A podcast interview with David Cohen, the co-founder and CEO of Techstars, the startup accelerator, which has backed thousands of startups. In the episode, Cohen addresses recent criticism about its corporate culture and discusses startup trends in Europe and beyond in 2024.Oleh John Reynolds

At the recent EIC Summit, we caught up with Jean-David Malo, Director of EISMEA, the European Commission’s executive agency for the European Innovation Council and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). It was a timely encounter, coinciding with the release of the EIC Impact Report 2023, which highlighted that the total value of the overall por…

The EIC Scaling Club team sat down with Fabrizio Del Maffeo on the sidelines of the recent Tech Tour Growth 50 Europe event in Paris. As the co-founder and CEO of Axelera AI, Del Maffeo kicked off the interview pitching his company as a 'small, fast-growing Nvidia'. That's intriguing enough on its own, but the entrepreneur of course told us a bit m…

Dr. Christian Nagel is a co-founder and partner of Earlybird, a technology investment powerhouse with more than €2 billion under management. Founded in 1997, Earlybird invests in all development and growth phases of tech companies, and has nestled itself among the largest and most experienced venture investors operating in Europe today. We caught u…

Amadeus Capital Partners has been investing in technology-enabled products and services for nearly three decades. Founded by Anne Glover and Hermann Hauser in 1997, Amadeus has backed more than 190 companies and raised over $1 billion for investment to date. When we had a chance to sit down with Anne on the sidelines of the recent Tech Tour Growth …

At the recent EIT Summit in Brussels, we sat down with the organisation's Director, Martin Kern, to discuss what's cooking over at the European Institute of Innovation & Technology. Kern, who's been part of the EIT leadership for almost a decade after a long career stint at the European Commission, told us more about the EIT Knowledge and Innovatio…

On the sidelines of the recent Tech Tour Growth 50 Europe event, we caught up with Jean Schmitt, Managing Partner at Jolt Capital, a growth capital investor in European B2B deep tech companies. Having been part of the predecessor programme of the EIC Scaling Club, Jean shared his views on the evolving deep tech scale-up creation and financing lands…

Azeem Azhar has had a rich career as a journalist, entrepreneur, author, speaker, analyst, consultant, but now bills himself as an 'independent academic'. These days, he's perhaps best known for Exponential View, which offers weekly deep dives on AI and breakthrough technologies to a vast audience of investors, C-suite execs and global leaders who …

We recently attend the EIT Summit in Brussels, where we had a chance to catch up with Maria Tsavachidis, CEO of EIT Urban Mobility, one of the organisation's so-called KICs. What is a KIC, you ask? As the EIT explains on its website, the acronym stands for "Knowledge and Innovation Communities" and they are essentially Europe-wide networks centred …

We had a very interesting conversation with the co-founder and CEO of clean energy scale-up Proxima Fusion at the recent DLD Conference in Munich, and fortunately for you we recorded it! Have a listen to this interview with Francesco Sciortino, whose deep tech company aims to build an entirely new generation of fusion power plants, using QI stellar…

On the sidelines of the recent Tech Tour Growth 50 event in Paris, we recorded a short but sweet interview with Jennifer Schenker, founder and editor-in-chief of The Innovator, which she describes as a "pan-European publication with global aspirations". Having covered the European technology sector for 30+ years, the veteran journalist started The …

On the sidelines of the recent Tech Tour Growth 50 Europe event in Paris, we had a chance to sit down with Timo Toikkanen, an early investor and advisor to, and these days chief executive officer of Finland-based professional mixed reality company Varjo. Toikannen talks about the origins and early, R&D-focussed years of the deep tech scale-up, less…

We jumped at the opportunity to sit down with Jennifer Webb, an Investment Director at Swisscom Ventures who leads investments in sustainable technologies. She joined from LGT Lightrock in London where she spent five years building the innovative sustainable technology investment vehicle with investments in B2B SaaS, healthcare and education. On th…

Deep tech company Soter Analytics was started in 2016 to reduce workplace ergonomic injuries in warehouses and factories, drive-down claims costs, boost productivity and improve worker retention using smart safety wearables and AI-driven technologies. At the most recent OTB Ventures Summit, we caught up with the company's CEO, Matthew Hart, who exp…

Managed by the European Investment Fund, the European Tech Champions Initiative (ETCI) has allocated nearly €1 billion to four strategic funds in its first year, including Atomico and Keensight Capital, in an effort to propel forward the EU tech sector with potential leverage of up to €6 billion. The ETCI fund-of-funds was inaugurated in February 2…

France-based deep tech company Cailabs is a global leader when it comes to designing, manufacturing and selling specialised photonics solutions for free-space transmission, industrial lasers, local area networks and telecommunications, among other use cases. An innovator in the world of 'complex light shaping', the high tech scale-up recently close…

We sat down with Jan Goetz, a quantum physicist and co-founding CEO of IQM Quantum Computers, building next-generation quantum computers right here in Europe. Goetz, who also served as an EIC Board Member in the past and recently - and graciously - accepted to become an EIC Scaling Club Council member, was kind enough to take time out of his day at…

In recent times, the issue of space traffic has become a priority for the European Space Agency because of the threat posed by the increasing amount of debris orbiting the Earth. Decommissioned or abandoned satellites, parts of rocket boosters and solar panels, and even simple nuts and bolts are orbiting hundreds of kilometres above our planet and …

We interviewed Rafal Modrzewski, co-founder and CEO of ICEYE, a Finland-based micro-satellite manufacturer, at the recent OTB Ventures Summit in Poland. Founded in 2014 and backed by the EIC along the way, ICEYE essentially provides persistent monitoring capabilities for any location on earth (even at night and when it's cloudy). Owning the world’s…

We caught up with Adam Niewinski, a partner at OTB Ventures, a Poland-based investment firm that backs deep tech startups and scale-ups from across Europe, particularly in the CEE region. The VC firm is investing primarily in four sectors, namely AI and automation, space tech, fintech infrastructure and cybersecurity. Check out our interview to lea…

The EIC Scaling Club team had a great chat with Ana Maiques, co-founder and CEO of Neuroelectrics a Barcelona-based deep tech company that produces devices to stimulate and treat the brain. Founded in 2011, it is a spin-off of Starlab Neuroscience Research which was established in 2000. Ana was nominated by IESE as one of the most influential entre…

The EIC Scaling Club touched base with Svilen Rangelov, co-founder and chief executive officer of Bulgarian deep tech company Dronamics, which is building the world's first cargo drone airline. In 2022, Dronamics was awarded a €2.5 million grant by the European Commission under the EIC Accelerator program, and secured a license to operate in Europe…

Oleh Gonz Sanchez

Oleh Gonz Sanchez

Hey everyone, this is your host Gonz, and welcome to another episode of the Seedtable podcast, where we try to make sense of what is going on in European technology. My guest today is James Clark. James is a London-based marketer with a somewhat unorthodox job: marketing director for a publicly traded VC fund, Draper Esprit. Before joining Draper, …

Hey everyone, this is your host Gonz, and welcome to another episode of the Seedtable podcast, where we try to make sense of what is going on in European technology. My guest today is Pietro Invernizzi. Pietro is an investor at Stride, the London-based venture capital firm, investing first checks in pre-seed alongside Fred Destin and Harry Stebbing…

My guest today is Philippe Botteri. Philippe is a partner at the venture capital firm Accel, and a co-creator of one of my favorite yearly reports on European tech, the Euroscape. Philippe’s career as an investor is nothing short of breathtaking. From hits like Ui Path to Doctolib, he is one of the most renowned investors in Europe today, so it was…

My guest today is Erika Batista. Erika is the Head of EMEA at On Deck, previously founding team & Director The Family, an incredible connector and one of the kindest humans I know. I’ve been meaning to get Erika on the podcast for a while and I finally found an excuse. Today we’re doing something different – we’re jamming for an hour on Atomico’s S…

My guest today is Matt Helt. Matt is a Growth & Development Coach who works with startup founders and other leaders to help them navigate their way back to what really matters, both in their life and their work. Before that, he was the program director of Techstars Startup Week, where he helped catalyze startup ecosystems in cities and countries ar…

My guest today is Natalie Novick, a sociologist and quantitative social scientist working on research to understand the social aspects of a startup community. For the past five years, she has been conducting fieldwork with entrepreneurs and community builders, starting in Santiago, Chile in 2015. Since then, she has lived and worked in 27 different…

Hey everyone, this is your host Gonz, and welcome to another episode of the Seedtable podcast, where we try to make sense of what is going on in European technology. Today I’m doing things a bit different and bringing you two guests instead of one: Fabrizio Rinaldi and Francesco Di Lorenzo, founders of Mailbrew; a Milan-based company that compiles …

Hey everyone, this is your host Gonz, and welcome to another episode of the Seedtable podcast, where we try to make sense of what is going on in european technology. My guest today is Julian Lehr. Julian is a friend, a writer and a thinker, currently working as a Startup Partnership Lead at Stripe. For the past few years, he has been writing incred…

My guest today is Chris Yiu. Chris is the Executive Director of the Technology and Public Policy team at the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change. Chris was previously a general manager at Uber and has held senior roles at a number of public, private and third-sector organisations. His work focuses on improving the dialogue between technology, an…

My guest today is Anirudh Pai, host of the Conservative Curious podcast and founder of Dreams of Electric Sheep, a newsletter that covers the intersection of tech, history, and economics. I'm warning you – this conversation with Ani is anything but typical: Ani’s unorthodox career progression. How being a child of immigrants shaped Ani’s views Why …

My guest today is Nicholas Mills. Nick is operator and early-stage investor, currently General Manager for EMEA at CircleCI, where he leads the new London HQ. Before joining CircleCI, Nick was the Head of Revenue for UK & Ireland at Stripe, and the Head of Sales for EMEA at Facebook so he has an incredible amount of experience to share with us. Nic…

Today's guest is Patrick Samy, co-founder and CEO of Span, a London-based early-stage startup that helps people address lifestyle-related symptoms and conditions such as anxiety, fatigue, and diabetes without medication. Health and health tech is one of my favorite topics so having Patrick on the podcast was a blast. In today's chat we discuss: the…

My guest today is Daniel Metzler. Daniel is the co-founder and CEO of Isar Aerospace, a Munich-based company that develops next generation rockets for sustainable access to space. Isar Aerospace was founded in 2018 and has been moving extremely fast since then: the debut of Spectrum, their launch vehicle, is scheduled for late 2021. That's a short …

My guest today is Avi Meir, co-founder and CEO of TravelPerk, a Barcelona-based business travel platform that revolutionizes the way that organizations budget, book, and manage business travels. Avi's story is fascinating: after doing an MBA in Barcelona he started Hotel Ninja – a hotel management software company – that he then sold to Booking.com…

My guest today is Ian Hathaway. Ian is an analyst, strategic advisor, writer, and entrepreneur, and currently leads product development for ecosystem advisory at Techstars, where he works with founders and community leaders around the world to support their path towards building better tech ecosystems. He is also the co-author of The Startup Commun…

Today I have with me Moritz Müller-Freitag, COO and co-founder of TwentyBN and let me tell you something: today's conversation was a blast. TwentyBN, which stands for Twenty Billion Neurons, is a company building human-centric AI technology and bringing seeing and sociable digital assistants to life. We start by talking about the company's origin s…

This is your host Gonz, and today I'm with Federico Travella, CEO and founder of NoviCap, a company that helps business unlock cash stuck in outstanding invoices and improve their cash flow. NoviCap has offices in Spain, The Netherlands and the UK and they are on track to finance over one billion euros by the end of 2021. Federico is a geologist by…

My guest today is Eze Vidra, co-founder and managing partner of Remagine Ventures, an early stage fund investing in ambitious entrepreneurs at the intersection of tech, media, data and commerce. Previously, he was a General Partner at Google Ventures (GV) Europe and led the fund’s first investment outside of the USand led the fund’s first investmen…

My guest today is Jacob Haddad, CEO of AccuRx, a London-based company working on a platform that brings patients and healthcare teams together. AccuRx started in 2016, raised a $9m Series A from Atomico and LocalGlobe in 2019 and has grown tremendously since then. I had Jacob on an earlier episode of the podcast but today's conversation is complete…

My guest today is Ferdinand Metzler, co-founder and CEO of Meepl, a Zurich-based company that develops accurate 3D virtual bodies & clothing models. Ferdinand's story is fascinating. After spending a semester in Hong Kong where he discovered the issues plaguing the fashion industry; he returned home united a small team of engineers and started the …

Welcome to the Seedtable podcast. Today we are not trying to make sense of what's going on in European tech, as we usually do. Today we are doing something much more entertaining – I'm joined by three fantastic newsletter writers – Brett Bivens from Venture Desktop, Packy McCormick from Not Boring and Sid Jha from Sunday Snapshots – to play fantasy…

🎙️ Listen on Apple Podcasts 🎙️ Listen on Spotify My guest today is Matt Clifford, co-founder and CEO of Entrepreneur First, which he started with Alice Bentinck back in 2011. Entrepreneur First is what is known as a Talent Investor – they help extraordinary individuals find a co-founder, develop and idea and raise money from the world's best invest…

🎙️ Listen on Apple Podcasts 🎙️ Listen on Spotify My guest today is Michael Sackler, founder and managing partner at Rooks Nest Ventures, a London-based early-stage venture capital firm that invests at the intersection of technology, media and entertainment. Before Rooks Nest Ventures, Mike founded and led Rooks Nest Entertainment, a successful prod…

🎙️ Listen on Apple Podcasts 🎙️ Listen on Spotify My guest today is James Wise, partner at Balderton, one of Europe's most prolific venture capital firms. James joined Balderton in 2013, where he focuses on health, productivity and security. Since then has led investments in companies like Sophia Genetics, Detectify and Kaia Health. James is also a …

🎙️ Listen on Apple Podcasts 🎙️ Listen on Spotify For this episode I'm talking with Brett Bivens. Brett is a venture investor at TechNexus, a Chicago-based venture capital firm. He focuses on Europe and operates out of Paris. On top of that, he writes Venture Desktop, a weekly newsletter that he describes as "an ongoing exploration of the ideas and …

🎙️ Listen on Apple Podcasts 🎙️ Listen on Spotify My guest today is Jacob Haddad, CEO of accuRx, a London-based company working on a platform that brings patients and healthcare teams together. The accuRx story is fascinating. After struggling with their initial idea right out of Entrepreneur First, they pivoted, captured over 90% of the primary car…