Heidi Lindvall went from human rights activist to startup founder to co-founding Pale Blue Dot, one of Europe's leading early-stage climate tech funds — backed by an investor list that includes Spotify founder Daniel Ek and the founders of Supercell, Zendesk, TransferWise, and DeliveryHero.

With €180M+ across two funds, Pale Blue Dot backs pre-seed and seed-stage startups working to reverse climate change.

In this episode, Heidi breaks down the opportunities founders are overlooking in climate tech, the mistakes that make investors ignore a pitch, and how to break into VC fundraising with a non-traditional background.

Hernan Haro grew Pulpo Media's revenue 14X before successfully exiting to Entravision, a publicly traded media company.

He then moved back to Argentina to found MrPink VC, a seed-stage fund that's built, invested in, and refined over 40 startups across Latin America, producing 10x returns and multiple exits.

In this episode, Hernan shares his journey from Argentina to the US and back, why building outside Silicon Valley can be a founder's biggest advantage, and how to build a fundraising story that actually lands.

Itaru Shiraishi is General Partner at EEI — Japan's first venture capital firm dedicated entirely to clean technology.

Before turning investor, he built ventures and structured deals at Marubeni, Masdar (the UAE's flagship renewable energy giant), and Fortis, giving him a cross-border track record spanning Japan, Europe, the Middle East, and North America.

Now his fund is deploying over $200M into Series A and B startups tackling energy and climate — sectors he believes are wildly overlooked while everyone chases AI and SaaS. In this episode, Itaru breaks down how to break into climate tech as an outsider and why this "boring" sector might be one of the biggest opportunities in venture today.

Bob Crimmins has built and scaled 5 venture-backed companies — and lived through enough failure and success to know exactly why 95% of startups don't make it.

Now a venture capitalist and angel investor, he's building Startup Haven, a fund, accelerator, and community that spans six major startup hubs from Seattle to Los Angeles, all designed to help founders like himself build venture-scale companies and actually exit them.

In this episode, Bob breaks down what separates the 5% who make it from everyone else — how to build a truly venture-scalable startup, how to set the right fundraising milestones, and the mistakes that sink even talented founders.

Justin Stanford dropped out of high school as a teenager to chase a dream of tech entrepreneurship — and built ESET Southern Africa into a business supporting a network of over 2,500 partners across 15+ countries, with annual revenue north of $10 million.

Forbes named him one of Africa's "30 Under 30" best young entrepreneurs, and he went on to co-found 4Di Capital, a Cape Town-based venture fund backing early-stage tech startups across the continent.

In this episode, Justin shares the lessons from building a pan-African company from a garage, why fundraising at the wrong time can sink a startup, and why founders should reconsider chasing hotspots like Silicon Valley.

Tammie Siew cut her teeth as an investor at Sequoia Capital before co-founding Revery, a wellness startup backed by Sequoia in a $3.5M seed round.

Today she's General Partner at Pebblebed, a venture firm she co-founded alongside a founding member of OpenAI and the former founder of Facebook AI Research — now backing frontier AI companies. In this episode, Tammie breaks down the lessons she learned at Sequoia, what it actually took to build and grow Revery, and her advice on where founders should live and build.

This is a rare look inside the mind of an investor who's built real credibility from both the operator and VC sides of the table.

Before founding Foundt Capital, Matt Tarver was an engineer who joined a microchip startup and helped it raise funding and successfully exit — including a cold call to Warren Buffett himself as part of the fundraise.

That audacity now defines his work as founder & GP of Foundt Capital, an early-stage fund backing breakthrough companies in life sciences, clean energy, and health tech.

Stephan Morais co-founded Indico Capital Partners alongside Cristina Fonseca, co-founder of Talkdesk — a billion-dollar unicorn in her own right.

Today Indico manages $200M+ in AUM with 5 portfolio companies that have reached unicorn status, backed by a Harvard MBA and two decades of experience as an entrepreneur, banker, and investor across 8 countries and 4 continents.

Indico was even hand-picked by Google for Startups as their partner fund in Portugal. In this episode, Stephan breaks down the right and wrong ways to approach investors, how to pick the right VC fund, and the fundraising mistakes founders make most often.

Carlos Miranda co-founded X8 Investimentos in 2010, pioneering middle-market growth capital in Brazil long before impact investing was trendy. Now he's launching the 8th Wave Fund — a $200 million vehicle set to back up to 80 companies across renewable energy, sustainable tourism, and the circular economy. Named one of the 100 Leaders Changing Business in Brazil by HSM, Carlos has spent over a decade backing exceptional entrepreneurs across health, education, and food. This episode dives into what it takes to build growth capital infrastructure in one of the world's most dynamic emerging markets. As well as how founders can approach VCs for fundraising.

Before founding Feld Ventures, Shane Feldberg helped grow Clearco (formerly Clearbanc) into a nearly $2 billion fintech unicorn — one of Canada's biggest tech success stories, backed by SoftBank Vision Fund.

That operator experience now fuels his work as founder and General Partner at Feld Ventures, where he invests early in AI, defense, and infrastructure startups.

His portfolio includes standouts like Vectara, VersusGame, and Everytable. This episode is a rare look at how building a unicorn from the inside shapes the way you evaluate the next one.