Corporate Venturing & Entrepreneurship Summit 2025

Mirjam van Praag

Mirjam is Professor Entrepreneurship & Leadership at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam  & Chair of the Adviesraad voor Wetenschap, technologie en innovatie (AWTI)

Passionate about combining an entrepreneurial attitude, leadership experience and academic expertise in entrepreneurship, innovation, management and organization to (i) fostering (entrepreneurial) leadership in organizations, (ii) contributing to (science based) flourishing entrepreneurship, (iii) bringing research and business together for societal impact, (iv) accelerating innovation and (v) driving transformation.

Broad (international) experience in organization building, leadership and on boards of public and private organizations both exec and non-exec. Focus on leadership, innovation, entrepreneurship, governance, strategy, research, execution, data and people management. Sectors: Academic, Financial, Public, Publishing, Cultural & Democracy, Data & Research, Biotech, Social Enterprises.

Academic in heart and soul, more than 25 years of experience in research and teaching in organizational and behavioral economics, management and entrepreneurship. Always combined research and teaching with eco-system building towards more innovation and value creation using academic knowledge and creating connections. Loves inspiring, and get inspired by, students.

Topics of study and/or teaching: behavioral differences between entrepreneurs & board members; learning entrepreneurship; entrepreneurial growth and management; governance and performance measurement.

Hans de Jong

Title of his keynote presentation: Changing external success factors and challenges facing Ventures in the growth phase” Hans de Jong will speak about the influence of growing and changing external success factors in the growth phase of Ventures. Aspects such as availability of talent, societal and political involvement and support, integral scoping, eco-systems, and time will be addressed” 

Hans de Jong has, until 2021, had a professional career in various management roles within Royal Philips. In his last role, he was responsible for Philips in the Netherlands. Presently he is active in various supervisory roles and boards, both in the High tech sector but also in the (social) societal area. Recently, he was appointed as a special envoy for the Dutch government to manage the Talent chapter of the Beethoven program for the Semiconductor Industry”.  

Aukje Hassoldt

Johannes Leitner

Johannes Leitner is the co-founder and Managing Partner at LM Political Risk and Strategy Advisory in Vienna, Austria, with over 15 years of expertise in geostrategy, trade compliance, geo/political risk management, and global business strategy. He also serves as the academic director of the EMBA program in International Management at the University of Applied Science for Economy, Management, and Finance in Vienna. Additionally, he is an accomplished author and editor, frequently leading panels at international conferences. He received his PhD from the Vienna University of Economics and Business, graduated in International Business Studies at the Vienna University of Economics and Business, and in Southeast European Studies at the University of Vienna. In addition, he was a visiting scholar at the Stockholm School of Economics.

Patricia Klopf

Patricia Klopf is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Strategic Management & Entrepreneurship at the Rotterdam School of Management. She holds a PhD in Global Strategy and an MSc in Economics from Vienna University of Economics and Business (WU Vienna). She also spent some time as a visiting scholar at the Villanova School of Business (Pennsylvania, USA).

In addition to her academic pursuits, Patricia has hands-on experience: Most notably, she had ventured into the private sector to work for a Dutch platform scale-up. There, she built the public affairs domain from scratch and supported strategic decision-making, including international market entry decisions.

Patricia's work focuses on the critical intersection of business and politics, exploring how companies navigate and influence their political environments through strategies such as lobbying. Her work is particularly relevant in today's era of geopolitical tensions, offering valuable insights into strategic management amidst complex and dynamic political landscapes.

Manuel Mendigutia

Manuel Mendigutia is Senior strategy adviser and Programme coordinator at the European Innovation Council (EIC) of the European Commission.

He works in the design and management of the Business Acceleration Services of the European Innovation Council (EIC), a +10Billion€ initiative under Horizon Europe supporting  top-class innovators, entrepreneurs, small companies and scientists with bright ideas and the ambition to scale up internationally. The EIC provides funding in grants and equity, coaching and business acceleration opportunities for those at cutting edge of innovation.

In the EIC, Manuel manages the EIC Corporate Partnership Programme, flagship programme that bridge the gap between EIC awardees and the largest corporations since 2017.

With more than 20 years of experience in the European arena, Manuel has developed his professional career in the fields of economic development and business innovation.

Manuel holds a degree in economics from the University of Salamanca with specialization in European affairs in the University of Leuven and a Master in International Business Economics from the Leuven School of Business and Economics. He also holds a diploma from the Spanish diplomatic school.

André Convents

Andre Convents is Section Head for Connect+Develop and intrapreneur at Procter Gamble. With 20 years of international experience at P&G, he led global multi-functional technology and innovation initiatives. He is an open innovation expert with extensive hands-on management of strategic alliances and collaborations across universities, companies and institutes. He is the leader of the open innovation program in a $15 Billion BU business unit.

With a keen interest in team collaboration, he led global culture change initiatives to enable organizational transformation in a large organization. As passionate innovator, he led both intrapreneurial new business initiatives and global and regional collaborations with SME’s. He is co-founder of inQbet to enable exponential technology and organization approaches in P&G.

He is currently also Vice President of the Belgian Industrial Research and Development Association and other associations. With a PhD from the Vrije Unversiteit Brussel he is inventor or author of more than 30 patents or peer reviewed journals. He is also co-founder of several startups.

Vareska van de Vrande

Vareska van de Vrande is Professor of Collaborative Innovation and Business Venturing at the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University (RSM)

Vareska joined RSM in 2007 after completing a PhD in Industrial Engineering and Management Science at the Eindhoven University of Technology. Her expertise focuses on the areas of corporate venturing and collaborative innovation, including external technology sourcing, corporate venture capital investments, strategic alliances, and corporate-startup collaboration. Other research interests include (corporate) entrepreneurship, patents, and venture capital. She has published articles in leading academic journals, including the Journal of Operations Management, Strategic Management Journal, Research Policy, the Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal, the Journal of Product Innovation Management, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, and the Journal of Business Venturing. At RSM, Vareska teaches courses and modules in Strategic Management and Corporate Venturing at the graduate and post-experience level.

In addition, Vareska is also the Academic Lead at Erasmus Enterprise and a certified LEGO SERIOUS PLAY facilitator.

Chiara Parisi

Chiara is a Senior Data Analyst at Techleap, where she leads internal and ecosystem reporting to support Dutch startups in scaling. She co-authored State of Dutch Tech 2024 and 2025, providing key insights for founders and policymakers. Previously, she worked in procurement analytics at AniCura (part of Mars Veterinary Health) and held various data-focused roles. Chiara specializes in structuring and modeling data to optimize analytics workflows, reporting automation, and data visualization. She holds a master’s degree in Policy Economics from Erasmus University Rotterdam.

Guus Verhees

Reinout vander Meûlen

Reinout vander Meulen is partner at TIN Capital, a leading European cybersecurity VC firm. His technical background, cybersecurity domain expertise and entrepreneurial roots enabled TIN Capital to fund rising stars such as EYE Security (NL),  Probely (PT, exit to Snyk), Egerie (FR), SignPath (AT) and 10+ other European privacy & cybersecurity startups. 

Reinout has a deep understanding of the intricacies and dynamics of the cybersecurity space. Combined with a relevant network based on trust, it gets TIN Capital preferred access to funding opportunities in some of the most exciting startups on the continent.

Francesco Di Lorenzo

Francesco Di Lorenzo is an Associate Professor in Strategy and Entrepreneurship at Copenhagen Business School in the department of Strategy and Innovation. He holds an MPhil and PhD in Management Science from ESADE Business School, a BA and an MSc in Business and Economics from Bocconi University. Before starting the academic carrier, Dr. Di Lorenzo worked as consultant for McKinsey&Co. and Accenture Strategy, focusing primarily on M&As operations in financial services. Dr. Di Lorenzo’s main research interests are in the areas of venture financing, technology strategy, strategic human capital, impact investing, primarily developed in the pharmaceutical and semiconductor industries and got published in leading strategy and entrepreneurship journals. Francesco is also an active economic and strategy consultant (also, research associate in Nordic Human Capital Advisory) and a former entrepreneur.

Title of his speech:
CVC and venture technology strategy: evidences and performance implications

Summary:
Beyond classical VC investing, Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) is a critical source of resources and assets acquisition for new ventures. A solid empirical tradition in the last decade has provide strong evidences to support the idea that both investee ventures and corporate investors benefits from their equity-based agreements, in terms of financial returns and innovation productivity. Yet, how CVC investors impact ventures’ technology strategy and what are the implications for ventures’ technological outcomes of CVCs are still under-studied questions. The talk will provide a sample research-driven overview on what has been recently done in this space up to date and what are relevant issues to keep exploring.

Helen Kardan

Jitse Duijsters

Jitse Duijsters is an Assistant Professor in Innovation Management & Strategy at the University of Groningen. He has completed his PhD on the topic of Corporate Venturing at RSM. Jitse’s research interests lie at the intersection of strategic management and entrepreneurship. He is interested in topics such as corporate entrepreneurship, venture capital, corporate innovation, organizational misconduct and social evaluations, inter-organizational relationships, and (change in) social networks.

Martijn Scholtes

Martijn Scholtes is Head of the Rabobank Corporate Venturing team. His team invests in early-stage Fintech companies with the aim to accelerate the innovation agenda of the bank. Martijn has over 20 years’ experience in different roles within Rabobank ranging from Mergers & Acquisitions, Leveraged Finance, Turnaround Equity and Group Finance.  He started the corporate venture capital activity of Rabobank in 2017 and was responsible for multiple spin-outs, fintech partnerships and VC fund investments. He is also member of the Innovation Board, overseeing new innovation projects at Rabobank. Martijn lives in Rotterdam, proud father of two adolescents and enjoys spending time with family and outdoor activities.

Caroline Witte

Caroline Witte is an assistant professor at the department of Strategic Management and Entrepreneurship. Her research interest cover international business, strategy and development economics. She is particularly interested in how firms manage their business in in fragile economies. In her research, she asks: ‘How can firms in fragile economies take advantage of a volatile institutional context?’ And more generally: ‘How can firms exploit the opportunities created by risk, uncertainty and discontinuous shocks?’.

Before joining RSM, Caroline was assistant professor of strategy and international management at the Department of Strategy and Innovation of the Copenhagen Business School. She has a PhD from the Erasmus School of Economics. Her PhD disseration was awarded the prestigious Dissertation Award of the International Management Division of the Academy of Management.

Siska van Houdt

Driven and enthusiastic professional with extensive financial-economic and strategic experience in SMEs both domestically and internationally, across various stages of development (start-ups, scale-ups, and mature SMEs). Business valuator with a strong sense of social return and impact.

Manager of Participations & Financing at LIOF, the regional development agency of Limburg (NL). LIOF implements the regional economic policy for the province of Limburg on behalf of the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy and the Province of Limburg.

Member of the Supervisory Board of Chemelot Ventures and the Investment Advisory Board of BVP Fund IV.

Master’s degree in Business Engineering from K.U. Leuven (Belgium), Registered Valuator, and member of the National Institute of Registered Valuators (NIRV)

Christopher Sabel

Dr. Christopher Sabel is an Assistant Professor in Strategy and Entrepreneurship at RSM in the department of Strategic Management and Entrepreneurship. He holds a Ph.D. from BI Norwegian Business School and an MSc from Stockholm School of Economics. Before starting an academic career, Christopher worked as a consultant for Monitor Deloitte, focusing on commercial strategy and M&A in the pharmaceutical industry. Christopher’s main research interests are in corporate-startup collaboration, particularly focusing on employee allocation, corporate venture capital investments, and corporate spinouts. Christopher is also very interested in hearing about startup M&A, so chat him up if this is of interest to you too!

Workshop: Corporate Venture Capital: Which investment practices generate value for startups?

Corporates often struggle to communicate their value to startups and are sometimes even perceived as “too dangerous” to partner with. However, some approaches to venture investing do unlock more value for startups than others. This session brings practitioners and academics together to discuss how corporates can impact ventures and to discuss practical approaches for how managers can make their corporate venture capital more attractive for startups and venture capitalists.