// startup autopsy

Runtastic

From Austrian dorm room to Adidas boardroom

acquisition gone wrongAcqui-hire

Fatal mistake: Runtastic did not fail — it succeeded spectacularly, being acquired by Adidas in 2015 for €220M after building one of Europe's largest fitness app communities.

Founded	2009
Closed	2015
Country	Austria
Sector	Consumer

50%

Key Events Timeline

2009-03

FOUNDING

Runtastic founded in Linz, Austria by Florian Gschwandtner and co-founders as a GPS fitness tracking app.

2012-06

FUNDING

Raised approximately $214K in external funding; grew primarily through organic viral adoption.

2013-09

PRODUCT LAUNCH

Expanded product suite to 20+ fitness apps reaching 50M+ downloads across platforms.

2015-03

ACQUISITION ATTEMPT

Adidas begins acquisition talks with Runtastic, drawn by its 70M+ registered users.

2015-08

SHUTDOWN

Adidas officially acquires Runtastic for €220M (~$240M), ending its independent existence.

Full Analysis

Analyst plan

Documented cause

Runtastic was acquired by Adidas in August 2015 for €220M, representing one of Austria's largest tech exits at the time. The company had achieved impressive organic growth to 70M+ users with minimal external VC...

funding ($214K raised). However, the acquisition ultimately proved unsuccessful. After 9 years under Adidas ownership, the company failed to deliver sustained value, culminating in Adidas's decision

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€0.4M

Peak valuation

HypeCycle · MoatType · ResearchTags

Runtastic raised €0.214185M before runtastic did not fail — it succeeded spectacularly, being acquired by adidas in 2015 for €220m after building one of europe's largest fitness app communities. ended it. See the documented cause, verified lesson and all failure signals.

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