Mastering Venture Capital

VCLeaders Academy is a comprehensive educational program for VC professionals who want to improve their understanding of the venture capital ecosystem.

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Who is it for?

Limited Partners

General Partners

Angel Investors

Corporates

Attorneys

Advisors

What will you learn?

- Building investment thesis
- Creating fund strategy
- Understanding fund legal and financial structure
- Developing fund brand
- Sourcing deals
- Screening investment targets
- Performing Due diligence
- Preparing start-up valuations
- Structuring and negotiating deals
- Managing portfolio companies
- Choosing the right value-creation strategy
- Understanding fund governance and economics
- Utilizing investor’s toolkit
- Understanding the investment lifecycle
- Choosing the right exit strategy
- Understanding current exit landscape

In the first Module, we cover areas related to establishing a venture capital fund: from defining your thesis to successfully creating the fund’s legal structure. We know that this part can be challenging, even for experienced fund managers, and we want to improve your chances of succeeding. Our goal is to make you better at understanding your unique value proposition, formulating your investment strategy, and preparing compelling marketing materials. We help you understand the VC landscape in Europe and help you find your spot in the start-up financing value chain. We also guide you through the most critical aspects of a fund’s legal documentation.

Finding, winning over, and executing deals is a VC’s bread-and-butter. To help you do these things efficiently, we show you the best market practices, inform you about current trends and teach about the pitfalls to avoid. The goal of the second Module is to show you the methods to find and select companies that fir your investment strategy and make up for your desired portfolio.

A typical VC fund has a life of up to 10 years. A lot can happen in a decade, and you can’t avoid every threat. However, with proper business and financial planning as well as risk mitigation practices, you can come prepared to the battlefield. In the third Module, you learn both about the front-end as well as the back-end of the VC business. We discuss value-creation strategies and loss-cutting techniques. We also look into fund operations, from managing a team to reporting to investors, to help you build a well-oiled VC machine.

If investments are a VC’s bread-and-butter, exits are the business’ holy grail. During the fourth Module, we discuss the importance of exit planning, discover various exit paths, and talk about current market trends. To help you choose the right exit strategy for your portfolio companies, we also present best practices and failures to avoid.

Meet the Speakers

Adam Kwaśniewski

Investor, Partner at Startup Development House

Adam Kwasniewski is a graduate of Warsaw School of Economics (SGH) and University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and has eighteen years of experience in digital business. Prior to founding BitRoot.Ventures, Adam managed Ad.Net S.A - leading Polish advertising network at that time. Then he joined Google as first employee in Poland and worked at Google for thirteen years. During his time there, he was Head of Sales in Poland, Head of Strategy and Operations for Central Eastern Europe and Middle East. Adam left Google 18 months ago in order to become an business angel and startup hunter. Currently, he actively invests in startups and advises startups and scaleups. So far he has partnered with 7 startups, including User.Com, HotTailors, WealthArc and Magnitt. Also, he recently became a partner in Startup Development House - a company developing solutions for entrepreneurs and corporations.

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Alexander Stasiak

CEO at Startup Development House

Alexander Stasiak is a graduate of the Warsaw School of Economics (SGH) and has ten years experience in digital business. Alex is a startup enthusiast, operational, hands-on, focused on getting things done, in the last four years scaling Startup House from 3 to 60 Team members and creating for clients new digital products from scratch. Supporting scrum product and dev teams delivering working software above expectations, enforcing a culture of continuous learning, and agile product development in the cloud.

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Alina Prawdzik

Managing Partner CEE at innogy Innovation Hub

At innogy Innovation Hub, Alina is Managing Partner responsible for operations in Central-Eastern Europe and Head of ‘Smart & Connected Buildings’, one of the company’s areas of investment, encompassing proptech.
A graduate of the University of Gdansk, Universität Tübingen, Copenhagen Business College and recently Leadership Academy for Poland. She began her corporate career working in Brand Management at Procter & Gamble’s Central Europe North.
In 2006 Alina became Country Manager at eBay Poland. In 2008 she was Head of European Emerging Markets at the European eBay headquarters in Bern. Between 2009-2013 as General Manager International Expansion eBay Europe, she introduced eBay to 9 new markets, including Russia and Scandinavia.
Alina also managed her own e-commerce strategy consultancy firm and worked for clients in Poland and abroad. She is also a business angel and invests in startups in Poland and across Europe.

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Barbara Sobowska

Co-founder at MOST Partners

Barbara Sobowska is a transaction lawyer working internationally with tech start-ups, individuals and venture capital funds on various transactions, including VC financings and market expansions. She is qualified to practice in the US, England and Poland. She gained experience while working at international law firms in Warsaw and London where she advised private equity funds and major corporate clients on a wide range of cross-border and domestic capital markets and M&A transactions.
She is an angel investor and mentor to tech companies. Her passion for tech start-ups and entrepreneurship started at Harvard Law School, where she was involved in the Harvard Law Entrepreneurship Project, working with early stage entrepreneurs on their business expansions

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Christian Ritosek

Founder, Managing Director at Candis GmbH

Christian is an entrepreneur and the Founder and Managing Director of CANDIS – a software for automated accounting processes and one of Germany’s most dynamically growing SaaS companies – with experience in the Accounting & Fintech space. Raised €10m+ in Venture Capital from top investors such as Lightspeed Venture Partners, Point Nine Capital, Speedinvest or Commerzbank. Winner of the KPMG Microsoft Innovation Showcase 2016. Diploma in Business Administration and Alumni of International School of Management in Germany.

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Damian Polok

Vice-President at Silicon Valley Bank

Damian Polok is currently working in the Frankfurt office to expand Silicon Valley Bank’s footprint in Germany. Damian has over 10 years of experience in financing multinational companies across a multitude of industries. Having started his career with Commerzbank AG, he supported German Mittelstand-firms and Blue Chips in Berlin, Frankfurt, as well as across German Desks in Moscow, Shanghai, Singapore and London.
In 2013 Damian transferred to mBank S.A. in Warsaw, where as a relationship manager he managed a portfolio of international small- to medium-sized enterprises. Additionally, he was tasked with the development of the bank’s business activities in Central and Eastern Europe and was named country manager for the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary.
In 2016 Damian became relationship manager at Bank of China Frankfurt, where he was responsible for cross-border cash management solutions. Amongst other initiatives, he developed and led the Technology, Media and Telecommunication coverage team at Bank of China. Damian’s study path led him through Cambridge, Berlin, Warsaw and Hong Kong. Damian was named Global Shaper and leads the Frankfurt Hub of the Community as curator.

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Dominik Zalewski

CFO Europe at e.ventures

Dominik joined Berlin team of e.ventures in 2017 as a CFO Europe. He previously held a position as a Finance Director at Berlin-based, early-stage VC fund, Point Nine Capital and worked as a senior analyst at Franklin Templeton Investments. Prior to that, Dominik was running a consulting boutique specialized in fundraising and economic development projects for the public sector. Dominik holds an M.A. in Business Administration from Poznan University of Economics.
Outside work Dominik is a passionate hiker, urban sketcher, and smart cities geek. Dominik is also a co-founder of urbanimpact.co, a matchmaking platform connecting urban tech start-ups with cities, corporates and investors in the smart cities field.

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Dr. Christian Schneider

Managing Partner at Vesalius Biocapital Partners

As a life science expert, Dr. Christian Schneider has extensive experience in the areas of diagnostics, medtech, and therapeutics.
Starting as an R&D scientist at Boehringer Mannheim/Roche he developed automated tests for the early detection of cancer. At Centocor he led diagnostic product development in transatlantic collaborations. Later, as a business developer and external research manager in Centocor’s / Johnson&Johnson’s biological therapeutics business, he negotiated, financed, and managed international early-stage product development projects.
As a Managing Partner of venture capital firm PolyTechnos he was directly responsible for the investments in and IPOs of OncoMethylome Sciences, Devgen and Jerini. In 2008, he joined the pan-European life science venture capital firm Vesalius Biocapital as a Managing Partner. Dr. Schneider holds a doctorate degree in veterinary medicine and a PhD in immunology, both from the University of Munich, Germany, and an MBA in healthcare administration from Penn State University, Pennsylvania.

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Henryk Ciesielski

Director at Duff & Phelps’s Central European Operations

Henryk has extensive experience in the field of business and assets valuations as well as transactions and restructuring services in Central Europe.
He joined American Appraisal (division of Duff & Phelps) in 2005 and serves as project manager for domestic and international engagements. Previously he worked for Deloitte in the Corporate Finance Department. Henryk is experienced in sourcing and execution of strategic as well as private equity backed transactions. He advises clients across a range of industries including traditional manufacturing, service and new technologies as well as private equity funds and financial institutions. Henryk holds an EMBA in Mergers & Acquisitions from University of Münster and is a Certified EFFAS Financial Analyst (CEFA). He is member of the Expert Group “Corporate Transactions and Valuation” of the Society of Investment Professionals in Germany (DVFA), member of the Expert Group “Leveraged Buy-Out Transactions” of the Polish Private Equity Association, founding member and Board Member of the Association of Restructuring Professionals.

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Jakub Falkowski

Counsel at Baker & McKenzie

Jakub Falkowski is a tech lawyer at Baker McKenzie Warsaw. Regularly advises on technology (IoT, M2M, driverless cars), outsourcing transactions (agile implementation, cloud) and counsels companies in the TMT sectors on digital media issues and complex copyright matters. Currently, mainly deals with issues related to innovative industries (fintechs, xtechs) and advised on data monetization and digital transformation. Primarily responsible also for comprehensive privacy related issues. Involved in several biggest IT transactions and arbitration proceedings on the Polish market.

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Łukasz Dziekoński

CEO & Founder at Montis Capital Group

Łukasz is the founding partner and the chief executive officer of Montis Capital – Venture Capital Fund. Previously, he served as the head of management board of the ‘Marguerite Fund’, and the member of the management board since 2010. Focused on
the equity investments in infrastructure, energy and the transport sector. He also served as a director in the largest bank in the CEE region – Bank PKO BP S.A., coordinating activities in the infrastructure and new technologies. Previously actively supporting foreign investments of the Bank in the CEE region. He served as the member of different supervisory boards, in the infrastructure and banking sector. Frequent speaker in many conferences and workshops, concerning infrastructure, PPP, VC and new technologies.

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Maciej Plichta

Sourcing and Growth Manager for CEE at innogy Innovation Hub

Experienced investment and M&A professional with 1000+ screened companies, 100+ analysed projects, 10+ investments and follow-ons closed.
Focused on business development and relationship management demonstrating track record with portfolio companies and advisory clients from various industries.
Strong business and financial analysis skills with project financing and company valuations experience.
Quick learner and problem solver with good communication skills and professional personality.

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Małgorzata Walczak

Director of PFR/ NCBR CVC Fund of Funds at PFR Ventures

Experienced Investor and business Angel with a demonstrated history of working in the investment management industry. Strong entrepreneurship professional with MBA from University of Minnesota/SGH.
Director at PFR Ventures, PFR NCBR CVC Fund of Funds, before that Managing Partner, Founder at ENEA Innovation Venture Capital Fund.
In 2007 she created first VC Fund in Poland consisting of private and public funds – HelixVenturesPartners together with MCI and National Capital Fund.
Previously, she has been involved in operational and general management at the positions of CEO in large companies, listed on WSE – e.g. as a CEO of Optimus S.A.; The Mint of Poland, Proxy and Director of Electronic Payment Department; Compaq Computer/HP – Marketing Director; UN – UNTAET East Timor Mission – Bobonaro Disrtict Coordiantor, Lotus Development – IT Software, Marketing Coordinatior.

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Marcel Müller-Marbach

Head of Equity Investments - Legal Service at European Investment Fund

Marcel Müller-Marbach is managing a team of in-house lawyers which is in charge of advising on EIF’s equity business activities. His responsibilities extend to the formation of new funds-of- funds managed/advised by EIF and the on-going legal management of an existing portfolio of above 700 PE/VC/mezzanine/loan funds, including secondary transactions. Marcel started his career as an attorney-at- law in 1999 with Clifford Chance, where he spent five years (Frankfurt and Washington D.C. offices) focusing on international litigation and dispute resolution.
Marcel is a law graduate of the University of Heidelberg and holds a Licence on Droit of the University of Paris-Nanterre.

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Marcin Hejka

Co-Founder and General Partner at OTB Ventures

Co-Founder and General Partner of OTB Ventures, VC fund investing in technology companies in CEE. From 1999 to 2017 at Intel Capital, first as Investment Director responsible for CEE investments and then as VP and Managing Director for EMEIA. Marcin was the Vice-Chairman of the Polish PE and VC Association between 2004 and 2010. He has invested and/or was a Board Member in numerous tech companies, including: AVG, Mall.cz, Yandex, WP.pl, Sigfox, Ozon, Fortumo, Centrum.cz, KupiVIP, Elmodis, Speaktoit (APi.ai), Index.hu, CG Trader, Nokta. He has also been a Supervisory Board Member at Bank Komunalny S.A. (1995 – 1999), Kredyt Bank S.A. (1997-1999), Agora S.A. (2008-2013) and Dromex (1998 – 1999). Marcin studied economics at the University of Gdańsk

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Mario Oelkers

MD at Brightpoint Group

Mario is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Brightpoint Group. A former associate of e.ventures and entrepreneur, Mario’s key expertise lies in business development and fund operations. He gained a profound corporate background in various industries before moving into VC. Mario studied at a top-tier business school in the Netherlands and holds a degree in business economics from the University of Hamburg.

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Monika Gebel

Associate at Baker & McKenzie

Monika Gebel is an advocate and mid-level associate in the Warsaw IP Tech team. She has over eight years of experience and specializes in intellectual property law, in particular in new technology law, e-commerce, video games law, telecommunications law, advertising and consumer protection law. She also specializes in data privacy and is a member of the GDPR taskforce involved in reviewing the data processing activities of companies and its documentation. She is preparing and presenting seminars for clients. She is also committed to sharing knowledge about law, she gives lectures to law students and recently co-organised with CD Projekt Red a monthly video games law course for young lawyers.

Meet the Speakers

Nick Stocks

Principal at White Star Capital

Before joining White Star Capital in 2016, Nick was a Principal at Global Founders Capital, a $1bn stage agnostic VC fund where he led over 30 transactions from Seed to Series B across Europe, the USA, South-East Asia, India, and Latin America in companies such as Canva, Nested, Grover, GoodLord and Albert. Since joining, Nick led or co-led investments in Echo, Butternut Box, Clark and Packhelp among others.
He was one of the first members of the team at UKCloud, a British cloud company focused on the public sector. He also worked with Access Industries-owned AINMT to launch a national mobile broadband network in Brazil.
He graduated from the University of Warwick and holds an MBA from London Business School. Born in Iraq, and raised in Portugal, he speaks English and Portuguese fluently. Nick is based in London.

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Nico Gramenz

CEO at Factory Berlin

In early 2019 Nico Gramenz became the CEO at Factory Berlin. Prior to this role, he was served as a Senior VP of Business Development at Siemens Mobility where his task was to strengthen partnerships between startups and corporates. In Factory Berlin, the largest innovation community in Europe he continues to connect the most intelligent thinkers and ambitious doers from diverse industries, cultures, and disciplines, and provide them with the resources to change the world. His main goal is to harness potential and empower changemakers for a smart, innovative, and sustainable future.

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Nikolas Westphal

Director at GP Bullhound

Nikolas is a Director at GP Bullhound. He is a passionate and highly experienced investment banker with more than eleven years of experience advising communications, media and technology (CMT) companies on mergers and acquisitions as well as a broad range of other capital market transactions. Most recently, Nikolas was a Vice President at Arma Partners, where he advised a broad range of European CMT clients on mergers and acquisitions.
Prior to this, Nikolas worked for six years in Morgan Stanley’s Investment Banking Division, serving European Media & Communications clients. In addition, he spent two years at Blackstone’s refinancing advisory (now part of PJT Partners). Nikolas has a track record of more than $40 billion of closed transactions to date. He holds a doctorate in financial economics from Leipzig Graduate School of Management – HHL.

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Oscar Jazdowski

Co-General Manager, Sales & Origination at Silicon Valley Bank

I am a Market Manager at Silicon Valley Bank and have been involved in technology financing for over 30 years. After starting my career at SVB Boston in 2002, I was transferred to SVB’s London office in 2010 to help grow the operations in the UK, as we applied for a banking license. In March 2013, I transferred to SVB's joint venture bank in Shanghai, SPD Silicon Valley Bank (SSVB), where I was Head of Corporate Banking. SSVB was granted a banking license in 2015. In April 2018 I was transferred to Frankfurt, to become co-General Manager of SVB Germany. SVB Germany was granted a banking license in May 2018 and opened operations in June of that year.

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Patric Gresko

Head of Unit at European Investment Fund (EIF)

Patric Gresko co-leads the venture capital activity of the EIF, Which he joined in 2001. The EIF is the largest European venture capital fund-of-funds with more than EUR 4BN under management and a portfolio of over 250 venture capital funds, technology transfer operators and business angels covering all major technology sectors, life sciences and social & environmental impact. The Team That Patric co-leads comprises close to 40 passionate investment professionals from 15 different countries. Patrick started his career with PricewaterhouseCoopers in Luxembourg as an auditor and consultant for the financial sector.

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Pavel Bogdanov

General Partner at Almaz Capital

Pavel Pasha Bogdanov is a general partner at Almaz Capital, a venture fund, which is backed by Cisco Systems, EBRD and IFC. Prior to joining AC, Pasha was a partner at Russian Technologies, an early-stage venture capital fund in Moscow. In 2005, he was recruited to Sistema Telecom. As Investment Director, Pasha arranged $2 billion of debt and equity financings for a number of Sistema’s portfolio companies. In 2002, Pasha joined KLA-Tencor, the leading semiconductor yield management company, as a Systems Design Engineer in Silicon Valley. Prior to KLA, he worked at Stanford University and Lawrence Berkeley National Lab at the University of California, Berkeley. Pasha earned a PhD from Stanford University, an MBA from INSEAD in Fontainebleau, France; and a BS from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology in Moscow.

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Ricardo J. Mendez

Technical Director, Europe at Samsung NEXT

Ricardo is the Technical Director at Samsung NEXT, Europe. He has been involved in software engineering for over 20 years, from large interactive installations controlled by multiple sensors, to juggling around medical data, to performing financial sensitivity analysis for bank overseers, to making games.

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Roy Gottlieb

Partner at Cardumen Capital

Roy is a partner with Cardumen Capital, an Israel-Spain VC. He is also the Chairman of the Young Venture Capital Forum, an organization that groups Israel’s venture capitalists and strives to professionalize and improve the skills of the VC community.
During his military service Roy served in a combative position in the Israeli Air Force Special Forces followed by a highly classified research position in The Technological Unit of the Intelligence Corps. Roy later joined Yigal Arnon & Co - a leading Israeli law firm. This was followed by an operational position in the New York office for an electronics engineering business executing military applications projects. Roy then joined lool ventures, an Israeli venture capital firm focusing on investments in the ICT markets. Following this position Roy joined Samsung Ventures, where he played a key part in multiple deals, including StoreDot, EarlySense, Corephotonics and more. He completed his Law and Business Administration degrees at the Interdisciplinary Center of Herzliya.

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Rozalia Urbanek

Investment Director at PFR Ventures

Rozalia is an Investment Director in PFR Ventures – the largest Funds of Funds in CEE investing in venture capital funds. She manages Open Innovation Fund of Funds with focus on investments in technology sectors and is responsible for International Relations. She is involved in multiple startups and venture capital ecosystem projects. Previously she used to work for private equity funds (ForeVest Capital and PineBridge Investment) and in transaction advisory (EY).
Rozalia holds CEMS MIM from Vienna University of Economics and Business and Master Degree in Finance from Warsaw School of Economics.

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Saul Orbach

Venture Partner at Starta Ventures

CEO, COO, Strategic Corporate Development Leader, Specialist in Building Profitable Companies from Innovative Ideas. Highly regarded, C-Level executive leader with successful track record building startups, emerging growth and market-challenged organizations; known for value identification and creation that delivers market share gain, revenue growth and increased shareholder value; part of leadership that drove five companies to IPO or acquisition.

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Tomaš Pačinda

Principal at Enern

Tomas joined Enern in 2015. He has helped develop Enern’s investments in Twisto or Slevomat and led investments in Footshop, Intiaro or Nautal.

Tomas is passionate about tech businesses defined by strong impact on consumer or professional networks. He focuses on venture investments across multiple sectors, particularly interested in fintech, retail, real estate and SMEs.

Prior to joining Enern, Tomas spent a decade in corporate finance roles, amongst others for GE Capital in the areas of consumer finance and real estate.

Tomas graduated from the University of Economics in Prague and holds ACCA qualification.

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Tomasz Danis

Partner at MCI

He manages the fund Internet Ventures FIZ and co-manages MCI.TechVentures 1.0
He worked for LinkedIn in California, where he was responsible for the creation of the competition strategy on the European market.
For more than 8 years he was employed at McKinsey & Company, where, as Engagement Manager, he was in charge of the implementation of strategic and investment projects for top European companies, and also for leading power industry, fuel sector, FMCG and Private Equity players.
In 2012, he took the function of Managing Director at Rocket Internet CEE, the world’s largest e-commerce project incubator, where he was responsible for the identification of new investments, raising capital, establishing new start-ups and development of Rocket’s portfolio of growth-stage companies.

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Wojtek Sadowski

CEO at Packhelp

Before he started Packhelp (Zapakuj.to) with his friends, he worked in the marketing sector and lead his own creative agency. Today, he leads Packhelp, a company that transforms the printing market and helps online shops with creating a unique customer experience. Packhelp has thousands of clients, more than 90 team members and more than 10 million dollars gathered from investors. Wojtek is a laureate of the Polish edition of the Forbes 30 under 30 prize.

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Yannick Oswald

Principal at Mangrove Capital Partners

I am a Principal at Mangrove, where I focus on consumer applications and brands as well as B2C and B2B SaaS businesses and marketplaces.I currently serve as a board member of Sybel, Safe365, Attentive.us, Echobox.
I began my career working as an VC analyst with FJ Labs in New York, where I focused on angel and seed stage ventures. Back in Europe, I founded a B2B SaaS start-up that digitizes the mobile communication flow between the various stakeholders of the investment fund industry. Next, I joined the strategy team of BIL, the oldest and second largest bank in Luxembourg. In 2015 I joined Mangrove and in early 2017 launched the Europe’s Female Founders community. I am a member of the Society of Kauffman Fellows, a global network of venture capital professionals in leading firms around the world, and of the Global Shapers Community. I hold an MSc in Business Engineering from Solvay Business School in Brussels.

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Barbara Sobowska

Co-founder at MOST Partners

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Chris Kobylecki

COO at Innovation Nest

Chris is taking care of Innovation Nest's deal flow activities and making sure that people know about Innovation Nest. He runs an invite only event called SaaS Meetup which gathers together B2B SaaS Companies, Founders, Mentors and Investors. Previously he was taking care of marketing for a Board of European Students of Technology, addressing 32 countries and over 90 universities.