Ep. 317 How I Raised It with Gesa Miczaika of Auxxo
episodePreviously titled “How I Raised It with Gesa Miczaika of Auxxo” — renamed by the publisher on Aug 2, 2026
How I Raised It - The podcast where we interview startup founders who raised capital.
49 min
1 speaker
8 chapters
transcribed 17 days ago
Transcript
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What is Auxxo Female Catalyst Fund and what does it invest in?
How do you find family offices? It's really hard to find them. It's really hard to find and they don't want to be found and they're also very private. A tip for for funds in Germany, or actually all everyone who wants to get German limited partners. The public register handels register in German. You can you can get the names of all the investors of any fund out of that register.
Hi guys, welcome to the How I Raised the Podcast, the show where you get an inside look at how real entrepreneurs and VCs raise capital for their businesses. I'm your host, Nathan Beckard, and today's episode is with Geisa McZaika of AUKSO Female Catalyst Fund, a VC fund that backs female-founded startups based in Europe. In this episode, we talk about the opportunities of investing in European women founders, how the firm evolved from angel investing into Into a proper fund, why raising fund number two is much harder than fund one, tips for cracking into German family offices, and much more. If you're tuning into this podcast to learn how to raise capital for your business, be sure to check out foundersuite.com if you're a startup, or fundingstack.com if you're a VC or advisor.
Both platforms will give you access to an awesome collection of tools for raising capital, including a massive investor database, a new Get Intro tool to get warm intros to investors, a CRM to manage your fundraise, a virtual data room to run due diligence, plus pitch deck hosting, investor updates, email. email tools and more. Last but not least, if you enjoy this conversation and think someone else would too, please share it with them and hit that subscribe button to get all our latest episodes. Thank you. Now sit back and enjoy this chat with Gesa. Welcome
to How I Race It. The podcast that goes behind the scenes with entrepreneurs who've raised capital. We uncover the tips, tricks, and techniques they use to get investors to write a check. Strap in and turn it off.
Hi, welcome to another episode of How I Raised It, produced by foundersuite.com for startups and fundingstack.com for VCs. Today I have Geisa Michaiker of AUXO coming to us from Berlin. How was your day?
Very good. Thank you for having me, Nathan.
Are you From Berlin? Did you migrate there or w where are you from? No,
actually I I was born and raised in South America. Then I moved to Southeast Asia and I've been in Germany um since uh university. But my parents and my all my ancestors are German, so Interesting. I am German but uh but I didn't grow up here.
Bi y the name Micheka, which I won't even try and spell, that's is that more Polish and
It's Polish, but it's my ex husband's last name, uh and and my kid's last name. That's why I kept it.
Got it. Makes sense. Gotcha. Gotcha. Gotcha. Very good. Great to have you. Let's just start off. What is Auxo?
Well, AUXOL is a venture capital fund that co invests and teams with at least one female founder across Europe in the super early stages. And uh basically what we want to do is we wanna change the face of the economy and make it more diverse.
Yeah. So, uh I was looking on a website. So you pre C and C, maybe give the kinda like, you know, boilerpoint, um overview, right, of what you invest in and stage industry, all that stuff.
Yeah, exactly.
How did Auxxo evolve from an angel fund to its first VC fund?
So it's it's precede and seed. We're industry agnostic, although I I must say we do prefer B2B topics and uh we love everything that is good for the world, for society, for the environment. Um, but we will also do anything else. So uh we always need a lead investor on board. Um and we take three to eight percent ownership. So uh usually um yeah uh the ticket sizes may range somewhere between two hundred thousand euros and one million euros. Um and we can only invest in Europe. Got it. And this is our second fund. So actually we set up our first fund in twenty twenty one. Invested in thirty companies with that one. Um, had an angel fund before that. Uh and now the pr second proper venture capital fund have four investments so far.
Yeah. We'll we'll get into the whole evolution. I think that'll be interesting.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is Auxxo Female Catalyst Fund and what does it invest in?
0:00–3:23
2
How did Auxxo evolve from an angel fund to its first VC fund?
3:23–8:10
3
What personal experiences led Gesa to start a fund focused on female founders?
8:10–12:49
4
What is the current state of female‑founder startups in Europe?
12:49–19:19
5
How did Auxxo raise its first and second funds and what challenges did they face?
19:19–26:22
6
How can emerging managers secure capital from the European Investment Fund and German family offices?
26:22–33:01
7
What practical tips does Gesa give to founders and new fund managers for fundraising and networking?
33:01–39:33
8
What are the key takeaways and future plans for Auxxo and its community?
39:33–49:21
Speakers
1 identifiedMore from How I Raised It - The podcast where we interview startup founders who raised capital.
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