Falkensteiner Ventures

Beat Blaser leads investment decisions as Co-Founder and Managing Partner. Erich Falkensteiner, chairman of the parent tourism group and co-founder of the venture arm, is closely involved. Andreas Arquin handles CFO duties across both the venture platform and the broader operating group.

Falkensteiner Ventures is the early-stage investment arm tied to FMTG Falkensteiner Michaeler Tourism Group. It uses the group's 30-plus hotels, tour-operator units, and gastro-shopping service as a real-world testing ground for portfolio companies. Several partners hold dual roles across the ventures arm and the operating businesses.

Deal flow is managed in-house and draws on the firm's network of mentors, founders, and hospitality executives. The firm does not run a cohort-based accelerator but screens startups through its innovation hubs in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Italy, matching founders with domain-specific mentors and potential pilot partners inside the Falkensteiner ecosystem.

The firm deploys its own capital directly into startups, typically writing tickets of up to €500,000 for concept-to-seed-stage companies. There is no public indication that it acts as a limited partner in external venture funds.

The firm's stated strategic focus is tightly defined: hospitality, travel and mobility, alternative accommodations and camping, leisure and food, and elderly care. Sectors outside these verticals are effectively excluded, though the team has signaled openness to future-tech combinations that sit at the interface of new and old economy within their core domains.

Falkensteiner Ventures presents itself as a direct, principal investor that uses its own balance sheet. It has not publicized a co-investment program alongside third-party GPs, and its public materials frame the value proposition around proprietary infrastructure and mentoring rather than syndicated deal participation.

The capital is tied to the Falkensteiner family's hospitality fortune. Erich Falkensteiner is the founder, chairman, and co-owner of FMTG, a tourism group that operates more than 30 hotels and over 20 other companies. The ventures unit invests the group's own money, not third-party funds.