Analysis

May 24, 2023

Exec churn and cash burn leaves N26 a long way from IPO

Regulatory issues, executive churn and a shutdown of the public markets have set the neobank back on its IPO plans


N26 cofounders, Maximilian Tayenthal (left) and Valentin Stalf

N26 started talking about an IPO in 2018. At the time, the neobank had raised cash from Silicon Valley guru Peter Thiel and heavyweight investors like Tencent, GIC and Allianz. The company was forecasting as many as a 100m customers in a decade, which would have made it bigger than Wells Fargo and Chase. 

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Miriam Partington

Miriam Partington was a senior reporter at Sifted, based in Berlin. She covered the DACH region and the future of work, and wrote Startup Life , a weekly newsletter on what it takes to build a startup.

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