The world of venture capital is evolving—VCs are investing earlier, AI is reshaping the game, and founders are navigating a complex funding landscape. In this episode, we sit down with Matthieu Lavergne, partner at VC firm Serena, to break down the current VC ecosystem, the role of angels, and why securing US investment is key for European startups scaling beyond Series B. We also dive into AI’s investment boom, the future of open-source models, and whether XR is poised for a comeback. If you're a founder looking to raise or just curious about where the industry is heading, this is an episode you won’t want to miss!

About our guest in this episode:

Matthieu is a Partner at Serena, investing in infrastructure software—AI, data, DevOps, cloud—and more broadly, software products built for technical leaders (CTO, CIO, CISO, etc.).
He is the leading author of The Commercial Open Source Report, the go-to resource for data-driven insights on how businesses monetize open-source projects. The report has quickly gained recognition among industry leaders, attracting engaged readers from top COSS startups, major tech companies, and leading investors.

Previously, Matthieu was a founder and operator before advising startups, private equity investors, and corporates on M&A and fundraising.

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Struggling to raise funds for your startup? Wondering why underrepresented founders face unique challenges in the investment world? In this episode, we sit down with the creators of Hotbed, Perdie Alder and M Coyle, a virtual accelerator tackling the funding gap for early-stage founders. We dive into their unique approach to selecting and supporting startups, the biases female founders encounter in fundraising, and how soft skills can make or break an investment deal. Plus, we explore success stories, key partnerships, and what’s next for Hotbed as they continue to shake up the startup ecosystem. Don’t miss this insightful conversation!

About our guests in this episode:

Perdie: Perdie is a two-time entrepreneur who has 8+ years of experience in the startup ecosystem, supporting thousands of founders and investors. Before co-founding Hotbed, Perdie designed programmes for entrepreneurs in London, Greece, and Ghana. Prior to working directly with startups, she worked for one, at Reward Gateway, which went through an exit when she was there. Perdie has a Bachelors in Business and Management with Psychology and a Masters in Entrepreneurship.

M Coyle: M has 6+ years supporting thousands of founders with Hotbed, Spice Startups, and as a Programme Lead for a tech community. M is also building Hotbed's product, and has a Bachelor's in Entrepreneurship from University of Westminster.

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How do startups secure game-changing connections with investors, corporates, and media? In this episode, we explore how Empact Ventures and OVHcloud act as super connectors — helping founders gain visibility, funding, and key partnerships. Chatting to founder and CEO of Empact Ventures, Kosta Mavroulakis, we dive into how pitching events, thought leadership opportunities, and tailored introductions can accelerate a startup’s journey. Plus, we discuss the role of Tech for Good, strategies for scaling impact-driven businesses, and the power of asking for help. If you're looking to expand your network and grow your startup, this is one conversation you won’t want to miss!  

About our guest in this episode:

Kosta Mavroulakis is an award-winning global super connector for tech startups and the CEO of Empact Ventures based in the UK. Empact Ventures brings people, tech startups and larger organisations together based on mutual need to make an aggregate social or economic impact through its initiatives and curated super connections. These include the global Super Connect for Good Competition, the Super Connect Series and its many MedTech events. He was recently appointed as a South West Regional Ambassador for Young Enterprise UK and as the Chair of the Global Industry Advisory Board of Albion Business School.

Prior to this, Kosta was one of the founding members and the Digital Development Director of the National Association of College and University Entrepreneurs (NACUE), a non-profit organisation supporting the development of student-led enterprise societies in 100 UK universities and 200 further education colleges which went on to secure £3.5m from the UK Government’s Department of Business, Innovation and Skills. In 2015 – 2017, he was the Campaign Manager of StartUp Britain, the UK’s leading campaign for small business launched at Downing Street with then Prime Minister David Cameron and Buckingham Palace before touring the UK to 90 UK cities and towns providing 15,000 people with free business advice.

He also held roles with the Global Entrepreneurship Network UK as its National Director for England, UK Vice Chair of the Europe-India Centre for Business and Industry and as the Global Vice Chair of the I-COM Global Data Startup Challenge.

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This episode features Rik Van Bruggen, VP for EMEA at Hopsworks, a platform for Data-Intensive Artificial Intelligence, who unpicks the captivating and trending world of AI and Data. Find out what you need to make high quality predictions, save costs when developing AI solutions, as well as mitigate risk  - implementing best-in-class governance in a fast-changing world.  

About our guest in this episode:

Rik Van Bruggen is Hopsworks' VP for EMEA and APAC, and has been working in the software and data infrastructure industry for more than two decades. He is an avid technical enthusiast, with a clear eye on how to use technology to generate value for organisations. He lives in Antwerp, Belgium, but frequently works with customers in different industries, across the globe.

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This Episode features John Kelly, Chief Revenue Officer at Remote. John, who has raised hundreds of millions of dollars in funding as an entrepreneur, will talks to us about his eight successful exits as well as the great leaps that are being made in the future and value of his talent recruitment and Employee of Record technology scaleup, REMOTE.

About our guest in this episode:

John Kelly joined Remote during a significant phase of growth, including the recent acquisition of Easop — a solution that enhances cross-border equity support — and Remote’s expansion into new markets. He brings over 25 years of experience leading go-to-market teams in both high-growth SaaS businesses and large global enterprises. His impressive track record includes previous roles as President/COO at SupportLogic and senior leadership positions at Hired, DemandBase, Symphony Talent, Oracle, and SAP. He reports directly to CEO Job van der Voort.

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This episode features Joana Kamenova, Commercialisation Officer at the European Space Agency. The European Space Agency (ESA) is an OVHcloud Startup Program partner and collaborates around the support of startups in the Space industry. We’ll find out about the biggest misconceptions in the space industry and discover the wealth of opportunities that Space offers startups looking to scale. 

About our guest in this episode:

Joana Kamenova is a Commercialisation Officer at the European Space Agency (ESA), where she focuses on several cross-cutting activities such as fit-for-purpose partnership building, business incubation, technology transfer, disruptive innovation and sustainability. Joana founded the ESA Partnership Initiative for Commercialisation (EPIC) that links up deeptech start-ups with established space and non-space companies. Currently, Joana manages ESA commercialisation activities in the UK, building on management experience within Austria, Czechia, Greece, Hungary, Poland and Switzerland.

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This episode features developer, David Bonilla Fuertes, the founder of Manfred, who has almost 20 years of experience founding and leading tech development for companies across multiple industries and is an industry influencer in Europe. David’s latest venture, Manfred, is changing the face of tech recruitment, as an open platform with a new approach to tech recruitment built by developers for developers. Topics include the complexities of tech recruitment, the value of new solutions as well as expert insights into tech recruitment from 20 years in the business. 

About our guest in this episode:

David Bonilla Fuertes is a developer and entrepreneur who writes one of the most popular tech newsletters in Spanish, La Bonilista. With +20 years experience building digital products and services, he has worked for startups like Atlassian and founded a couple. The last one —Manfred, a tech recruiting boutique— was sold to the SNGULAR Group, where he works as Chief People Officer, caring for more than 1,400 people.

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This episode features Josep Carmona who left his role as Professor of Computer Science, at renowned UPC University in Spain, to head up Process Talks, a startup that is challenging the future of work with a platform that automates office processes for people interacting with computers. Topics that are included in the discussion are large language models (LLMs), natural language processing (NLP) and OpenAI. The episode explains why it is critical to consider LLMs early in a startup’s journey in order to scale, and how to do so.

About our guest in this episode:

Josep Carmona is a scientist who became an entrepreneur way past his forties. Currently, he is the CEO of Process Talks (www.processtalks.com), a company that is revolutionising office processes with (generative) AI. Josep also holds a Full Professor position at the Universitat Polictècnica de Catalunya, where in the last decade he was leading a research lab on processes and data science and its applications.  

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This episode features Chris Holscher from holscher.one who gives some fascinating insights into industry analyst relations, having been ranked in the top 10 of experts in this field. In this episode Chris shares some of the results of his cutting-edge research on how startups, analysts and investors can work together to get the biggest return on investment.   

About our guest in this episode:
Chris Holscher is a specialist in Industry Analyst Relations management for startups/scaleups in B2B tech/services. He helps to sharpen strategies and messaging, to accelerate product-market fit, de-risk investment and to amplify brand value. In 20+ years Chris has worked with global tech giants, scaleups and early-stage startups. He was voted a global top 10 expert in his field in 2022. Chris leads the "State of Startups with Industry Analysts" research and co-authored the startup chapter in the 2nd edition of „Analysts on Analyst Relations“. Chris lives in Hamburg, Germany. He is gladly addicted to all things Scandinavian and specialty coffee.

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This episode on tech recruitment features Courtney Robinson  who has been through OVHcloud’s Startup Program with his venture, Hypi (https://hypi.ai/), a development platform for startups that enables them to develop low code web and development apps, effortlessly. As a founder with great technical expertise, Courtney shares how best to navigate tech recruitment and gives tips for hiring the right tech team to help scale your business. 

About our guest in this episode: 

Courtney is Co-founder and CEO of Hypi. He has over a decade of experience working in startup and scaleup companies doing everything from building social media platforms to advertising and ecommerce. With a technical background, he has a keen interest in databases, big data and

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