German Start-up Monitor Report for 2024

Your start-up has 30 employees or more? Congratulation! You made it to the top 10% of start-ups in Germany with respect to the headcount. With 50+ employees you are in the top 5%.

However, the correlation between headcount and success can be misleading. Having 30+ or even 50+ employees might indicate you made it over some threshold, but it also signals higher burn rates and increased complexity. For start-ups these factors can quickly turn into liabilities. The general trend in the start-ups in Germany in 2024 was to fire, not to hire (average headcount 2024 was 17 employees vs 19 employees in 2023). One could say, you need to do more with less and be even more efficient.

The reality is that the financing in 2024 was as scarce as in 2023. The optimism among the overall increased wave of founders in Germany in 2024 is intriguing. Perhaps it's a reflection of an entrepreneurial culture that thrives on challenges. Or maybe it's an opportunistic belief that stagnation itself creates opportunities for disruption? After all, tough times often force founders to innovate more creatively and build businesses with more robust foundations.

So, does headcount matter? It might, but not as much as focus. Start-ups that succeed in tough economic conditions often share some key traits:

🦹 Resilience: 

The ability to adapt to market changes quickly and pivot if necessary.

🔎 Efficiency: 

Doing more with less by focusing on sustainable growth rather than vanity metrics.

🪙 Value creation: 

Building a product or service that solves a real problem, even in a stagnating economy.

For more information about the start-up scene in Germany in 2024, look at the full report here: https://startupverband.de/fileadmin/startupverband/mediaarchiv/research/dsm/Deutscher_Startup_Monitor_2024.pdf

Source: Deutscher Startup Monitor 2024