLA) and hemp fibre, resulting in a naturally sourced, biodegradable, recyclable and reusable material. It is currently used in the production of cutlery, straws and plates, but the product range is constantly expanding.

– BetMe Entertainment’s team aims to monetise the gaming time of casual gamers and create a community platform for them, primarily through transaction-based pricing. This means that it will solve betting on games supporting online multiplayer modes, primarily on smartphones (later on PC and consoles), thus providing revenue not only to professional esports players but also to casual gamers who can build their own follower base on the BetMe platform.

– GreenDrops Farm is developing an indoor crop farm using hydroponic technology that operates automatically and energy-efficiently thanks to IoT devices and control from a browser-based interface, and requires minimal human intervention during cultivation.

– Appartman solves the difficulties of the private landlord with an easy-to-use online booking system that can be used across multiple interfaces, simplifying administration. It can be integrated with their own website, or even a Facebook or Instagram page, so they can receive direct bookings from social media.

– Festivize is a digital, community-based festival app that provides an end-to-end solution for operators in the event and conference industry. The enhanced platform facilitates communication and information flow between visitors, organisers and exhibitors, thus simplifying the event organisation and management processes.

– Golf On Chain aims to combine the existing, but infant, digital golf market with the NFT market by selling courses created by design studios to users, thus creating communities and giving digital golfers the exclusivity that is typical of golf.

– Sharity is a transparent and innovative donation platform where users can track the donations they wish to give to NGOs. The platform also allows those who cannot contribute to charity campaigns to do so by viewing advertisements.

The OXO Labs team of experts remains committed to providing incubation services and sharing their overall business development expertise. The incubator welcomes applications from other companies on the OXO Labs website without any industry restriction, but due to the Group’s strategic objectives, it pays special attention to energy, cleantech, agritech, fintech, cybersecurity, sportstech and tourism innovation projects.