Private Equity and M&A Community

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Conference Co-Chair
Senior Counsel,  Reed Smith LLP,  Munich

Christian von Sydow advises clients on corporate law, M&A, private equity, restructuring, corporate conflict resolution and estate planning. He has represented a large number of international and German clients, including strategic and financial investors, in acquisitions and sales of businesses in Germany and internationally in cross-border matters. Mr. von Sydow represents clients in a wide variety of industries, including automotive supply, consumer electronics, defence, energy, internet, optics, publishing, retail, software, technology and testing technology, travel and tourism.

Conference Co-Chair
Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Munich

Dr. Nikolaus von Jacobs advises private equity funds and German strategic players on private equity, venture capital and private and public mergers and acquisitions.

Before joining Reed Smith, he was a partner at an international law firm and headed its German private equity practice. He has also worked in investment banking and European capital markets for Merrill Lynch in London.

University Professor and Dean, University of Augsburg

Gregor Kirchhof, born in 1971, has held the Chair of Public Law, Financial Law and Tax Law at the University of Augsburg since 2012, where he is also the Director of the Institute for Business and Tax Law. He is currently also the The Dean of the Faculty of Law. After studying in Freiburg and Munich, obtaining a Master of Laws in the London Law Program at the University of Notre Dame (USA), and passing the examination to become a specialist lawyer for tax law, he held the professorship for constitutional and administrative law at LMU in Munich. Gregor Kirchhof’s main research areas lie in constitutional law, tax and financial law, public commercial law, and the fundamentals of the European Union. Gregor Kirchhof was a Fellow at the Forschungskolleg normative Gesellschaftsgrundlagen research facility in Bonn, and is amongst other things a member of the scientific advisory board of the Deutsche Steuerjuristischen Gesellschaft (German tax law society), of the Munich Unternehmenssteuerforum (company tax forum), of the Strategic Advisory Board of Die Familienunternehmer (Family Entrepreneurs) as well as of the Board of Directors of the Munich European Conference.

Conference Co-Chair
Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Munich

Dr. Nikolaus von Jacobs advises private equity funds and German strategic players on private equity, venture capital and private and public mergers and acquisitions.
Before joining Reed Smith, he was a partner at an international law firm and headed its German private equity practice. He has also worked in investment banking and European capital markets for Merrill Lynch in London.

Legal Counsel, Head of Gimv Germany, Munich

Schahin Haghani joined Gimv in March 2023 as a Legal Counsel for our Munich office. His focus will be on the German deals and portfolio. 

Prior to joining Gimv, Schahin was a partner in a leading German law firm advising international clients on M&A transactions. He has over 20 years of experience in national and cross-border transactions. 

Schahin Haghani graduated at University of Freiburg and holds a Master in Mergers & Acquisitions (LL.M.) from the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management. 

Partner, HWF Partners

Philipp is a Partner at HWF, who leads HWF’s offering in the German speaking countries and supports the US team with its expansion in North America. He has a wealth of knowledge in placing bespoke transactional risk insurance products (W&I, tax, contingent) in the context of M&A transactions. Philipp is regarded as a leading broker and clients value his commercial approach and technical excellence.

Philipp and his teams have advised on numerous complex transactions and have been able to spearhead innovative developments in the market.

Philipp is a trained lawyer, admitted in Germany and the USA. He is fluent in German and English.

Prior to joining HWF, Philipp spent several years as an attorney with leading international law firms in Germany and the United States and advised German and international clients on all aspects of corporate law, takeover law, and in connection with M&A transactions. In particular with respect to national and cross-border transactions. His focus has been on private equity and venture capital transactions over the previous years.

Managing Director, DC Advisory

Philipp is a Managing Director in DC Advisory's Frankfurt team covering the Industrials sector.

Philipp started his investment banking career in 2001 with Deutsche Bank and later spent several years with ABN AMRO / RBS and Commerzbank. Philipp is also registered as an attorney at law.

CEO, Partner & Co-Founder, OMMAX

Toni is the CEO and a partner at OMMAX, responsible for the overall development and strategy of the company and its finances, as well as leading OMMAX on its mission to build digital leaders. Toni advises numerous international corporations and medium-sized companies on digital transformation, having led over 500 digital projects in digital strategies, digital operational excellence, data science, and transaction advisory services throughout his 15-year career.

​He is a digital expert advising selected financial investors and has led over 150 commercial, digital, and tech due diligence projects. Having had articles published by computerwoche, CIO Magazine, IT Zoom, and more, Toni is considered one of Germany's top digital experts with a strong focus on sales, marketing, and data, supporting companies to implement and drive changes to thrive in the digital age.

​Prior to OMMAX, Toni worked among others at the global incubator company Rocket Internet, the world's leading asset manager DWS, and at Transfer Partners, a transaction management consultancy​. Toni is also an in-demand speaker at conferences and trade fairs such as SuperReturn and MuMac, a guest lecturer at universities such as Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster (WWU) and Universität Mannheim (UniMa), in addition to frequently participating in podcasts and webinars. These experiences have allowed him to share his contribution to the successful development of digital business models, and his role as a strategically thinking practitioner and pioneer of the digital consulting age.

Toni holds a M.Sc. in Accounting from the University of Mannheim (Finance, Banking and Auditing).

Managing Partner, Vidia Equity

Johanna is Founding Partner of Vidia, where she is responsible for the firm’s general strategy, co-leading the transactions team and fundraising. She founded Vidia beginning of 2021 with the aim of driving decarbonization in the industrial segment, with a focus on scaling climate solutions for the highest emitting industries in the DACH and Nordic regions. Prior to founding Vidia, she was a Partner at Orlando Management, a Munich based midmarket private equity firm. She also founded Orlando Nordics in Stockholm, successfully establishing Orlando’s presence in the Nordics. Johanna started her career in the Investment Banking Division of Goldman Sachs. Johanna studied law at Bucerius Law School in Hamburg and the University of Sydney.

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Chicago

Sid focuses his practice on mergers and acquisitions and emerging company/venture capital transactions. He has experience representing public and private companies, private equity firms, and investment and hedge funds in an array of corporate transactions, including mergers, acquisitions (both asset and stock), divestitures, financings, fund formation and general corporate matters across multiple industries. Additionally, he regularly represents founders and investors (strategic and financial) in a variety of emerging company transactions, including angel and series investments.

Managing Director and Head of Germany, Lincoln International AG

Michael provides overall strategic and operational leadership for Lincoln International’s activities in Germany, Switzerland, Austria and the Benelux region. He principals the procurement and management of clients, leads deal teams and recruits qualified personnel.

In addition to his operational roles within the firm, Michael is passionate about mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in Germany. He has 25 years of experience advising on M&A, public takeovers, fairness opinions and corporate divestitures. His clients are comprised of large corporations as well as mid-sized privately-owned businesses and leading private equity groups. Michael brings global, cross-border expertise to his projects, helping clients navigate the increasing complexity of transactions, and creating a comprehensive deal experience.

Michael is currently Vice Chairman of Shareholder Value Beteiligungen AG and Vice Chairman of the German software company, SNP SE. Michael is lecturer on the topic of M&A at the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management.

Prior to joining Lincoln International, Michael led M&A at Sal. Oppenheim (Germany), Europe’s largest private bank. Previously, he worked in the investment banking division of Citigroup Global Markets in London and Frankfurt. Michael began his career at EY.

Michael holds a doctorate in corporate finance from Fribourg University. He is a Chartered Financial Analyst in the UK.

Partner, EMERAM Capital Partners GmbH

Sven Oleownik has extensive experience in Management Consulting and M&A Advisory as well as in the Private Equity business. In addition, he was repeatedly assigned as a supervisory board member of various family-owned businesses. As such, he also trains supervisory board member as part of the Deutsche Börse qualification program.

He already financed his studies as a shareholder in a trade fair construction company, which he founded jointly with two other partners. After graduating, he began his professional career at an investment company financed by family offices. In the context of new investments and the support of portfolio companies, he also became Managing Director of a portfolio company active in the field of manufacturing industrial goods. He then spent nine years at Dr. Wieselhuber & Partner, a leading management consultancy focused on the advisory of family-owned companies, ultimately as a partner and member of the management board. Sven mainly led projects in the field of strategic development, restructuring, buy and build projects up to the integration of new acquisitions, their financing up to IPOs as well as changes of shareholders and succession. For further twelve years he was Managing Partner of Corporate Finance Advisory at Deloitte in Munich. His sector focus was primarily on consumer goods and technology companies as well as private equity. Before joining Emeram, for seven years he headed the German office of Gimv, an international private equity firm listed on the stock exchange in Brussels, building up its team and investment business in DACH.

VP, Deputy General Counsel & Corporate Secretary, EPAM Systems

Kate Pytlewski is VP, Deputy General Counsel – Global Corporate for EPAM Systems, Inc., a global, publicly traded IT services company.  Kate leads a team of legal professionals responsible for M&A and acquisition integration, corporate governance, capital markets, global subsidiary management, and other key areas for EPAM operations in 50+ countries. Prior to EPAM, Kate was Senior Corporate Counsel for a financial services company and spent eight years as a corporate associate in private practice in New York and Philadelphia.

Director, Senior Legal Counsel, Robert Bosch LLC

Heather Schroder is a Director and Senior Legal Counsel for Robert Bosch LLC. Ms. Schroder is based out of Robert Bosch GmbH’s North American headquarters in Detroit, Michigan, and serves as the M&A and Corporate legal team leader for North America.  In her role, she is responsible for overseeing all cross-border M&A activities into and out of the U.S. and Canada.   A New York native, prior to joining Bosch in 2014, Ms. Schroder was Senior Corporate Counsel at ATMI, Inc., a publicly-traded, semiconductor company in Connecticut; prior to working in-house, Ms. Schroder worked as a Corporate Law Associate in private practice in New York City. Ms. Schroder is admitted to the bars of New York, Connecticut, and Michigan. She is also a Director on the Board of Advisors for Syracuse University College of Law.

Member of the Board, Chairman of the Ratings Committee and Member of the Index Committee, Global Green Xchange AG

Martin was infected with the “Wall Street virus” at a young age and consequently started his professional career in 1996 with a multi-faceted banking education. He lived out his creative streak and passion for graphics, design and the web after hours. Thus, at the age of 18, he founded his first company with his trainee colleague. Subsequently, the native of Allgäu expanded his regional focus and knowledge spectrum through career stations in Munich and London. There, Martin was able to learn valuable skills in institutional asset management. Highlights included managing the Kuwait Investment Office and successfully launching an issuing platform for a German infrastructure development institution - against all odds, in the midst of the 2008 financial market crisis. At BayernLB, he was responsible for a smooth new product process for equity and commodity products. His interest in alternative investments and financial innovation has accompanied him since that time.

Partner, Summa Equity

Matthias Fink is a Partner at Summa Equity, responsible for the firm’s activities in the DACH region. Founded in 2016, Summa is an impact investor focusing on three thematic areas: Resource Efficiency, Changing Demographics, and Tech-Enabled Transformation. The purpose of Summa is to invest in solving our global challenges.

Summa has c. EUR 5 billion in assets under management and has made over 30 platform investments across the three funds raised to date. The investments have the potential for long-term sustainable outperformance because they address some of the social, environmental, and governmental challenges we need to solve as a society.

Previously, Matthias was a Partner at The Riverside Company and a Consultant at Boston Consulting Group. Matthias holds a Master of Science in International Business Administration from WU Vienna and an MBA from the University of Cambridge.

CEO, base camp management consulting GmbH

Marcus P. Höfer is the CEO of base camp. Thanks to his cooperation with a number of private equity funds and their portfolio companies, Marcus Höfer offers long-term management consulting experience and has been extensively involved in various international and national digitalisation projects and transformations. As an early adopter of new technologies and a 'digital native', Marcus Höfer is the optimum contact person in all areas of digitalisation for companies that dare and want to take this important step.

Marcus Höfer graduated from the Technische Universität München with an MSc in information systems focussing on corporate finance.

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Munich

Oliver Rathje is a member of the Litigation and Dispute Resolution Group in Munich and Frankfurt and has more than 20 years' experience advising on contentious matters in the firm's core business areas. Oliver specialises in complex commercial and corporate litigation and arbitration, typically in multi-jurisdictional circumstances with multiple stakeholders.

In his commercial practice, Oliver covers a wide range of industries, including banking and financial services, manufacturing, the automotive industry, life sciences, real estate, energy and natural resources. What is getting ever more important in this context is representing clients in order to achieve preliminary legal protection (attachment and temporary restraining orders) and advising them on cross-border litigation and restructuring, as well as insolvency-related scenarios. In addition, Oliver advises on compliance-related matters.

Partner, Verdane

Dominik joined Verdane in May 2023 and is responsible for Verdane’s presence and activities in the DACH region across all investment strategies.

Prior to Verdane, Dominik was a partner at EMH Partners, where he carried out numerous investments in software, healthcare, and B2B service companies. Before joining EMH, he was a Director at Chequers Capital where he led many transactions in the German mid-market segment. Dominik started his career at Barclays Capital in Leveraged Finance and Financial Sponsor Coverage.

He holds a B.A. in European Business from Dublin City University and a diploma in Business Administration from ESB Reutlingen.

Partner – Sustainability & ESG, Allianz Consulting, a part of Allianz Services, Munich

Scott Zuercher is a sustainability, climate finance and carbon market expert with over 18 years of experience across the institutional asset management, development banking, energy and insurance markets. Scott is currently the global practice lead for Sustainability & ESG at Allianz Consulting where he and his team support the Allianz Group and its global operating entities across an array of sustainability related topics.

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Frankfurt

Oliver advises on all aspects of debt finance transactions both domestically and internationally. He focuses in particular on counseling financial institutions, private equity sponsors and other investors, credit/debt funds and corporate clients on acquisition finance (leveraged buyouts, including recapitalizations), corporate finance (corporate lending, including refinancings) and structured finance.
In addition to advising on transactions on a global scale, Oliver completed studies in Germany and the US, including the LL.M. program at Madison law school, Wisconsin and the Executive Education Program at Harvard Law School, Cambridge.

Prior to joining Reed Smith, Oliver worked for other leading international law firms with the same advisory focus.

Managing Director, Ares Credit Group

Daniel Crommen is a Managing Director in the Ares Credit Group, where he focuses on European direct lending. Prior to joining Ares in 2024, Daniel Crommen was a Managing Director and Head of Acquisition Finance DACH at ING Bank, where he focused on originating, structuring and executing of leveraged finance transactions in the German speaking region. Previously, Daniel Crommen was an Associate in the Leveraged Finance team at Commerzbank AG. Daniel Crommen holds an M.B.A. (Diplom-Kaufmann) from European Business School in Oestrich-Winkel, Germany and a Master of Laws from Frankfurt School of Finance and Management in Frankfurt, Germany.

Partner, Bright Capital

Felix is a Partner at Bright Capital and is part of the Frankfurt based Private Credit Investment Team. He joined Bright Capital in 2018 and is responsible for originating, underwriting, and executing sponsor-backed and predominantly sponsor-less investment opportunities with a strong buy-and-build angle in the DACH lower-mid-market. Felix has >10 years of industry experience and, prior to joining Bright Capital, worked in Leveraged Finance at HSBC, where he focused on structuring and executing mid and large cap sponsor-backed LBO transactions. Felix started his career in Investment Banking, holds a Master of Science in Finance and studied in Germany, the US and France.

Partner, Apera Asset Management

Benjamin is a Partner at Apera Asset Management, where he focuses on private debt activities in the DACH region as part of the Investment Team. Before Apera, he built and led the lower-mid market activities with financial sponsors for the DACH region at UniCredit’s leveraged finance team until 2020. Over his 13-year tenure at UniCredit, Benjamin also gained extensive experience in debt capital markets, corporate and sponsor debt advisory, and arranging structured financing solutions for infrastructure and natural resources sectors across EMEA.

He holds an M.Sc. in Economics from the Hochschule für Wirtschaft & Umwelt Nürtingen-Geislingen.

Head of Leveraged Finance, Managing Director, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC), Frankfurt

Head of M&A and Transaction Solutions DACH & CEE, Aon, Frankfurt

Ulf Cramer is Head of M&A and Transaction Solutions DACH and is based in Frankfurt. With more than 15 years of experience in the financial services sector he joined Aon from AIG where he headed-up the Trade Finance business for North Europe managing the development and growth of Trade Finance business in the German speaking countries, Benelux and the Nordics. Ulf started his career at Deutsche Bank prior to joining Swiss Bank Julius Baer, NY and French credit insurer Coface. He holds a master’s degree in Economics from the University of Bonn.

Managing Partner Germany & Austria, McKinsey, Düsseldorf

Fabian Billing has been Managing Partner of McKinsey Germany and Austria since March 2021. Prior to that appointment, he was Leader of McKinsey's Organization Practice in Europe. He began his career at McKinsey in 1999. Fabian Billing supports clients in implementing extensive transformations, operating model redesigns, growth strategies, and merger management. He has been working intensively in the telecommunications and high-tech sectors and with industrial clients for more than 15 years. 

Vice Chairman, Riverside, New York
Advisory Board Member, M&A and Transaction Solutions, Aon

In 2006 Pam joined Riverside, a global multi strategy private equity firm, where she currently serves as Vice Chairman and sits on the Riverside Investment Council. She is also Chair of the Board of the American Investment Council, a member of Aon’s global M&A advisory board, a member of the board for Accordion Technologies and is a Trustee of the National Humanities Center, where she chairs the audit committee. Prior to joining Riverside, she served for 22 years at JP Morgan Chase with senior roles in both the Real Estate Division and the Private Bank.

Director, Executive Compensation, Aon, Zürich

Krithika advises on Reward and to Remuneration Committees and senior leadership, based in Zurich. Prior to joining Aon, Krithika worked in consulting and in-house Reward roles – most recently at Galderma S.A. as the Global Lead of Incentive Compensation and International Mobility – and in consulting at KPMG and EY.

Krithika brings in over twelve years of consulting and in-house experience and has worked on a portfolio of clients across diverse sectors – life sciences, financial services, technology, and FMCG with most recent focus on PE backed life sciences. Recent work includes design and implementation of remuneration committee set-up, board disclosures, new equity reward programmes and associated strategy and governance frameworks.

Krithika has a Masters’ degree in Law from the London School of Economics & Political Science and is a qualified tax advisor.

Director of Finance, Gastromatic

Former Senior Partner, The Riverside Company, Munich

Michael Weber will be joining Cinven in October as a Partner.

He worked at The Riverside Company for 15 years, until August 2024, as a Partner and member of the Investment Committee at the Riverside Europe Fund. In this role, he was responsible for investment activities in the DACH region (Germany, Austria, and Switzerland) and led the Software and Technology sector investment team in Europe. Michael originated and led several software and tech transactions, including Transporeon, Actineo, Bike24, and Gastromatic. He currently serves on the board of Bike24 AG and Funke Medien.

Before joining Riverside, he worked at Auctus Capital Partners, a leading Munich-based German small-cap private equity fund focused on buy-and-build investments. At Auctus, he led the acquisition of iu.de (formerly Career Partner Group), which is now the largest online university in Europe. Prior to that, he worked at Dynamics Venture, a cleantech venture capital fund backed by RWE, investing in renewable energy, clean water, and innovative waste processing technologies on a global scale, contributing to a sustainable energy transition.

Michael began his career at The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) as a strategy consultant, working in financial services and private equity with a focus on international M&A and due diligence projects. Michael holds a Ph.D. in Strategic Management, awarded summa cum laude, and spent three years in academia as an Associate Professor of Strategic Management at Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. He also earned a degree in Business Administration with highest distinctions from Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich.

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Washington

Health care and life sciences companies, along with investors, look to Brian to navigate complex regulatory, strategic, and transactional matters and to find pragmatic solutions. This includes advising on compliance with myriad federal and state laws, providing transactional guidance and managing regulatory due diligence, and assisting with responses to government audits and investigations. Brian’s clients include medical device and pharmaceutical manufacturers, hospitals and health systems, digital health companies, managed care organizations, long-term and post-acute care providers, specialty pharmacies, pharmacy benefit managers, and private equity investors that support these health care and life sciences companies.

VP Sales EMEA Advanced Therapies, Siemens Healthineers, Forchheim

Patrick’s career to date covers the spectrum from clinical , academia and commercial management within the Medtech imaging space. Having been with Siemens Healthineers for 14 years across a variety of roles, his focus and speciality is on strategic market expansion in this highly competitive market.

Director, Deutsche Private Equity, Munich

Philip Fischer has been with Deutsche Private Equity since March 2024. Previously, he was an Investment Director at Avedon Capital Partners, where he was responsible for the HealthCare & Consumer Goods division in DACH. In his role, he was responsible for four transactions and was on the advisory board of a portfolio company in the field of medical micronutrients. Prior to Avedon, Philip led a team at ProSiebenSat.1 Media AG that focused on minority investments in growth companies. He began his career at J.P. Morgan in London, focusing on M&A and capital markets transactions in the Diversified Industrials division. Philip studied business administration at the European Business School.

Partner, capiton AG, Berlin

Fritjof Franz is Partner of capiton AG. Before joining capiton in 2018, he worked for several years as Head of Global M&A and Licensing for the listed Paul Hartmann Group, as well as several years for a private equity investor, a management consultancy and as a lawyer in the field of M&A and restructuring. Fritjof Franz is a certified lawyer and holds a LL.M. in M&A from Frankfurt School of Finance and Management and a MBA from IE Business School in Madrid.

Managing Director, Raymond James, Munich

Tobias co-heads the European Healthcare Coverage at Raymond James, with particular focus on the Healthcare Services and Health-Tech segments. Prior to joining Raymond James, Tobias worked as Partner at Cowen, focusing exclusively on Healthcare M&A in the DACH and European regions. Previous roles include 8+ years at GCA Altium (now Houlihan Lokey) and 4+ years at Deutsche Bank Corporate Finance in London.

Tobias holds an LLB from King’s College London and an MBA from Columbia Business School in New York.

Executive Director, DC Advisory, Frankfurt

Edward de Stigter is Executive Director in DC Advisory’s Frankfurt team covering the Healthcare sector.

He started his investment banking career in 2009 with ABN AMRO / RBS, followed by JPMorgan and Commerzbank before joining DC Advisory in 2013. Edward holds an M.Sc degree in Finance and Investments as well as a B.Sc. degree in International Business Administration from Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University, the Netherlands.

Conference Co-Chair
Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Munich

Dr. Nikolaus von Jacobs advises private equity funds and German strategic players on private equity, venture capital and private and public mergers and acquisitions.
Before joining Reed Smith, he was a partner at an international law firm and headed its German private equity practice. He has also worked in investment banking and European capital markets for Merrill Lynch in London.

Founding Partner, OHM Capital

Franz Angermann is a founding partner of Ohm Capital, an Investment Office based in Munich. The firm serves a number of German families as Investment and Family Office. Ohm takes overall responsibility and control of its clients situation and assets and applies a clear governance from strategic to operational levels. In this work, Ohm Capital continuously combines investment and tax-legal considerations on all relevant decisions and processes.

Franz has over 25 years of experience in advising family offices and managing large private fortunes. He began his career as a Managing Partner in a Munich tax consulting firm, focusing for over a decade on tax consulting Family Offices, often in international context. He then served as Executive Director at Goldman Sachs Wealth Management, and as Managing Director at UBS between 2006 and 2017. At UBS Franz managed the German Ultra High Networth Client business, followed by a European product role in Private Equity and Direct Investments.

Franz Angermann completed a certificate as German tax advisor and a doctorate in international tax law at the University of Hamburg, based on a degree in business administration from the University of Munich.

Managing Director and Founder, Grammig Advisory

As founder of Grammig Advisory, David Grammig is the visionary behind an exceptionally unorthodox network building approach in the family office space, leveraging his career experience in industries such as banking, intelligence and business development.

As former Director for International Relations at a GCC-based single family office, over the years David has established, and continues to grow, valued connections with fellow family offices. David lives by the credo “no level of technological sophistication can replace a handshake” and this is no different when it comes to his family office networks.

Director, EOS Partners GmbH

Christian is a Director at EOS Partners, focussing on attractive Software & IT Services and Healthcare transactions in the DACH region.

Prior to joining EOS, Christian invested private capital in small and mid-cap companies at VTC. Before that, he was involved in building the William Blair Frankfurt franchise and advised entrepreneurs and private equity clients in M&A transactions.

Christian holds a BSc in Business Administration from Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich and a MSc in Finance from the University of St Andrews.

Partner, Astorius Capital

Oskar is a Partner at specialist small cap investment firm Astorius in Hamburg, where he is primarily focused on investor relations and fundraising.

He has worked with private pools of capital throughout his career that began in the Private Wealth Management division at Goldman Sachs. In his capacity as the family officer for a Swiss-based tech entrepreneur, Oskar co-founded ASK THE CIRCLE, a global collaboration and deal-exchange platform for Single Family Office investors. He joined Astorius in 2019.

Oskar is an Econometrician by academic training in Maastricht, Taipei and Milan, and a mediocre golfer by passion.

Partner, Penguin Capital

Nico is a partner at Penguin Capital, heads the alternatives program and serves on the private equity investment committee. Before building Penguin Capital’s family investment platform, he co-founded one of Europe’s leading adtech players with $800m+ in annual revenues. He holds a BA in Business Administration and Management from the University of St. Gallen and a MS in Accounting and Finance from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE).

Partner & Managing Director, AlixPartners

Rainer has more than two decades of professional experience. He helps large companies navigate the complexities of restructuring and transformation, and those clients profit from his expertise in turning around, transforming, or refinancing their businesses.

Rainer has successfully led large-scale, complex restructuring and transformation programs across various industries, both in advisory and management roles (Chief Restructuring Officer/ Chief Restructuring Advisor).

His wide-ranging experience with banks and credit insurers effectively helps in the negotiation of complex financing issues. He successfully negotiated and implemented major headcount reduction programs.

Who’s Who Legal recognized Rainer as Global Leader in restructuring and insolvency advisory. He is an active member of the Turnaround Management Association (TMA). Previously, he was heading EY’s Turnaround and Restructuring practice in EMEIA and was a Senior Partner and Berlin office head at Roland Berger. Rainer has a PhD in innovative corporate finance and a master degree from Catholic University of Eichstaett-Ingolstadt.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, London

Linton advises insolvency practitioners, US and European investment banks, UK clearing banks, hedge funds and private equity houses across the full range of international and domestic restructuring and insolvency matters. His principal areas of focus include cross-border restructurings, creditor and debtor representations, out-of-court restructurings, pensions restructuring and insolvency litigation.

Managing Partner, Birkenstein Capital

Tobias is the Managing and Founding-Partner at Birkenstein Capital, where he focuses on special situations investments in the DACH region. Birkenstein Capital is the local operating partner from Davidson Kempner, a global leader in special situations investments with currently USD 37bn under management. Birkenstein/DK employs a bottom-up, fundamental approach to investing in both public and private markets, with a focus on stressed or distressed companies as well as opportunistic investments resulting from events and/or value propositions.

 Before Birkenstein, Tobias was CEO of a public listed company and prior to that he was Head of Restructuring and Debt Advisory at Rothschild in Frankfurt. He has extensive experience in restructuring, capital raising across the capital structure and (distressed) M&A. He started his career as a consultant with The Boston Consulting Group in 1999 and gained extensive private equity and investing experience early in his career as one of the first team members of Bain Capital Europe.

Tobias holds an M.Sc. in Finance from London Business School and master’s degree from Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich.

Partner & Managing Director, SGP Corporate Finance

Dirk Pahlke joined SGP Schneider Geiwitz in May 2024 as Partner and Managing Director for the newly established SGP Principal Solutions business, focusing on the specific challenge-driven transformation of a target under temporary full ownership with a clearly defined upside sharing mechanism at exit for the benefit of the previous owner.

Before joining SGP Schneider Geiwitz, he was a Global Partner of Rothschild & Co and head of M&A in the German-speaking countries until the end of 2023 where he worked for nearly 30 years based in Frankfurt and, earlier in his career, London.

Managing Partner, palero capital GmbH

As Managing Partner of palero capital, Conny advises palero group on all financing transactions at its portfolio companies and on its M&A activities. She is an expert in special situations M&A and financing.

Before, she worked for many years at a listed private equity firm as a Director in the M&A division and started her career in investment banking. 

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  New York

Peter is a partner and leader in the Technology Transactions practice within Reed Smith’s Global Corporate Group. He has an electrical engineering and intellectual property background, and had worked in the computer science industry prior to his career in the legal services industry. He has extensive experience advising corporate clients regarding tech transactions, including mergers, acquisitions, spinoffs, and complex IP transactional matters, in each case in the intellectual property, information technology, cyber security and privacy practice areas. Peter has provided counsel on numerous intellectual property portfolio and patent prosecution matters. Peter also has extensive experience litigating complex IP matters, with a focus on patent litigation involving technology in the electrical engineering arts.

Peter is a member of Reed Smith’s Emerging Technologies team and a lead Tech Transactions partner in the science, engineering, and software space and handles matters all industries and technologies, including matters for clients in diverse technology fields such as computer software, microelectronics, IoT and other Internet technology, blockchain, cryptocurrency. He is also a member of On-Chain: Reed Smith’s Crypto & Digital Assets Group which represents clients relating to Cryptocurrency and related mining matters as well as matters relating to other Digital Assets such as Tokens and Stable Coins, and related fractionalization, FinTech, Health / MedTech, InsurTech, information technology systems, telecommunications, media technology, virtual reality, solar, defense and aerospace technology, cyber security, cloud computing, artificial intelligence and machine learning, data and analytics technology, and data protection.

Prior to his legal career, Peter gained more than four years’ experience as a lead negotiator for IP licenses and agreements for IBM in the Intellectual Property & Licensing (IP&L) of IBM’s Headquarters Division and more than 15 years’ experience as an engineer and manager for IBM in the microelectronics division, during which time, he performed such tasks as card-level electronics design and testing, software development, and semiconductor research and development.

Managing Partner & Founder, Cadence Wealth Capital GmbH

Leonard has 18 years of investing experience. Having started his career at Bain, he worked at BC Partners and led the DACH office of Vitruvian Partners as a founding team member. Leonard has a Master of Industrial Engineering from ETH Zurich and is an active growth tech investor.

Co-Founder & CEO, Gain.pro

Nicola Ebmeyer is the Co-Founder and CEO of Gain.pro, a leading financial technology company that has transformed the private equity and M&A landscape. Over the past six years, Nicola has led Gain.pro to remarkable growth, expanding the team to 300 employees and serving thousands of prestigious clients globally. The company has established offices in Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, Warsaw, and Bangalore, with a New York office opening soon.

Nicola's journey to founding Gain.pro began during her tenure at McKinsey & Company, where she worked in both the Munich and Amsterdam offices. She advised clients on strategic initiatives and gained profound insights into the private equity sector. As a Manager, Nicola played a crucial role in shaping strategic projects for top-tier clients, inspiring her to develop a solution to streamline and enhance deal origination in the financial industry.

Through a unique blend of advanced technology and human intelligence at scale, Gain.pro provides unparalleled transparency into the world's private companies, their owners, and their industries. In today's competitive environment and challenging macroeconomic climate, having full visibility into sweet spot investment opportunities is more critical than ever. Gain.pro operates at the forefront of technological developments in generative AI, enabling its clients to focus on their core strengths—originating and closing deals.

Gain.pro's clients range from local boutiques to global giants across private equity (e.g., KKR, CVC, Blackstone), M&A (e.g., Goldman Sachs, UBS, Rothschild), consulting (e.g., McKinsey, BCG, Bain), and law (e.g., Freshfields, Linklaters, Ropes & Gray).

Co-Founder & CEO, ValueWorks GmbH

Dr. Wolfgang Faisst is Co-Founder & CEO of ValueWorks.ai and Senior Advisor at Cadence Growth Capital. In addition, he heads the "Business Model Innovations" working group of AcaTech's German AI initiative and is a lecturer at the Universities of Bamberg and Bayreuth.

Previously, he held numerous strategic innovation positions within SAP. These included the founding and management of SAP Exchange Media as a business network for digital advertising and the SAP Store as an e-commerce platform for marketing SAP and partner solutions. In addition, he was head of product management for the "SAP Business Suite powered by SAP HANA“ driving the start of SAP S/4 HANA, SAP’s core product.

In this function, he initiated the SAP Marketing Cloud and drove the strategic development of the most important SAP solution with regard to Cloud and Big Data and later also in the direction of Artificial Intelligence and digital business models as part of the Intelligent ERP initiative. In his responsibility, the offering and collaboration model for development partners in the cloud was redefined. As head of "On-Demand Service Solution Management" and co-lead for the first SAP Cloud Program, he laid the foundation for SAP's cloud offerings.

Before joining SAP, Dr. Faisst worked as a management consultant and senior project manager for Bain & Company in the Munich, Zurich and London offices. He advised international key accounts on strategic IT issues and leading IT companies. He is co-founder of the IT practice group of Bain & Company in the German-speaking countries.

Previously, he worked for Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Peter Mertens at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg on the subject of "Virtual Enterprises and their IT Support" and worked as a research assistant at the Bavarian Research Center for Knowledge-Based Systems.

Co-Founder & Managing Partner, DealCircle GmbH

Graig Gröbli is Co-Founder and Managing Partner of DealCircle, a holistic technology solution with the world's largest database of search and buy profiles. The superior matching technology makes the Hamburg-based fintech, founded in 2018, the preferred partner of hundreds of M&A advisors in buyer identification and market outreach. They get access to a Big Data-supported buyer database with over 250,000 profiles (family offices, private equity, MBI and corporates).

At DealCircle, he is primarily responsible for M&A operations and business development. 

Prior to founding DealCircle, Graig Gröbli was a partner in a mid-cap private equity investor with a focus on business services & software transactions. In the past, he served on the advisory board of various family-owned and private equity-backed companies.

CEO, DriveLock SE

Arved is the CEO of DriveLock SE. He has been working in the IT industry for 30 years with a focus on IT security. Before joining DriveLock SE, he was Managing Director of Dracoon GmbH and his mission is to accelerate digitalization in Germany. Previously, he was responsible for the international business for Empirix (Oracle), Fortify and Veracode and he led the German IT security business of HP as well as being CEO of KeyIdentity GmbH.

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  London

Brendan’s practice focuses on advising clients on the structuring, establishment and operation of, and investment into, alternative investment funds across all major asset classes including credit, private equity, infrastructure and real estate. He also advises in relation to spin outs, secondary transactions, GP-led restructurings, managed accounts, carried interest and other co-investment schemes.

Director & General Counsel, REIA Capital GmbH

Stefan Benz has been working in private equity for 15 years as an attorney and in-house counsel, adding extensive legal and tax expertise to the REIA team.

Stefan studied law with a focus on corporates, capital markets, and tax at the University of Passau. He began his career as an attorney at Poellath+, a leading German law firm specializing on private equity and M&A. At Poellath+, Stefan was involved in numerous corporate transactions, particularly company acquisitions by private equity funds. Since 2017, Stefan has been working for a family office which is affiliated to REIA. As the Head of Investments (Legal), he oversees corporate investments of this family office in the DACH region, and the USA and has a special focus on tax and legal structuring of investments. Stefan serves on the advisory board of Deon Digital AG, a software company based in Zurich.

CEO, Managing Director, ACE Alternatives GmbH, Berlin

Managing Partner, Fernbrook Capital Management LLC, New York

Bill Detwiler is a founding Managing Partner of Fernbrook Capital Management LLC, a New York-based investment firm. Fernbrook invests in early growth-stage technology companies in North America, the United Kingdom, and the European Union.

 Prior to Fernbrook, Bill was a mergers & acquisitions attorney and an entrepreneur who built two successful merchant banks. He also was the Chief Investment Officer of United Safety Ltd., an international energy safety services company with offices in Houston, Calgary, and Abu Dhabi. Bill started his career at PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Washington

Edward is a partner in our Fund Formation and Investment Management Group. He is a leader in investment management practice and representation of endowments, foundations, pension plans, family offices and outsourced chief investment offices (OCIOs), among other institutional investors. As former chair of the American Bar Association’s (ABA) Institutional Investors Committee and a frequent author and speaker on institutional investment issues, Edward is considered a national thought leader on legal, compliance and policy issues relating to institutional investment. He was a member of the Institutional Limited Partners Association’s steering committee on the recent adoption of model limited partnership forms and a model non-disclosure agreement. His practice also includes representation of academic partners on industry/academic collaborations, consulting and start-ups.

Edward has more than 30 years of experience in investment management, regulatory oversight, risk management, operations, and compliance and ethics programs for both institutional investors and investment advisors. He is a member of the securities law committee of the National Association of Pension Plan Attorneys (NAPPA). From 2012 to 2015, he was a lecturer at the University of Virginia School of Law where he co-taught a course on private equity and hedge funds. He is the author of numerous articles, including, “How Safe Are Institutional Assets in a Custodial Bank’s Insolvency?”, the leading paper on bank custody law. He also is co-author, with Nobel Prize winner H. Robert Horvitz, Ph.D., of Connecting with Companies: A Guide to Biomedical Consulting Agreements (2nd edition, 2014).

Edward was the former general counsel of the University of Virginia Investment Management Company (UVIMCO), where he advised on a range of institutional investment topics, including securities and investment advisory laws, investment advisory contracts, bank custody, and international issues, as well as compliance and operations and board matters from 2008 to 2016. Prior to joining UVIMCO, he was associate general counsel for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. He began his legal career as an associate at Shearman & Sterling and Paul Weiss Rifkind Wharton & Garrison.

Senior Legal Counsel, Siemens AG

Adam has worked in the PE Fund industry for over 20 years, on both the GP and the LP side. Adam is currently the chair of ILPA’s Legal Advisory Council, having been elected in March 2022, and has been a member since October 2018.

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Munich

Dr. Germar Enders focuses his practice on private equity, mergers and acquisitions (M&A), and general corporate law. Germar has extensive experience in advising strategic and financial investors as well as management teams on domestic, cross-border and multi-jurisdictional transactions, and on all aspects of corporate law, including corporate structurings. He advises in a broad range of industries, including automotive, consumer, e-commerce, IT and healthcare.

Prior to joining Reed Smith, Germar worked at other leading international law firms in the field of Private Equity/Corporate/M&A and as assistant professor at the Max-Planck-Institute and the University of Munich. During his legal clerkship, he trained in Cologne and New York. He regularly publishes articles on matters of corporate and civil law, including in legal reference books and commentaries.

Managing Partner, SGP Corporate Finance, Munich

Nicolas is Managing Partner at SGP Corporate Finance, the Munich based M&A practice of Schneider Geiwitz. His expertise primarily includes growth/private equity transactions, but also distressed/special situations in buy- and sell-side engagements. Prior to joining SGP with his team in 2019, Nicolas held key M&A positions including Managing Director at CFI Group - Corporate Finance International and Helbling Business Advisors in Switzerland. Nicolas played a key role in leading CFI's global IT services and software sector group and actively contributed as a dedicated member of the business services team. Prior to CFI, he was a partner at CAPEO Corporate Finance and head of M&A at Buchanan Capital Group. He started his career in investment banking at Doertenbach in Frankfurt in 1997.

Co-Founder & Managing Partner, DealCircle GmbH, Hamburg

Kai Hesselmann is Co-Founder and Managing Partner of DealCircle, a holistic technology solution with the world's largest database of search and purchase profiles.

The superior matching technology makes the Hamburg-based fintech, founded in 2018, the preferred partner of hundreds of M&A advisors when it comes to identifying buyers and approaching the market. They have access to a big data-supported buyer database with over 250,000 profiles (family offices, private equity, MBIs and companies).

At DealCircle, he is primarily responsible for business development, product & tech and marketing.

Before founding DealCircle, Kai Hesselmann was a partner of a mid-cap private equity investor with a focus on transactions in the industrials segment as well as a consultant for M&A transactions.

Chief Visionary Officer, synaforce GmbH, Mainz

Stephan has been CVO at synaforce in Mainz since the sale of ITecon GmbH last year. He started his career in 1996 at Deutsche Bank (IT) in the Windows NT area. Just two years later, he and three other partners founded ITecon GmbH, a data center operator and provider of complete IT services. Since then, he has successfully led the company to the purchase of its first own data center, including a modular data center design with increases energy efficiency, and the founding of further subsidiaries.

Investment Director, Family Trust Investor FTI GmbH, Munich

Friedrich Wallwitz is an investment director and has been active in the investment business since 2018. Prior to Family Trust, he was an investor for Gimv NV and an M&A advisor focusing on succession situations for Edmond de Rothschild and PMB Capital, guiding family-owned companies through a change of ownership. He began his career at J.P. Morgan as a commodities trader.
 
Friedrich holds a B.A. Economics and International Relations from Lancaster University, and an LL.M. Law & Economics from the Universities of Hamburg, Rotterdam and Berkeley. In addition to his work at J.P. Morgan, he completed an M.A. Christian Theology at the University of London.

Managing Partner, Astorius Capital, Hamburg

Julien Zornig joined Astorius Capital in 2013 and is responsible for sales & marketing, human resources and corporate communications. After studying business administration at the University of St. Gallen, he started working for the Berenberg Group in Zurich. There he managed the entire hedge fund activities of the group within a few years. His tasks included setting up a professional fund management and auditing unit.

After moving to “the other” Hamburg private bank, Julien worked in the M.M.Warburg Group in the area of private equity and at the same time built up strategic relationships with family offices and asset management companies. His extensive network in the German-speaking financial industry has been a great support for him since the foundation of Astorius.

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Frankfurt

Octávio is a founding partner of the firm’s Frankfurt office and a member of the Global Corporate Group. He has substantial knowledge and extensive experience in advising on national and cross-border transactions, in particular on mergers & acquisitions, private equity, venture capital, and finance transactions as well as in advising on general corporate matters.

Co-Founder & CEO, ecoplanet, Munich

Maximilian has a background in management consulting and entrepreneurship. He began his career at Boston Consulting Group (BCG), where he specialized in the industrial goods sector, honing his skills in strategic problem-solving and business development. Five years ago, Maximilian transitioned into entrepreneurship, bringing his expertise to new ventures. Since July 2022, he has been a co-founder of ecoplanet, a company building a B2B Energy Orchestration Layer for companies across Europe. At ecoplanet, Maximilian is responsible for the commercial side of the business, driving growth and forging strategic partnerships to expand the company's impact.

Principal, Acton Capital, Munich

Joseph joined Acton’s investment team in 2020. He brings a deep passion for numbers and a profound curiosity for business models in all shapes and colours. Combining a generalist’s mindset with a passion for tech, his interest spans across sectors, functions, and geographies. When looking at a company’s aspirational vision and its hard performance metrics, Joseph has a remarkable ability to identify strategic twists that can unlock further value.
Joseph gained experience from his previous responsibilities at Google, where he supported leading European retailers to shape their digital strategies. He holds degrees from the University of St. Gallen, Columbia University and Hertie School of Governance. By creating the knowledge community Emerald Nodes, Joseph started a platform to facilitate interdisciplinary exchanges in tech, business, and policy across both sides of the Atlantic.
He likes to spend his free time hiking in the mountains, reading up on recent developments in the tech space and world politics. Born and raised close to the alps, he lived in New York, Bangkok, Hamburg and Berlin before he finally returned to Munich.

Partner, Crosslantic Capital Management GmbH, Düsseldorf

Christian Köglsperger is Partner at Crosslantic and with the company since the first day. As entrepreneur at heart and tech investor by profession, he compiled over 15 years of experience in the market. Before Crosslantic, he worked for the NuCom Group, where he conducted a wide range of major acquisitions, and SevenVentures, where he joined in 2011. He started his investment career working for German based VCs and in corporate M&A.

Founder, SGI, Hannover

Nan is a co-founder of the Sino-German Initiative (SGI), which explores cross-border business activities between German and Chinese mid-cap companies. SGI particurlary focuses on the medical devices sector, serving both as an investor and expert in execution. Previous to becoming an entrepreneuer, Nan worked as an investment banking analyst at Goldman's NY and London office in TMT & Industrials sector, and an analyst at Carmignac, specialising in long-short equity in the global consumer space.  

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Munich

Philipp is a partner in the Munich office and a member of Reed Smith’s Entertainment & Media Industry Group. Philipp has a broad proficiency in the digital area. With more than two decades of experience, he has a strong focus on cross-border projects and complex agreements. In the digital sector, his dynamic practice involves cloud, mobile and e-commerce, Internet of Things, AI and 4IR frameworks as well as Web3, metaverse and data economy. More generally, he covers information technology, outsourcing, telecoms, and data protection.

Philipp’s clients include major international industrials from the high-tech sector as well as specialized SMEs, highly innovative start-ups, and business incubators. In addition, his expertise includes digital solutions in the area of sustainability and impact investing.

Partner,  Reed Smith LLP,  Munich

Andreas is co-managing partner of Reed Smith’s Munich office and a member of the firm’s Emerging Technologies Group. He is also co-head of the global Artificial Intelligence practice of Reed Smith.

Andreas' practice focuses on legal advice around technology, digitalization, data, artificial intelligence, privacy and IT/cyber security (Germany and EU). He is passionate about technology and privacy and a thought-leader when it comes to legally evaluating new technologies and finding practical ways to “make things possible.” In addition to advising clients regarding compliance, product development and agreements, Andreas is also highly experienced in representing clients before data protection authorities and courts. 

Co-Founder & CEO, fenyx, Berlin

Lennart Corleissen is a dynamic entrepreneur with a strong commitment to sustainability and social impact. As Co-Founder and CEO of Fenyx GmbH, he specializes in innovative solutions for furniture reuse, offering a comprehensive service that covers the entire lifecycle of furniture, from purchase and sale to leasing and personalized consulting. Beyond his business ventures, Lennart actively contributes to global change as Co-Founder and Chairman of the I DO Project, connecting students with socially-oriented NGOs worldwide. With a background in management consulting, Lennart has independently helped small to medium-sized companies with project management, strategic planning, and cost management, always guided by his passion for sustainable and socially responsible practices.

Managing Director, Blue Tree Group, Munich

Dr Michael Daldrup is the Founder and Managing Director of Blue Tree Group, a Munich-based boutique financial advisory firm specialising in the valuations as well as financing and M&A transactions of mid-market companies across the German-speaking and Benelux regions. The advisory team is structured into two industry sector groups: Consumer, Retail & Services, and Technology & Software.

Prior to founding Blue Tree Group, Dr Daldrup served as Head of Valuation and M&A at Süd-Chemie AG and later at Clariant AG, both publicly listed performance chemical companies.

Earlier in his career, Dr Daldrup gained significant experience within the investment banking sector, having worked in Technology & Software teams at Jefferies International, KPMG Corporate Finance, and Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein.

Dr Daldrup is a Certified Credit Analyst (DVFA GmbH). He completed postgraduate studies in Economics at Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona and holds a PhD in Economics from RWTH Aachen University. Additionally, he earned a Diplom-Kaufmann from RWTH Aachen, with further academic experiences at the University of Maastricht and the University of Liège.

Chief Platforms & Growth Officer & CEO Joyn, Seven.One Entertainment Group, Munich

Katharina Frömsdorf is Chief Platforms & Growth Officer of the Seven.One Entertainment Group and CEO of Joyn.
In addition to Joyn, the Seven.One Entertainment Group's streaming platform, she is responsible for the "Growth & Revenue Diversification" division, which bundles the digital entertainment business in addition to the media company's traditional TV and streaming business.
This includes the largest creator ecosystem with the influencer marketing and creator business of Studio71 and Buzzbird, the booming podcast market under the umbrella of Seven.One Audio, high-quality live entertainment and music from Seven.One Starwatch, licence and fan products at Seven.One Licensing and the Group's innovation projects.
An economics graduate, she has been with ProSiebenSat.1 since 2005, where she has held various positions and management roles, establishing or developing various business models for the Group, including Starwatch, SAM Artist & Sports, Merchandising, MMP Events, Ticketing & Podcast.

Partner & Head of DACH, IceLake Capital, Munich

Sergej is a Partner and Head of DACH at IceLake, responsible for growing IceLake’s investment team and transaction capabilities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

IceLake is an independent private equity firm that supports entrepreneurs and managers in building leading companies with asset-light business models in the verticals B2B Services, IT Services, Software and Healthcare. IceLake specializes in identifying distinctive companies led by entrepreneurial management teams, with whom IceLake partners to actively support their long-term growth objectives via Buy & Build, internationalization and strategic organic initiatives. IceLake values open discussion, eye-level cooperation, pragmatism, merit-based ambition and entrepreneurial initiative as the basis for the partnership with entrepreneurs and management teams.

Before joining IceLake in 2023, Sergej was a Director at DPE Deutsche Private Equity, investing in numerous "Mittelstand" companies across the DACH region. Previously, Sergej worked at Waterland Private Equity, Stern Stewart & Co., and Credit Suisse. Sergej holds an MBA with distinction from INSEAD and studied business administration at Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich and University of Warwick.

Investment Director, Trill Impact, Munich

Moritz is an Investment Director at Trill Impact Advisory, focusing on Impact Private Equity.  He has around 10 years of professional experience, both in the private equity industry and management consulting. Before joining Trill Impact, he worked in senior investment roles at EMH Partners and Armira Beteiligungen. Moritz started his professional career at Boston Consulting Group where his last position was that of a Project Leader.

Moritz holds a diploma in Industrial Engineering from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, and a Ph.D. in energy and resource economics from the University of Cologne.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, London

Tom Whelan focuses his practice on private equity and M&A, advising private equity sponsors, multi strategy funds, other private capital investors and corporates, helping them deploy capital across the world.

Tom handles buyouts, including secondary buy-outs and secondaries, take privates and co-investments, general M&A, bolt-ons, management incentive plans, restructurings and refinancings through to exits. During the course of any investment, Tom advises on portfolio company work and any changes to management incentive plans.

Tom regularly executes transactions in regulated sectors such as healthcare, technology, media and telecoms, financial services, water and energy, as well as handling many transactions in other sectors such as real estate, hotels and leisure, food, consumer and retail, industrial and automotive.

Senior Managing Director, Chair of DACH Forensic & Litigation Consulting, FTI Consulting, Düsseldorf

Dr. Stefan Heissner has more than 30 years’ experience in investigating and preventing white-collar crime and corruption. In advising businesses and governments for more than 25 years, Stefan has been instrumental in almost all relevant fraud and corruption cases in Germany, either by investigating, auditing or advising on compliance, remediation, dispute or claims matters.

With extensive experience in fraud and corruption patterns, as well as broad Big Four leadership experience, Stefan is a leading expert in optimizing compliance management systems regarding effectiveness and efficiency, including digitization and managed services capabilities. He has advised clients in almost all industries and sectors, including public administrations and governments.

Prior to FTI Consulting, Stefan led PwC’s forensics team in the Europe, Middle East and Africa (“EMEA”) region and co-led the firm’s German risk and regulatory team. Preceding this role, he spent 15 years at EY, where he led the forensics and integrity services in EMEA and India. Additionally, he acted as the firm’s global markets leader and EY DACH digital solutions leader.

Before EY, Stefan spent eight years at KPMG, where he became a partner in 2003 and led the firm’s global intelligence team. He started his career in the German police, where he spent five years in departments for white-collar crime and corruption.

Stefan studied economics and focused on white-collar crime and corruption from a scientific perspective. The thesis of his first diploma focused on tax fraud, the second on corruption. In his Ph.D., he analyzed the fight against white-collar crime from a behavior-economical perspective. Additionally, he was a visiting lecturer at The European School of Management and Technology (“ESMT”) in Berlin and publishes books, commentaries and specialist articles on a regular basis.

Partner, MADAUS Capital Partners, Munich

Nicolas Hübner is partner at the family office MADAUS Capital Partners. Since 2016 he has been building up the appropriate structures to successfully manage his family’s wealth holistically. Herby Alternative investments and especially direct private equity investments play a major role in asset allocation.

Before joining MADAUS, Nicolas was portfolio manager at a small- to mid-cap private equity company, worked in consulting and was at a major international corporate and investment bank.

Co-Founder and Partner, SEVEST Management GmbH, Munich

David Lisewski is Co-Founder, Partner, and Investment Committee member of SEVEST. At SEVEST he also leads our investment team. Before co-founding SEVEST, he was involved in over twenty transactions across a wide range of sectors, for Bregal Unternehmerkapital, GIC, General Atlantic, Lazards and Deutsche Bank.

SEVEST is a mid-market buyout fund with a focus on industrial technology businesses in DACH. Through our entrepreneurial family background, our strong track record as mid-market investors, and our operator-led active ownership approach, we support our portfolio companies to reach their growth potential.

Managing Director, Metric Capital Partners, Munich

Sebastian joined Metric in 2018 as an Investment Director and opened the MCP Munich office.

Prior to joining Metric, Sebastian was an Investment Professional at EQT Partners since 2015, investing in large and mid-cap companies. Before that, Sebastian worked at A.T. Kearney since 2009, advising clients on strategy, restructuring and M&A projects

Sebastian holds a PhD in Finance and a Diploma in Physics from Technical University Munich. Furthermore, he holds an Honors Degree in Technology Management from the Center for Digital Technology & Management.

Partner, EGERIA Beteiligungen GmbH

Prior to joining Egeria in April 2020, Hannes worked at Apax Partners in Munich and also spent several years in the industry as a member of the Executive Board at German Mittelstand companies in finance, operational and digital transformation roles.

He started his career at UBS Investment Bank in London. Hannes holds an MBA from INSEAD and a Masters’ degree in International Economics from the University of Innsbruck.

Hannes is passionate about working together with entrepreneurs and management teams and helping them grow their business.

In his role for Egeria Beteiligungen GmbH Hannes advises Egeria Funds on potential investment opportunities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

Conference Co-Chair
Senior Counsel, Reed Smith LLP, Munich

Christian von Sydow advises clients on corporate law, M&A, private equity, restructuring, corporate conflict resolution and estate planning. He has represented a large number of international and German clients, including strategic and financial investors, in acquisitions and sales of businesses in Germany and internationally in cross-border matters. Mr. von Sydow represents clients in a wide variety of industries, including automotive supply, consumer electronics, defence, energy, internet, optics, publishing, retail, software, technology and testing technology, travel and tourism.

Conference Co-Chair
Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Munich

Dr. Nikolaus von Jacobs advises private equity funds and German strategic players on private equity, venture capital and private and public mergers and acquisitions.

Before joining Reed Smith, he was a partner at an international law firm and headed its German private equity practice. He has also worked in investment banking and European capital markets for Merrill Lynch in London.

Chair Professor for Government and the Political Economy of China, University of Trier

From 2013 to 2018, Heilmann served as the Founding President and CEO of the Mercator Institute for China Studies (Merics) in Berlin. Merics evolved into Europe’s leading think tank on Chinese affairs under his leadership.
His research and advisory activities focus on China's economic, technology and financial market policies with their linkages to geopolitical and geo-economic dynamics. Heilmann has many years’ experience providing advice to European policy-makers and corporate leaders on China strategy.

Some of Heilmann’s most important research work came out of projects at Harvard and Oxford Universities. He co-edited the widely influential book Mao's Invisible Hand: The Political Foundations of Adaptive Governance in China (Harvard University Press, 2011; new edition 2020). His book Red Swan: How Unorthodox Policy-Making Facilitated China’s Rise (Hong Kong 2018; Beijing 2019) was published in both English and Chinese language. Red Swan deals with the distinctive interplay of long-term national development agendas and broad-based local experimentation that have provided an unforeseen agility to China’s economic and technological development.

Conference Co-Chair
Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Munich

Dr. Nikolaus von Jacobs advises private equity funds and German strategic players on private equity, venture capital and private and public mergers and acquisitions.

Before joining Reed Smith, he was a partner at an international law firm and headed its German private equity practice. He has also worked in investment banking and European capital markets for Merrill Lynch in London.

Chief Revenue Officer, Datasite

Todd Albright is Chief Revenue Officer for Datasite, a role he has held since April 2015.

In his role as CRO, Todd is responsible for leading the global sales strategy for the company, managing a global sales organization of nearly 200 sales professionals and supporting clients in over 170 countries.

Prior to joining Datasite, Todd held several sales leadership roles at a number of high growth firms. Most recently, he served as Senior Vice President & Head of Americas Sales at FIS Global. Prior to that, he was Senior Vice President and Head of Sales and Marketing for ACTIV Financial Systems as well as Vice President and Head of Global Financial Services Accounts for Intralinks
(now part of SS&C).

Todd is active in professional and community organizations. He currently serves as a fintech venture advisor to Broadhaven Capital Partners and is a Member of the Board of Trustees for Park Children’s Day School in New York.

He holds a BA in Public Policy from Duke University and an AAS in International Economics from Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nurnberg. He has also completed executive education programs at Harvard Business School.

Head of M&A and Transaction Solutions EMEA, Aon

Michael Carr is Head of Aon’s M&A and Transaction Solutions in EMEA. He is responsible for Aon’s regional solution lines, industry verticals and new ventures including Structured Credit, Corporate M&A and PE Portfolios. Michael works with the whole Aon team to ensure high quality execution of innovative solutions to the M&A market. He has worked with Aon since the early 2000’s in Guernsey, London, Sydney and the Nordics, specializing in event driven transaction solutions and major corporate risk financing programs. Michael holds an MBA from the Australian Graduate School of Management.

Partner, EMERAM Capital Partners GmbH

Sven Oleownik has extensive experience in Management Consulting and M&A Advisory as well as in the Private Equity business. In addition, he was repeatedly assigned as a supervisory board member of various family-owned businesses. As such, he also trains supervisory board member as part of the Deutsche Börse qualification program.

He already financed his studies as a shareholder in a trade fair construction company, which he founded jointly with two other partners. After graduating, he began his professional career at an investment company financed by family offices. In the context of new investments and the support of portfolio companies, he also became Managing Director of a portfolio company active in the field of manufacturing industrial goods. He then spent nine years at Dr. Wieselhuber & Partner, a leading management consultancy focused on the advisory of family-owned companies, ultimately as a partner and member of the management board. Sven mainly led projects in the field of strategic development, restructuring, buy and build projects up to the integration of new acquisitions, their financing up to IPOs as well as changes of shareholders and succession. For further twelve years he was Managing Partner of Corporate Finance Advisory at Deloitte in Munich. His sector focus was primarily on consumer goods and technology companies as well as private equity. Before joining Emeram, for seven years he headed the German office of Gimv, an international private equity firm listed on the stock exchange in Brussels, building up its team and investment business in DACH.

Managing Director, DC Advisory

Philipp is a Managing Director in our DC Advisory Frankfurt team covering the Industrials sector.

Philipp started his investment banking career in 2001 with Deutsche Bank and later spent several years with ABN AMRO / RBS and Commerzbank. Philipp is also registered as an attorney at law.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Chicago

Siddesh focuses his practice on mergers and acquisitions and emerging company/venture capital transactions. He has experience representing public and private companies, private equity firms, and investment and hedge funds in an array of corporate transactions, including mergers, acquisitions (both asset and stock), divestitures, financings, fund formation, and general corporate matters across multiple industries.

Additionally, he regularly represents founders and investors (strategic and financial) in a variety of emerging company transactions, including angel and series investments. Sid currently serves as the Vice-Chair of the firm’s Global Corporate Group.

Managing Director, CEO Germany, Chairman of the Management Board, Lincoln International AG

Michael provides overall strategic and operational leadership for Lincoln International’s activities in Germany, Switzerland, Austria and the Benelux region. He principals the procurement and management of clients, leads deal teams and recruits qualified personnel.

In addition to his operational roles within the firm, Michael is passionate about mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in Germany. He has 25 years of experience advising on M&A, public takeovers, fairness opinions and corporate divestitures. His clients are comprised of large corporations as well as mid-sized privately-owned businesses and leading private equity groups. Michael brings global, cross-border expertise to his projects, helping clients navigate the increasing complexity of transactions, and creating a comprehensive deal experience.

Michael is currently Vice Chairman of Shareholder Value Beteiligungen AG and Vice Chairman of the German software company, SNP SE. Michael is lecturer on the topic of M&A at the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management.

Prior to joining Lincoln International, Michael led M&A at Sal. Oppenheim (Germany), Europe’s largest private bank. Previously, he worked in the investment banking division of Citigroup Global Markets in London and Frankfurt. Michael began his career at EY.

Michael holds a doctorate in corporate finance from Fribourg University. He is a Chartered Financial Analyst in the UK.

Partner, HWF Partners

Philipp leads HWF’s offering in the German speaking countries. He has a wealth of knowledge in placing bespoke transactional risk insurance products (W&I, tax, contingent) in the context of M&A transactions. Philipp is regarded as a leading broker in Germany and clients value his proactive approach and technical excellence.

Philipp and his team have advised on numerous complex transactions in the German market and have been able to spearhead innovative developments in the market.

Philipp is a trained lawyer, admitted in Germany and the USA. He is fluent in German and English.

Partner and PE Leader Germany & EMEA, PricewaterhouseCoopers GmbH WPG

Steve joined PwC in the UK in 1993, and qualified as an ACA in 1996. He joined the Transaction Services team in January 1997 and has worked exclusively within the M&A field since that date.

Having primarily worked on cross border transactions during his time in the UK, he transferred to the Frankfurt office in July 2001 where he has focused upon serving the private equity market and was promoted to partner in July 2005. Since 2012 Steve leads the PwC Private Equity Industry for PwC Germany and since 2020 he also leads the PwC Private Equity Industry for the EMEA region.

With a wide exposure to various industries advising on both the buy-side and sell-side, Steve has significant experience in large cross border deals for private equity and corporate clients.

Director, Senior Legal Counsel, Robert Bosch LLC

Heather Schroder is a Director and Senior Legal Counsel for Robert Bosch LLC. Ms. Schroder is based out of Robert Bosch GmbH’s North American headquarters in Detroit, Michigan, and serves as the M&A and Corporate legal team leader for North America.  In her role, she is responsible for overseeing all cross-border M&A activities into and out of the U.S. and Canada.   A New York native, prior to joining Bosch in 2014, Ms. Schroder was Senior Corporate Counsel at ATMI, Inc., a publicly-traded, semiconductor company in Connecticut; prior to working in-house, Ms. Schroder worked as a Corporate Law Associate in private practice in New York City. Ms. Schroder is admitted to the bars of New York, Connecticut, and Michigan. She is also a Director on the Board of Advisors for Syracuse University College of Law.

Conference Co-Chair
Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Munich

Dr. Nikolaus von Jacobs advises private equity funds and German strategic players on private equity, venture capital and private and public mergers and acquisitions.

Before joining Reed Smith, he was a partner at an international law firm and headed its German private equity practice. He has also worked in investment banking and European capital markets for Merrill Lynch in London.

Deputy General Manager, Fosun Pharma

Connie He is the Deputy General Manager of the International Department at Fosun Pharma Group, a leading Chinese pharmaceutical group with a global footprint. She leads the international investment at Fosun Pharma. Prior to joining Fosun Pharma, Connie’s career spanned investment banking and private equity, including working in the investment banking and principal investment areas at Natixis and being CEO of a portfolio company’s European business.

Connie holds an MBA from Columbia Business School and a B.A. in Professional Accountancy from the Chinese University of Hong Kong. She is also a Fellow Chartered Certified Accountant.

CFO, NICI GmbH

Since 2016, Eric serves as CFO of NICI GmbH, a company known for gift and toy business. He is responsible for overseeing NICI's financial operations, M&A, business development as well as strategic initiatives. Prior to joining NICI, he was a director and board member of a Chinese family business in Textile Industry and responsible for the acquisition of NICI.

Founder & CEO, SILREAL GmbH

Chenchao Liu, originally from China and a resident of Germany since 2002, is the esteemed founder of SILREAL GmbH. Holding a degree in Chemistry from the Technical University of Munich, Mr. Liu has also enhanced his academic credentials as a visiting researcher at esteemed institutions like the Max Planck Institute and ETH Zurich.

With extensive consulting experience spanning the public sector, biopharmaceuticals, and healthcare providers, Mr. Liu has cultivated an expertise that bridges European and Asian markets. He serves as a guest lecturer on digital health in China at various academic forums in Denmark and Switzerland. In addition to this, he is a contributing author for the World Economic Forum.

His depth of knowledge and strategic insights in healthcare and Sino-European relations have been sought after by a myriad of private corporations and public organizations. These include the German Federal Ministry of Health, the States of Berlin and Saarland, AstraZeneca, Bayer, Opseo, Tencent, the European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries (EFPIA), and The Federation of German Industries (BDI).

Leader of Business Development, Nio GmbH

Zhu Liu has more than ten years work experience in Fortune 500 companies (Accenture and Alibaba) and entrepreneurial experience in e-commerce industry. He has a deep understanding of e-commerce landscape in Europe and China, extensive experience in multinational project management and business development, outstanding communication skills in crosscultural business environment.

Zhu is fluent in Chinese, English and German.

Managing Director, Co-Lead of the German Turnaround and Restructuring Services, AlixPartners

Dr. Rainer Bizenberger helps large companies navigate the complexities of restructuring and transformation. These clients profit from his expertise in turning around, transforming, or refinancing their businesses. Getting things done is his philosphy. Rainer has more than two decades of professional experience. During this time, he has successfully led large-scale, complex restructuring and transformation programs across various industries, both in advisory and management roles (Chief Restructuring Officer / Chief Restructuring Advisor). His wide-ranging experience with banks and credit insurers effectively helps in the negotiation of complex financing issues. He successfully negotiated and implemented major headcount reduction and portfolio optimization / divestment programs.

Who’s Who Legal recognized Rainer as Global Leader in restructuring and insolvency advisory. He is an active member of the Turnaround Management Association (TMA). Previously, Rainer was heading EY’s Turnaround and Restructuring practice in EMEIA. He also was a Senior Partner and Berlin office head at Roland Berger. Rainer holds a PhD in innovative corporate finance and a master degree from Catholic University of Eichstaett-Ingolstadt.

Manager Special Risk Management, Atradius

Ulrik is in charge of the Special Risk Management team for Nordics, Baltics, Russia, CIS and Ukraine and responsible for risk mitigation, credit analysis and underwriting on troubled companies. Prior to Atradius, Ulrik has worked as legal counsel and as a strategic advisor to management concerning a wide range of legal matters including corporate & commercial, contracts, data protection, cyber security, taxes, foreign law, mergers & acquisitions, competition law, tender law (public procurement), construction law, insolvency law (including financial restructuring), employment law/HR related matters etc. He has extensive experience in negotiations with commercial entities and governmental bodies as well as in a wide range of commercial and legal disciplines, with a strong commercial approach. 

Before joining Atradius in 2021, Ulrik worked with Schneider Electric Denmark, Huawei Technologies (Denmark) and several law firms.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, London

Linton advises insolvency practitioners, US and European investment banks, UK clearing banks, hedge funds and private equity houses across the full range of international and domestic restructuring and insolvency matters. His principal areas of focus include cross-border restructurings, creditor and debtor representations, out-of-court restructurings, pensions restructuring and insolvency litigation.
Linton is “recommended” in Legal 500 UK where he is described as a “personable and clever” practitioner. He was also described as an 'emerging star who has worked on a string of excellent high-profile cases and will lead the way in years to come’ (Legal 500, 2020). He has lectured and written articles on restructuring topics and has completed secondments in the Financial Stability Division of the Bank of England and in the global restructuring group at RBS.

Clients appreciate Linton’s wealth of deal experience, technical knowledge and business acumen as well as his ability to guide his clients through complex restructuring arrangements and re-financing deals.

Chief Credit Officer and General Representative, Hamburg Commercial Bank AG

Dr Thomas Dohrmann is Chief Credit Officer and General Representative at Hamburg Commercial Bank AG. Tom and his teams cover all key asset classes of the bank including corporates, commercial real estate, shipping, project finance and capital markets. The risk management activities range from analyzing and deciding new credits to monitoring performing transactions to restructuring and work-out of distressed and non-performing exposures. Additional responsibilities include capital markets operations, asset appraisals and quality management of covered bonds.

Prior to Hamburg Commercial Bank AG, Tom worked as Head of Restructuring & Work-out and Senior Credit Executive at NordLB, Hannover and as Director at Fitch Ratings, New York. Before, he had spent ten years in various Credit Risk Management positions at Deutsche Bank, Frankfurt and New York.

Tom holds an PhD in Law from Leibniz-University of Hannover and an MBA from the Fuqua Business School at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina. He is married with four children.    

Managing Partner, palero capital GmbH

As Managing Partner of palero capital, Conny advises palero group on all financing transactions at its portfolio companies and on its M&A activities. She is an expert in special situations M&A and financing.

Before, she worked for many years at a listed private equity firm as a Director in the M&A division and started her career in investment banking. 

Investment Director, ELF Capital Group

Florian Wimpff is an Investment Director in the ELF investment team. Prior to joining ELF, he worked at mid-market investment and advisory firms ESO Capital and Herter & Co in the field of mid-market investing, debt and restructuring advisory.

Director, PricewaterhouseCoopers GmbH WPG

Carolin is responsible for PwC's Deals Tax Team in Stuttgart and certified German tax advisor ("Steuerberaterin"). She has major project experience in various cross-border transactions mainly focusing on tax due diligences (buy-side and sell-side), tax structuring/modelling, the preparation of funds flows and cap tables and post deal integration work. Carolin has been working on a number of deals which also included coordination of international tax teams for private equity houses and strategic corporate buyers. 

Further, Carolin is the German Emerging Leader in PwC’s Global PE-RA-SIF initiative and the tax representative in PwC Germany’s Value Creation in Deals Community as well as Co-Founder of the newly formed Women@PwCStuttgart network.

Partner, Summa Equity Advisory GmbH

Matthias is responsible for Summa Equity in DACH (Germany, Switzerland, and Austria), spanning sourcing, value creation, and portfolio management across our investment themes with a focus on Resource Efficiency and Tech-Enabled Transformation.

Summa Equity invests in companies that are solving global challenges and creating positive Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) outcomes for society. Summa’s purpose is to co-create win-win for investors, portfolio companies, and society through aligning its vision and investing in line with the UN SDGs. Summa invests across the themes of Resource Efficiency, Changing Demographics, and Tech-Enabled Transformation, and has c. EUR 4bn assets under management.

Before joining Summa Equity, Matthias was a Partner at The Riverside Company and before that a consultant at Boston Consulting Group. He holds a Master of Science in International Business Administration from WU Vienna and an MBA from the University of Cambridge.

Director, HWF Partners

Caroline heads the Munich office of HWF. She specialises in placing bespoke transactional risk insurance (W&I, contingent, tax) in the context of international private equity and M&A transactions. Caroline is valued for her proactive and pragmatic approach and technical excellence. Caroline and her team have advised on complex transactions in the German speaking market and have been able to spearhead innovative developments in the market.

Caroline studied law and business in Germany, Chicago and London. Prior to joining HWF, Caroline has worked at Milbank and Clifford Chance. She is a trained lawyer, admitted in England, Wales and Ireland, and is fluent in German and English. Caroline is also a committee member of 100 Women in Finance, a global organisation committed to gender equity by promoting diversity, raising visibility and empowering women to find their personal path to success in the finance industry.

Partner, EMERAM Capital Partners GmbH

Sven Oleownik has extensive experience in Management Consulting and M&A Advisory as well as in the Private Equity business. In addition, he was repeatedly assigned as a supervisory board member of various family-owned businesses. As such, he also trains supervisory board member as part of the Deutsche Börse qualification program.

He already financed his studies as a shareholder in a trade fair construction company, which he founded jointly with two other partners. After graduating, he began his professional career at an investment company financed by family offices. In the context of new investments and the support of portfolio companies, he also became Managing Director of a portfolio company active in the field of manufacturing industrial goods. He then spent nine years at Dr. Wieselhuber & Partner, a leading management consultancy focused on the advisory of family-owned companies, ultimately as a partner and member of the management board. Sven mainly led projects in the field of strategic development, restructuring, buy and build projects up to the integration of new acquisitions, their financing up to IPOs as well as changes of shareholders and succession. For further twelve years he was Managing Partner of Corporate Finance Advisory at Deloitte in Munich. His sector focus was primarily on consumer goods and technology companies as well as private equity. Before joining Emeram, for seven years he headed the German office of Gimv, an international private equity firm listed on the stock exchange in Brussels, building up its team and investment business in DACH.

Founding Partner, Vidia Equity

Johanna is Founding Partner of Vidia, where she is responsible for the firm’s general strategy, co-leading the transactions team and fundraising. She founded Vidia beginning of 2021 with the aim of driving decarbonization in the industrial segment, with a focus on scaling climate solutions for the highest emitting industries in the DACH and Nordic regions. Prior to founding Vidia, she was a Partner at Orlando Management, a Munich based midmarket private equity firm. She also founded Orlando Nordics in Stockholm, successfully establishing Orlando’s presence in the Nordics. Johanna started her career in the Investment Banking Division of Goldman Sachs. Johanna studied law at Bucerius Law School in Hamburg and the University of Sydney.

Managing Partner/CEO, REIA Capital

Thomas is a founding partner of REIA Capital being based in Hamburg. REIA Capital Funds invest in private equity funds with a small and lower mid cap strategy. Moreover, he is an advisor to several single family offices. Thomas has been active in the private equity universe for more than 25 years. Prior to founding REIA, Thomas was the founder and for more than 10 years the CEO of a private equity fund-of-funds business. In addition, he also spent more than 12 years as an investment professional/partner of the large cap private equity fund BC Partners in their German team. Thomas started his professional career in leverage finance with Dresdner Kleinwort in 1997 after graduating from University Passau with a MBA.

Managing Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Munich

Daja is Office Managing Partner of the Munich Office and has a 10+ years dispute practice encompassing, among others, finance related litigation, complex commercial litigation as well as arbitration – often in cross-border conflicts. From an industry perspective, she has wide-ranging expertise covering finance (including cryptocurrencies), insurance, health care, life science, real estate, entertainment & media.

Partner & Managing Director, AlixPartners GmbH

Veit Buetterlin is a Managing Director in AlixPartners’ Risk practice. He is internationally recognized as a “financial crime expert” (CNN) and for his roles on high-profile compliance and risk management transformation projects. For three consecutive years, Who is Who Legal (WWL) recognized him as “one of the world’s leading practitioners” in investigations. Following its most recent reviews, WWL recognized him, as one of only three forensic accountants from the European Union and as a “Global Elite Thought Leader” in forensic accounting and investigations. He received numerous additional recognitions: Among others, he won Lexology’s Client Choice Award in 2022 and was recognized by Global Investigations Review (GIR), Handelsblatt and Best Lawyers. He has held key roles in investigating and remediating some of Europe’s biggest compliance matters. This includes major money laundering, terrorism financing, sanctions compliance, securities compliance, tax, corruption, asset tracing, financial statement, and environmental law matters. Crucial were also his roles in investigating and remediation IBOR, Dieselgate, certain high-profile top management misconduct, and major bankruptcy cases.

Veit has supported clients on-site in more than 20 countries and led assessments in the context of examinations commissioned by the European Central Bank (ECB), the German Federal Bank, the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA), and other European regulators. He had numerous key roles related to U.S. monitorships commissioned by the DOJ, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), and U.S. bank regulators. Following that, Global Investigations Review (GIR) highlighted the advice Veit gave to “multinational companies over compliance monitorships following U.S. enforcement actions.”

Veit’s inhouse experience includes acting as a money laundering reporting officer, a divisional head of investigations, and internal audit manager, and holding CFO responsibility, in various multinational companies.

Veit gained his doctoral degree with a thesis on a mathmatical environmental economics topic from the Tuebingen University. He researched at Harvard University and studied at Yale University and Heidelberg University. He is invited as a speaker and lecturer at international conferences and renown universities, such as St. Gallen University, Zurich University, or Frankfurt University. He is a member of the selection committee of the German National Academic Foundation. He is a Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist (CAMS), a Certified Global Sanctions Specialist (CGSS), a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE), a Certified Fraud Specialist (CFS), a Certified Professional Forensic Accountant (CPFAcct), and a Certified Professional Internal Auditor (CPIA).

CEO, base camp management consulting GmbH

Marcus Höfer is the CEO of base camp. Thanks to his cooperation with a number of private equity funds and their portfolio companies, Marcus Höfer offers long-term management consulting experience and has been extensively involved in various international and national digitalisation projects and transformations. As an early adopter of new technologies and a 'digital native', Marcus Höfer is the optimum contact person in all areas of digitalisation for companies that dare and want to take this important step.

Marcus Höfer graduated from the Technische Universität München with an MSc in information systems focussing on corporate finance.

Partner, Evolution Environmental Asset Management LP

Benedikt von Butler is a Partner and Portfolio Manager at Evolution Environmental Asset Management LP.

He joins the firm from Enviva, a NYSE-listed producer of sustainable wood bioenergy, where he was the Managing Director for Germany. Mr. von Butler is a carbon markets veteran with over 20 years’ experience co-heading carbon desks at Evolution Markets, Cantor Fitzgerald, Citigroup, Mercuria Energy, and Hartree Partners.

In 2003, together with Andrew Ertel, he structured the first-ever transaction of European CO2 allowances and the first-ever trade of “Assigned Amount Units”, between the governments of Japan and Slovakia. Since then, Mr. von Butler has been instrumental in bringing liquidity to nascent carbon markets, helping many of the major banks and utilities enter the carbon market for the first time and transacting a wide variety of carbon credits.

Partner, Carlsquare

Daniel has 22 years of experience in structured finance, almost ten of which he spent in debt advisory. Most recently, he was Managing Director at DC Advisory, where he was responsible for debt advisory in the DACH region. In this role, he was responsible for the origination and execution of advisory mandates for private equity, corporates, infrastructure funds and banks. The structured financings included transaction-related financings as well as operational and growth financings.

Investment Director, Bright Capital

Felix is an Investment Director in the Frankfurt-based deal team and joined Bright Capital in 2018. He is responsible for origination and execution of new investment opportunities for Bright Capital’s credit strategies. Prior to joining Bright Capital Felix worked at HSBC in Frankfurt, London, and Dusseldorf where he focused on the structuring and execution of mid and large cap sponsor-backed LBO transactions across Germany and Austria. Felix holds a Master of Finance as well as Corporate Management and studied in Germany, the US and France.

M&G Investments

Head of Leveraged Finance, Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC)

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Munich

Dr. Germar Enders focuses his practice on private equity, mergers and acquisitions (M&A), and general corporate law. Germar has extensive experience in advising strategic and financial investors as well as management teams on domestic, cross-border and multi-jurisdictional transactions, and on all aspects of corporate law, including corporate structurings. He advises in a broad range of industries, including automotive, consumer, e-commerce, IT and healthcare.

Prior to joining Reed Smith, Germar worked at other leading international law firms in the field of Private Equity/Corporate/M&A and as assistant professor at the Max-Planck-Institute and the University of Munich. During his legal clerkship, he trained in Cologne and New York. He regularly publishes articles on matters of corporate and civil law, including in legal reference books and commentaries.

Managing Director, SGP Schneider Geiwitz Wieland Corporate Finance GmbH

Nicolas is Managing Partner at SGP Corporate Finance, the Munich based M&A practice of Schneider Geiwitz. His expertise primarily includes growth/private equity transactions, but also distressed/special situations in buy- and sell-side engagements. Prior to joining SGP with his team in 2019, Nicolas held key M&A positions including Managing Director at CFI Group - Corporate Finance International and Helbling Business Advisors in Switzerland. Nicolas played a key role in leading CFI's global IT services and software sector group and actively contributed as a dedicated member of the business services team. Prior to CFI, he was a partner at CAPEO Corporate Finance and head of M&A at Buchanan Capital Group. He started his career in investment banking at Doertenbach in Frankfurt in 1997.

Founder, Serafin Group

Philipp is the founder of Serafin Unternehmensgruppe, a Munich-based industrial holding company that invests in mid-sized companies with business models that can be further improved by implementing strategic and operational measures.

He is also the founder of Serafin Asset Management, a digital asset manager based in Frankfurt and Zurich. Together with Herbert Kloiber Jr., he has set up Night Train Media. Philipp is also a founding partner of Sevest, a Munich-based private equity fund.

He started his career as an associate at KPMG in the audit department before moving on to corporate finance valuation services. After that, he worked for a financial investor. He was also active in wealth management, business analysis and acquisitions and was involved in numerous M&A transactions. Philipp completed his studies at the London School of Economics with a Master of Global Economic History

Co-Founder & Managing Partner, DealCircle GmbH

Kai Hesselmann is Co-Founder and Managing Partner of DealCircle, a holistic technology solution with the world's largest database of search and buy profiles. The superior matching technology makes the Hamburg-based fintech, founded in 2018, the preferred partner of hundreds of M&A advisors in buyer identification and market outreach. They get access to a Big Data-supported buyer database with over 250,000 profiles (family offices, private equity, MBI and corporates).

At DealCircle he is primarily responsible for Business Development, Product & Tech and Marketing. 

Before founding DealCircle, Kai Hesselmann was a partner of a mid-cap private equity investor with a focus on transactions in the industrials segment as well as an advisor for M&A transactions.

Investment Director, Family Trust Investor FTI GmbH

Friedrich Wallwitz is an investment director and has been active in the investment business since 2018. Prior to Family Trust, he was an investor for Gimv NV and an M&A advisor focusing on succession situations for Edmond de Rothschild and PMB Capital, guiding family-owned companies through a change of ownership. He began his career at J.P. Morgan as a commodities trader.
 
Friedrich holds a B.A. Economics and International Relations from Lancaster University, and an LL.M. Law & Economics from the Universities of Hamburg, Rotterdam and Berkeley. In addition to his work at J.P. Morgan, he completed an M.A. Christian Theology at the University of London.

Partner and German MidMarket Deals Leader, PricewaterhouseCoopers GmbH WPG

Daniel heads the German MidMarket Deals service offerings of PwC and is a partner in the Deals Tax Group. He has over 22 years of buy-/sell-side as well as carve-out transaction experience. In recent years he covered leading transactions in the Technology & Software, Business Services, Health Care and Retail & Consumer sectors.
Next to focusing on German and international private equity clients he advised numerous sell-side, carve-out and IPO processes in the German “Mittelstand” while providing support to far more than 200 successful transactions.
Daniel is a German certified tax advisor (Steuerberater) and a US CPA holding a diploma in business administration. He joined PwC in 2018 after working 18 years for Arthur Andersen / EY.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Brussels

Wim is an EU regulatory partner in the firm’s Brussels office, focusing on the life sciences sector.

Wim helps pharmaceuticals, medical devices, cosmetics, and food companies navigate the regulatory process in Europe throughout the life cycle of their products — from planning and development, to approval and marketing, to enforcement and ongoing compliance. His work has been recognized by Legal 500 on its 2023 list of notable EU Regulatory: Pharma, Medical Devices and Biotech practices.

Executive Director, DC Advisory

Edward de Stigter is Executive Director in DC Advisory’s Frankfurt team covering the Healthcare sector.

He started his investment banking career in 2009 with ABN AMRO / RBS, followed by JPMorgan and Commerzbank before joining DC Advisory in 2013. Edward holds an M.Sc degree in Finance and Investments as well as a B.Sc. degree in International Business Administration from Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University, the Netherlands.

Partner, capiton AG

Fritjof Franz is Partner of capiton AG. Before joining capiton in 2018, he worked for several years as Head of Global M&A and Licensing for the listed Paul Hartmann Group, as well as several years for a private equity investor, a management consultancy and as a lawyer in the field of M&A and restructuring. Fritjof Franz is a certified lawyer and holds a LL.M. in M&A from Frankfurt School of Finance and Management and a MBA from IE Business School in Madrid.

Managing Director, ISP Healthcare

Achim is the Managing Director of ISP HEALTHCARE. He has more than 15 years experience in assessing and investing in healthcare and life sciences businesses and building world class healthcare companies. Before founding ISP HEALTHCARE, he built the successful investor advice and international businesses at a leading German healthcare consultancy. He started his career at a global strategy consulting firm in Munich, London, and Sao Paulo. He completed his studies at the London School of Economics and Bocconi University of Milan.

Co-Founder and Managing Director, PARATUS Holding GmbH

Friedrich von Kleist is Co-Founder and Managing Director of PARATUS, a Healthcare Software B2B Buy and Build. Before starting PARATUS, he worked at GREENPEAK Partners as Head of Healthcare investments. Furthermore, Friedrich von Kleist gained several years of experience as a healthcare management consultant and private equity fund-of-fund investment professional. Friedrich von Kleist holds a Master in Management from ESCP Europe in Paris, a B.Sc. in Agricultural Economics from University Kiel and is a certified bank clerk trained at Sal. Oppenheim jr. & Cie. AG & Co. KGaA.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Munich

Dr Andreas Splittgerber is a partner in the Munich office of Reed Smith and member of the Tech & Data Group.

Andreas specialises in IT law, data protection and privacy, cyber security, social media law and internet law (Germany and EU). He is passionate about technology and privacy and thought-leader when it comes to legally evaluating new technologies (e.g. internet of things, artificial intelligence).
His clients include renowned US technology companies and providers of internet platforms as well as European technology companies.

Co-Founder & CEO, ValueWorks GmbH 

Dr. Wolfgang Faisst is Co-Founder & CEO of ValueWorks.ai and Senior Advisor at Cadence Growth Capital. In addition, he heads the "Business Model Innovations" working group of AcaTech's German AI initiative and is a lecturer at the Universities of Bamberg and Bayreuth.

Previously, he held numerous strategic innovation positions within SAP. These included the founding and management of SAP Exchange Media as a business network for digital advertising and the SAP Store as an e-commerce platform for marketing SAP and partner solutions. In addition, he was head of product management for the "SAP Business Suite powered by SAP HANA“ driving the start of SAP S/4 HANA, SAP’s core product.

In this function, he initiated the SAP Marketing Cloud and drove the strategic development of the most important SAP solution with regard to Cloud and Big Data and later also in the direction of Artificial Intelligence and digital business models as part of the Intelligent ERP initiative. In his responsibility, the offering and collaboration model for development partners in the cloud was redefined. As head of "On-Demand Service Solution Management" and co-lead for the first SAP Cloud Program, he laid the foundation for SAP's cloud offerings.

Before joining SAP, Dr. Faisst worked as a management consultant and senior project manager for Bain & Company in the Munich, Zurich and London offices. He advised international key accounts on strategic IT issues and leading IT companies. He is co-founder of the IT practice group of Bain & Company in the German-speaking countries.

Previously, he worked for Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Peter Mertens at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg on the subject of "Virtual Enterprises and their IT Support" and worked as a research assistant at the Bavarian Research Center for Knowledge-Based Systems.

Co-Founder & Managing Partner, DealCircle GmbH

Graig Gröbli is Co-Founder and Managing Partner of DealCircle, a holistic technology solution with the world's largest database of search and buy profiles. The superior matching technology makes the Hamburg-based fintech, founded in 2018, the preferred partner of hundreds of M&A advisors in buyer identification and market outreach. They get access to a Big Data-supported buyer database with over 250,000 profiles (family offices, private equity, MBI and corporates).

At DealCircle he is primarily responsible for M&A operations and business development. 

Prior to founding DealCircle, Graig Gröbli was a partner in a mid-cap private equity investor with a focus on business services & software transactions.

Director, Google Cloud

Patrick van den Hoevel is Director at Google Cloud, leading the Deal Pursuit team in EMEA, responsible for negotiating all major and most strategic cloud engagements in EMEA.

He has 15+ years of experience in information technology, starting with IT outsourcing at Siemens and Atos, licensing business, and cloud computing at Citrix and LogMeIn (now GoTo/Lastpass), and IT consulting at NTT DATA. Patrick held various leading positions in legal departments and contract management before joining Google Cloud in 2019. He grew a team of 5 professionals to 40 negotiation experts. His goal is to develop sustainable and mutually beneficial business relationships at the crossroads of legal and business development. 

Managing Director, Intermediate Capital Group (ICG) Beratungsgesellschaft GmbH 

Thomas von Werner is Managing Director at ICG, responsible for equity and subordinated debt investments from the Mid-Market Fund in the DACH region. Prior to ICG, Thomas worked among others at EQT and Penta Investments, being responsible for investments in DACH / CEE and head of TMT sector group. Thomas started his career as consultant at Bain & Co in Munich and holds a PhD in Economics from Université de Fribourg, studying in Fribourg and Cambridge University.

Operating Partner, Riverside Europe Partners GmbH

Julian Heerdegen joined Riverside in 2020. Prior to joining Riverside, Julian was employed at Lincoln International as the Director of TMT where he provided sector coverage and deal origination and execution for numerous TMT sell side and capital raise mandates. Prior to joining Lincoln International, he held various technology consulting and technology marketing positions at iCrossing Gmbh, a global digital marketing agency; SugarCRM, a software company and b.telligent a business intelligence consultancy. Julian holds a German University Diploma in Business Information Systems and a Master’s degree in Business Sciences from the University of Bamberg & Cracow University of Economics.

Chief Technology Officer and MD, Project A Services GmbH & Co. KG

Stephan started his career as a Software Engineer after finishing his diploma in Computer Science and worked many years in Software Engineering and Tech Leadership roles.

Since joining Project A in 2015, Stephan has worked with our portfolio companies to build modern, scalable software systems and the corresponding tech organizations. He has advised them on their digital transformation.

Companies like Trade Republic, Kry, Spryker, Sennder, Lampenwelt, Gartenhaus, Amann Girrbach, and many more were supported in interim CTO and VP Engineering positions, with teams of experts and by interviewing, hiring, and mentoring their Tech Leadership. In addition, Stephan works closely with our Investment Team on the VC and PE side to support them in their Due Diligence processes.

Partner, Verdane

Dominik joined Verdane in May 2023 and is responsible for Verdane’s presence and activities in the DACH region across all investment strategies.

Prior to Verdane, Dominik was a partner at EMH Partners, where he carried out numerous investments in software, healthcare, and B2B service companies. Before joining EMH, he was a Director at Chequers Capital where he led many transactions in the German mid-market segment. Dominik started his career at Barclays Capital in Leveraged Finance and Financial Sponsor Coverage.

He holds a B.A. in European Business from Dublin City University and a diploma in Business Administration from ESB Reutlingen.

Partner, wdp GmbH

Daniel Tschentscher assists our clients in developing and executing digital strategies. As a founder and CEO of multiple digital businesses, he has first-hand experience of the challenges involved in implementing digital value creation programs. At wdp, Daniel helps our clients turn their digital goals into reality – digitalizing existing business areas, setting up new business units and even implementing entire new digital business models.

In close cooperation with investors, shareholders, and management, Daniel develops roadmaps for digital value creation, including milestones, deliverables and detailed execution plans. Where required, a team of proven interim and change managers ensure that these roadmaps are implemented – for as long as is needed until the goals and the targets are met. In doing so, one of the core objectives is to establish an organization with strong execution capabilities that can autonomously master the ongoing challenges of digitalization.

After more than 25 years in digital business and over 100 successful digitalization projects, Daniel’s extensive expertise includes strategy and organizational change, digital product development and process optimization, marketing- and sales-process digitalization, and the implementation of efficient IT development methodologies. He studied in Berlin, Cologne, Lausanne and Barcelona, holds an MBA from the IE Business School in Madrid and speaks five European languages.

Principal, LEA Partners GmbH

Before joining LEA Partners, Kurt worked several years for a midcap private equity company, where he co-built the technology franchise. Kurt holds a master's degree in finance from the University of St. Andrews.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Paris

Guilain has an extensive experience in M&A, venture capital and Private equity transaction. His practice in Paris is crucial to support global clients building their strategic portfolios in France and across Europe.

Guilain advises sovereign-wealth funds, venture capital and private equity funds, industrial clients and managers in private and public M&A and restructuring.

Guilain graduated from HEC Business School, Paris I Sorbonne University and holds a LLM from Stanford Law School. He is admitted to the Paris and New-York bars. Guilain is the Co-Head of the Private Equity practice for Reed Smith LLP in Europe.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Frankfurt

Octávio is a founding partner of the firm’s Frankfurt office and a member of the Global Corporate Group. He has substantial knowledge and extensive experience in advising on national and cross-border transactions, in particular on mergers & acquisitions, private equity, venture capital, and finance transactions as well as in advising on general corporate matters.

General Counsel, Three Hills Capital Partners

Massimiliano Calabro joined Three Hills as General Counsel at the end of 2020 and he is based in the headquarter in London. He has 20 years of legal advisory experience in the M&A market with a specific focus on the private equity industry. Massimiliano joined from Gianni, Origoni & Partners (a premier international law firm) where he was a Partner in the Corporate-M&A department with a focus on PE transactions. Before becoming a Partner, he worked for one year in New York as a foreign lawyer of the Corporate-M&A department of Milbank, Tweed, Hadley and McCloy and he gained a Master of Laws (LL.M.) in Corporate Governance & Practice at Stanford Law School.

Legal Counsel, Gimv

Schahin Haghani joined Gimv in March 2023 as a Legal Counsel for our Munich office. His focus will be on the German deals and portfolio. 

Prior to joining Gimv, Schahin was a partner in a leading German law firm advising international clients on M&A transactions. He has over 20 years of experience in national and cross-border transactions. 

Schahin Haghani graduated at University of Freiburg and holds a Master in Mergers & Acquisitions (LL.M.) from the Frankfurt School of Finance and Management. 

Associate, All Seas Capital

Alain joined All Seas Capital in 2021, where he is an Associate.

Prior to ASCP, Alain held positions at Rothschild & Co and Credit Suisse, advising clients across a variety of transactions across M&A, restructuring and financing, as well as a European private equity firm, where he worked across a range of mid-market investment transactions, primarily in the industrial technology and healthcare sectors.

He holds an MBA from London Business School and a BA from University of Zurich.

Managing Director, Metric Capital Partners

Sebastian joined Metric in 2018 as an Investment Director and opened the MCP Munich office.

Prior to joining Metric, Sebastian was an Investment Professional at EQT Partners since 2015, investing in large and mid-cap companies. Before that, Sebastian worked at A.T. Kearney since 2009, advising clients on strategy, restructuring and M&A projects

Sebastian holds a PhD in Finance and a Diploma in Physics from Technical University Munich. Furthermore, he holds an Honors Degree in Technology Management from the Center for Digital Technology & Management.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, London

François Feuillat is a partner in our Global Corporate Group. He has more than 25 years’ experience handling complex cross-border mergers and acquisitions, takeovers, joint ventures, private equity deals and corporate finance transactions involving more than 70 countries and worth a total of over US$100 billion.

Transaction Lead and Vice-President, Energy Infrastructure Partners (EIP)

Stanislas Berti is Transaction Lead and Vice-President of Investments at Energy Infrastructure Partners (EIP) in Zurich. He is responsible for investment in new energy transition technologies and led EIP’s recent investments in clean molecules (Fluxys Group) and e-mobility solutions (Electra). Prior to joining EIP in 2021, Stanislas was working for Macquarie Capital’s Green Investment Group (GIG) in London. He closed more than 1GW of onshore and offshore wind (greenfield and brownfield), contributing to the inception of GIG’s offshore wind development business Corio launched in 2022. Stanislas holds a MSc in Financial Analysis from London Business School and a BSc in Financial Engineering from Paris-Dauphine University.

Director, Aon

Nicolò Castagna heads up Aon’s Infrastructure M&A practice in EMEA. He has joined Aon in late 2019 from Moody's, where he was responsible for a portfolio of project finance and corporate infrastructure ratings in a variety of sectors. Prior to Moody's, Nicolò spent eight years at Mediobanca, structuring project finance and corporate facilities across a wide range of infrastructure assets.

Nicolò holds a Master of Science in Corporate Finance from Bocconi University in Milan and has completed an Exchange Programme at LMU in Munich.

Managing Director, Aon

Corey Lewis is a Managing Director on the Aon Transaction Solutions team based out of New York, NY. He is a Co-Leader of the North American Tax Insurance Practice and is the Tax Credit Insurance Practice Leader. Corey joined Aon in 2015 after beginning his career as an associate in the International Tax Services: Financial Services/Real Estate division in the New York office of PricewaterhouseCoopers. At PwC, Corey focused primarily on the tax structuring of international real estate investments.

Corey was recognized as a Power Broker and Rising Star in 2019, 2020, and 2022 and as a Power Broker Finalist and Rising Star in 2023 by RISK & INSURANCE Magazine. Corey graduated from the University of Michigan with a B.A. and The University of Texas School of Law with a J.D.

Global Head of ESG Transaction Advisory Services, Aon

Luise O’Gorman is Aon’s Global Head of ESG Transaction Advisory Services working with both corporate and financial sponsor clients to help incorporate ESG considerations into the investment lifecycle. In this role, Luise is leading the development and growth of a holistic ESG proposition tailored to M&A and other transactions; designed to meet the growing demand for pre-acquisition ESG solutions and post-closing support.

Prior to joining Aon, Luise was a management consultant with a career focus in climate risk, the energy transition, renewable energy and sustainability more broadly. Working with PwC, Baringa Partners, and as an independent consultant, she advised Central Government, regulators, investors and corporates in the UK and EU, particularly in the Energy and Financial Services industries.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Munich

Philipp is a partner in the Munich office and a member of Reed Smith’s Entertainment & Media Industry Group.
Philipp has a broad proficiency in the digital area. With more than two decades of experience, he has a strong focus on cross-border projects and complex agreements. In the digital sector, his dynamic practice involves cloud, mobile and e-commerce, Internet of Things, AI and 4IR frameworks as well as Web3, metaverse and data economy. More generally, he covers information technology, outsourcing, telecoms, and data protection.

Philipp’s clients include major international industrials from the high-tech sector as well as specialized SMEs, highly innovative start-ups, and business incubators. In addition, his expertise includes digital solutions in the area of sustainability and impact investing.

Finally, he has extensive experience in aviation and is active in international arbitration. 

Founder, & CEO, Arthur Technologies Inc.

Christoph Fleischmann is the founder and CEO of Arthur Technologies. In 2011, he co-founded a machine learning startup before entering the world of spatial computing in 2013. He went on to be a founding partner of two VR companies, Inflight VR and Megaparticle, the company behind PokerVR. 

In 2016, Fleischmann founded Arthur Technologies, a large-scale virtual office space that enables businesses to collaborate in XR, offering enterprises the advantages of in-person work without geographical constraints. As a leading XR enterprise collaboration solution, the company now employs more than 60 employees internationally. The platform is used by renowned organizations around the world, such as the United Nations, BCG and Societe Generale.

Director, Siemens AG

Principal, Acton Capital Partners GmbH

Joseph is a principal at Acton Capital Partners, which he joined in 2020. Prior to Acton Capital, Joseph worked at Google Germany and various startups, advising retailers and fintechs on strategy and international expansion. At Acton he focusses on software investments with a particular focus on fintech and healthcare.

Joseph holds degrees from University of St. Gallen, Columbia University and Hertie School of Governance.

Co-Founder, EcoPlanet Green Operations GmbH

Henry is Co-Founder of ecoplanet, making SMBs the leaders of the energy transition. The ecoplanet software is a one-stop-shop for energy, covering consumption optimisation, intelligent procurement and safeguarding regulatory compliance.

Before founding ecoplanet, Henry was Engagement Manager at McKinsey & Company where he focused on the industrial sector as well as digital business models. Henry holds a Master in Industrial Engineering as well as a PhD in Entrepreneurial Finance from the TU Munich.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, London

Bronwen has twenty years’ experience in Fund Finance, having been active in the space since its inception in the London market. She acts for banks and other financial institutions, sponsors, general partners, and fund managers on a whole range of fund finance matters including capital call (subscription line) facilities, Net Asset Value (NAV) facilities, hybrid facilities, and general partner and co-investment facilities.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Frankfurt

Dirk-Peter is a founding partner of the firm’s Frankfurt office and a member of the Financial Industry Group. He has substantial experience in advising on finance transactions and on banking laws and regulations.
One particular focus of his practice is the representation of domestic and international clients in real estate finance, non performing loans and credit portfolios transactions. He also advises regularly on domestic and cross-border acquisition finance transactions as well as on corporate finance transactions.

National and international publications regularly recommend him in the area of “lending and acquisition finance”.

Director Global Funds Banking, HSBC Innovation Bank

Mirza is responsible for client origination and providing bespoke fund-level debt solutions across EMEA. He has 10 years+ of professional experience in banking. Prior to joining HSBC Innovation Banking (ex SVB UK), he spent 8 years in the mid cap leveraged finance space (DZ BANK, IKB) Germany. He has further experience in the renewable energy space (juwi) where he was part of the project finance team.

Mirza holds a MSc in Business Administration from Goethe University Frankfurt and University Paris Dauphine.

Founding Partner, PINOVA Capital

Joern Pelzer is Founding Partner of PINOVA Capital, a Private Equity firm focusing on profitable medium-sized companies in industrial technology and information Technology in German-speaking regions. He has been an investor in industrial technology and information technology companies since 1998.

Prior to PINOVA Joern was a Partner at global private equity firm 3i, where he was based in Germany and Silicon Valley. Before joining 3i, he worked at the Fraunhofer Institute, where he focused on Research & Development and software for production technology. Furthermore, he has an entrepreneurial family background.

Joern studied Industrial Engineering at the Technical University of Berlin (Dipl.- Ing.), International Relations at London School of Economics (M.Sc.) and received his executive education from Harvard Business School (OPM).

Head of Institutional Banking, SEB

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, London

Sam is a partner in the firm’s Global Corporate Group in London, focusing on M&A and Private Equity transactions. He advises corporates, financial sponsors, institutional investors and management teams on all aspects of M&A and investment transactions, both domestically and, more typically, cross-border. He has led cross-office and cross-practice teams on numerous acquisitions, disposals, buyouts, add-on deals, growth equity and venture capital investments.

Investment Manager, EGERIA Beteiligungen GmbH

Prior to joining Egeria, Florian worked in the investment team of Gimv primarily focused on the DACH market.

He started his career at Perella Weinberg Partners based in London where he focused on M&A and capital markets transactions.

Co-Founder and Partner, SEVEST Management GmbH

David Lisewski is Co-Founder, Partner, and Investment Committee member of SEVEST. At SEVEST he also leads our investment team. Before co-founding SEVEST, he was involved in over twenty transactions across a wide range of sectors, for Bregal Unternehmerkapital, GIC, General Atlantic, Lazards and Deutsche Bank.

SEVEST is a mid-market buyout fund with a focus on industrial technology businesses in DACH. Through our entrepreneurial family background, our strong track record as mid-market investors, and our operator-led active ownership approach, we support our portfolio companies to reach their growth potential.

Partner, Rivean Capital Advisory GmbH

As a partner in Rivean’s Frankfurt office, Andreas is involved in originating and executing transactions in Germany. Andreas also is head of the German office.

Prior to joining Rivean Capital, Andreas spent two years at a Chinese cross-border investment fund in Munich where he led and helped to set up the European investment team. Before that, Andreas worked at BC Partners in Hamburg and at Credit Suisse in Frankfurt.

Andreas obtained a master’s degree in business administration from European Business School, Oestrich-Winkel (Germany).

Partner, EMZ Partners GmbH

Julia Luca joined EMZ Partners GmbH in 2023. She has worked in private equity since 2011, including prior roles at Equistone and DBAG. Julia started her career at Deloitte in Transaction services.

Julia holds a Master in Mathematics from TU Darmstadt and an LL.M. from WWU.

Partner, Legance

Sven advises international corporate clients and financial investors in cross-border M&A transactions and operations with a special focus on inbound acquisitions in Italy from the DACH area (Germany, Austria, Switzerland) and Nordics. Sven has extensive experience in mergers & acquisitions and joint ventures, as well as in corporate law, commercial contracts and the renewable energy sector. He regularly counsels clients in the real estate investment sector, with a particular regard for tourist resort development projects.
Sven is admitted to practice both in Germany and in Italy and is a member of the International Bar Association (IBA).

Senior Associate, Reed Smith LLP, London

Romain is a technical lawyer who seeks to solve challenges for his clients with an unwavering focus on the underlying business objective for each matter.
He brings over eight years’ experience working within the shipping industry to the Transportation Industry Group. As an English solicitor and French Avocat, he works between our London and Paris offices and focuses on transactional matters.

He uses his strong understanding of operational and commercial constraints of the maritime sector to advise banks, alternative lenders, shipowners, and charterers on their financial and commercial transactions relating to commercial vessels, cruise ships, and superyachts.

Managing Director, HAMMONIA Reederei GmbH & Co. KG

Eric started his professional life at Fraport. He worked in M&A before leading the restructuring and outsourcing of a major business unit. 2003 Eric became CEO of Leipzig Airport where he was – inter alia – in charge of developing the Airport’s infrastructure. Later he was asked to join DHL Express and led DHL Express’ Airport operations in Germany, including Leipzig Hub.

In 2012, Eric took over Amazon’s German fulfillment organization, spent one year in the US and later oversaw the buildup of Amazon’s Polish country organization. From 2015 to 2019 Eric was the CEO of Fiege Logistics in Switzerland and from 2019 until 2023 CEO of DPD Germany.

Eric studied business administration at the University of Applied Sciences in Mainz.

Managing Partner, ConsusPartner

Rainald Roth joined the ConsusPartner team as a partner in 2017. Previously, he worked for more than 20 years in Corporate Finance / Investment Banking at Deutsche Bank, Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein and Société Générale, mainly with a focus on M&A.

With his expertise in advising on complex M&A transactions, Rainald Roth has been offering seminars on M&A through BVL (Bundesvereinigung Logistik) for some time. In addition to the transport & logistics sector, Rainald Roth also has in-depth experience with transactions in the facility services market.

After his first and second state examinations in law (University of Freiburg, Higher Regional Court of Oldenburg), Rainald Roth completed a course in business administration at the Open University of Hagen.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, London

Shervin is a partner in Reed Smith's private funds formation group, based in the London office. He has particular experience advising fund managers on all aspects of the establishment, structuring and operation of a wide range of private investment funds, including in the private equity, private credit, infrastructure, growth capital and venture capital asset classes. In addition, Shervin advises fund managers on their internal matters, including management vehicle set-up and structuring and carried interest arrangements, as well as their co-investment activities.

Partner, Reed Smith LLP, Washington

Ed is currently a partner in our Global Corporate Group. He is a leader in investment management practice and representation of endowments, foundations, pension plans, family offices and outsourced chief investment offices (OCIOs), among other institutional investors. As former chair of the American Bar Association’s (ABA) Institutional Investors Committee and a frequent author and speaker on institutional investment issues, Ed is considered a national thought leader on legal, compliance and policy issues relating to institutional investment. He was a member of the Institutional Limited Partners Association’s steering committee on the recent adoption of model limited partnership forms and a model non-disclosure agreement. His practice also includes representation of academic partners on industry/academic collaborations, consulting and start-ups.

Senior Legal Counsel, Siemens AG

Adam has worked in the PE Fund industry for over 20 years, on both the GP and the LP side. Adam is currently the chair of ILPA’s Legal Advisory Council, having been elected in March 2022, and has been a member since October 2018.

Chief Investment Officer, Equistone

Oskar is Chief Investment Officer, Chairman of the European Investment Committee and a member of Equistone’s Management Board. Prior to taking on the CIO role, Oskar completed over thirty transactions as a deal executive at Equistone.

Before joining Equistone, Oskar worked in private equity with DB Capital Partners and Apax Partners and as a strategic consultant with AT Kearney.

He holds a BA in Economics from Columbia College, an MBA from The Wharton School and a Master’s in International Studies from the University of Pennsylvania.

Managing Director, CF Private Equity

Miriam Schmitter is Head of ex-U.S. Private Equity based in Commonfund's London investment office and is a member of the Investment Committee. Miriam's primary responsibilities include due diligence, manager selection and investment management for the firm’s private equity programs while also contributing to venture capital, natural resources, and distressed capital programs.

Before joining Commonfund Capital, she was with Cambridge Associates where she served as Managing Director and head of international private equity research in London. Miriam was also a member of the internal Investment Committee at Cambridge. Prior to 2005, she was an investment manager of private equity fund investments at Allianz, where she researched and selected private equity investment opportunities.

Prior to that, Miriam was an investment professional at DB Capital Partners/ DB Investor, the direct private equity investment division of Deutsche Bank, where she evaluated buyout investment opportunities. She also worked as a consultant for Deloitte & Touche performing financial analysis and valuations and conducting financial due diligence for clients. Miriam has a PhD from the University of Darmstadt and an M.B.A. from the University of Mannheim.

Managing Partner/CEO, REIA Capital

Thomas is a founding partner of REIA Capital being based in Hamburg. REIA Capital Funds invest in private equity funds with a small and lower mid cap strategy. Moreover, he is an advisor to several single family offices. Thomas has been active in the private equity universe for more than 25 years. Prior to founding REIA, Thomas was the founder and for more than 10 years the CEO of a private equity fund-of-funds business. In addition, he also spent more than 12 years as an investment professional/partner of the large cap private equity fund BC Partners in their German team. Thomas started his professional career in leverage finance with Dresdner Kleinwort in 1997 after graduating from University Passau with a MBA.