Members of the Board
Nicolas Brien – President of the Board
Chairman of the Management Board at EuraTechnologies.
Nicolas Brien is Chairman of the Management Board at EuraTechnologies, Europe’s biggest incubator. Since 2020, he has presided the European Startup Network, Europe’s most influential tech industry group, representing startups in Brussels . Mr Brien sits on the Board of many companies and foundations, such as Tilder or France Alzheimer. From 2016 to 2021, he led France Digitale, Europe’s largest Startup organization with 2000+ startup members and 100+ VC. Prior to joining the digital ecosystem, he ran the Direction of Studies at Kantar-TNS Sofres (WPP) and was a senior advisor to Najat Vallaud-Belkacem (Spokeswoman of the French Government).
Nicolas holds a master degree from Columbia University’ SIPA. He regularly contributes to the global conversation on tech policies through op-eds in global media (such as Sifted, Tech.eu, LesEchos,…) and keynotes speeches at international Tech events (such as the FutureProof Summit, Startup Nation Summit, CEBIT, BlockForum Vilnius or the Young EuroMediterranean Leaders Summit).
Markus Raunig – Austrian Startups
CEO of AustrianStartups and founder of sponsor.bar.
Markus Raunig is the CEO of AustrianStartups – a non-profit platform that promotes entrepreneurship in Austria. He is leading a distributed team of 50 people all over the country and stays in close contact with all relevant stakeholders in the startup ecosystem. Before taking over at AustrianStartups in January 2017, Markus founded his own startup sponsor.bar, organized Europe’s largest student startup conference Entrepreneurship Avenue and worked closely with several successful international startups during the Pioneers Challenge.
Ned Dervenkov – BESCO
CEO and Board Member at BESCO
Ned has significant experience in customer discovery, customer development, sales and after sales management, product-market fit analysis, early stage strategising, managing micro to small teams, stakeholder management, funding, prospecting and generic digital marketing know-how. Furthermore, he has a proven track record in customer funnel building and delivered one of the most successful crowdfunding campaigns in Bulgaria. He is experienced in government to business relationships, governmental and institutional technology consultancy, international affairs and policy making, lobbying and assessing macro economical impact. He also participated in the creation of several laws impacting the entrepreneurial ecosystem in Bulgaria.
Tomas Zhang Mathiesen – Danish Startup Group (DSG)
Founder & Chairman of DSG.
Tomas is the founder and Chairman of DSG – a non profit organization in Copenhagen to engage their members and community in a variety of events, workshops and social networking opportunities within the Danish startup/entrepreneurial scene. Tomas also works full-time in PriceWaterHouseCoopers (PwC) where he has a Manager position and working within software implementation, ISAE declaration and automation/RPA projects. Tomas enjoys listening to podcasts, playing soccer, volunteering activities and traveling with friends and families.
Matthias Zwingli – Swiss Startup Association
Project Manager Startup Enablement at Digital Switzerland.
Matthias connects startups, corporates, investors and hubs as a Startup Ecosystem Builder. At present, he works for Digital Switzerland, an organization that comprises more than 150 leading companies, organizations, academia and politics to achieve its mission to establish Switzerland as a leading European digital-innovation hub.
Hajdi Cenan – CROAI
VP at Croatian AI Association and President at Croatian Startup Association
Hajdi is co-founder & CEO of the AI startup airt. Before airt, she was the Executive Director of the most awarded Croatian digital agency DRAP, to which she came after holding numerous positions in the leading media company EPH, including Director of Sales and Marketing and Director of tourism publishing. Hajdi was named among the top 100 most influential businesswomen in Croatia, nominated for the Veuve Clicquot Business Woman Award, and listed among the top 100 most important STEM entrepreneurs in Croatia. She also serves as the VP of the Croatian AI Association and has most recently co-founded Croatian Startup Ecosystem Association (Cro Startup) where she serves as the President.
David Hanf – German Startup Association
Co-Founder & Chairman of German Startup Association
David is CFO / Managing Director of thermondo.de, Germany’s largest B2C heat service company with more than 600 employees. Before Thermondo, he has been part of building smava.de, Germany’s leading online loan marketplace, as Managing Director, CFO/COO. David is an internet entrepreneur with a management background in strategy, finance, venture capital, and business intelligence. Before smava, he worked in Venture Capital. He co-founded the German Startup Association and is an active Angel Investor.