Entrepreneurial Realities

AI’s energy hunger is exploding — but can photonic computing unlock a sustainable future for AI? Samarth Vadia, CEO & Co-founder of Linque, shares his path from quantum research to founding a deep tech start-up, tackling one of AI’s biggest challenges: exploding energy use in data centers.

Discover how computers that run on light could transform data centers, make AI more energy-efficient and sustainable.

Hosted by Lucia Lara from our Climate / Circular Lab.

Can a start-up really go from founding to a successful exit in just 18 months? Dylan, founder of CareMates, proves it is possible.

In this special end-of-year episode, Antoine and co-host Magnus dive deep into Dylan’s journey — from bootstrapping and rapid scaling to navigating unexpected challenges and achieving a successful exit.

This episode covers:

• How to draft a winning EXIST application

• How B2B SaaS pricing is really determined

• What it takes to bootstrap and scale a tech company

Please meet Ryan Grant Little.

Ryan reaches out from Kyiv where he has moved to support Defence startups in the country where it really matters.

Do join us for an inspiring presentation to better understand the dynamics of Defence Technology, why this really matters to us all in Europe and hear how Ryan has genuine impact.

Ryan and I met beginning of this month at the first Defence Hackathon organised by EDTH in Kyiv.

For all of us in Munich, the TUM Venture Lab and Europe Defense Tech Hub will organise a Hackathon in February 2026. Details are here. Do join us.

We are joined today by two Venture Capitalists, Fadwa Ouardani and Omar Hedeya.

Fadwa and Omar explain what brought them to the world of venture capital and also the initiative of "Habbitis" to support founders from the Arab Diaspora.

Meet Marcus Lobbes, visionary director of the Dortmund Academie of Theater and Digitalisation.

Marcus will be the curator at the Richard Wagner Bayreuth Festival for the first ever AI powered production of the Ring des Nibelungen, bringing artificial intelligence into the world's most prestigious Wagner opera Festival.

In this episode of Entrepreneurial Realities, discover how Marcus merges artistic genius and technological boldness to reinvent what it means to create, perform, and experience art.

Lucia, our new host, talks with Dr. Andreas Weiss, CTO of Qkera, about turning his PhD research into next-gen battery materials to advance future energy storage. From lab experiments to scaling a startup, Andreas shares the surprises, challenges, and lessons learned along the way.

Prof. Maria Roche from Harvard Business School talks with Antoine Leboyer about her research showing how limited resources can push startups to be more creative and experimental. Maria also shares her own story to becoming a professor at Harvard — and what she’s learned about what truly drives innovation.

This week, Dariia Rekun, Pipeline manager at the SW/AI Venture Lab interviews Jonathan Luther-Bergquist, partner at Inflection XYZ, for a deep dive into venture capital with a focus on deep tech and defense – two areas gaining significant importance in Europe.

Explore Inflection's thesis-driven approach centered on sovereignty and compute, understanding how controlling these resources is vital for future national and individual independence.

Learn about "new defense" and its distinction from traditional industry, highlighting its importance through rapid iteration cycles and the application of commercially available technology.

Listen as Jonathan shares invaluable advice for aspiring defense tech founders, including leveraging European Defense Tech Hub hackathons to connect with military end-users and build impactful products.

Gain insights into how venture capital selects companies with massive upside and be inspired to "just do things" to tackle critical challenges

We are diving into a remarkable story of innovation born at the Technical University of Munich — OneTutor — an AI-powered tutoring platform that’s reshaping how students learn, without replacing the human role of educators.

I sat down with the founders — Philipp Cisistian, Jann Winter and Professor Alexander Pretschner, who built OneTutor from the ground up, combining cutting-edge AI with real pedagogical insight.

Learn about this startup which began as a local experiment and is now in use at over 20 institutions across Germany as well as being piloted in the United States.

In September 2023, Israel's Sefaria, Munich's AppliedAI Institute and the Venture Lab joined forces to explore how AI could enhance Torah study. After months of embedding, prototyping, gathering feedback, and fine-tuning, Sefaria is preparing to roll out new AI-powered features in the second half of the year—making them available to the million-plus users who rely on their platform.

This marks a significant milestone for any organization, but especially for Sefaria, which is deeply committed to truthfulness, transparency, and intellectual rigour. It’s also a moment that resonates with all AI startups working at the TUM Software/AI Venture Lab, where responsible innovation is a shared value.

So do join us as we discuss with Hadara Steinberg, AI Researcher and Product Manager and Lev Israel, Sefaria' CTO as they share the insights, challenges, and learnings from building an AI platform at the intersection of tradition and cutting-edge technology.

... and reach out if you want to join the pilot.