United Internet acquires 30% stake in new cloud hosting company of Andreas Gauger and Achim Weiss
Montabaur, Berlin, November 3, 2010. United Internet AG, Europe's leading internet specialist, has acquired a 30% stake in ProfitBricks, an innovative start-up in the field of cloud hosting. The investment will enable United Internet to add a complementary segment to its activities in its cloud computing business with the brands 1&1, GMX, WEB.DE, Fasthosts and InterNetX and access new customers in this growth market.
ProfitBricks was founded by former 1&1 Management Board members Andreas Gauger and Achim Weiss, two "hosting veterans" with over 15 years' experience in the telecommunications and webhosting sector. The company's objective is to develop innovative, powerful cloud applications and complex cloud-server infrastructures and thus high-performance, so-called infrastructure-as-a-service solutions (IaaS). The target group comprises developers and internet providers who will be able to create and operate their own products and applications for customers based on the ProfitBricks solutions. The products of ProfitBricks are currently being developed and designed from scratch by a developer team led by former 1&1 CTO Achim Weiss and are expected to be ready in spring 2011.
In view of the complementary alignment of the brands of United Internet and ProfitBricks with regard to product offering and target groups, as well as their highly successful cooperation in the past, the two parties agreed that United Internet should take a 30% share in ProfitBricks. The remaining 70% of the shares will be held by the two founders and managing directors of ProfitBricks GmbH, Andreas Gauger and Achim Weiss.
Andreas Gauger summarizes the decision to cooperate with United Internet AG as follows: "Although there was strong interest from reputable venture capital funds to invest in our new company, the decision to work with United Internet was ultimately an easy one. United Internet is the best possible strategic partner for us. We already cooperated very successfully with United Internet in the past and hope to be able to repeat this success".
Achim Weiss and Andreas Gauger jointly founded Germany's first webhosting company "Schlund + Partner" in 1995 and over the following 13 years, following the take-over by United Internet, turned it into one of the world's largest hosting firms after its integration into the "1&1" brand.