On our mission to increase the visibility of the Austrian startup community and strengthen the
entrepreneurial ecosystem AustrianStartups relies on each and everyone of the community: on you.
Over the years many stood out in shaping the ecosystem in a special way and helped in creating
the startup community as we would call it today.
As ambassadors of the community, representatives of a certain group in the community, enablers
and networkers 9 outstanding individuals have joined AustrianStartups in our advisory board.
Each and everyone stands for a certain group in our ecosystem and has a specific task to support
the community. Besides that they help us in realizing our mission, provide us with strategic advice
and assist us with their network. Finally, they define the strategy of AustriaStartups together with
the management (‘Vereinsvorstand’) to answer the most important needs of the community at the
right time. “Stop talking, show us the advisory board” Right, here we go…
Andreas Tschas: Startup Hub Austria
Andi is the Co-Founder of Pioneers. He focuses on connecting the Austrian with international ecosystems.
Birgit Hofreiter: Entrepreneurship at Universities
As head of Informatics Innovation Center (i2c) at TU Vienna, Birgit has an eye on fostering entrepreneurship at Austrian universities.
Florian Gschwandtner: Connection to Berlin
The Runtastic CEO and Co-Founder aims to connect Austria to the vibrant startup hub in Berlin.
Hansi Hansmann: Business Angels
Connecting business angels and startups is the focus of one of Austria’s most distinguished business angels.
Markus Wagner: Connection to Silicon Valley
The founder of i5invest is the local ambassador in Silicon Valley to connect Austria with the most important startup hub.
Matthias Reisinger: Impact Startups
He is the Co-Founder of Impact Hub Vienna and he supports social businesses.
Oliver Holle: International VCs
The founder of SpeedInvest will establish the connection to international VCs.
Werner Wutscher: Old Economy
He is the founder of New Venture Scouting and will bridge the gap between old and new economy.
Yves Schulz: Startup Hubs Vienna-Bratislava-Budapest
As founder of sektor5 he will connect Vienna to our neighbouring hubs
in Bratislava and Budapest.
Networking Partners for Social Business and Universities
Impact startups are an essential part of the Austrian ecosystem. The Impact Hub Vienna is the key player for social businesses from all kinds of industries. As AustrianStartups aims to be a brand for all startups in Austria, it is the logical conclusion to connect with the local hero to foster social entrepreneurship.
Not sure what Impact Startups are? Well, they are entrepreneurial ventures whose primary objective is to maximise their social impact rather than the profit. They are addressing and solving societal challenges with innovative new products and services.
More than 2/3 of Austria’s entrepreneurs have studied at a university. Therefore, universities make and shape the future startups. The Entrepreneurship Center Network raises awareness of entrepreneurship among students and is an inter-university platform that connects students from different universities and disciplines. It provides them with startup related know-how and useful tools.
As the most important platform for students we are happy to have a partner that is focussing on sustainably increasing the number of startups to come out of universities.
Finally we want to say thank you:
_to all the individuals who helped us over the last 15 months: you are awesome.
_to our prime sponsor Internet Foundation Austria (IPA) who supported us in the difficult startup phase.
_to all our supporting members who enable us to do our job.
There is more to come: stay tuned and subscribe for the newsletter below, follow us on Twitter, Facebook or Instagram.
