The Berlin clone factory’s simple payments service, Paymill, has picked up €10 million from Holtzbrinck and Sunstone. With Rocket’s many operations pulling in tens of millions in investment each month, the flotation rumor comes as no surprise. Read more »
People love to hate clone artists like Berlin’s endlessly cash-hungry Rocket Internet, but is this really a clear-cut debate? And where should we draw the line? Read more »
It turns out you can’t conquer the whole world in one go after all. But, even if low margins have forced the Samwer brothers out of Istanbul, for now their successes are easily big enough to compensate. Read more »
Never ones to rest on their laurels, the Samwer brothers have launched their copy of hot payments service Stripe, while also partnering up with the cellular carrier Millicom for a fresh push into emerging markets Read more »
Germany’s Rocket Internet may have not made its big U.S. push yet, but one of its early plays — parenting subscription service Petitebox — has failed amid logistical problems. Will it make up for that by resurrecting the service under a new name? Read more »
The Samwer Brothers have stopped being furtive about the extent of their many clones, with a new site that lists their full portfolio as part of a wider rebrand. But what can we learn from this dramatic shift? Is Rocket Internet looking to America? Read more »
Rumors suggest the Samwer brothers are prepping a clone of hot payments startup Stripe to add to their copies of Square and BillMeLater – though it remains to be seen whether this would be a quick-sale ploy or a long-term play. Read more »
Rocket Internet did it before with eBay and Groupon, and now it’s done it again – having founded a very similar service to Care.com, it has now sold that service to the the U.S.-based care-giving firm for equity. Read more »
Germany’s notorious clone merchants have sold their stake in furniture operation Fashion For Home, but that still leaves them with good alternatives in the space. Whether they can produce strong players in less traditional e-commerce markets is another question. Read more »
The Swedish investor has become a new backer of Billpay, a Samwer brothers operation and PayPal rival that’s talking expansion – but what kind? Read more »
Eight-figure VC investments don’t show up every day, but website tools firm Jimdo turned it down on principle – even though it knew the decision would make it harder to get to number one. Read more »
Payment startups hoping to conquer Europe will be watching their backs a little more closely today, with the news that the Samwer brothers have just pulled together “double digit funding” for their Square clone. PayLeven (previously known as Zenpay) is a straight-up copy of Square: a […] Read more »
After the CEO of social gifting company Wrapp said he wanted to take on Germany’s notorious Samwer brothers, the business is finally delivering by launching in Germany and taking on the copycat kings on their home territory. Read more »
Just months after Germany’s notorious Samwer brothers courted controversy by cloning design sales site Fab.com, they are about to close their copycat site, Bamarang, down — folding it into its more successful stablemate, WestWing. Read more »
The fact that Germany’s Rocket Internet is launching another clone should come as a surprise to no-one. But even with their copycat reputation, cutting and pasting code for their new Nigerian online store seems more than little bit lazy. Read more »
With the financial outlook gloomy across Europe, there’s constant chatter about how hard it is not being Silicon Valley. But a growing number of people are challenging entrepreneurs to stop complaining and start building. Can they light a fire under the continent’s startups? Read more »
The Berlin clone factory rakes in the cash, but from whom? We take an initial look at the the sources of Rocket’s fuel. Read more »
One Berlin startup has just discovered it has a Russian twin with the same layout, business model and even the same name — a surprising situation, given that Germany is better known for being the copier rather than the victim. Read more »
Germany’s Samwer brothers are notorious as Europe’s chief cloners of web companies through their Rocket Internet vehicle. But we discovered their empire of e-commerce copycats is increasingly global, with companies operating in more than 50 countries worldwide. Read more »
German clone factory Rocket Internet, the incubator run by the controversy-courting Samwer brothers, has reportedly chosen its next target: white hot payment service Square. Read more »
In what is starting to look like an e-commerce version of Risk, Wrapp is retaliating against clone-artists Rocket Internet by launching on their home turf and detailing ambitious expansion plans Read more »
A new Rocket company has just popped up in Indonesia, offering a suspiciously similar service and look to the world’s most prominent e-tailer Read more »
Florian Heinemann, long-time marketing chief for the infamous Samwer brothers, has joined other ex-Rocketeers at Project A Ventures — an incubator that has been explicitly set up as a move away from Rocket’s copycat model. Read more »
Social gifts startup Wrapp says it is massively speeding up its expansion plans as a direct response to a copycat funded by the notorious German Samwer brothers — and the company’s CEO is warning retailers that doing business with the clone could prove costly. Read more »
Germany’s Rocket Internet — an incubator notorious for its habit of copying other businesses — rarely opens its doors. But we got a rare peek inside one of its new projects, the kitchen service HelloFresh. So what is it like working for the Samwer brothers? Read more »
Europe’s most notorious cloners have built their reputation by copying big American companies. But now they appear to be readying a new rival to small Swedish startup Wrapp — a change of tactics that has ‘surprised’ Wrapp CEO Hjalmar Winbladh. Read more »
The team behind design sales site Fab.com was outraged to discover a U.K.-based rival that seems to mimic not only their business but also their look. But outrage may not be enough to stop Germany’s Samwer brothers from going big with their latest clone. Read more »
