Noxtua raises € 80.7 Million for Europe’s sovereign Legal AI

Germany's leading legal publisher C.H.Beck, a leading AI and High-Performance Computing solutions company Northern Data, the business law firm CMS as co-initiator of Noxtua, and the international law firm Dentons invest in sovereign European AI
Strategic financing of approximately € 80.7 million for further development of Europe’s leading sovereign Legal AI Noxtua and expansion into additional markets
Soon available: integrated Legal AI workspace "Beck-Noxtua" with C.H.Beck's exclusive data

BERLIN/MUNICH, April 23, 2025 – Berlin-based Legal-Tech startup Xayn (soon to be Noxtua SE), developer of Europe's first sovereign Legal AI Noxtua, has completed its Series B investment round of approximately € 80.7 million with C.H.Beck, Germany’s leading legal publisher, as the leading investor. Additional new investors on board include High-Performance Computing (HPC) specialist Northern Data, Germany’s largest business law firm CMS as Xayn's long-standing partner and co-initiator of the Legal AI Noxtua, as well as global law firm Dentons. This financing round, combined with powerful strategic partners, an expanded product offering (including the Legal AI Beck-Noxtua), and the forthcoming expansion into additional markets, brings together comprehensive AI, legal, and computing expertise, further solidifying Noxtua's position as Europe's leading sovereign Legal AI.

Tradition Meets Innovation: Beck-Noxtua

The exclusive legal data of market leader C.H.Beck converges with the groundbreaking Legal AI of the Berlin-based AI company, born out of research at the University of Oxford and Imperial College London and developed in close collaboration with CMS. With this specialized AI, legal experts can research legal matters and analyze and draft legal documents – legally compliant and competent. The sovereign European Legal AI adheres to the high professional, criminal, and data protection law requirements for attorneys (e.g. Section 203 of the German Criminal Code (StGB), Section 43e of the German Federal Code for Lawyers (BRAO)), enabling its use by professionals bound by confidentiality without requiring anonymization.

Noxtua is built on specialized proprietary AI models trained with high-quality legal data. Through its partnership with C.H.Beck, the AI company leverages the publishing house’s exclusive legal data for training and further optimizing of the Noxtua Legal AI. With more than 9,000 available works, 80 specialist journals, and up to 1,000 new publications and new editions every year, the specialized publisher has by far the largest legal database in the German-speaking world with beck-online – with well over 55 million documents covering all relevant areas of law. beck-online contains, among other things, the most comprehensive collection of relevant commentary literature, which is essential for lawyers in their daily work.

Representatives from Noxtua, C.H.Beck, CMS, and Dominik Schiener.

Strategic investment in Europe's digital sovereignty

The current geopolitical shifts lend additional weight to this investment in sovereign European technology – above all in AI: in addition to high-quality data, Europe needs its own AI models and an autonomous infrastructure for more digital sovereignty and in order to avoid or reduce technological dependencies. This is where the strategic investor Northern Data, based in Frankfurt am Main, brings extensive expertise in sovereign, European high-performance computing and hosting. Culturally, European values such as data protection and transparency must remain anchored in technology development. With its strategic partners C.H.Beck, CMS, and Dentons, Noxtua is doing justice to their legal expertise, thereby also securing its roots in local European markets. The strategic-political dimension is reflected in the increasing geopolitical uncertainty, which makes it necessary for Europe to gain greater control over key technologies.

Bringing Together Comprehensive AI, Legal, and Computing Expertise

With the new investors, leading companies from three industries unite their forces with Noxtua: C.H.Beck contributes comprehensive juristic know-how, leading research, and specialist data expertise and will exclusively distribute the jointly developed products in Germany and other countries where the publishing house is represented. Long-standing partner CMS and new investor Dentons ensure as leading law firms that the products match the market needs. Northern Data brings a high-performance European infrastructure provider critical for AI applications.

"We are delighted about the successfully completed financing round and the new strong partners by our side – especially now, when Europe's digital sovereignty is more crucial than ever. European digital sovereignty is not merely a political question, but one that must also be addressed with hard technical facts – which is why the successful Series B round is of high strategic relevance to us. With C.H.Beck, Northern Data, CMS, and Dentons as our new investors, we are bringing together a unique combination of AI, legal, and computing expertise. This enables us to expand our position as the leading sovereign Legal AI in Europe. In doing so, we are also continuing the journey we began in 2017: building powerful AI based on European values," highlights Dr Leif-Nissen Lundbæk, CEO & Co-Founder Xayn/Noxtua.

"The connection between Noxtua and C.H.Beck publishing house is far more than the combination of leading legal specialist information with outstanding technology. Noxtua's vision of a sovereign European Legal AI aligns hand in hand with our values as an independent family-owned company, bearing a special responsibility towards the legal system", states Professor Dr Klaus Weber, member of the Executive Board at C.H.Beck. "This carefully selected partnership with Noxtua is a cornerstone of our innovation strategy. Together, we will further expand our portfolio of AI solutions," explains Dr Dr Oliver Hofmann, Head of Legal Tech at the publishing house. "In the future, we will offer our customers not only high-quality content and research capabilities, but also comprehensive productivity solutions for their legal work."

Professor Dr Klaus Weber (C.H.Beck), Dr Dr Oliver Hofmann (C.H.Beck), Dr Leif-Nissen Lundbæk.

Aroosh Thillainathan, Founder and CEO, Northern Data Group, commented: "We empower the world’s most innovative companies – not just through our technology, but also by fostering the ecosystems that spark groundbreaking ideas. Our strategic investment acknowledges how Xayn/Noxtua successfully combines cutting-edge AI applications, fine-tuned LLMs, proprietary databases, and powerful compute resources—all within our sovereign, legally compliant AI infrastructure. We are excited to support Xayn’s/Noxtua’s continued growth as they scale to meet the growing demand for Legal AI."

"I am delighted that our vision of a European Legal AI has become a reality. With C.H.Beck as a partner, we are creating the basis for a new standard tool that can bring about lasting change to lawyers' day-to-day work," says Dr Markus Kaulartz, lawyer and partner for Artificial Intelligence at CMS. Dr Martin Vorsmann, Managing Partner at CMS, adds: "Noxtua's users benefit from the fact that the AI was developed using law-focused training data right from the start – and we will continue to provide this input in the future."

"Dentons has always been driven by the vision of being the law firm of the future, so innovation is in our DNA. As part of our wider strategy to embrace the power of artificial intelligence to transform our industry, we are excited by the opportunity for Dentons Europe to contribute our legal and innovation expertise to the development of Noxtua to address the specific needs of the European market," highlights Wendela Raas, CEO of Dentons Europe.

Waiting List For Beck-Noxtua Open

Law firms and legal departments can now register for the Beck-Noxtua waitlist: www.beck-noxtua.de

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XAYN AG BECOMES NOXTUA SE

Noxtua Management: Simon Joecks (Chief Technology Officer), Ruth Rothmaler (Chief Product Officer), Dr Leif-Nissen Lundbæk (CEO & Co-Founder), Dr Clara Herdeanu (Chief Communications Officer).

Concurrent with the completed Series B, the AI startup founded on research from Oxford University and Imperial College London begins its official rebranding from Xayn AG to Noxtua SE. With its new legal form and additional headquarters in other European countries, the AI company expands into new European markets. This establishes Noxtua as a genuinely European AI company, aiming to promote Europe's sovereignty.

Previous investors Global Brain Corporation, KDDI Open Innovation Fund, CMS, and Dominik Schiener remain invested in the startup. The latter, along with C.H.Beck, takes over the shares of former investor Earlybird VC, in alignment with the AI startup's new strategic orientation.

Boilerplate

About Noxtua

Noxtua is Europe's leading sovereign Legal AI. The legally compliant and competent AI helps legal professionals to research legal issues and review, and draft legal documents. The GDPR-compliant Legal AI meets the high professional and data protection requirements for lawyers (§ 203 Penal Code, § 43e Federal Lawyers' Act) and is certified according to ISO 27001, 9001, 27018, 27017, 42001, and BSI C5. The product version Beck-Noxtua is based on the exclusive data of Germany’s leading legal publisher C.H.Beck and Germany’s largest business law firm CMS.

Emerging from a 2017 research project by Dr. Leif-Nissen Lundbæk and Professor Dr. Michael Huth at Oxford University and Imperial College London, the Berlin-based Legal-Tech company, formerly known as Xayn, boasts extensive experience in developing highly efficient GDPR-compliant AI solutions. Strategic partners, including Germany's leading legal publisher C.H.Beck, the High-Performance Computing specialist Northern Data, Germany's largest business law firm and co-initiator of the Legal AI Noxtua CMS, as well as the world's largest law firm Dentons, have invested a total of € 80.7 million in the German startup as part of its Series B funding round.

More information: www.noxtua.com

About C.H.Beck

The C.H.Beck Group is a leading media company. More than 2,200 employees at various European locations work on the production and marketing of a wide range of legal and scientific specialist books as well as a sophisticated non-fiction and literature programme. With its national and international publishing business, its own printing plant, distribution centres, bookshops, seminar companies and various shareholdings, C.H.Beck covers the entire value chain of a modern media company.

C.H.Beck is one of the biggest and most established names in German publishing. With its beck-online database, its multi-volume series, loose-leaf works, textbooks and AI-supported chat books, C.H.Beck is the market leader among specialist legal publishers in Germany. Legal professionals, tax consultants, accountants and many other professional groups benefit from the high quality standard of Beck products and services.

More information: www.beck.de

About Northern Data

Northern Data Group is a leading provider of AI and High-Performance Computing (HPC) solutions, leveraging high-density, liquid-cooled, GPU-based technology to empower the world’s most innovative organizations. Together with our partners, we are passionate about the potential of HPC to drive not only technological advancements but also societal progress.

More information: www.northerndata.de

About CMS

CMS is one of the leading corporate law firms in Germany. More than 700 lawyers, tax advisors and notaries advise clients from major corporations to SMEs and start-ups on all aspects of national and international corporate law. CMS has offices in the eight major business centres in Germany: Berlin, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Cologne, Leipzig, Munich and Stuttgart. CMS is represented by more than 6,000 lawyers in over 40 offices worldwide.

More information: www.cms.law

About Dentons

Across over 80 countries, Dentons helps you grow, protect, operate and finance your organization by providing uniquely global and deeply local legal solutions. Polycentric, purpose-driven and committed to inclusion, diversity, equity and sustainability, we focus on what matters most to you.

More information: www.dentons.com

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Factsheet: Noxtua, C.H.Beck

Noxtua: Further Information

Bios: Noxtua, C.H.Beck

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Further information

What are the USP’s of Noxtua as Europe's sovereign legal AI?

Noxtua is based on proprietary AI models, trained with exclusive legal data, and is hosted on the European Open Telekom Cloud. The Legal AI is being developed by the Berlin-based start-up Xayn AG (soon to be Noxtua SE), which emerged from a research project at Oxford University and Imperial College London in 2017. The guiding principle is to develop powerful AI based on European values such as transparency, data protection, and the rule of law. Noxtua is therefore a genuinely European project in terms of its development, database, and implementation.

How does Noxtua take care of privacy and security?

Lawyers must protect their client’s personal data, trade secrets, and other sensitive information. Therefore, their tools need to meet high security and privacy standards. Noxtua fulfills the high requirements for the protection of professional secrecy under Section 43e German Federal Code for Lawyers (BRAO) and Section 203 (1), (3), (4) German Criminal Code (StGB).

The Xayn/Noxtua company cannot view client data (such as prompts and documents entered or responses from Noxtua) in plain text. This data is not used to train AI models and is not available to third parties. Uploaded information and documents are only processed in the working memory and are not stored long-term. Noxtua uses a secure sovereign EU cloud and additionally encrypts all data to protect sensitive information. The Open Telekom Cloud adheres to strict standards, ensures physical security in its data centers, and complies with the industry-specific provisions of the German Criminal Code (StGB), the German Social Security Code (SGB), the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) and the German Federal Office for Information Security (BSI).

Noxtua is a pioneer in data protection and security, as confirmed by independent audit procedures. The AI start-up was the first German company to receive ISO/IEC 42001 certification, which ensures the responsible development and use of AI systems. The company is also certified to ISO 9001 (the world's most recognized quality management standard), ISO/IEC 27001 (the world's leading standard for information security management), ISO/IEC 27018 (international standard for the protection of personal information in cloud storage), ISO/IEC 27017 (international security standard for secure cloud environments), ISO/IEC 42001 (the first international standard for AI management systems) and BSI C5 (catalog of criteria for secure cloud computing from the German Federal Office for Information Security).

What is the story behind Noxtua?

Noxtua was launched on the market in February 2024. The Legal AI was developed by the AI company Xayn (soon to be Noxtua SE) with legal expertise, experience, and input from Germany's largest commercial law firm CMS. The co-initiator of Noxtua also provided, among other things, the first exclusive legal data with which the legal AI could be trained and developed. Emerging from a 2017 research project by Dr. Leif-Nissen Lundbæk and Professor Dr. Michael Huth at Oxford University and Imperial College London, the Berlin-based Legal-Tech company, formerly known as Xayn, boasts extensive experience in developing highly efficient GDPR-compliant AI solutions.

What is the technological basis for Europe's sovereign Legal AI Noxtua?

Noxtua Review & Draft and Noxtua Research can either be used via the interface or integrated into your own systems via the API. The Legal AI is based on its own family of models, including the original Noxtua LLM and Noxtua Voyage Embed (a vector model for AI-supported searches specializing in European and German law).

Noxtua LLM, which specializes in the legal sector, has a processing capacity of up to 256,000 token context lengths and 111 billion parameters. This corresponds to around 140,000 words in German and 190,000 words in English (approx. 560 pages in German/780 pages in English with standard formatting and around 250 words per page). This is the model for processing long legal texts. The data sets are provided by members of the Legal AI Alliance such as the law firms CMS and Nordemann. They include documents such as various court decisions from Germany and other EU countries, contract templates and interactions with contracts and lawyers as well as a synthetically generated and legally verified data set.

Noxtua Voyage Embed is a vector model for AI-supported searches that specializes in European and German law. The search model was launched by Noxtua together with the Stanford spin-off Voyage AI and dejure.org, one of the most comprehensive legal databases in Germany. Noxtua Voyage Embed (voyage-law-2-xayn) outperforms Open AI's most powerful search model (text-embedding-3-large) on average twice as much in legal text benchmarks, with 1.7 times better search accuracy and 2.2 times better ranking quality at three times lower dimensionality. This makes the model at least twice as good at finding relevant legal documents – all while using less energy and resources.

Noxtua Research is based on the Noxtua Research Model (question-answer model), which is fed by the proprietary Noxtua Legal Large Language Model and the customized search model Noxtua Voyage Embed.

Due to the new strategic partnership with Germany’s leading legal publisher C.H.Beck, Noxtua is able to use the most extensive and exclusive legal dataset in the German-speaking world to train and optimize the Legal AI.

What characterizes C.H.Beck's database?

Germany’s leading legal publishing house C.H.Beck covers all areas of law with beck-online, the largest legal database in the German-speaking world with well over 55 million documents. It contains, among other things, the most comprehensive collection of relevant commentary literature, which is essential for lawyers in their daily work.

What does the name Noxtua stand for?

The name Noxtua is derived from the Latin word Noctua, meaning owl, and combines this with the X from the original company name Xayn. In Ancient Greece and Rome, the owl was the companion of Athena, the goddess of wisdom, strategic thinking, and warfare. With its ability to see in the dark, the owl complemented Athena's powers of foresight in ancient mythology. Together they symbolized the pursuit of knowledge and strategy, a union of intellect and strength.