LUMITOS Celebrates Anniversary – From University Vision to Leading B2B Online Marketing Expert
Organic Growth Instead of Venture Capital: How LUMITOS Survived the Dot-com Crisis and Became Market Leader
LUMITOS AG is celebrating its 25th anniversary and today presents itself as a leading B2B marketing platform for chemistry, life sciences, food, and adjacent industries. What began in 1997 as a university project at the Free University of Berlin is now an internationally successful company with impressive figures: over 17 million portal users annually, more than 1,900 satisfied customers, and over 150,000 newsletter subscribers.
From Vision to Digital Reality
The success story of LUMITOS began as early as 1997 with the launch of chemie.de as a research project of the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). The founders already had far-reaching visions at that time: Stefan Knecht pursued the idea of a LifeScience Network – a fee-based information system that centrally collects, structures, and thematically links global life science data. Thomas Richter formulated the overarching goal: "To free people from tedious research and inferior content."
In 2000, Claus Schröter, Thomas Richter, Hans Benedict, Dr. Thorsten Fröhlich, and Stefan Knecht founded LUMITOS AG as CHEMIE.DE Information Service GmbH – right in the midst of the dot-com bubble burst. While many internet start-ups failed, the founders consistently focused on organic growth instead of venture capital. As Claus Schröter emphasizes in retrospect: "From a university chemistry portal in 1997, a successful industry platform emerged despite the dot-com crisis. Organic growth instead of venture capital ensured survival and ultimately exceeded all forecasts."
Continuous Innovation and Expansion
In the following years, the Berlin-based company systematically expanded its specialized portals: in 2001, bionity.com launched for the biotech and pharmaceutical industry, followed by analytica-world.com in 2003 in collaboration with Messe München, and in 2008, quimica.es was added as a Spanish-language platform. By 2011, the portals were available in four languages, as the offering was expanded to include French content. In 2017, the brand relaunch to LUMITOS took place along with a strategic realignment, and additionally, yumda.com became part of the LUMITOS portal landscape.
B2B Online Marketing at the Center
LUMITOS has long since evolved beyond merely providing specialized portals. The company now positions itself as a comprehensive B2B online marketing service provider and operates its portals in six languages (German, English, Spanish, French, Italian, and Portuguese).
With services ranging from online strategy development through search engine optimization and advertising to email marketing and content creation, LUMITOS offers a complete spectrum of digital marketing services.
"The continuous development and adaptation to the needs of our customers and users has always been the key to our success," explains Dr. Björn Lippold, Chief Content Strategist at LUMITOS. "While the digital landscape – and thus our portals – has changed dramatically since the early days with chemie.de, our focus has always remained on high-quality, reliable professional information and effective B2B marketing solutions."
Pioneers for Virtual Events
Particularly during the Corona pandemic, LUMITOS demonstrated innovative strength: The company developed a platform for virtual trade shows within a very short time and successfully established formats such as the virtual lab show, the virtual process show, the virtual battery day, and the digital lab day. These digital events reached thousands of participants worldwide and set new standards in the B2B event industry.
Technological Pioneer Role
LUMITOS was also one of the first B2B providers to use AI tools like Midjourney for content creation, thereby revolutionizing the visual worlds of its portals. According to its own statements, LUMITOS is particularly proud to have continuously developed new ideas over 25 years and today leads companies to success with AI-supported tools, virtual events, and data-driven marketing strategies.
Looking to the Future
With its steadily growing international network, LUMITOS looks optimistically to the future. The company plans further innovations in the field of AI-supported information research and aims to further expand its position as an indispensable partner for B2B online marketing in the chemistry, life sciences, food, and adjacent sectors.
Discover our complete 25-year timeline and be inspired by 25 years full of milestones, innovations, and success stories --> https://www.lumitos.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/LUMITOS-time-travel-2025.html
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