Entrepreneurial Realities

Ravi Venkatesan, Chairman of The Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet and founder of GAME, shares insights from his new book, exploring the intersection of entrepreneurship and personal purpose. He discusses the importance of adaptability in career changes and highlights foundational skills like mindset and leadership as crucial for modern entrepreneurs. Ravi emphasizes the urgency of transitioning to renewable energy, aiming to enhance global energy access while reducing carbon emissions, all while inspiring intentional living and recognizing untapped potential.

This week's TUM Venture Labs podcast features two inspiring guests from Infineon: Nico Kelling, Head of AI Center of Excellence, and Lamin Ben-Hamdane, Head of Start-up cooperations. Together with Antoine, we deep-dived into: Infineon’s Digital Agenda the vast potential of AI for the semiconductor industry how innovation cooperation works for the benefit of both: start-ups and Infineon!

In today's episode, Antoine meets Markos Kern, a serial entrepreneur, CEO of LYMB.iO, and co-founder of Civil Relief Munich. He tells us about his newest organization (Civil Relief Munich), which he co-founded to help thousands of people who had to fly due to the war in their home country. Three weeks after its creation, Civic Relief Munich has gathered a permanent team of 80 volunteers and 1,000 drivers to safely organize transportation from the Ukrainian Polish border to Germany. Around 1000 refugees have been transported to Munich as well as directly paired with host families with the best possible match. Details and information is at Civil Relief Convoy Munich | Linktree. You can donate at Help & donate to Ukraine - Civil Relief Munich. This is an amazing and inspiring story which illustrates that the principles of entrepreneurship can bring the best of us during the most difficult of the times.

In this week's episode, Antoine meets Andreas Schwarzenbrunner, a Partner at Speedinvest. Andreas introduced Speedinvest and his way from TUM to a VC fund in their discussion. Furthermore, Andreas explained how Speedinvest values early-stage start-ups and added some valuable tips about fundraising.

In this episode Antoine meets Gregor Haidl, a Senior Investment Manger at High-Tech Gründersfonds (HTGF) and TUM Alumnus. The HTGF is a German-based VC fund with public and private investors. In their discussion, Antoine and Gregor are talking about the operating model of the HTGF as well as how early-stage teams should engage with their first customer(s) and early adopters.

We are back from our short break: Antoine Leboyer and Roman Werner, the MD of our FAB Venture Lab, discuss with Judith Camarcat, VC Associate at Five Season Ventures, the latest trends, and challenges in Food Tech. In their exciting discussion, they cover the topic from a business as well as a research angle and especially spotlight the DACH market.

First Momentum Ventures is the first student-run VC fund founded by Sebastian and his co-founders. In this week's session, Antoine and Sebastian are talking about the story and business of First Momentum and what fellow students can learn from it.

In this week's episode, Antoine discusses with Nicolas Kozakiewicz, Chief Innovation Officer of Worldline, the hype and reality of the Blockchain. Therefore, they elaborate on the technology's primary use cases, the chances, and their limitations.

To reinvent urban mobility Pascal Blum and his Co-Founders developed electric mopeds and founded their own company, unu motors. In this week’s episode, Pascal and Antoine discuss unu’s path to a successful startup and its challenges along the way.

Entrepreneurial Realities, listen to Mark Gazeki, a serial entrepreneur and angel investor, to start the year. Mark talks about his lessons learned during the founding and scaling companies and his tips for other founders.