Volker Hirsch Email & Phone Number

Macclesfield, Gb

The EIC Scaling Club is an exclusive community of 100+ European deep tech scale-ups and their partners. The 2-year program brings together high-potential deep tech companies focusing on major global challenges with investors, corporate innovators, and other industry stakeholders to spur growth. I am mentoring in their New Biotech Platforms group.

Macclesfield, Cheshire, Gb

Blue Beck is a developer of games and apps across every smartphone and digital online platform imaginable. Standing 40+ strong, our engineers boast an average (!) of 15 (wo)man years in relevant experience, so we are second to none on deep, deep knowledge. If someone moans about Android's device fragmentation, we have a good laugh...I co-founded the company and I provide guidance on company strategy and market development as well as driving business development.

West Midlands, Gb

Advantage Creative is a non-profit (Community Interest Company - CIC) advisory and investing body focused on the creative industry and the evolving sector of CreaTech.

West Midlands, Gb

Tech North Advocates is a collection of tech leaders, experts and investors uniting to form the most influential independent, private sector group in the North of England. Tech North Advocates is a private sector led coalition of expert individuals from the tech sector and broader community who will be committed to championing the North of England’s potential as a world-class hub for tech and digital businesses. It will strive to support the North's tech start-ups and high-growth businesses in finding new investment, new talent and continued success. The group will consists of technology entrepreneurs, established digital giants, journalists, government figures and vital suppliers to our industry. The group also has Overseas Advocates from 20 countries and territories across the world which include Tech London Advocates, Tech Nordic Advocates, Tech China Advocates, Tech India Advocates to name but a few.

Brussels, Be

Coaching and mentoring in a number of the European Innovation Council (EIC) programmes.

Quantified Ventures invests and advises at early stage in EdTech, “deep” tech, AI, robotics, climate change and related fields.

Berlin, De

The Greentech Alliance brings together green technology businesses, that fight climate change with their products and services in the most responsible and respectful to our planet manner, to support them with advice about funding, impact, visibility and strategy with the help of top VCs, journalists, advisors and entrepreneurs.

London, England, Gb

Official Audio Partner of World Book Day. Yoto is an interactive audio platform for kids. They make carefully connected audio players that kids control without using a screen. And they have a catalogue of audio that inspires creative play and learning. I invested in their very first funding round.

London, Uk, Gb

Enroly connects students with trusted university admission and visa support in their home country - for free.

Newmarket , Gb

Wonde helps simplify the way in which school data is accessed by third party applications. For developers, a simple API gives them access to reading and writing school data.

London, Select State, Gb

Pi-Top revolutionises STEM education with Raspberry-Pi-based hardware and a comprehensive software package around it. It is the only solution of its kind that is endorsed by the leading UK awarding body OCR.

Macclesfield, Cheshire, Gb

London, England, Gb

Full partner, then Venture Partner in the early-stage funds of the firm. I was an investor director at Exonar (acquired by NowVertical) and Seldon. Amadeus V Technology Fund (where I was a partner in) invested in Altana AI, Brytlyt, Charco Neurotech, Constructive Bio, Cryptosense (acquired by SandboxAQ) Immense Simulations, iPronics, Nu Quantum, OriBiotech, Photonic, Pimloc, Quibim, Riverlane, Seldon, Sprout AI, Tenzo, The ID Co, Unlikely AI, V7, Xampla, and XYZ Reality plus a bunch of proof-of-concept tickets.

Alderley, Cheshire, Gb

The Medicines Discovery Catapult is a national centre of applied R&D that industrialises and drives the adoption of new techniques, processes and technologies across the UK on medicines discovery. Funded at the core by InnovateUK, it is an independent, non-profit organisation. As CCO, my role was to build the framework enabling partnerships with private enterprise (big and small), academia and beyond. In addition, I built the foundations of an investment programme (both internally in the form of a venture studio as well as externally to leverage the company's scientific insight and network in its ecosystem to identify early opportunities in the ecosystem) in order to further the organisation's aim to broaden access to world-class scientific tools, technologies and processes and achieve a more balanced financial position long-term.

Manchester, England, Gb

The Link App helps law firms improve client communication by utilising a secure channel of communication to clients. It struggled to find wider traction, and ultimately folded.

Macclesfield, Cheshire, Gb

I was elected as a Parent Govenor forming part of the school's governing body of our children's "outstanding" (Ofsted) comprehensive school in Macclesfield. I served as Chairman of the Parent Governors Committee and on the Curriculum and National Teaching School Committees.My election followed years of working with the school on its performing arts specialisation and co-organising the annual TEDx Youth @ Manchester conference, whose 2009 inaugural version was amongst the world's first TEDx conferences aimed at young people.From 2017-2023, I acted as a Community Governor (since our daughter graduated with her A-Levels). In 2023, it was time to step down and leave the field to others more closely connected.

Co-working space co-located with the Blue Beck office. Never recovered post-Covid, so we are using the space in other ways...

London, Gb

(Acquired by Ex.Co)Bibblio provided ML-powered content enrichment and contextually relevant recommendations. I invested in and worked with the team to shape the proposition as part of their participation in the Emerge Education accelerator programme. I followed on with the investment and continued to advise the founders, culminating in them asking me to serve as their Chairman.The company was acquired by Ex.Co, an Israeli media-technology business to bolster their product offering.

Coventry, England, Gb

Aula is a communication platform dedicated to education. Think Slack for classrooms. Didn't work out: great product, (too) difficult market. Acquired for pennies by the University of Coventry.

Bellevue, Washington, Us

Recurrence was a "flight simulator" for business schools. Case studies for the 21st century.I was an investor as part of their participation in the Emerge Education accelerator and was then asked (and accepted) to serve on their board, which I did until September 2018.The company battled for scale but, ultimately, failed and wound up at the end of 2021.

Redmond, Washington, Us

This was called "Microsoft Accelerator" at the time; I reckon MSFT for Startups is its closest equivalent...

San Francisco, Ca, Us

Wearable - IoT World is an end-to-end platform to accelerate products to market. Focused on providing a clear path to market across the Innovation Process. Launched to have high-impact in a high-potetial emerging niche market through accelerator programmes, advisory and events.

This one died.

London, England, Gb

Emerge Education, the accelerator operator by Emerge Venture Lab is the premier EdTech accelerator in Europe. Originally born out of the Said Business School at Oxford University, it is now run out of the EdSpace in Shoreditch, London.I was the very first Venture Partner and have been investing in every cohort since its inception. In addition to working with the startups within the programme, I am helping the CEO (and founder) with strategic guidance and assist in the further development and expansion of the programme.

Vancouver, British Columbia, Ca

Live ops and gaming-as-a-service platform. Acquired by Animoca (ASX:AB1).

Po Box 77592, London, Gb

Member of the Strategy & Initiatives and Marcomms Committees. Resigned following my resignation from BlackBerry (Memberships in MEF are corporate ones).

Waterloo, Ontario, Ca

Having arrived with the acquisition of Scoreloop, I was asked to head business development for their (then very small) games team to build the ecosystem for the BlackBerry 10 platform, contributing key platform and publisher deals (including EA, Rovio, Disney, etc.) in the early stages and help it to a platform launch with more than 70,000 apps aboard, about 1/3 of which games. We set a world record on launching a games platform. No one, not Apple, not Google, not Nokia or Microsoft achieved what we did: launching this many games on a platform that didn't exist before!I was one of two spokespersons for games within BlackBerry worldwide and one of the company's faces in the games space. I resigned to (again) pursue entrepreneurial activities.

Scoreloop was a trailblazer for mobile social games. It provided social infrastructure software for games, solving a number of riddles: its solution addresses social discovery, people interaction and organic connectedness of players and their friends. It boasts a feature set that includes challenges, virtual currencies, achievements and many more and can be completely adapted and run on a white-label basis so that it will not interfere with look-and-feel and branding needs of developers and publishers. It has more than 450m users across multiple mobile platforms (BlackBerry - to which we sold - decided to sunset the service as of December 2014).I was initially retained as a Strategy Advisor when the company had some 400,000 users (we were at 100m+ 18 months later) and then brought fully on board as Chief Strategy Officer within 6 weeks of engagement. I was responsible for the company's corporate and business strategy and oversaw worldwide business development, acting as the outside face of the company, including developer relations (25,000+). I also acted as the company's General Counsel and was Secretary and CFO of its US subsidiary, Scoreloop, Inc. (which I set up to prepare a move to the West Coast, which was impending just prior to us selling the company to BlackBerry).We sold Scoreloop to BlackBerry in June 2011. I drove much of the transaction, including presentations to and negotiation with BlackBerry.

Connect 2 Media is a global publisher of games for mobile, iPhone and PC with offices in Manchester, Madrid, Krakow, Tel Aviv, Paris and Bangkok.I was key to the team that raised $9m from Acuity Capital as well as to the buy-out of the business of Hands-On Mobile EMEA, SE Asia & Latin America and the acquisitions of Connect 2 Play and Rayfusion. I designed much of the business plan and case behind this.I was also responsible to bolster the licensing portfolio, signing 40+ titles and brands inside 6 months, including titles from stalwarts such as Konami, Take2 (via Oasys) and BMW as well as securing deals with small indie studios such as a tiny Finnish outlet called Rovio (also known as the folks who brought Angry Birds to the world).

San Francisco, Ca, Us

I was initially a strategic advisor to the company, helping to define and align positioning and strategy for their European business. This resulted in the acquisition of a game studio, identification of growth areas and shaping of a new executive team. I was then brought on board as the member of the executive team responsible for corporate and strategic business development, licensing and legal affairs for the EMEA, APAC and LatAm regions. I was directly responsible for the negotiation of all licenses, strategic partnership and distribution contracts in the region, and have closed more than 150 deals in this position.During my tenure, our region's business has grown by more than 150%. I identified numerous areas of improvement in the business and formulated new business initiatives, which he helped shape (e.g. in the areas of UGC and social networking).I acted as the company secretary and a signatory and a board member of the company's subsidiaries.

The German-Maltese Chamber of Commerce helps and connects economic, financial, business and trade partners who operate in, from and between Malta and Germany. It also provides guidance to inward investment to Malta as well as with a view to general trade policy issues.

I founded and ran this specialised strategic consultancy with a focus on cross-border corporate & commercial transactions with special regard to European market entry and cross-border roll-out strategies and implementation. I undertook extensive work in mobile telecoms, media and entertainment, brand licensing, etc. (including projects in Germany, the UK, USA and Israel) with deal values of up to c. $ 50m. Good times...

iWorld was a fairly audacious project: an incubator that - in 2000 - focussed on mobile only. Boom! Deutsche Bank, Bank of America, UBS/Payne Webber and Hikari Tsushin as well as the late Keith McCaw (of McCaw Cellular fame) agreed with us and invested nearly $40m into the company.I had particular responsibility for corporate governance, corporate development, M&A, investor relations with our illustrious investor base, as well as assisting the operational businesses in their strategic efforts. I served as Head of Negotiations for iModel Music, which included licensing top-brand entertainment content (multi-platinum recording artists and leading consumer brands, including Britney Spears, Duran Duran, Nile Rogers [of Chic and We Are Family-fame], and many more).I also led the investment of the company in the Rights Group, LLC (NY) and served as a General Manager of that company.As Head of iSmartMoney, I oversaw the internal investment committee steering the development of the company's new business divisions.Finally, I also served as director of all international subsidiaries.

Köln, De

02/1995-10/1996: Undergraduate Associate11/1996-10/1999: Graduate Associate11/1999-10/2000: Rechtsanwalt (Attorney)The corporate and commercial law "boutique" law firm then was known as Luther & Partner, one of the most prestigious firms in Hamburg. The partnership was merged with Andersen Legal on 01/01/2000, then became EY Law Luther Menold and now trades as Luther.I served in the corporate department where his activity comprised M&A (c. 50% cross-border), restructurings (up to c. $ 250m deal value), joint ventures (up to c. $ 120m deal value), general corporate law (incorporation, holding structures, etc.) and general commercial law (incl. supply and delivery agreements in German and English, SLA's, general terms, etc.). I was also involved in international commercial arbitration (ICC, DIS, Stockholm Chamber of Commerce, etc.). Volker represented clients in and/or from the UK, US, Sweden, France, Denmark, Ireland, Gibraltar, Azerbaijan, Russia amongst others.My tenure began in a dispute between the shareholders of a German-Canadian-Russian oil joint venture which based its legal roots in Gibraltar. The responsible partner took me there for a first meeting and left me after 2 hours to run it on my own. Terrified as I was, I never looked back.

London, England, Gb

Then Deringer Tessin Herrmann & Sedemund (now merged into Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer). I assisted the office managing partner in Brussels in affairs of European Merger Control and European Competition Law. I also contributed to a commentary text book on the Merger Control Regulation. Finally, I had the immense pleasure (even though I was somewhat awestruck) to assist the then Counsel to the Federal Republic of Germany in a case at the European Court of Justice ("Brasserie des Pêcheurs"), which - whilst being a lost cause became somewhat of a landmark judgment.

Brussels, Be

ELSA is the world's largest law student association striving for "a just world in which there is respect for human dignity and cultural diversity".I was elected to the International Board (in spite of delivering my election speech with a high fever) where my responsibilities included all marketing affairs, external relations with partners, editor-in-chief of "Synergy", the member magazine, which was distributed to all of its 25,000 members, general management and strategic direction of the organisation, which obtained consultative status with UNESCO and is a partner to UNHCR. Meanwhile, ELSA has also partnered with the UN, ECOSOC and others. I also helped broker the first institutional sponsorship deals between ELSA and Clifford Chance, PricewaterhouseCoopers and the European Commission.

Mciarb Course, International Commercial Arbitration

Post-Graduate Degree In European Integration & International Economic Relations, European & International Law

Law, Law

Law, Law