COLOGNE, Germany, March 28, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- The German investment company Media Ventures GmbH has bought into Hoccer Betriebs GmbH as principal investor. Dirk Stroer's company has already successfully invested in several new internet-based technologies. Hoccer is a young German company under the leadership of Jerome Glozbach de Cabarrus which has developed the messenger applications "Hoccer XO" and "Hoccer Classic". Both chat programs are technologically unique in terms of safety and guarantee user anonymity and privacy with no registration process. The applications have established themselves as a safe alternative to "WhatsApp" and have cracked the 2.5 million download limit. Dirk Stroer is impressed: "The market is looking for safe alternatives to 'WhatsApp'. Moreover, many people do not want to put control over their personal information completely in the hands of the Facebook networks," adds Prof. Skibicki, Scientific Director of the German Institute for Communication and Legal Matters on the Internet (DIKRI). "Hoccer is providing an alternative to end-to-end encryption and the possibility of anonymous use without automatic access to files and address lists."
These facts have motivated Dirk Stroer to buy into the Berlin-based app developer with an investment of 50 million euros. In return, his company Media Ventures will receive a 51% stake in Hoccer GmbH. "Hoccer" was taxed 100 million euros for the takeover. Prof. Skibicki: "The valuation of 100 million euros is justified in the light of these global structural changes towards complete mobile communication and the need to protect yourself in the best possible way from NSA monitoring and hackers and to guarantee the secure transmission of large amounts of data. As a German company with leading encryption and German servers, Hoccer has an advantage over US companies, which are subject to American surveillance requirements. The German approach to security and privacy could develop into an export hit - even more so when one takes into account the transfer of internal company information."
