Elevatry raises €3 million and launches AI platform for strategic procurement

Munich, 15 October 2026 – Elevatry GmbH has closed a pre-seed financing round of €3 million. The round was joined by Bayern Kapital, the management consultancy H&Z and several business angels, among them Jan Henner-Theißen, Martin Berr-Sorokin, Mike Simon, Markus Ehrle, Andreas Junck and Alexander Bruehl. Elevatry's agentic AI platform for strategic procurement went live on 28 September 2026.

The biggest profit lever in procurement is underdeveloped

Strategic procurement has a decisive influence on the cost, quality, resilience and compliance of a company's entire spend. The potential is considerable: for a company with €1 billion in revenue and €500 million in spend, a 10 percent improvement can mean €50 million in additional profit. At a 5 percent margin, that would be equivalent to doubling revenue to €2 billion.

In practice, procurement teams often only have the capacity to actively manage a portion of their suppliers and categories – leaving a large part of the potential lever untapped. Until now, much of the working time in strategic procurement has not scaled, because it goes into analytical and intellectually demanding work.

Companions take on complex, knowledge-intensive tasks

This is where Elevatry comes in. The platform's Companions, including the Category Strategist, Negotiation Coach and Risk & Integrity Manager, take on the analytical work, research and scenario assessments along the entire source-to-contract process. This ranges from needs analysis through sourcing strategy, tendering and supplier selection to should-cost analysis, negotiation, contracting and performance tracking. The Companions bring leading industry- and category-specific expertise, in both breadth and depth.

Elevatry sees itself as a system of initiative rather than a system of record. The platform plans proactively, prioritises by impact in euros and prepares proposals. Decisions are made by the team. Customers configure levels of autonomy, approvals and data sovereignty themselves, on an open multi-LLM architecture. Every result builds into an ever more refined knowledge layer that belongs exclusively to the customer.

"Strategic procurement is one of the biggest profit levers in any company. So far, it has only been pulled where there is enough capacity and the right knowledge is available," says Heiko Schwarz, co-founder and CEO of Elevatry. "Our Companions take on complex cognitive work and carry out tasks at the highest level. This lets procurement teams apply the methodology of their best category managers to every category. Our investors bring together capital, exclusive procurement expertise and market access. From now on, we are proving the impact with our customers."

"Elevatry combines a highly experienced founding team with a clear vision for the future of strategic procurement. The AI-native platform addresses a significant lever for efficiency and value creation in companies and, through the intelligent use of procurement knowledge and data, creates customer value that is immediately tangible. At the same time, the company operates in an attractive, fast-growing market for AI-powered procurement software. We look forward to supporting the team on its continued growth path together with a strong consortium of business angels." Monika Steger, Managing Director of Bayern Kapital

"We have backed Elevatry with great conviction since its founding. Agentic AI will fundamentally change procurement by intelligently automating recurring knowledge work and effectively supporting decision-making," say Harald Enz and Jonas Harm, Managing Partners of H&Z. "Elevatry brings together leading AI technology and deep procurement domain expertise in a unique way. For us, one thing is clear: our clients expect us not only to observe innovation, but to actively shape it and translate it into tangible value. That is why we are investing in Elevatry and will work closely with the company as a strategic partner on its growth path."

"I invested because a team with decades of procurement experience is building exactly the product the market is missing. On top of that, Heiko Schwarz (riskmethods) and Christian Ruck (Orpheus) bring two highly successful serial entrepreneurs on board," says Alexander Bruehl of SaaS Garage, who is investing as a business angel. "Many AI offerings automate ordering processes. Elevatry starts with the spend itself, which is where the biggest profit lever lies."

Capital for platform, team and market entry

Elevatry will use the funds to further develop the platform and the portfolio of Companions, and to carry out the accompanying go-to-market activities for its market entry. The team will therefore grow in particular in engineering, AI and marketing as well as customer success. The initial focus is market entry in the DACH region and the EU, with internationalisation focused on North America in the medium term. The law firm WIPIT Partnerschaft mbB advises the company, among other matters, on this financing round.

A founding team with experience in procurement and enterprise software

Behind Elevatry are three founders. Heiko Schwarz (CEO) brings around 25 years of experience in strategic procurement and procurement software; he previously founded riskmethods, which was acquired by Sphera. Christian Ruck (Chief Product Officer & Operations) was an Associate Partner at McKinsey and COO of the procurement SaaS provider Orpheus, which was sold to McKinsey. Tizian Ruck leads the technical development of the platform as AI Lead.

About Elevatry

Elevatry is the AI platform for strategic procurement. Its Companions (among them the Category Strategist, Negotiation Coach and Risk & Integrity Manager) take on routine analytical work along the source-to-contract process, with real procurement depth and industry- and category-specific expertise. As a system of initiative, the platform plans proactively, prioritises by impact (€) and prepares proposals – the team decides. Customers configure levels of autonomy, approvals and data sovereignty themselves, on an open multi-LLM architecture. Every result feeds a knowledge layer that belongs exclusively to the customer. Elevatry was founded in 2026 by Heiko Schwarz, Christian Ruck and Tizian Ruck and is based near Munich.

More at: elevatry.ai

Press contact
Heiko Schwarz | presse@elevatry.ai

About Bayern Kapital

Bayern Kapital is one of the most experienced and best-capitalised venture capital investors in the DACH region. With around €1.3 billion in assets under management, more than 120 active portfolio companies and investments of up to €50 million per company, Bayern Kapital is one of the few investors in the market that finance companies from pre-seed through to global growth and scale-up rounds from a single source. As a public venture capital investor, Bayern Kapital invests in consortia with leading national and international venture capital funds and supports tech start-ups and scale-ups as a reliable anchor investor across several financing rounds.

Since 1995, Bayern Kapital has financed around 390 start-ups and scale-ups with more than €675 million of its own equity capital, in fields such as deep tech, life sciences, AI, climate tech, SaaS, new space and quantum technology. Its many success stories from Bavaria include EGYM, planqc, SimScale, Tubulis, Quantum Systems and OroraTech.

More at: www.bayernkapital.de

Press contact
Madeleine Guggenheim | Guggenheim@bayernkapital.de | Mobile: +49 176 192325-46

About H&Z

H&Z Group brings together leading European management consultancies with a clear focus on measurable impact. More than 850 employees at 24 international locations help mid-sized companies and corporate groups to strengthen their competitiveness for the long term. With specialists in procurement, performance, digital transformation, restructuring and sales, H&Z translates strategic goals into concrete results along the entire value chain.

More at: hz.group

Press contact
Constanze von Lentzke | constanze.von.lentzke@hz.group | +49 151 40239948