Buildcast

For this episode, we brought together the leaders of two companies we’ve had the pleasure of working with recently: Plan A’s Lubomila Jordanova and Recup’s Florian Pachaly. Both share a commitment to sustainability, and work towards this through innovation and entrepreneurship. We discussed the importance of sustainable innovation, and how companies can supercharge their sustainability efforts.

Christian Knörle leads Forward 31, Porsche Digital’s digital company builder. He is an expert in business building, corporate strategy, and marketing and sales, particularly in the automobile space, and he has previously worked at Daimler. We caught up with him to find out exactly how Forward 31 goes about building ventures, and compared notes on the future of automotive innovation.

LabTwin, a company building a voice assistant for use in laboratory environments, was built by BCG Digital Ventures and Sartorius in 2019. Since then, the company has seen a wealth of success and progress. We checked in with co-founders Magdalena Paluch and Steffen Gloth to talk about what they’ve learned from building LabTwin, working on a corporate innovation project, and the future of technology in the research sector.

Florian Gamper has been Chief Technology Officer at a variety of companies, and is a former Engineering Director of BCG Digital Ventures. We caught up with him to talk through what corporates need to consider when building technical products and businesses, and considered the current state of tech-led innovation in Europe.

Jakob Fricke is an innovator working within the automotive sector. Currently at door2door, an innovation partner for the future of public transport, Jakob has previously worked in corporate innovation for Samsung Next and Daimler. We caught up with him to talk about how the automotive industry might look over the next decade, what he’s learned about working in industry-leading companies, and his personal attitude to experimentation and technology.

Alexandra is an author, consultant, public speaker, entrepreneur and designer living in London. At the forefront thinking around the Internet of Things, Alexandra has founded companies, designed products, and written two books, the most recent titled Creating a Culture of Innovation. We cover the development of IoT, the most important skill for designers, and how to create a culture of innovation.

We hear a lot about start-up innovation - inspiring stories from inexperienced entrepreneurs with nothing but an idea and a dream who go on to change the world. In the second season of Buildcast, we're checking in with intrapreneurs - innovators changing the game from within the businesses that shape the world we live in. We'll uncover what happens when a start-up mindset meets corporate culture and what separates firms on the verge of extinction from those that will survive into the next century.

The COVID-19 crisis changing the way we live and work, and having a huge impact on technology and business. With this in mind, we’re putting out a series of short Buildcast episodes covering how different sectors are responding. For this episode, DV's Sid Shah caught up with Rob Derow to talk about the impact the crisis has had on marketing. Their conversation covers the rapid shift to e-commerce, lower digital advertising costs, and what companies should focus on right now.

The COVID-19 crisis changing the way we live and work, and having a huge impact on technology and business. With this in mind, we’re putting out a series of short Buildcast episodes covering how different sectors are responding. For this episode, DV's Sid Shah caught up with Beth Viner to talk about the impact the crisis is having on consumer behavior, the long-term implications for how we buy products, and how companies can use their purpose to respond to the crisis and rebound on the other side.

The COVID-19 crisis changing the way we live and work, and having a huge impact on technology and business. With this in mind, we’re putting out a series of short Buildcast episodes covering how different sectors are responding. For this episode, host Sid Shah caught up with Nate Beyor to talk about how the healthcare sector is using technology to respond to the crisis, and the potential digital solutions offer for improving experiences for patients. Sign up for the next MIT COVID-19 hackathon here: https://covid19challenge.mit.edu/

Alison Rushworth is an experienced digital consultant with a track record of driving business value through innovation, customer strategy and experience design. With more than 20 years of experience in product/service design and digital strategy, Alison is a recognised expert in human behaviour. We caught up with Alison to talk designers as leaders, what design approaches can bring to building companies, and how to approach new technologies.

Ella Rabener has a proven track record of entrepreneurship in the fintech sector, having played a key role in the launch and development of wealth management platform Scalable Capital before joining DV as Partner and Managing Director. She has also founded and led companies in the furniture and fashion sectors, including Westwing.ru, and is currently a managing director and partner at BCGDV, where she’s responsible primarily for fintech. We sat down with Ella to talk about the current state of innovation in the finance sector, covering the new offerings from the big tech companies, how legacy financial institutions can innovate, and the role startups can play in pushing finance forward.

Markus Mutz is currently CEO of OpenSC, an impact venture built by DV in partnership with the World Wildlife Fund for Nature that uses advanced technology to enable more sustainable, ethical, and profitable supply chains. Before OpenSC, Markus was a Venture Architect Director at DV, where he worked in both Berlin and Sydney. We caught up with Markus to talk about the potential of social venturing and the importance of transparency.

Amaryllis Liampoti is currently Partner and Director of Growth at DV, where she’s led the growth operations of several DV ventures. She has previously worked at Rocket Internet and co-founded camping booking platform Campsy.com. We caught up with her to talk about the future of growth tactics and achieving traction, and get her advice to new entrepreneurs.

Buildcast is a brand new podcast brought to you by BCG Digital Ventures. We talk to a diverse set of guests, from CEOs and engineers to designers and product managers, about their experiences building businesses. For this episode, we sat down with Calvin Hung. Calvin has worked for some of Silicon Valley’s fastest-growing startups, Disney, and Yahoo. Now he’s in Berlin, building companies with BCGDV. We caught up with him to talk blockchain ventures, the Chinese technology scene, and why he describes himself as an ‘accidental PM’.

Buildcast is a brand new podcast brought to you by BCG Digital Ventures. We talk to a diverse set of guests, from CEOs and engineers to designers and product managers, about their experiences building businesses. For this episode, we sat down with Yael Biran. We talk to Yael about her varied career, in which she's worked for AirBnB and Octopus Now, and also started her own company, Flag. We cover the different attitudes to building companies all over the world, and talk about her recent experience building social impact ventures.

Buildcast is a brand new podcast brought to you by BCG Digital Ventures. We talk to a diverse set of guests, from CEOs and engineers to designers and product managers, about their experiences building businesses. For this episode, we sat down with Arndt Roller. Arndt has been building businesses since the early days of the commercial Internet. We spoke to him about how he sees digital as a means to an end, his time leading Europe's largest online dating service, and what drives him today.

Buildcast is a brand new podcast brought to you by BCG Digital Ventures. We talk to a diverse set of guests, from CEOs and engineers to designers and product managers, about their experiences building businesses. Our first season focuses on the European startup ecosystem. For this episode, we sat down with Jasson Schrock. Jasson has an impressive CV, having worked on YouTube just after its acquisition by Google and then on Google News in its early days. We talked to him about how design impacts business, his experience building companies, and what he thinks is the most important factor in success or failure.

Buildcast is a brand new podcast brought to you by BCG Digital Ventures. Each episode we sit down with CEOs and entrepreneurs, designers and engineers with a diverse set of backgrounds. The thing they have in common: a desire to build. We talk to them about a company or product they’ve built, how they went about it, and what they learned along the way. In our first series, we’ll cover Europe’s first online dating service, the early days of YouTube, building social ventures--and so much more. Stay tuned for stories of entrepreneurship, innovation, and technology from the forefront of venture building.