Patrick De Smedt
DG GROW - European Commission. Senior Expert in the unit dealing with 'SME internationalisation and Enterprise Europe Network' where he is involved with the policy development for the Enterprise Europe Network (EEN), Innovation support programmes for SME in Horizon 2020 and support for SME to participate in the Internal Market and markets in countries outside the EU. He was involved in the set-up of the EEN scale-up advisors and access to finance services as well as pilot projects on opportunities for SMEs in the sharing economy and SMEs networks for export.
Max Brigonzi
Head of Research at Mind the Bridge. Max has delivered internationally-recognized reports with data and insights on corporate open innovation, global start-up ecosystems, venture capital and European policy. Reports have been featured on Financial Times, IlSole24Ore, El Pais, TechCrunch, etc... He is an experienced professional in EU project management, data science, research, and business/strategic consulting for start-ups. Regularly invited to speak as guest lecturer at events and academic institutions including: Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna di Pisa, UPO, University of Insubria.
Joe Haslam
Executive Director, Owners Scaleup Program, IE Business School. Joe has more than 20 years of experience from the start-up phase to the scale-up phase and beyond. He is the cofounder of five companies and an investor in several more as well as a board member. Marrakech, the first company he cofounded, raised over $75m in Venture Capital and scaled up to 250 employees. He is now the cofounder and Chairman of Hot Hotels, the first company from Spain to be accelerated by the Techstars program in the USA (Boston, summer 2015). At IE, Joe was first appointed Executive Director of the Owners Scale-up Program in 2013. He also teaches an elective called “Scaleup Your Startup” in the International MBA Program and a High Impact Online Program “Scaleup: How to Successfully Manage Growth” for IE Exponential Learning. He is currently writing a book “The Scale-up Checklist” along with Professor Daniel Corsten.
Andreas Mihalovits
Andreas is a German Angel Investor having invested in more than 70 international startups and a former serial entrepreneur. He co-founded his first internet company Omniga in 1999 and, after reaching profitability within 2 years, grew it to a venture builder focused on business models based on subscription services with more than 150 employees as of today. In 2012 he started investing in startups and later also got engaged in the Spanish ecosystem as the founder of Marbella Tech Angels, a network of more than 160 investors, founders & mentors living around Marbella. Andreas is also co-founder of the Global Super Angels Club, a platform for angel investors usually investing six-figure euro amounts in startups, supporting its members to improve their deal flow and speed up their search for like-minded co-investors.
Mercè Tell
General Partner at Nekko VC, a venture capital fund specialized in the internationalization of startups across Europe. With more than 15 years experience in Venture Capital Mercè has led and supported seed and early stage venture investments into software, eCommerce, mobile and telecom.
Juan Alvarez de Lara
Board member of EBAN, co Chairman EBAN Impact Investing Committee. Founder and General Partner of Origen Ventures Fund, an impact tech transfer fund (30 MM€, hard cap 40 MM€) specialized in funding spin offs launched from universities, research centers, scientific and technological Parks in KETS sectors. Founder and CEO of Seed&Click, with over 20 years of experience in national and international financial management responsibilities. Board member of AED (Spanish Association of Directors). He is Investor and Advisor of startups (Footters, Ermes Cyber Security). Professor at Toulouse Business School, UPF and ESADE Business School in Alternative Finance and Entrepreneurship, and been involved in more than 200 events as keynote speaker, panelist, jury and workshops.
Mª Luisa Garcia Garcia
President of AABAN Business Angel Network. Partner, founder or investor in QaShops (sold to a French multinational), 3ants development&services, SouthupVentures, Bubocar, Estudio Abrego, Opensalud, among others. Co-founder Ad4kids sold to a british multinational (Superawesome Ltd). She has a High expertise as Strategy, New Business Models, Innovation and Technology Professor and start-ups developer. Over 14 years experience as management board member, and 12 years as administration board. Fluent in English and German, having been based in London, Munich, Madrid and Seville. She has also lived in the US. Broad knowledge of the Andalusian market, having a developed a significant network in the region. Awarded “Premio Andaluz a la Excelencia”, leadership for Supercable, “European Business Award” for business development Emasesa, “Premio Andaluz a la Innovación” for software innovation Emasesa.
Stefan Mathesius
Head of Financial Instruments at the Andalusian Innovation and Development Agency under the Ministry of Economy, Knowledge, Enterprises and University, which spearheads Andalusian’s efforts in regional development. He is responsible for the design, implementation and management of different types of financial instruments within a Fund of Fund structure with more than € 1 billion under management. The aim is to finance Andalusian companies that have difficulties to access the financial market, such as technology based companies in early stage phases. Prior to that position, he was economic advisor at the Ministry of Innovation, Science and Enterprise. Before joining the Public Sector he worked for several years in management consultancy, investment banking and private equity at Goetzpartners and Cerberus Capital Management. Stefan holds a degree in Industrial Engineering from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (Germany) and an executive MBA from IIST (Spain).
