We count on a dedicated, full-time team of professionals that are involved in the sourcing and analysis of startup projects for our Partners.
Our Team
Leadership
With a passion for entrepreneurship, investment and innovation, Gonzalo founded Faraday Venture Partners in 2011 to promote and manage early stage investments for private investors.
Isaac, in turn, with relevant experience as a Business Angel, joined Faraday in 2012 as a Strategic Partner, gradually becoming one of our most important shareholders and clients.
Gonzalo became inspired to found Faraday in 2011 on the verge of becoming a father. After 10+ years of working in investment banking, strategy consulting and hedge funds in London and Madrid, 2011 was the year he decided to embark on his passion of becoming an entrepreneur. Having started out working from his family’s apartment, Faraday has since gone from strength to strength and today has offices in 3 European countries, over 220 Partners, over 28 portfolio companies and 3 Exits under its belt.
In his spare time, when Gonzalo is not spending time with his 2 girls, he’s usually composing or recording another of his many songs that usually passes their first audience test here in Faraday’s offices.
Isaac came onboard at Faraday in 2012 and became an equity partner shortly afterwards. During the following years he also became an angel investor in several start-ups in Israel and Spain and founded Ben Oldman in 2013.
Isaac has an outstanding personal track-record as an independent investment manager and was awarded the 'Best European Emerging Manager' in 2014 for his role as Portfolio Manager of Ben Oldman Special Situations Fund. Additionally, Ben Oldman's funds have received several awards, amongst them, 'Best European Distressed Credit Fund' of 2016.
Managing Directors
Faraday’s communicating vessels between Clubs involves a network of Managing Directors in selected countries/regions, each of them a part of the Investment Committee and responsible for sourcing deals, managing investments made in their regions and empowering portfolio Startups.
Our Managing Directors are successful senior professionals with ample experience and wide-reaching connections in their local early stage investment/innovation ecosystems.
Jaime joined Faraday close to a year after it was founded by Gonzalo straight out of KPMG where he spent nearly three years in the M&A department and where he was able to forge his professional connection with Gonzalo. For Jaime, Faraday provided an opportunity to combine two of his biggest passions: entrepreneurship and finance, the former an aspect he was exposed to since childhood and which was instilled in him by his entrepreneurial family.
Jaime is our very own quintessential “Iron-Man” and sport junkie with a golf handicap that makes us green with envy.
Dennis has joined the crew as Faraday's Managing Director for Germany in late 2019. Dennis and Gonzalo had already met 2 years prior to this, in the process of a joint investment that didn't materialise in the end. Yet, this was the moment when they bonded over their vision for a united European investment ecosystem. Dennis will be leveraging the network he built in his 10+ years as a passionate entrepreneur and angel investor to start building the first of many European Faraday hubs.
Dennis is a true European citizen. He’s German by nationality, was raised in Spain and Sweden and speaks 4 languages fluently. When Dennis is not out and about mingling with people building his network, you will either find him on a tennis court or training for his next sailing trip on Munich's nearby lakes.
François-Xavier joined Faraday in 2021 as Managing Director Benelux. François-Xavier has worked both in the technical areas of Software Development, as well as in Transaction Advisory Services for Ernst & Young. In the last 7 years, François-Xavier has been immersed in the Belgian and Dutch ecosystems as Manager for the Access to Finance department of EIT Digital, backed by the European Union, as Business Angel and as CFO and CRO for a Deeptech Startup, Cloudalize.
François-Xavier, with extensive experience and network in both Belgium and the Netherlands, will help us build, leverage and develop our Faraday business model in three of the most interesting ecosystems in Europe.
Operations
From Faraday’s headquarters in Madrid, we provide operational support to Managing Directors, allowing them to focus on deal sourcing and portfolio companies’ empowerment. We divide this support into 3 core areas, each of them led by experienced senior professionals: Finance Administration, Compliance & Legal Affairs and Communications.
Prior to Faraday, Javier has spent over 10 years within the Finance and Legal sphere during which he’s worked with ADICAE providing financial and legal assessment to consumers. During this period, he was also asked to collaborate and lend his expertise legal counsel to several national and European institutions such as the European Commission, the European Banking Authority, the Bank of Spain and Better Finance.
Javier, much like Jaime, is a bit of a sports-fanatic having run Madrid’s 10k New Year’s run in professional time (35min 45sec). He’s now taken on his next challenge and is training for an “Iron-Man”. Aside from his exceptional achievements in sports, he also fulfils a vital role in our office as the main supplier of the cookie stash in times of need.
Lucía joined Faraday by way of Argentina having fulfilled a live-long dream of hers to study abroad and work in Europe. Lucía is our team’s financial accounting whiz having acquired substantial financial experience in Deloitte and América Móvil (Claro), as well as experience in Venture Capital, through her work at Iberdrola in the I+D+I department as a part of her MBA’s internship program with the University of Salamanca. Lucía is the heart of the Faraday family, and aside from handling the financial side of our business also provides tax and administrative support to our Partners and shareholders.
Lucía is exceptionally diligent and has a passion for solving problems and does not rest until solutions can be found. In her free time, Lucía loves to dance to any type of rhythm and aims to perfect her Italian language skills given her Italo-Argentine roots.
Nicole joined Faraday in 2018 as Head of Communications and Marketing after she moved from London to Madrid. Nicole gained valuable experience as a Communications, Marketing and Public Relations professional having worked more than 5 years with a range of full-service PR and Marketing agencies in central London for clients in the financial and professional services sector.
Furthermore, Nicole, who’s Austrian, is multi-lingual and has lived in 4 European countries. She’s known to bring the most creative lunches to work, enjoys gardening, watching “Narcos” and had a moment of fame in the blockbuster Quantum of Solace next to Daniel Craig.
