Startup Grind

Today we have a presentation from our 2016 Global conference with Johan Brenner, General Partner of the European based Venture Capital Fund Creandum.

Johan is one of Europe’s most experienced venture capital investors who has worked across a broad set of industries globally. He has built a number of successful businesses as an entrepreneur and has also been a Partner in several other leading venture capital firms.

Before Creandum, Johan spent more than 4 years as a General Partner at Balderton Capital (previously called Benchmark Capital Europe) with investments in companies like MySQL, Rebtel, Zopa, Habbo Hotel and Wonga.

Lets listen into Johan’s presentation on the European Startup Ecosystem at Startup Grind’s Global Conference earlier this year.

Toptal is an amazing company. They've got over 2,500 developers and designers in their network. They've screened them extensively so that you get to work with the top 3% of developers and designers. So basically what happens is that you let Toptal know what type of developer or designer you're looking for, they understand your business and technical requirements and they search for the right person for you.

You don't have to do all the screening and interviews that you normally would and they make it really easy for you. You can even do part time hires that are a few hours a week or full time hires as well.

If you want to get connected to them, send me a note at [email protected] and I can personally introduce you to my friend Nelson. He's a VP at Toptal who will make sure you get an amazing experience.

Pete Newell is a nationally recognized innovation expert whose work is transforming how the government and other large organizations compete and drive growth.

He is the CEO of BMNT, an innovation consultancy and early-stage technology incubator that helps solve some of the hardest real-world problems in national security, state and local governments, and beyond. BMNT is headquartered in Palo Alto, CA, with offices in Los Angeles, San Diego, Washington DC, Boston and London.

He holds holds a BS from Kansas State University, an MS from the US Army Command & General Staff College, an MS from the National Defense University and advanced certificates from the MIT Sloan School and the Stanford Graduate School of Business.

He is also a founder and co-author, with Lean Startup founder Steve Blank, of Hacking for Defense (H4D)®, an academic program taught at 22+ universities.

In addition, Pete is a Board Member for Solace Power, a wireless power technology company; and Hacking for Defense Incorporated, the 501c3 non-profit responsible for extending Hacking for Defense® academic programming to universities across the United States.

Prior to joining BMNT, Pete served as the Director of the US Army’s Rapid Equipping Force (REF). Reporting directly to the senior leadership of the Army, he was charged with rapidly finding, integrating, and employing solutions to emerging problems faced by Soldiers on the battlefield.

From 2010 to 2013 Pete led the REF in the investment of over $1.4B in efforts designed to counter the effects of improvised explosive devices, reduce small units exposure to suicide bombers and rocket attacks and to reduce their reliance on long resupply chains. He was responsible for the Army’s first deployment of mobile manufacturing labs as well as the use of smart phones merged with tactical radio networks.

Pete retired from the US Army as a Colonel in 2013. .He is an Army Ranger who has received numerous awards to include the Silver Star and Presidential Unit Citation.

(Interviewed by Chris Joannou @DREAMPUSHERS).

Melanie Perkins is an Australian technology entrepreneur. She is known as the CEO and co-founder of Canva, an online design and publishing tool which makes graphic design simple for everyone.

Melanie is one of the youngest female CEO to be leading a tech start-up valued at over a billion dollars. Melanie has raised more than $166 million from investors including Google Maps co-founder Lars Rasmussen, Yahoo! CFO Ken Goldman, and funds such as Bond, General Catalyst, Felicis Ventures and Blackbird.

As Google’s Chief Marketing Officer, Lorraine manages a global team responsible for telling the evolving story of Google’s brand, driving revenue growth, and bringing Google’s products to life for billions of users every day. Her teams focus on Google’s core products, including Search, Maps, Photos and the Google Assistant; Google’s Platforms, such as Android, Chrome, Play and YouTube, and support the company's new Hardware division. Lorraine was responsible for driving Google’s social impact focus on education, economic opportunity and inclusion, and for the company crisis response strategy. Previously, Lorraine led Marketing for Google in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Lorraine graduated from Dublin City University with a joint honors degree in International Marketing and Languages. She has been named Adweek’s Grand Brand Genius, Business Insider's Most Innovative CMO, one of the world’s 50 Most Powerful Moms, and most recently Cannes Creative Marketer of the Year. A native of Ireland, Lorraine lives in the Bay Area with her husband and two children.

Bridgette is the co-founder of the Google for Startups team (previously Google for Entrepreneurs). Today, she leads the Programs and Operations team globally that helping startups grow with the best of Google in 125 countries. In addition, Bridgette is part of the core team behind Google for Startups Campus: physical hubs where entrepreneurs can learn, connect, and build companies that will change the world. Along with her team, she develops the programs that provide startups unparalleled access to mentorship, connections and trainings to support the growth of their startup. Today, there are 6 Campuses in London, Seoul, Tel Aviv, Madrid, Sao Paulo and Warsaw serving over 300,000 member entrepreneurs.

Startup Grind Global Conference 2019

Sid Mofya, a Kauffman Fellow, is the COO of the Draper Venture Network and has one of the most interesting roles in venture capital: helping his team coordinate the alliance of member funds and providing post-investment support for their collective portfolio of over 900 companies.

Sid’s journey into the venture capital world is fairly non-traditional. Sid was born in Zambia and studied in the UK as a chemical engineer. After college, he went to work for Shell as a chemical engineer at an oil refinery. Sid yearned to move back to Africa and make an impact on the local communities there, so he left Shell for business school and eventually moved to Tanzania to work for a healthcare organization doing medical research that focused on diseases such as HIV/AIDS, malaria, and influenza.

It was around this time Sid started looking into venture capital and entrepreneurship with a greater focus.

Sid eventually got in touch with the Draper Venture Network, which was searching for someone to help build a support platform for their global investments. He has been helping the Network grow since.

Today, DVN consists of over 20 member funds and supports a full-time Services team based in Silicon Valley. The Network currently has member funds across Asia, Australia, Middle East, Europe and North, and South America. The funds are currently deploying over $2B in assets and are invested in almost 1000 active portfolio companies.

(Interviewed by StartupGrind's Chris Joannou).