Startups


MEDIA KEYNOTE:
Dr. Klaus Hommels, Founder, Lakestar “The Midas King of Entreprenuers”.

Klaus is one of the leading European business angels and has been involved in numerous successful internet investments that have become industry giants, including Skype, Facebook, Xing, Spotify, king.com, StarDoll, and QXL/Tradus. He invests in promising start-ups that have the potential to become major players in the internet space. Klaus started his career at Bertelsmann, joined AOL Germany in 1995 where was as board member responsible for business development, content and advertising sales. He was also involved in the establishment of Freenet, worked for Apax Partners and was a partner of Benchmark Capital before founding his own venture capital fund Hommels Holding.

Klaus graduated with a Master’s degree in Business Administration from University of Fribourg in Switzerland and holds a PhD degree in Finance from the same university. He was named “most successful European entrepreneurial private investor of the year” in 2006 by a group comprised of IESE, INSEAD and the University of St Gallen.

FEATURED PANELISTS
EMRE EKMEKÇİ, President Business Development, Dogan Online Group, Turkey

Emre is the President, Business Development at Doğan Online Group Companies. Founded in 1999, Doğan Online Group consists of the leading e-commerce, portal, betting, travel, private shopping, furniture, and online advertising businesses in Turkey. His team is tasked with new venture identification and continuous improvement within the group. Prior, in partnership with European Founders Fund, Emre pioneered the daily deal business in Turkey, by launching Groupon's Turkey operations and its local brand www.sehirfirsati.com, making it a market leader company in less than 18 months.

Emre has global experience in Interactive Marketing having served for 8 years at a leading full-service agency in Los Angeles with focus on global business development and has worked on location in Los Angeles, Chicago, Hong Kong, Shanghai, London and Paris. Emre has an MBA with honors from Columbia Business School in New York and holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Industrial and Systems Engineering from University of Southern California.

Cesare Maifredi,
Investment Manager, 360 Capital Partners, Italy

Cesare joined 360° Capital Partners in 2010 as Investment Manager. Prior to joining the firm, he worked as Senior Engagement Manager in the New Jersey and Houston offices of McKinsey & Company (2006-2010), as Consultant in Bain & Company (2005), as Project Manager in A2A - one of the leading Italian multi-utilities - (2003-2004) and as senior analyst in a Accenture - a global IT consulting company (2001-2003). Cesare has extensive experience in cleantech (renewables, energy efficiency and storage, low carbon technologies, water conservation), power generation, upstream oil and gas with particular focus on investment selection, deal structuring, strategic and business planning, business development and policymaking. Cesare holds an M.B.A. from Darden School of Business Administration of the University of Virginia (2006), and Master degrees in Industrial Engineering (2004) and Mechanical Engineering (1999) from the University of Brescia, Italy.

Lucian Despoiu, Founder, General Manager, Kondiment Group, Romania

Kondiment one of the biggest full service digital marketing agencies in Eastern Europe, with 10 years of activity on local and international markets; Lucian has a history of innovation and success in the internet field, he led the acquisition of a division of Lycos Europe, founded the leading online recruiting platform in Romania, e-jobs and expanded Kondiment into new vertical markets including online political marketing for local and international markets. Lucian also founded “Volunteers for Ideas and Projects”, an NGO started in 1998 with the aim of bringing together the student elite and the leaders in the socio-economic and political environments, and to cultivate their entrepreneurial spirit.

Jan Borgstädt,
Head of European Ventures, Bertelsmann Digital Media Investments

Jan Nils Borgstädt is heading the European Ventures at BDMI. Currently he serves on the boards and councils of BDMI´s Portfolio Companies Learnship, alaTest, Sportal, Contentfleet, and Dealunited, He also cares for BDMI´s investments in the French Venture Fund ISAI and the Italian venture incubator H-Farm. Before joining BDMI in 2007 he was a member of the Bertelsmann Entrepreneurs Program, working as a consultant on digital media projects throughout the Bertelsmann Group. Prior to that Jan founded two companies in Cologne, both in the professional publishing market. Jan studied Law and Business Administration at the University of Münster, Germany. He graduated with a Diploma specializing in Finance, Auditing & Controlling. He also holds a Master of Marketing from EADA Business School, Barcelona, Spain. Jan lives in Cologne and Berlin; he loves to travel and is passionate about Sailing and Skiing.

Jérémie Berrebi, Co-founder, Kima Ventures

Editor for ZDNet France in 1996, Jeremie co-founded one of the first French internet success stories in 1997 sold to TNS Group (UK) in 2004: Net2one (a Google News ancestor) where he raised $10 million in 1999 and exited successfully in 2006. Co-founded, and was at the helm of Zlio.com (“create your own shop even if you have nothing to sell and make money !”) funded by Mangrove Capital Partners (the 1st Skype Investor).. In 2010, he co-founded Kima Ventures with Xavier Niel, investing in 1 to 2 startups a week everywhere in the world. .

Jérémie is now considered as the most active angel investor in the world and is part of the top 10 most influential technology investors in Europe for The Telegraph. Jérémie posseses a very strong Internet, Mobile & Ecommerce business & technical knowledge.

Thomas Hoegh,
Founder and CEO, Arts Alliance

Thomas is the founder of Arts Alliance, Arts Alliance Media and the Met Film School and is both an artist and an entrepreneur. As an artist Thomas’ work spans theatre, film and music, often with a technology angle. He is currently making a film about Shakespeare’s hidden codes and treasure.

Arts Alliance is an investment organisation that builds and supports innovative and high growth companies in Europe, typically targeting private media and entertainment companies that have a technology angle. Arts Alliance Media (AAM) is Europe’s leading provider of digital film distribution services, dedicated to building a European digital network to deliver film to cinemas. LoveFilm was incubated and spun off from AAM.

Thomas sits on the boards of City Screen; Kenshoo; Kiala; the Metropolitan Film School (founder); Kebony; Daylife and Plan UK. He is a visiting professor of Kanazawa Institute of Technology.

Mony Hassid,
Managing Director, Israel & Europe Motorola Mobility Ventures

Mony brings over twenty years of experience in R&D, engineering, business development and venture investments to Motorola Mobility Ventures with responsibility over Israel and Europe. He is responsible for identifying and executing strategic investments in start-ups to accelerate access to new technologies, new markets and new talents for all of Motorola’s existing and future businesses. He is actively engaged in strategic development for various Motorola businesses and identifying ways in which venture investments can accelerate business activities. Specifically, he focuses on mobile, digital home, Internet and new media, software, and semiconductor technologies.

Prior to joining Motorola Ventures, Mony was a private consultant to first tier venture capitalists, their portfolio companies and fresh entrepreneurs on technology and business development aspects in the ICT arena.

Previously, Mony worked in Motorola Cellular Israel in a number of leadership roles and led the R&D efforts of several large system projects within his service.

Mony holds an MBA from the Recanati Faculty University of Tel Aviv, an MSEE from the University of Tel Aviv and a BSEE from the University of Tel Aviv.

Greg Lockwood,
Partner, Piton Capital

Greg has been a venture investor as a partner with UBS Capital, as an angel, and with Piton Capital since 1996. Prior to this he worked in telecoms corporate finance and held operating roles in classified media publishing. In his time with UBS he helped create Sunrise, the alternative telecom services provider in Switzerland, and made investments in sector-leading companies such as Betfair which became the world's largest betting exchange. Other investments include Wolfson, Attenda, Identify Software, Radlan, and BullionVault. Greg has a Masters of Management degree from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management.

Nazmin Alani, Partner
BDC Venture Capital

Nazmin joined BDC Venture Capital in 2004 and focuses on early-stage investments in mobile, digital media, broadband and infrastructure. Nazmin is currently Director of OneChip Photonics, BTI Systems, Seawell Networks, Dyaptive and Mobidia Networks and sits as an observer at BLINQ Networks. Nazmin has 25 years of experience in the communications industry and has worked with incumbent and new service providers involved in wireline, wireless, and satellite communications.
His work experience includes assignments in Canada, the U.S., Mexico, Argentina, Asia, and Australia. Prior to BDC, Nazmin was at Gartner Consulting as Vice President of the Broadband Practice.

Nazmin holds a bachelor of applied science (BASc) degree in electrical engineering from the University of Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, and an MBA from the University of Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. He also completed the Executive Telecommunications Program at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina and the Entrepreneurship Development Program at MIT.

Michael Jeon,
Head, Samsung Ventures Europe

Michael Jeon is the head of Samsung Ventures Europe, based in London, where he is looking for opportunities in consumer IT, mobile/wireless, digital media and certain areas in clean-tech and medical technologies.

Prior to moving to London, Michael was with Samsung Ventures America, where he was involved in the boards of Envivio, LiveMedia, Widevine (acquired by Google), Sibeam, PureDigital (acquired by Cisco), Impinj, ForteMedia, and Ubicom. His latest investments at SVE include Cambridge Broadband Networks in the UK and Novaled AG in Germany. Michael holds a BS EECS from University of California, Berkeley, an MS from Carnegie Mellon University, and an MBA from MIT Sloan.

Saul Klein,
Partner, Index Ventures

Saul Klein joined the London office of Index Ventures as Partner in February 2007. He currently serves on the boards of Alertme, Chartbeat, Erply, GlassesDirect, MyHeritage, Seedcamp and Songkick. Saul brings over 15 years of experience successfully building and exiting companies in both the US and Europe as an entrepreneur, operator and seed investor. Most recently he was the co-founder and original CEO at what is now Lovefilm International (Amazon) and part of the original executive team at Skype (eBay). Saul loves working with seed and early stage companies. Since 1999 he has been a Founding Partner of The Accelerator Group (TAG) he also started Seedcamp and OpenCoffee Club, which is now active in over 90 cities around the world.

Oliver Holle,
Founder, SpeedInvest

Oliver is a serial entrepreneur with deep experience in the mobile and internet industry. While still a student in 1992, Oliver founded SYSIS, one of the first European internet startups that took smart, interactive games to the exploding online market. Facing the challenge of the internet crisis, Oliver turned SYSIS’s focus towards mobile, which resulted in 2004 in the formation of 3united AG, a local 3-way merger that created a top European player in the mobile content industry. Leading 3united, Oliver oversaw 2 years of rapid growth which lead to the acquisition of the company by VeriSign Inc. at a valuation of USD 67m in early 2006. Post transaction, Oliver relocated to California, to take on the global responsibility for VeriSign’s mobile media business as Vice President. Mid-2008, Oliver left VeriSign to start his company, The Merger, the predecessor of the his current Fund Speed Invest.

Andreas Tschas,
co-Founder and CEO of STARTeurope

Andreas is co-founder and CEO of STARTeurope, an initiative that supports high-tech startups in the early stage and helps forming new businesses. 2009 till 2010 he worked as an assistant for a member of Parliament for the Austrian Parliament. In 2011 he graduated from the Vienna University of Economics and Business.

Marina Treshchova,
CEO and co-founder Fast Lane Ventures

Marina Treshchova is CEO and co-founder of Fast LaneVentures. She joined Pascal Clément’s Direct Group in 2002, after six years of experience with a US telecom company and spent several years in the US, as Deputy General Director, Segol Radio Page as well as Managing Director, Bartell’s Distributing, Inc.-both in Seattle. She is active with portfolio companies WebPrime Group, kolizeo.ru and chateauonline.ru. Previously Marina was the chairman of Otto Group, with full involvement in all aspects of operations and joint ventures. Since launching operations a year ago, Fast Lane Ventures has affirmed itself as one of the most active investors on the Russian Internet scene. Among its most notable startups have been online shoe retailer Sapato.ru, daily deal site KupiBonus.ru, airfare search service Jizo.ru, real estate database Domgeo.ru and Q&A content provider Relevant Media.

Michael Jackson,
General Partner, Mangrove Capital

Michael Jackson is a General Partner at Luxembourg based Mangrove Capital Partners. Active across all of Europe, Russia and Israel, Michael spends his time looking for investable projects while advising portfolio companies as they grow into significant operations. His professional life has always involved scaling and operating large consumer focussed communications businesses. From development of mobile telephone operations, through the roll out of Tele2 in Europe to 26 million customers, to creation and establishment of 9 MVNO operations in Europe, Michael hopped over to Chief Operations Officer role at Skype. Here, with special responsibility for all aspects of Skype's paid services, he led the organisation that took the company into 100 M euro plus within three years. All these positions involve significant International and organisational scaling, and it is these experiences that Michael can bring to the entrepreneurs. Too often, entrepreneurs fail to realize their full potential through fear of the unknown - at Mangrove, we make the unknown known - not least by making sure that our portfolio CEOs are exposed to people who have been very successful, and through this build a network of advisors and friends who can help them for ever, Michael keeps in touch with the grass roots of new technology by spending weekends at various European Bootcamp type events - Startup Bootcamp in Denmark, HackFwd in Germany in Estonia to name but two. Michael has an Honours degree in Electronic and Communications Engineering from University College, London

Matt Marshall,
Founder and Editor-in-Chief of VentureBeat

Matt is Founder and Editor-in-Chief of VentureBeat. In the fall of 2009 he also took on the role of Executive Producer of DEMO, the premiere launchpad event for emerging technologies. Prior to starting VentureBeat, Matt covered the venture capital beat for the San Jose Mercury News from 2001 to 2006. He significantly expanded the newspaper’s coverage of venture capital during that time, in daily articles and a weekly column called the VC Insider, and then online with his blog SiliconBeat. Matt was awarded Journalist of the Year by the Northern California Society of Professional Journalists in 2002, and the James Madison Freedom of Information award in 2003. These awards were for a series of articles he wrote in conjunction with two successful Mercury News lawsuits, in part instigated by Matt, against California’s public pension fund (CalPERS) and the University of California. As a result of these laws suits, public employees now have full access to information on the performance of their retirement investments. Matt was a correspondent for the Wall Street Journal in Bonn, Germany from 1995 through 1998. In 1999 he wrote a book while in Germany, “The Bank: the Birth of Europe’s Central Bank and the Rebirth of European Power” (Random House, 1999). He has also written for the Washington Post and several other publications. Matt holds a PhD in Government and an MA in German and European Studies from Georgetown University.

Eric Van Der Kleij,
CEO of the UK Government’s Tech City Investment Organisation

Eric Van Der Kleij is the CEO of the UK Government’s Tech City Investment Organisation (www.techcityuk.com), responsible for accelerating the fastest-growing Tech cluster in Europe. Eric leads a unique team of fellow entrepreneurs, tech-sector specialists and Government professionals in developing Tech City as a magnet for technology-led investment, innovation and talent – making it one of the top three destinations in the world for technology companies, entrepreneurs and investors.
A successful technology entrepreneur himself, Eric has over 25 years’ experience, including founding and growing Adeptra, a leading fraud and collections technology business, for which he raised US$40 million in venture capital. Eric is an ‘entrepreneur-in-residence’ with the UK Government, previously acting as Chief Adviser to UKTI’s Directorate for Investment, implementing major investment projects with “exceptional global potential”.
Prior to this, he helped to establish and develop the UK Government’s Global Entrepreneur Programme (GEP, www.entrepreneurs.gov.uk), the national strategy for attracting ideas and entrepreneurs of exceptional potential to the UK. GEP is one of Europe’s most successful entrepreneurship-in-government organisations operating today.

Zohar Zisapel,
Chairman of RAD Data Communications

Zohar Zisapel, Chairman of RAD Data Communications, founded the company in 1982 together with his brother, Yehuda. In a relatively short period, RAD grew into a group of 14 companies with an aggregate sales of $ 1.250 billion in 2011. Five of those companies are traded on the Nasdaq stock exchange: RADVISION, Ceragon Networks, Radware, RADCOM and Silicom. Eight of the companies that started under the umbrella of the Group merged or were acquired and most continue to operate in Israel under different names (Siemens, Avaya etc).

Prior to founding RAD, Mr. Zisapel served as head of the Electronic Research Department of the Ministry of Defense in Tel Aviv. Mr. Zisapel was honored with both the Israel Export Award and the Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 1994 and the Hugo Raminceanu Award for Economics in 1996. He was nominated by the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology as a Distinguished Fellow of its Faculty of Electrical Engineering in 1998, received an Israeli Industry Life Award in 1999, a Doctor Honoris Causa from the Technion in 2001, and the Israel Communications Award in 2004.

From 1998 to 2000, Mr. Zisapel served as Chairman of the Israel Association of Electronic Industries.

Tova Cohen,
Senior financial correspondent for Thomson Reuters in Tel Aviv

Tova Cohen is the senior financial correspondent for Thomson Reuters in Tel Aviv and has covered the Israeli financial markets and business sector for the past 15 years. Prior to that she was a correspondent for Reuters in South America, based in Brazil. She also worked a reporter covering Wall Street for McGraw Hill/Standard & Poor’s. Ms. Cohen graduated from Barnard College in New York and has a Masters degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

Ed Mlavsky,
Founder of Gemini Israel Funds

Dr. Ed Mlavsky founded Gemini Israel Funds and is today Chairman Emeritus. A longtime innovator and advocate for venture capital, Ed is widely recognized as one of the founding fathers of the Israeli high-tech and venture capital industries. He was chosen to manage the first venture capital fund to emerge from the Israeli government's Yozma program, the precursor to Gemini Israel Funds in 1993. Previously, Ed spent thirteen years as Executive Director of the Israel-US Bi-national Industrial Research & Development Foundation (BIRD). During his tenure, he was responsible for investments of $100 million in more than 300 joint projects between US and Israeli high-tech companies. Prior to BIRD, Ed was Executive Vice President of Mobil Tyco Solar Energy Corporation, a joint venture created by Mobil and Tyco Laboratories. Ed co-founded Tyco in 1960 and became the company's President in 1974.

Ed holds a series of degrees and awards from the Israel high tech institution, has published 53 scientific and technical papers and holds24 registered patents. He revieveda PHD from Queen Mary College, University of London.

Jose Marin,
Managing Director and co-Founder of IG Expansion

Jose is the Managing Director and co-Founder of IG Expansion. IG identifies and takes successful internet business models into emerging markets (main focus Brazil). IG builds one project per year and will not build more than 6 (investing the first $3 -$ 5million per project). 4 of the 6 are already operating with Viajanet (Expedia for Latam) its biggest success.

Jose is also founder of Serendipity Investments, company that has invested in 68 start-ups. Currently 61 active investments, 2 liquidated and 5 exits yielding over 2.5 x cash return on the total capital invested. Before this, Jose invested personally in projects such as Bazee (auctions sold to eBay in 2005) and eDreams (Pan European Travel site sold to TA Associates in 2006) obtaining top tier returns.

In 1999 he co-founded DeRemate.com (eBay model for Latin America). The company raised over $75 million in capital, did a partial cash-out sale to Terra and later merged with Mercado Libre that went public on NASDAQ . Jose started his professional career as a consultant at The Boston Consulting Group and holds an MBA and an MA in International development Economics from Stanford

Philipp Moehring,
Associate, Seedcamp

Philipp manages portfolio relations, the application and selection process, and Seedcamp's network of mentors and partners. He works closely with all of the Seedcamp companies to achieve their goals and get in touch with the right people in the network. His investment focus is on new web technologies, mobile applications, and innovative application of technology to existing markets, both consumer and business focused.

Before Seedcamp, Philipp was an Investment Manager at DuMont Venture, a German VC fund, where he scouted investment opportunities and managed investments in the consumer internet space. He also worked with many startups in operational and advising roles, focusing on consumer facing internet technology and media. He is a member of the advisory board at cloudControl.com.

Philipp received his Msc in Technology Management and Entrepreneurship from HEC and EPFL in Lausanne, Switzerland. He holds a BSc in International Business from Universiteit Maastricht in the Netherlands and spent time at the Warrington College of Business at University of Florida and the Instituto Tecnologico de Buenos Aires.