At Hack & Hustle we believe that genius is global & hate that opportunity isn’t. Despite the potential of the European Single Market, start-ups have difficulties in growing as fast as their American counterparts. The availability of capital is a key catalyst for a thriving start-up ecosystem. In this respect, Europe lags behind. The European …
Meeting European VC Champions: Views on Firm and Partner Building
William McQuillan is a founding partner at Frontline Ventures. This is the second part of our talk, check round one, if you haven’t yet. We chatted about: How William perceives the funding environment in Europe, compared to the US; How Frontline collaborates with its LPs in adding value to their portfolio companies; The importance of firm-building …
Breaking into Venture: SAFE notes. Are they really that safe?
At Hack & Hustle we believe that genius is global & hate that opportunity isn’t. Despite the potential of the European Single Market, start-ups have difficulties in growing as fast as their American counterparts. The availability of capital is a key catalyst for a thriving start-up ecosystem. In this respect, Europe lags behind. The European …
Meeting European VC Champions: Globally Ambitious B2B Companies
William McQuillan is a Founding Partner of Frontline Ventures and joined us for a chat. We chatted about: How William has built a truly differentiated investment thesis for Frontline’s two funds. What William looks for in seed-stage startups and why he believes integrity is all-important and money cannot be the founder’s main driver. How William …
Meeting European VC Champions: Collaborating across the Atlantic
Shomit Ghose is the General Partner of ONSET Ventures and joined us for a chat. We chatted about: If data ethics are the next big differentiator for startups; How the European and American VC landscapes differ and what we can learn from both; How to increase your presence and establish collaborations between US and European …
Meeting European VC Champions: Collaborating with Business Angels
Michael Hansen is the CEO of the Danish Business Angels Network and joined us for a chat. We chatted about: The importance of politicians making brave strategic decisions in promoting cluster development; The story of the Danish Robotics Cluster in which the first collaborative robots were hatched, counting with two acquisitions at a valuation of …
Meeting European VC Champions: Leading Early-Stage Deep Tech
The second VC champion I had the opportunity of chatting with was Stephan Morais. Stephan is the founder and Managing Partner of Indico Capital Partners, a leading early-stage deep tech VC firm. We chatted about: How Stephan tackled raising a VC fund and what to should look for in LPs How European VCs can push …
Will remote working become the new normal for everyone?
Everyone experiences feelings of isolation or increasing distractions when embracing remote working. Small and medium-size enterprises (SMEs), which account for the major part (99%) of the European economy, have been particularly impacted by recent events. Dealing with increasingly restrictive liquidity reserves, SME owners are facing particular difficulties in this ongoing pandemic outbreak. The economic and …
Meeting European VC Champions: Cross-border Life Sciences investing
Recently, I had the opportunity of chatting with Marc Lohrmann, the Managing Partner of Vesalius Biocapital Fund III (VBC III). VBC III is a 120M€ venture capital (VC) fund investing in late-stage companies in drug development, medical devices, diagnostics and digital health, across Europe. We chatted about: How Marc and Vesalius work as a country …
In Europe, the startup funding graduation rate is also surprisingly low
In this post we: Present a primer on the startup funding graduation rate in Europe; Find that both European and US VC-backed companies show a steep drop off rate between Seed and Series A; Find that the startup graduation rate in Europe and the US shows exponential decay; Find evidence suggesting that Seed investments have been increasing …