OWOW Venture Studio raises €2.65 million to build new startups in traditional industries
Eindhoven, September 2026 – Eight family offices and angel investors are jointly investing €2.65 million in Eindhoven-based OWOW Venture Studio. With this capital, the studio will build or accelerate new ventures over the coming years, with a focus on manufacturing and the OEM sector. The funding is intended for early-stage B2B startups, with investments ranging from €100,000 to €250,000 per startup.
These may be ideas originating within OWOW itself, as well as existing startups founded by external entrepreneurs who are seeking investment and want to accelerate their growth together with OWOW. The investment in each venture depends on its stage of development and commercial potential.
Ambition: three ventures a year
OWOW Venture Studio aims to add at least three new ventures to its portfolio every year for the next three years. The studio focuses mainly on manufacturing and OEMs: sectors in which OWOW has worked for almost fifteen years, and where many processes still run on outdated or fragmented systems. By building ventures for customers OWOW already knows, the studio wants to increase the chance that new products meet real market demand from day one.
The Venture Studio was formally launched in late 2025. It initially aimed for €2.0 million, but increased the round to €2.65 million because of investor interest. It has since made its first two investments: Eindhoven-based Synthgen, which generates synthetic data so that AI models for robots and machines can be trained far better without endlessly collecting real images, and Caddy Clubhouse, a British platform that aims to become the Uber of caddies in the very traditional world of golf.
Traditional industries
The studio focuses on B2B startups in traditional sectors such as manufacturing, the OEM sector and construction. Software-as-a-service and artificial intelligence, including physical AI applications, play an important role. OWOW sees particular opportunities in traditional industries where many processes still rely on outdated or fragmented digital systems. OWOW also has a large client base in these sectors.
Its model differs from that of a conventional investment fund. OWOW provides not only capital, but also its top AI specialists, software developers and designers. Startups also gain access to the client base and business contacts of the existing product studio.
Over almost fifteen years, OWOW has worked for more than 500 clients in these traditional and industrial sectors. That network should help new ventures find potential users and their first customers more quickly.
“For every venture we build or invest in, we want to be able to find launch customers ourselves. If we can’t, it’s not a win-win, and we don’t invest. We only invest in the industries we have worked in ourselves for almost fifteen years. We know the customers there, and they know us.”
— Robin Dohmen, founder & co-CEO of OWOW
Don’t start by building
A venture studio builds several companies simultaneously, based on its own internal ideas or in partnership with outside entrepreneurs. OWOW aims to combine market validation and product development from the outset. This should prevent startups from spending months developing technology, only to discover afterwards that customers are not interested in the product.
This approach ties in with OWOW’s existing product studio, which develops digital products and AI applications for clients. OWOW has approximately 45 employees. OWOW says this organisation allows it to quickly assemble multidisciplinary teams around a new venture.
The Venture Studio is led by Dohmen. The core team also includes Head of Ventures and lean-startup expert Kees van Nunen, Head of Product and digital product specialist Vincent van Deursen, and OWOW founder Pieter-Jan Pieters. The studio also works with additional specialists on a project-by-project basis and has an advisory board featuring well-known names from the venture capital sector.
Apply
The studio is looking for founders and startups in traditional industries, as well as professionals from these sectors with an idea they want to bring to market as a new startup together with OWOW. Apply here.