KOHPA: When even the biggest storm doesn’t endanger the calm #DHDL

Right from the start, they radiate the greatest calm: Walter and Peter, both trained paper makers, enter the cave, deliver an extremely infor­ma­tive pitch and are subse­quently the centre of one of the hottest discus­sions to be observed in the cave for a long time. But they keep their cool until the very end.

They need 200,000 euros to kick their company into turbo gear, and at least 15% of the shares would be worth it to them.

The two experts have managed to combine carbon and paper fibres, which are actu­ally not at all compat­ible with each other, and thus created a paper that can conduct elec­tricity. This sounded almost unbe­liev­able to the lions, and so the two founders were sure to attract the atten­tion of the five expe­ri­enced investors from the start.

After five years of devel­op­ment work, a paper was created that is 0.2 mm thin and can be used exactly like paper, you can even cut it. The only differ­ence is that it conducts elec­tricity. The carbon fibres are obtained from waste mate­rials from the carbon processing industry, and the company’s first product can heat surfaces very effi­ciently up to 35 degrees within seconds. A sustain­ability dream of a product, then. But the founders from Bavaria have even more to offer: Their second product is designed to keep out electro-​magnetic radi­a­tion that is too strong and there­fore unhealthy for human beings.

But this is precisely the crux of the discus­sion: Dr. Georg Kofler strongly doubts this point, while Carsten Maschmeyer and Nico Rosberg find KOHPA protect quite inter­esting. But the founders remain completely calm, talk about their expe­ri­ences and answer ques­tions about measured values. After all, KOHPA protect is selling well and is respon­sible for the lion’s share of sales to date. And that’s some­thing to be proud of: started in 2017 with 30,000 euros, the company has gener­ated a whop­ping 200,000 euros in annual turnover in each of the last two years. And the fore­cast for 2021 is even as high as 530,000 euros, so busi­ness seems to be picking up even more. The company can also boast a good margin.

But the lions remain scep­tical, Nico Rosberg wonders if there is a catch. And that is quite under­stand­able. Such a product would normally be put through its paces by investors, espe­cially insti­tu­tional investors would prob­ably send tech­nical experts for a closer eval­u­a­tion. A diffi­cult situ­a­tion for the founders, who can prac­ti­cally only convince with words in the cave.

But although it looks as if this is the crit­ical point, they remain calm and present strong argu­ments. Like the offer to sell their patents for a whole 6 million euros. A certain amount of life expe­ri­ence certainly helps to react in such a calm and consid­ered manner when so much is at stake. However, good prepa­ra­tion and the prepa­ra­tion of the most impor­tant argu­ments should also serve inex­pe­ri­enced founders well. A good tip here is to write down the likely sticking points of the nego­ti­a­tion together with 2-3 strong counter-​arguments each. With a very tech­nical and inno­v­a­tive product, it is prac­ti­cally in the nature of things that it will be a matter of actu­ally convincing the investors of the inno­v­a­tive strength. Because even in “normal” nego­ti­a­tions there is the “too-​good-to-be-true” effect, which can make for rather reserved reac­tions.

And so the lions are persuaded by the unflap­pable founders, and in the end there is a joint offer from Dagmar Wöhrl, Carsten Maschmeyer and Nico Rosberg. The founders accept the 33% that their dream team wants, and Nico Rosberg even comments on the deal with “What a fasci­nating inven­tion, so really, that we see some­thing like that here in the “Die Höhle der Löwen”, fantastic”. An amazing praise, and the founders are visibly happy.

But for all their calm, they also seem almost a little relieved when they describe their impres­sions to Moder­ator Amiaz after­wards. Under­stand­ably, the heated discus­sion does not seem to have left them entirely cold. Whether it was innate char­acter, expe­ri­ence or prepa­ra­tion that enabled them to calmly present their argu­ments in the face of strong oppo­si­tion is some­thing we will never know. Perhaps it was a mixture of all of these.

For all others, however, targeted prepa­ra­tion can bring precisely this calm­ness, which can best bring out their compe­tence even in diffi­cult situ­a­tions.

But let us first be happy about the outcome of the nego­ti­a­tion. After all, when a model founder with a model start-​up receives their three lions of choice, it can be an emotional moment.

Photo (above): TVNOW / Bernd-​Michael Maurer