I have over 20 years of experience working with internationally successful companies like Scania, Boliden, SCA/Essity and Autoliv/Veoneer. This has given me a strong knowledge of different industries, markets, positions and insight from working with people from different cultural backgrounds. Independent of industry, size or geography all great businesses have one thing in common; You need great people to succeed.

Great people are not necessary overachievers with the best education. To me great people are and remain curious. They want to learn from others and to understand better. They want to innovate and develop, to try new things and new ways and to learn from different cultures. Meeting all these fantastic and curious entrepreneurs on a daily basis is truly living my dream. Our shared knowledge and curiosity to learn from each other will help us create tomorrow’s most successful companies.

New York, 2007. I was about to start Mediaplanet from scratch in one of the most competitive markets in the world. I thought I knew exactly what to do and how to do it. What became my biggest challenge was handling the stream of small failures and successes. Keeping the drive, focus and hope for me, for a newly recruited organization, for my family and for everyone else was a daunting task.

Starting a new business is like a twelve-round boxing match but with a new fighter to face in every round. Failures and setbacks will give you new opportunities and new chances to succeed. We became cash flow positive within a year, quickly grew revenue and opened six offices in North America. My family and I ended up staying in the U.S. for ten years.

What I admire most about entrepreneurs isn’t their ability to come up with great ideas, but the mental strength and tenacity to execute them. It is a mental game that requires exceptional strength. In order to succeed you must learn to fail successfully.

I grew up working on our family farm. In the beginning I was watching, studying and learning what the older farmers were doing. When I was old enough my father and his foreman let me try different tasks on my own. They started by showing us, then supervising us and teaching us what was important or dangerous. Eventually I knew the farm and the work by heart, finding my own ways to improve on it.

I apply the same philosophy to our portfolio companies. We know how to help companies in an early stage take the next step. We know what is important and the dangers when you scale a company. A young company will not get the help they need from a couple of hours with an industrial advisor. Discussing IPR and next round strategies is not enough.

From my experience a company needs someone to just do it, so they can see, learn and experience what the next step is all about.

Working this way gives me a sense of fulfilment, helping others take the next step and grow, in what becomes our common journey.

Then and now; 16 investments, two IPOs and three +100 MEUR companies later…

I am a long-time investment banker but also an entrepreneur. I love numbers and I know the financial markets. But my passion has always been entrepreneurship. Meeting with and talking to successful entrepreneurs, discussing business models and development opportunities is what makes my job fun.

I find myself in the middle and I get enormous satisfaction in being able to translate between entrepreneurs and financiers. When these two worlds meet it gets really exciting.

Many entrepreneurs spend too much time chasing cash, keeping investors happy or trying to secure the next round of financing. This contributes close to nothing when it comes to developing the business, often in a critical phase where every hour of the day, every sales call or R&D meeting can make a difference.

As an investor, byWiT does not invest and disappear, hoping for success and a possible future equity round at a higher valuation. We are in this together with the entrepreneurs. We love to share responsibilities and work loads, making sure that we use all resources where they are most needed and set a long-term financing plan. Every journey will have its ups and downs and working through it together we can secure a strong partnership and reduce stress. We are fully committed to every investment and only by rolling up our sleeves can we secure a higher success rate.

Something magical happens when you connect the right people with the right idea. I have dedicated a great deal of my life and career in search of these innovative ideas. Through my work I have been able to help turn good ideas into great ones. This happens when you find the right partners and the right investors.

I have helped facilitate big deals and worked with fund raising activities on an international level. I have also played an active part in post-investment activities aimed at supporting new businesses by providing base investment and entering non-domestic markets. I have experience working with Fraser, MTG, Bonnier, SEAF, META Group and RNB.

With a long experience I have developed my own set of specialities: Investments, ICT, IT and related industries, transportation, green technology, sustainable innovations, open innovations, crowdsourcing, crowdfunding. My work with byWiT allows me to do what I really love: to use my skills to help grow businesses and ideas.

On a clear, brisk Wednesday morning thirty-five years ago, every resident of Lincoln Park Drive awoke to find a brown paper bag on their doorstep with the words “CAN-DO RECYCLING” stamped in bright blue letters on the side with instructions to: “FILL THE BAG WITH NEWSPAPERS, ALUMINUM AND GLASS. LEAVE OUTSIDE ON SATURDAY MORNINGS.”

Today we take recycling for granted.  But in 1986 there were no recycling bins or recycling pick-ups and scrap prices were high.  There was, however, a motivated ten-year-old who spied a new market and opportunity to build a successful business and help the planet at the same time.

That first Saturday there were only a handful of bags. I was discouraged, but the following Wednesday, the new paper bags that materialized on doorsteps had a copied note that added: “Recycling is good for the environment and CAN-DO will donate one-third of proceeds to the Wesselman Park Nature Center.”

Voila!  On Saturday almost everyone in the neighborhood left a full bag in front of their door.  We quickly scaled up—to Oak Street, Gum Street, and Cherry Street.

But homes weren’t the only source of recyclables in Evansville.  The motherlode of aluminum cans was the type of house that didn’t respond to a stamped paper bag and a note—fraternity houses, at the University of Evansville.  I learned that sifting through their dumpsters, although lucrative, was perilous and time-consuming.  With a couple of knocks on back doors, I negotiated with the fraternities, and now we were making two trips to the recycling center every Sunday instead of one.

Sometimes, great start-ups are victimized by their own success.  Everyone loved the idea—including our state government, which orchestrated a hostile takeover of my recycling business by providing everyone in Evansville with a recycling bin and free weekly pick-up service.  I never stood a chance.

I lost my “Can-Do Recycling” business, but the spirit of Can-Do infuses my approach here at byWiT with every new opportunity.  I work to build companies that create new markets through digitalization.  My years of working in investment banking means I approach every challenge in a structured and quantitative manner, but I love getting my hands dirty  to build durable businesses that can live on. 

September 2001, a few months after graduating from high school I decided to start a job and turn my hobby into 9 to 5 by designing interactive websites and multimedia products in the early days of web 2.0. Without prior knowledge and experience, I had to meet with founders and business owners and transform their requirements into tangible, viable digital products in the age of TV and magazines. Shortly after, I began freelancing and changed to complete projects 24/7, also introduced mini CDs to my product offering in order to maximize the profit. But only a year later I faced a big challenge, there were only 24 hours in a day! I spent so many physical hours at work and my lack of experience prevented me from understanding that way of working was not scalable anymore.

Fast forward 20+ years later. After co-founding a startup with an exit and helping 10 different startups with their growth journey, I learned growth has many layers. It starts with the foundation for any business, which is normally about achieving the product and service-market fit. But while building the foundation you should already plan to add the next layers to achieve long term sustainable growth.

I truly believe that you can not hack your way into growth because it is a scientific and measurable approach that is highly data-driven. At byWit we work together with our portfolio companies to implement a customer-centric growth process that test hypothesis, discovers insights, produces results, and increase sales. It’s all about the numbers!