Dinika is a Principal at Cherry Ventures, based in London. Prior to Cherry, Dinika was an operator for more than four years at Uber, where she was part of the founding UberEats team in EMEA, and later General Manager of JUMP (e-bikes / scooters) in the UK. She also spent a year in the climate tech space at Kaluza, part of the Ovo Group (inc. Vertical Aerospace) a SaaS platform focused on electric grid optimization. Dinika started her career as a technology investment banker, and has spent several years as an angel investor and advisor to female founded startups, a deep area of passion of hers. She holds degrees from London Business School and Northwestern University in Illinois where she was a mathematics major.

Sophia is a Partner at Cherry Ventures. Based in Stockholm, Sophia brings her expertise on Nordic startups and a growing interest in the femtech space to the team. Sophia joined Cherry from Atomico, where she also served as Partner and created the firm's well-known Angel Program. Sophia is passionate about supporting early-stage companies, an interest she has discovered through 40+ angel investments of her own across Europe and North America. For seven years, Sophia also served as Spotify's Global Marketing Director, developing the audio platform from an apartment-based Swedish startup into an international household name. Aside from venture capital, she also acts as Board Director at the non-profit organization Race for the Baltic, is cofounder of AllBright.se, and is an innovation advisor to the Swedish Prime Minister. Sophia is a graduate from Stockholm University.

Thomas is a Partner at Cherry Ventures and is particularly excited about product-centric founders and industry-defining opportunities in software. Prior to Cherry, Thomas gained experience as an entrepreneur building Bonusbox, an e-commerce data and loyalty network. He also worked as assistant to the CEO and in corporate development at Penguin Random House in New York and in the e-commerce division of Bertelsmann/Arvato. He gained additional experience at McKinsey and in several startups. Thomas studied economics in Essen, London, and Berkeley and holds an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Carlo joined Cherry in 2016. Before Cherry, he gained first-hand experience as an entrepreneur transforming his family's healthcare business. He also started two companies, a marketplace in the travel industry (that failed) and a DTC beverage company (that grows nicely). Before that, he started his career at the M&A division at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. He holds a bachelors in Business Administration from the University of Mannheim and an MBA from MIT Sloan. He spends his free time with various activities ranging from soccer to skiing to hiking, as long as they're outdoors. Carlo is particularly interested in dedicated solutions to solving the climate crisis, improving the current financial system, or providing better healthcare. The bolder the idea, the better.

Alex joined Cherry Ventures in 2020, bringing a technical background and operational founding experience to the team. Before Cherry, he built and sold his fintech startup. Having previously spearheaded computer science research projects and worked in private equity and consulting, Alex continues to toggle between — and translate — computer science and financial know-how at Cherry. These seemingly disparate interests are also reflected in his education at Technical University Munich, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the Center for Digital and Technology Management. A proud Bavarian, Alex spends some of his time for Cherry in Munich (but he’s acclimated well to the German capital). He loves mountains, skiing, sailing, and a nice, cold Weißbier. Though excited by all tech-driven disruption, Alex is particularly interested in workflow automation.

Christian is a Founding Partner at Cherry. After a few years at Boston Consulting Group, Christian joined Zalando as its first CMO. Christian was responsible for building and managing the group’s marketing efforts (like, for example, performance marketing, CRM, PR, TV, and brand marketing). He then joined the management board of Peek&Cloppenburg and was responsible for the company’s online business. He holds a masters (Diplom) in business administration from WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management. He has lived and worked in the US, Spain, Brazil, and South Africa. Christian gets excited about founders that are as passionate about execution as they are about building a strong and sustainable brand. He has a particular focus on logistics and mobility as well a food technology companies.

Nicole is an Investor at Cherry based in London. She is particularly interested in health equity, sustainability infrastructure, computational biology, and privacy-preserving technologies. Nicole joined Cherry from Atomico, where she focused on Series A deep tech and enterprise investments. She worked with Atomico's investments in accuRx, FabricNano, Healx, Kheiron, LabGenius, and more. Prior to that, she was an investor at Real Ventures, an early-stage VC firm based in Montreal, Canada, and began her career as the Scientific Project Lead at Moonshot Health, a developer of scientifically validated digital biomarkers. Nicole holds a BSc in Cognitive Science and MSc in Neuroscience from McGill University. Originally from Canada, she speaks English, Cantonese, enough French to get around a city, and communicates with her deaf pup, Winston, through sign language — German in the works.

Max joined Cherry in 2021. He studied law in Barcelona and Berlin and passed the bar exam in 2020. Before Cherry, Max worked as a legal trainee in private equity at Freshfields, but rounded out his interests working at Zenjob as a project manager, consulting at Boston Consulting Group, and in VC at Acton Capital. He’s interested in regulated industries, cybersecurity, and, no surprise, improving the legal software stack. Outside of venture, Max can be found catching up on the latest in international politics, playing tennis, or planning his next travels. Though working across deals, Max will also support our Nordic coverage.

Matteo is a Principal at Cherry. Before joining the team, he was an investor at Initial Capital in London where he invested in and was a Board Director for several entertainment and consumer tech startups. Before becoming an investor, Matteo spent almost ten years at Google where he performed different roles including Product Manager at YouTube during the early years after its acquisition and as Head of Games for Google Play in Europe. Prior to Google, he worked at Bain and Company. He holds a business degree and a masters in corporate finance from LUISS Guido Carli Business School. He is currently a Member of the Tate Members Council.

Patrick joined the investment team in 2017 and is particularly excited about SaaS, open source, and fintech. As an early Bitcoin hodler, Patrick has already lived through several financial cycles and become just a little bit smarter each time. He enjoys the outdoors and would not be doing his Austrian citizenship proud if he weren't a ski instructor. Patrick previously worked at Dreamit Ventures. He was educated in Vienna, London, and Philadelphia, and holds a bachelors of economics from the University of Pennsylvania.

Filip is a Founding Partner at Cherry Ventures and a founder at heart. Before Cherry, he started his first startup company in 2008, a digital marketplace for art and collectibles (long before there were NFTs). He then joined Zalando (ZAL:GR) as member of the founding team. At Zalando, Filip led business development, which included the international expansion as well as product. Filip was also founder and CEO of the group’s shopping club, Zalando Lounge. He left Zalando at the time of the group IPO in 2014 to fully focus on Cherry with Christian accompanied by the idea to build the VC he would have wanted to have by his side as an entrepreneur.  Filip is also an active supporter of the Ashoka network, helping founders start social businesses around the world. Together with his wife, he started a family foundation supporting education and access to entrepreneurship for families from disadvantaged backgrounds. Filip serves on the board of KfW Capital as well as the Bundesverband dt. Startups (BVDS). He holds a masters of science degree from WHU-Beisheim School of Management. At Cherry, Filip primarily invests in software companies with a focus on fintech, retail infrastructure, and healthcare.

Ben is a Venture Partner at Cherry Ventures. His fascination with computers and technology began at age 12 and he hasn't stopped hacking devices ever since. He created and contributed to various open-source projects — like themoviedb.org — before becoming a founder in 2006. Working primarily as a CTO/CPO, Ben has three exits under his belt, including moviepilot.de. He is obsessed with finding good common grounds among product, tech and business requirements. As a member of the investment team, he focuses on deeptech, crypto, SaaS, and other technology-related opportunities, but enjoys evaluating the tech side of industry-agnostic products. Ben is active in the Berlin tech community as a speaker, mentor, and supporter. He also insisted to list that he’s undefeated in FIFA here in the office and that he was part of the German Quake national team.

Catherine is Head of Communications & Platform at Cherry Ventures, bringing several years of professional journalism experience to the team. Most recently, she was a freelance journalist reporting on German tech for Silicon Allee and Sifted, a Financial Times-backed news site. She moved to Berlin as a Fulbright scholar in 2018 to research art restitution after spending several years as CNN’s White House and Capitol Hill assignment editor. Catherine hails from the Washington, DC area and earned her bachelors degree with honors in English literature from Dartmouth College.

Alex is CFO and Operating Partner at Cherry. He works across all aspects of Cherry’s fund and internal operations, finance, and investor relations. In addition, our founders value him as a sparring partner on all finance related topics. Alex joined the firm as Head of Finance in 2016 after spending several years in investment banking, most recently at Morgan Stanley in London. During his time at Morgan Stanley, Alex was involved in several large public offerings including the IPOs of Zalando and Rocket Internet. He holds a masters of science in finance and accounting from EBS Business School.

Dominik is Cherry's Senior Manager of Venture Development & Finance and enjoys supporting our portfolio companies on all things growth and finance related. Before joining Cherry, he spent several years as an investment professional at CMP Capital Management Partners, a private equity fund with strong focus on special situations and turnarounds. Dominik holds a masters in finance from ESADE Business School, where he specialized in venture capital & private equity, M&A, and operational financial management.

As Head of Talent Advisory, Louisa supports our founders around matters involving recruiting global top talent, hyper-growth, and scaling. She is passionate about using data to aid strategic decision-making, advising on operational excellence, process optimization, and performance improvement. Louisa has lived all over the world and brings experience in executive search with international firms — including having founded her own agency — plus in-house, most recently at N26 as Global Head of People Operational Excellence.

Lexi joined Cherry Ventures in 2017 and now manages internal operations at the firm. Prior to Cherry, she worked as an office manager and junior SEA manager at Magine TV, a Swedish startup in Berlin. Lexi perfected her organizational skills by working in the film industry as a production and project manager for several years. She loves food, dancing, and her guilty pleasure — trash TV.

Christina joined the Cherry team as an executive assistant. She previously worked several years as an executive assistant at Leverton GmbH, a tech startup, and at Design Hotels AG, a hotel marketing corporation, both in Berlin. Prior to moving to Germany, she lived in London and worked at Burberry on its global launch of its multi-language e-commerce platform. Christina has lived in Italy, Spain, Switzerland, France, the UK, and Germany and has a passion for languages. She speaks five languages and holds a language degree in Spanish and Italian from the University of Manchester. She loves great food, traveling, and learning about new cultures.

Conny joined the Cherry team as an Executive Assistant. Christian, Filip, and Conny have been working as a team for many years during her time at Zalando. She previously worked with the German-American Chamber of Commerce in Philadelphia and at several other international companies. Conny studied event management in Leipzig, Germany. She is a huge fan of travel and loves visiting her friends in the US.

Rossa is an accounting and finance professional with over eight years of experience in the fund industry. Having graduated from Dublin City University in 2013 with a bachelor's degree in Business Studies, he worked as an auditor for EY Dublin in the Asset Management department for two and a half years. Following this he moved to Luxembourg where he joined EY Luxembourg auditing Private Equity and Real Estate funds for a year and a half. Thereafter, he worked with Langham Hall Luxembourg S.à r.l. in the Fund Administration department for three and a half years.