Burda holds the majority stake in nebenan.de. What does this mean?

We founded the neighborhood network nebenan.de in 2015 as a social start-up. To connect as many neighbors as possible on our platform, we have been and still are dependent on investor funds. Operating such a nationwide platform, which is free for private individuals, requires a lot of start-up capital. These investor funds came, among others, from the media company Burda.

Burda invested in nebenan.de already in 2016 and 2018. Through a further investment, since August 2020 Burda has held more than 50% of the shares of Good Hood GmbH, the operating company of nebenan.de. Since then, nebenan.de has been part of the Burda family.

Good Hood GmbH, which operates nebenan.de, remains an independent social enterprise. We stand for the values with which the nebenan.de founders established the platform and follow the vision of turning neighborhoods into livable places and creating genuine social value.

We are working to cover our expenses (for staff, servers, etc.) in the future through a fair business model, based on voluntary support contributions from private individuals, advertising contributions from local businesses, non-profit organizations, cities & municipalities, and paid, clearly labeled advertising content.

Until then, however, it is a longer path – we are not yet financially self-sufficient. Burda supports us in advancing our refinancing strategy so that nebenan.de can be offered free of charge in the long term.

Does Burda have access to all user data? Does nebenan.de share user data with Burda?

No. We do not share your data. Not with shareholders or investors either. Protecting your data is a priority for us.

Burda only receives anonymized statistical information from us about the general growth of nebenan.de, the level of activity on the platform, the number of neighborhoods, etc.

Who are the other investors?

Besides Burda, the founders themselves as well as Deutsche Tele Medien GmbH, Nordwest-Zeitung Publishing Company, and pd ventures, the venture arm of the Mediengruppe Pressedruck Augsburg, have invested in nebenan.de.

Why does Burda invest in nebenan.de? What does Burda hope to achieve?

Burda is a traditional company with a 100-year history and deliberately wants to support a company committed to social impact.

Burda is a long-term, trustworthy, and important partner for us who believes in us and our vision and shares the values of our founders. Of course, Burda also has an interest in eventually getting back the money they invested in nebenan.de – but only once nebenan.de itself is profitable and our business model bears fruit.