On April 25, 2025, Berlin-based legal tech startup Xayn, which is set to become Noxtua SE, announced the successful completion of its Series B investment round, raising approximately €80.7 million. This funding round was led by C.H. Beck, Germany's premier legal publisher, with additional investments from Northern Data, a high-performance computing specialist, CMS, one of Germany's largest business law firms, and the global law firm Dentons.
Xayn has developed Europe’s first sovereign legal AI platform, Noxtua, specifically designed for the German and European legal systems. This innovative platform is tailored to meet the stringent privacy, compliance, and professional secrecy standards necessary in the legal profession. Noxtua offers a suite of AI-powered tools that assist legal professionals in their daily tasks, ensuring they can operate within the complex legal frameworks of Europe.
The foundation of Xayn's technology stems from research conducted at the University of Oxford and Imperial College London. The platform utilizes reinforcement learning, which is crucial for improving its performance over time. While its initial development did not focus on language models, it quickly became apparent that these models would be essential. Noxtua effectively combines reinforcement learning with transformer and recurrent neural networks, optimizing both performance and energy efficiency. Remarkably, this allows its models to reduce energy consumption by up to 98% compared to other alternatives.
The collaboration with Dr. Markus Kaulartz from CMS highlighted a significant gap in the market: existing legal AI tools, particularly those from the United States, could not be utilized in European legal contexts. This realization prompted Xayn to create a compliant, powerful AI tool specifically designed for Europe, addressing the unique challenges posed by the continent's fragmented legal systems.
Data sovereignty and privacy are at the core of Xayn's mission. Dr. Leif-Nissen Lundbæk, CEO and co-founder of Xayn, emphasized the company’s commitment to a privacy-first, European-centric approach to AI. He stated, "This means designing systems that are data-efficient, respect privacy, and support sovereignty. We've had many conversations with US investors and partners who simply don't understand why it matters. But for Europeans, it's critical — especially given our dependence on foreign technologies."
In Germany, law firms are required to comply with the Professional Secrecy Act, which limits the use of cloud-based tools like ChatGPT. Obtaining client permission to process their data using such platforms is often impractical. Consequently, many firms have relied on on-premise software until now. Xayn’s Noxtua adheres to the high professional, criminal, and data protection law requirements for attorneys, enabling its use without requiring anonymization. Notably, Noxtua is trained on legal data, not client data, focusing on contracts and clauses designed specifically for this purpose.
Currently, Xayn is working on the third generation of Noxtua, which will leverage C.H. Beck's exclusive legal data for training and further optimization. C.H. Beck boasts the largest legal database in the German-speaking world, with over 55 million documents available through beck-online. This extensive resource includes more than 9,000 works and 80 specialist journals, making it an invaluable asset for legal professionals.
Dr. Lundbæk remarked, "This increase in data allows us to massively enhance the model's capabilities. It's not just a minor update; it's a significant evolution of the product." The partnership with C.H. Beck is particularly powerful in civil law countries like Germany, where literature such as commentaries and academic articles is crucial for legal interpretation. Dr. Oliver Hofmann, Head of Legal Tech at CMS, pointed out, "When a client sends a request, a lawyer must first understand the context, analyze the documents, and reference relevant case law and literature to provide advice or draft documents. That's why this partnership between Noxtua and Beck is powerful. Noxtua provides the AI and software capabilities, and we bring the legal data — both for training the model and supporting references."
Xayn updates its model approximately every three months, incorporating new functionalities and improved reasoning to ensure that the latest documents and rulings are integrated. This commitment to continuous improvement positions Noxtua as a leading tool in a rapidly evolving legal landscape.
The interest in Noxtua has surged among legal professionals in Germany, who have traditionally lacked access to AI-embedded tools available to their global counterparts. Dr. Lundbæk noted, "When we announced Noxtua publicly, we were overwhelmed by the interest. It clearly filled a massive gap. Law firms and legal departments are under pressure from growing regulations and shrinking headcounts—they need solutions like Noxtua to stay ahead."
Xayn has expanded its user base to include large law firms like CMS, enterprises, and government departments. The public sector, in particular, has shown increasing interest due to regulatory pressures. Dr. Lundbæk emphasized that governments are moving faster than expected in adopting such technologies, stating, "Our focus on security, compliance, and sovereignty—supported by partnerships with Deutsche Telekom and Northern Data—aligns well with public sector needs."
Noxtua includes contract review templates developed in collaboration with firms like CMS, designed to guide users through legal workflows. Upcoming features will include matrix review and multi-step templates, which automate entire legal workflows such as contract review, redlining, and email generation. One notable example is ENBW, a German energy provider, which utilizes the platform to automatically detect incoming contracts, apply checklists, generate redlines, and notify legal teams—all without manual intervention.
As geopolitical shifts underscore the need for sovereign European technology, the investment in Noxtua is more critical than ever. Aroosh Thillainathan, Founder and CEO of Northern Data Group, remarked, "We empower the world's most innovative companies—not just through our technology, but also by fostering the ecosystems that spark groundbreaking ideas. 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."
With previous investors like Global Brain Corporation and KDDI Open Innovation Fund remaining committed to the startup, Xayn is poised to redefine the landscape of legal technology in Europe, ensuring that legal professionals have the tools they need to navigate an increasingly complex regulatory environment.
