You have more than 2 decades of professional experience. What were the most important waypoints in your career?
I studied mechanical engineering and worked in aerospace engineering because I was always interested in technology. Coming from the engineering world, I also had an affinity for process control and organization. This led me to the first important waypoint in my career, when I left the world of engineering to go into management consulting working for PwC and IBM. Leading projects and coordinating with different stakeholders from clients, vendors/contractors and the own firm was my daily business. The second important milestone was when I switched from my consulting role to the investment world.

Why that switch?
Beyond engineering and technology, I also had a keen interest in finance and economics. I decided to do an MBA, which is not only a good opportunity to improve your skills and grow personally, but also for a career switch. This is why I ended up joining Goldman Sachs and later Deutsche Bank in London. I worked in investment banking with a focus on financial institutions. Our team did classic corporate finance work like mergers and acquisitions and capital market transactions. It was a very intense period, particularly around the financial crisis, when people got fired all around me while I had a young family and worked 80 hours per week.

How does one endure so much pressure?
First of all, you need a wife that is willing to take part in this. But it is also clear that you need grit and a true fascination, an internal motivation to do the work. In this environment, nobody pats you on the back and tells you what a great job you did. The only feedback you get is your bonus (and they came down across the industry during the financial crisis), that’s it.

What did you find fascinating about corporate finance?
Raising capital or buying firms is a very fundamental process for a company. In a big investment bank, you are working for very large companies and are in direct contact with top management and the decision-makers in the capital market. Through the capital markets you receive immediate feedback on how your work benefits your clients. And finally, you also get to work with very smart and ambitious people.

After some time you changed jobs and joined the Qatar Investment Authority.
Yes, this was the third big waypoint in my career, the switch from an advisory role to a buy side role at the heart of taking investment decisions. It was a fascinating opportunity because when I joined, QIA was still a young organization. It was founded only in 2006 as a sovereign wealth fund to invest the reserves from the trade surplus of the Qatari state to preserve its wealth for future generations. It was like joining a startup with an unfathomable balance sheet. At QIA I built a private equity investment platform for the financial institutions portfolio.

How is life as an expat in Qatar?
This was the big unknown for us before we moved. It was actually quite comfortable. I lived with my family in a compound that had everything: playgrounds, swimming pools, tennis courts, a supermarket, a club house with restaurant, etc., but it was a very artificial way of life. I found it very exciting to get to know another culture, and my wife and sons even learned Arabic. After almost six years we decided to come back to Switzerland because we wanted our kids to grow up in Europe.

You joined a company called Legend Holding. Why?
Legend is the holding company founded by Liu Chuanzhi. You might not be familiar with this name, but in China, he is a very prominent private entrepreneur and role model. Mr. Liu originally worked as a computer scientist before becoming an entrepreneur in the 1980s. He started to manufacture computers under the Legend brand and grew this business successfully. Later, when it became known as Lenovo and IBM’s global PC business was acquired, it gained the worldwide status that it has today. While Legend Holdings is still a major shareholder of Lenovo, it started to diversify its business away from IT around the year 2000. In 2015 its overseas office, responsible for all strategic direct investments outside of China, was established in Zurich. To work for Legend Holdings was an exciting opportunity. Our first big investment was taking over Banque Internationale de Luxembourg for EUR 1.5 billion.

After working for these investment behemoths, QIA and Legend, you joined a firm that is a bit smaller, Verve Ventures. What was the reason for your decision?
I was determined to start my own business, but then I learned about the Constructive Venture Fund project at Verve Ventures. I realized that this would be very close to what I intended to do on my own, but that I could build on an existing platform and infrastructure. For me, this was the opportunity that I was looking for where I can combine and build on the components which I developed in my career thus far. I have an affinity to engineering and technology, I worked on digitalization projects and I have significant investment know-how. Besides, I was involved in launching Homegate and Swissquote at the start of my career. This is why I think Swiss Immo Lab is an ideal fit for me.

What is the goal of Constructive Venture Fund?
We started CVF as a shared corporate venturing program of up to 5 companies. We want to bring companies and startups that are related to real estate together and create an ecosystem that benefits all of them. We will provide capital to startups, but also access to the companies and their networks. The companies can become pilot customers or act as enablers for the startup, this is a much closer connection than a traditional VC fund could bring. The companies themselves profit by being close to innovation as well as the ideas and talent of the startups.

What is the difference between Constructive Venture Fund and a normal corporate venturing program?
A company that wants to start a corporate venturing program usually has to hire somebody from the outside to run it and it takes a lot of time to get it going. But Constructive Venture Fund can rely on the expertise of a dozen investment professionals at Verve Ventures, a deal flow that is already well established, and the entire infrastructure for venture capital investing that is in place. Verve Ventures as external investment manager combined with professional governance ensures independence and agility, which is important in the fast-moving startup world. And the benefit of joining forces, combining networks and expertise as well as being able to better diversify the investment risk is obvious. Moreover, Swiss Immo Lab can offer access to more diverse networks and competencies than one company alone.

Constructive Venture Fund was officially launched on the 6th of December 2019. How did the start go?
Already on the following day we were contacted by potential additional partners that were interested in joining SIL. This immediately validated the hypothesis that our offering is attractive for more than just the founding companies, and it confirms the solid reputation Verve Ventures has in the startup world. One person who wrote to me explained that they’ve been thinking about corporate venturing for some time and had planned to do it on their own but that they realized how much faster everything would go if they joined SIL.

What kind of startups does Constructive Venture Fund plan to invest in?
We want to work with startups that accelerate innovation in all areas related to real estate, including development and construction, property and facility management, financing, insuring, furniture, appliances, building technology, network/telecommunication and energy and utilities. They can be active in fields as diverse as building materials, analysis software, property management, marketplaces, construction or smart cities. We’re scouting first and foremost in Switzerland and Europe.

What happens when the money the initial companies have committed is invested?
With the first phase that has started in 2019, we want to build a track record. Once this is done, hopefully in the next one to two years, we intend to launch the second phase and onboard other investors such as family offices and other institutional investors. Our medium-term goal is to get Swiss Immo Lab to an investment volume of CHF 50 to 100 million and establish it as the go-to proptech venture capital investor in Europe.

You’ve seen many different work environments in your life. How does working at Verve Ventures in Zurich compare to, say, working with investment banking hotshots in London?
I’ve never been in a workplace where people work together in such a hands on, constructive and at the same time professional manner. The caliber of people Verve Ventures is able to attract as a small and young firm is astonishing, and they lack the arrogance you sometimes see in environments that are full of intelligent and ambitious people. Moreover, the diversity of backgrounds here is not only refreshing but it truly forms the basis for the effectiveness of the team. I find this quite impressive.