He Scaled to €800M Revenue, Then Said It Was "The Wrong Choice" - Julian Teicke

Julian Teicke is a serial founder, in the last 12 months alone, he's co-founded four companies. But before any of that, he spent 10 years as CEO of the company that made his name, scaling it to €800M in revenue and 1,500 people.

He raised the money using an "ultimate experiment of manifestation," as he calls it: find the largest round ever raised in your vertical at your stage, then take it times two. It worked — Series A went from a $15M benchmark to $30M raised, Series B from $120M to $240M, Series C from $300M to over $600M. Then he tells you the part most founders never say out loud: it came from wanting to be seen, not from a calibrated goal.

In this ICONS episode, Julian gets specific about what actually happened — not the sanitized version. He explains the difference between building from "dirty fuel" (a paradigm he calls the dominant theme in venture capital, built on exploiting childhood trauma) and building from a grounded place. He recounts the moment an employee confronted him directly: that his unresolved dynamic with his father was scaling to every corner of the organization, taking the whole team hostage. And he admits, on the record, that going full-stack instead of building a broker model was the wrong choice — one that cost the organization its spirit.

He also walks through what he's building now: The Delta, a Berlin campus and venture builder that started as a way to process the 30 business ideas he generates in a single hour, and BAD1, the conference that grew out of it. He makes the case for why Berlin is the ecosystem worth betting on, backing it with the ecosystem's own 10x ambition — from €169B to €1.7T by 2036, with 250 unicorns and €30B in annual venture funding. And he closes on something AI still can't do, no matter how good the models get.

Watch or listen to the full episode on our channel or Spotify.

Guest: Julian Teicke, Co-Founder of wefox, Founder of The Delta & BAD1

Host: Roman Kirsch

Topics Discussed

• Scaling wefox to €800M in revenue over 10 years as CEO — with his father joining the team as a hire along the way

• The fundraising formula: find the largest round ever raised at your stage, then raise 2x

• Series A, B, and C — how the round sizes escalated, and what it revealed about manifestation

• The honest admission behind the strategy: raising to be seen, not from a calibrated goal

• "Dirty fuel" vs. clean fuel — why he calls trauma-driven ambition the dominant pattern in venture capital

• The employee who confronted him: how an unresolved family dynamic was taking the whole organization hostage

• The full-stack insurer decision he now calls the wrong choice, and what it cost the company

• Why trauma is not required to build great companies — and what he believes now instead

• The job of a CEO: spotting which data point turns into a positive spiral versus a negative one

• What he looks for in founders now: whether they seek discomfort or avoid it

• Co-founding four companies in the last 12 months, and the one just announced that's "a completely different beast"

• The Delta's origin story: turning 30 business ideas an hour into an actual venture-building platform

• How BAD1 grew out of that same need

• His case for why Berlin is the ecosystem worth betting on

• Berlin's 10x ecosystem goal by 2036 — from €169B to €1.7T, 250 unicorns, €30B in venture funding

• What Julian believes AI still can't replicate about human connection

Chapters:

0:00 Cold Open

1:12 Meet Julian Teicke

3:41 Welcome, Julian!

4:57 Why He Became an Entrepreneur

6:44 "Dirty Fuel" vs. Clean Fuel

8:04 The Manifestation Story

13:41 From Dirty Fuel to Balance

14:52 Hiring His Father — The Hostage Moment

17:00 Would He Do It Again?

18:29 The Delta & BAD1 Origin Story

20:12 Luca App, Theo, Handly — The Hit Rate

21:49 What He Looks For in Founders Now

23:45 4 Companies in 12 Months

29:57 How AI Changed Company Building

32:10 15 Years of Lessons

41:59 The Fundraising Formula: Raise 2x

44:47 The Goal Wasn't Calibrated

47:18 The Wrong Choice: Full-Stack Insurer

51:44 Masa Son & "The Beginning of the River"

58:09 Berlin's 10x Ecosystem Goal by 2036

1:03:08 Rapid Fire Questions

1:03:26 "Stop The Suffering"

1:03:40 What AI Still Can't Do

About Julian Teicke

Julian Teicke is a serial founder who has co-founded four companies in the last 12 months alone. Before that, he spent 10 years as CEO scaling a company to €800M in revenue and 1,500 people. Today he runs The Delta, a Berlin campus and venture builder home to over 900 early-stage founders, and BAD1, the conference that grew out of it.