Our Mentors

Michal Ambler, EY
Consultant at Advanced Analytics

Michal is a consultant at Advanced Analytics EY that focus on using advanced analytical methods for clients, mainly in the telecommunications, retail, consumer goods and automotive industries. Given the previous experience of EY's business consulting, he devotes himself to the development of the solution as well as to business development for clients from the largest international and regional corporations.

Denis Beloglazov, Bigle.cz
CEO, Founder

Denis focuses on consulting, evaluation, strategy with an emphasis on the team, the market and the solution of the consumer´s needs. He is in interaction with venture funds and clubs such as altaclub.vc, 2be.lu, smarthub.vc, iidf.ru, blockchain.capital, fortross.vc, addventure.vc, startaventures.com. He also aims at the formation of portfolios with an emphasis on risk analysis. One of the examples of his co-own projects is venture Bigle.cz (modern real estate portal providin online services in the real estate market) and Focus startup (productivity tools, fintech, proptech). He is member of csproptech.com. Active business angel, member of clubs: angelsband.by and investoro.com. Managing Partner at Velociter Invest a.s. (Estonia). 

Pavel Bartoš, Happyend
Startup Expert

Pavel is a marketing expert focused on start-ups. Within the Happyend, where he is a co-founder, he helps to start-ups to find their ideal customer and build the whole start-up for the customer. He always works with data and facts instead of suppositions and thoughts. He acts as a mentor in the Google Launchpad, an incubator of European Space Agency, Czech invest and Vodafone Labs.

Jan Bartovský
HR consultant

Jan is an HR consultant with 16 years of experience in all HR areas. Took part as HR person in several M&As: the merger of Živnostenská banka and HVB, forming of ICT division within T-Systems, acquisition of Siemens IT Solutions and Services by Atos Origin and forming of Atos on the Czech territory. He has deep experience in IT personnel outsourcing/insourcing when delivering IT as a service.

Tamás Békási, EIT Health
Healthcare Startup Specialist, Business Development and Communication Expert

Passionate, results-driven leader and high performer with a can-do attitude. Highly organised Business Consultant and Communication Expert with over 10 years of experience spanning multiple industries such as IT, Telecommunication, Electronics (B/W) and Retail. Powerful interpersonal, communication and facilitation skills scout hidden capabilities in people and in organizations as well.

Kristýna Bokajová, Meatballs, s.r.o.
HR

Kristýna is an experienced HR guru with a demonstrated history of working in the various industries on a full variety of positions. She is a strong entrepreneurship professional, skilled in HR Consulting and Advisory, Negotiation, Analytical Skills, Executive Search, and Technical Recruiting.

Juraj Boldiš, VZP

From ERP integration to deep strategic planning, Juraj helps organizations reach new levels of success through effective IT management and solutions-based architecture. For more than a decade, He has led companies through turbulent periods by keeping processes running smoothly, no matter the circumstance. Whether it’s an acquisition or a new workflow, he is dedicated to change management and top-down leadership, get teams on board and adopt new challenges together.

Peter Breyl, Vychodoslovenska Energetika
Strategy Manager

Certified Senior Project Manager with international experiences in IT business, innovation and transformation projects with internal and external customers. Expertise in the entire scope of construction projects, estimation and management. Leader plan strategy and implementation of company-wide initiatives incorporation commercialization, industry partnership and business development viewpoints through effective bridge-building and articulate communication. Perfect understanding of global company management and processes. Communication and interpersonal skills to establish rapport with all levels of staff and management. In past, Peter worked in T-Systems Slovakia and NESS Czech.

Hana Čepová, Právě teď'!

Experienced Project Manager with a demonstrated history of working in the professional training & coaching industry. Skilled in Marketing Management, Life Coaching, Analytical Skills, Coaching, and Advertising. Strong education professional with a Coach Practitioner by EMCC focused in Professional Coach from Academy of Coaching Excellence.

Akos Dervalics, InnoEnergy HUB, Hungary
Manager of InnoEnergy HUB

Ákos is an experienced European business developer and fundraising expert focusing on establishing innovation ecosystem in the energy, mobility, smart city and green technologies sectors. Ákos works as manager of the EIT InnoEnergy Hub Hungary and leads portfolio management at Startup Campus Incubator.

Prior to this Ákos served in senior business development management roles within the research and consulting sectors. Ákos is also actively engaged as coach and mentor of several incubation programs across Europe. 

His philosophy stands on the belief that guiding a team’s efforts is more beneficial for making businesses sustainable rather than delivering tailor-made models because the team learn and experience by doing and gets the capability to sustain results.

Mark Downey, Oriana International
Business Development Manager

Mark is currently leading the international expansion of a Hungarian B2B software vendor which specializes in workflow and process digitalization using the low-code methodology.

Martin Dzurjanin, Detecon International
Managing Consultant

Martin is an experienced management consultant with international project experience primarily in the telecommunications industry. He has also worked with clients from transportation and utility industries predominantly on topics focused around telecom and finance.

Alan Fabik, HARDWARIO
Co-founder

Alan has worked for several years in big corporation JABLOTRON. Now, he is the CEO of startup HARDWARIO pushing his project BigClown. 

Antonín Ferdan, Lipo.ink (previously SKODA Auto)
Idea manager

Antonín works as a coordinator of projects focusing on idea management in SKODA Auto. He is a trainer, project manager, politician, volunteer, and entrepreneur. He combines the experience from a multinational corporation with his political experience, voluntary work for local communities with a professional background in education.

Evgeny Frolov, DEX Innovation Centre
Business Development and Fundraising Manager

Evgeny is a team member of the DEX Innovation Centre with long term experiences in the startup ecosystem. He was 3 years an ambassador of the international startup competition called Seedstars in the Czech Republic. He was also responsible for investor relations in ITACA Business Incubator, has a business experience not only in CEE but in CIS and Central Asian regions. He has 8 years of his own entrepreneurial experience in very different fields, organizes lectures and seminars about entrepreneurship.

Gustavo Guillen
Expert for Latin America Market

Gustavo has aligned his IT & Services background with Imports and Exports to and from Latin America, which are his target market and knows really the best. His focus covers from “core banking”, IT and Telecommunication through food consumables to the creating of investment opportunities for Latin America and financial groups in CEE. He gained his experiences in NY as V.P. & Operation Manager NMB (ING) Bank, Manager of Delloite Touche Consulting CEE, and CA Computer Associates as Strategic Alliances Manager for CEE, Turkey and Switzerland.

Adi Gaskell
Innovation writer

Adi is an innovation writer and consultant who has worked with leading organizations from the private and public sectors, including Deloitte, DellEMC, GSK, the Ministry of Defence, InnovateUK, Government Office for Science and National Health Service.  He writes regularly on business, innovation and technology for Forbes and the BBC, as well as academic publications such as the LSE Business Review.  He has also contributed authored and ghost-written content for companies such as Salesforce, Alcatel, BBVA, HCL Technologies, Adobe and InnoCentive, as well as white papers and journal articles.  He has also contributed to a couple of books on innovation and is currently co-writing a book on the future of workplaces. 

He has an academic background in computing and artificial intelligence and studied innovation at the Tuck School of Business.

Klara Horton
Head of Operations

Klára Horton is the Head of Operations at Deepnote, a startup focused on building a new kind of data science notebook that makes data science teams radically more productive. Apart from her work at Deepnote, Klara helps startups set up their culture, operations, and processes. She also organizes events for online medium CzechCrunch and is the founder of the Before You Shine startup community, which organizes educational and networking events, mentoring and helps young talent to explore and start their career in the startup ecosystem.

Jakub Houska, 2050.Ventures
Business Scout

Jakub Houska is a business-oriented person with a passion for startups. Now he works as a business scout for 2050.Ventures based in Bucuresti and builds an east-west link. He is industry agnostic & looking for startups with marketable solutions and readiness to expand their market.

Osman Salih, O2
Innovation wizard at O2 , Start-up Development & Innovations

Osman studied psychology but spent most of his professional career in IT thanks to his fondness for technology. He was involved in the implementation of enterprise information systems and consulting activities. From there it was not far from the innovation and startup world. He is dedicated to marketing and helping startups to grow. He has practical experience in project management and product management as well.

Martin Javnický, Erste Group Bank, Česká spořitelna
Business innovation, transformation and development

Martin focuses on the complex delivery of brand new business/products from initial idea to final real product on the market, tunning up of business effectivity. In past, he worked in different managing positions in ČSOB, O2 and Eurotel. He likes innovations, out of box thinking and prefers strong positive personal motivation. First "no" doesn´t mean "NO".

Tereza Jílková, InnovEYtion Hub
InnovEYtion Hub Advisor

Tereza is passionate about innovations, new technologies and new business models improving the world around us. Therefore she decided to join EY and focus on innovation management, community building, idea generation support, idea prioritization and product development. 

Michal Jordán, Patent Attorney, CEO
PatentEnter s.r.o.

Michal´s job is to link technology and law in the way which helps to make the project successful. This is often used by patents, trademarks, and researchers. Michal spent much of his professional life in design and development, where he was responsible for the industrial-legal strategy and the success of several development projects. Therefore, besides the patent law, he has a good background to understand the priorities of the companies and pragmatically link all aspects.

David Kovalský
Investor and advisor

David is a seasoned entrepreneur with a strong IT background. Through multiple companies, he’s spent a decade in bringing FinTech innovations to the CEE market. After successfully exiting, David redefined himself as an advisor, supporter, and an investor. He brings startup know-how and experience by taking a company to the next level. David loves to travel across Europe from west to east in search of startup talent. He’s also a huge space fan and still keeps his plans for outer space travel on the roadmap. Primarily he's working with CEE companies as a strategist and CEO coach.

Jan Kubalik, DEX Innovation Centre
Chairman of the Board

Jan has a technological background in computer science. His 20 years of professional career was all about start-ups, from working with them, through being a technological entrepreneur to be a social entrepreneur and support them. Jan builds the excellent network worldwide by serving the clients or building the partnership with Alcatel Lucent (Nokia), Alstom Energy (GE Energy), Fujitsu, T-Mobile, Fraunhofer and many other. His expertise is business development and fundraising for innovation and research.

Martin Kujan, Senior Consultant for Technology Transfer
Civitta Slovakia (previously Neulogy)

Martin is a senior technology transfer consultant and start-up advisor. He specializes in bridging legal and business perspective in the process of commercialization and protection of intellectual property. He advises start-ups and research institutions on various strategic issues covering intellectual property strategies, legal aspects of investments and license negotiations.

Daniela Kuklová, EY 
InnovEYtion Hub Advisor

Daniela has a strong background in the start-up ecosystem performed at the international scale. She has graduated from London University, where she was involved in a start-up platform located in the Silicon Round that aimed to support new businesses and accelerate their growth. Within EY she covers the agenda of Smart Cities and building feasible financial models for such infrastructure projects as well as corporate innovation focusing on the idea generation process, new product development and company’s innovation culture.

Kristýna Machová, Inven Capital
Investment Manager

Kristýna is an Investment manager in the captive fund established by a major European energy utility ČEZ. She seeks investments into small to middle-market innovative clean-tech companies in Europe. 

Anna Martynenko, EY
Senior Consultant

Anna is a Senior Consultant for Financial Accounting Advisory Services at EY. She can help with financial reporting assistance and accounting support in connection with the preparation of the financial statements in accordance with IFRS and Czech GAAP.

Agata Mazepus, Kiwi.com
Journalist

A highly organised journalist and communications professional with a passion for sustainable development and track record of working in international organisations. 

A high performer and a so-called "busy bee" that values data and facts over theory and wishful thinking. At the same time, she is a creative type, constantly coming up with new ideas for improving the current and developing new projects.

Sintija Meissner, WeWork
Manager

Sintija is a manager at WeWork Labs where she is helping early-stage startups to grow and succeed. Prior to that, she has worked for two different startup studios; the first was dedicated to building companies for multinational corporations, while the second one focused on vertical AI startups. Over the past 5+ years exploring the Czech startup scene she has had the opportunity to wear many different hats from market research, project management, business operations, sales and marketing activities.

Jaroslav Menčík, MAVERICKS
Partner & Attorney-at-law

Jaroslav focuses on legal consultancy for startups, venture capital funds and technology companies. Prior to joining MAVERICKS, Jaroslav worked almost 10 years for a leading international law firm, where he acquired extensive experience in all aspects of transactional law, corporate law and IP & IT law. When advising startups, Jaroslav likes to draw on his expertise in U.S. law, which he gained during an LL.M. program at New York University School of Law.

Tomáš Molnár, Schaeffler
Head of Digital Transformation Europe

Tomáš has over 10 years marketing and sales experience in consumer products and service sectors from international corporations (e.g. EY) and own business perspective.  He has experiences to help companies to identify, reach and engage customers in the relevant and most convenient way suitable for them. Within Schaeffler he focus on enabling organization to stay successful also in future by driving, encouraging and supporting transformation internally and externally.

Tomáš Morava, HARDWARIO

His lifelong career includes finance and investment that he seeks, manages and manages through his own consulting firm, LIFTIA.
He is one of the founders of the start-up HARDWARIO where he works as financial management, besides securing investment resources and legal issues. He is also responsible for B2B company business activities. Tomáš graduated in business economics at the University of Economics in Prague and completed a six-month internship at the CBS Commercial College in Copenhagen. He obtained a doctorate in business management and management at UoE in Prague.

Tomas has more than 17 years of experience with M&A, buying and selling companies, start-ups and investments, which he managed for major private companies and private investors. After 12 years in the investment group EXPANDIA and 2 years of investment management in JABLOTRON, he started his own business to help both start-ups and experienced entrepreneurs grow their business.

Jiří Mzourek, GoodData

Experienced executive with a deep knowledge of software engineering and user experience with proven delivery of results with 15+ years of experience with remote management.

Strong in rapid product definition/innovation and design, based on the latest industry trends (research - prototyping - testing/design - delivery)

Zuzana Nehajová, EY 
InnovEYtion Hub Leader

Zuzana Nehajova has joined the ranks of EY in their campaign to promote innovation and modernization of industry and societies alike. She leads a formed EY InnovEYtion Hub dedicated to helping companies of all sizes as well as a public administration within the CEE region and beyond to adopt new technologies and trends, rendering optimization of processes and higher resource efficiencies.

Tomáš Nielsen, NIELSEN MEINL
Lawyer

Tomáš in an excellent lawyer with perfect knowledge of IT and copyright law, broadcasting and telco, media law, alternative dispute resolution (negotiation and mediation) and business contracting process. Tomáš lectures Telecommunications Law at the Faculty of Law of Charles University and ICT Law at CVUT. He is also the referee of the International Arbitration Court in Riga. He has also held the post of President of the Association of Electronic Communications Users in the Czech Republic in the past.

Jaroslav Novák, Wunderman, Ogilvy Group CZ
Group Business Director

Jaroslav works 20 years in client service and new business development in CEE region mainly in the advertising industry managing client´s portfolios, pitches, direct marketing, media, digital marketing and PR. At Wunderman, he established new client account team from the scratch without any given client and worked with FISCHER Group, AMAZON, SHERLOG, Česká spořitelna, Nestlé, Stock, Czech Tourism, Vitana, Carlsbad Mineral Waters, O2, Pilsner Urquell, Dr.Oetker, GE Money Bank, Danone and other.

Michal Novák
Independent Business Consultant

Jan Marek, Liberec city
Member of Liberec city Council

Jan has wide experiences from public administration and he knows precisely needs of the city and how their processes in public procurement look like. He focuses on topics: Central municipal heating system, Urban planning and Development strategies of the city (Jan developed Smart specialization strategy for Liberec region). Following this knowledge, he can share his insider insights of successful sales to public procurers.

Martina Pipiskova, EY
 

Martina is an experienced Senior Consultant in EY, driving Digital Agenda in Financial Accounting Advisory Services. She is passionate about new technologies in finance and also excited to share her knowledge and experience with start-ups. Martina is also responsible for business development activities and actively participates on the sales process. She is an Ambassador for financial planning tool - EY Finance Navigator in the Czech Republic and has significant experience in optimisation of financial processes, financial planning and RPA.

Roman Polák, BWS Trade

Roman supports motivated persons and meaningful projects. He helps them with mentoring and a psychometric tool for personality development in the work environment.

Nikola Rafaj, StartupYard
Chief Operation Officer

Nikola Rafaj is an internet entrepreneur with 20 years of experience. At StartupYard is responsible for managing the company and program and supporting new teams to launch and raise money. Nikola has experience in banking, e-commerce, and investments.

Jaroslav Salva
Mentor, Senior Advisor & Trainer with Passion for People Development

Jaroslav worked not only for small Czech companies but also for big international corporations. He was responsible both for direct sales and sales through a channel. Worked with simple SW and HW products, but also with complex systems such as ERP. He has been improving his management skills while leading various teams. Management experience taught him how important is every single member of the team for the final success and helped to build knowledge in leadership.

Jakub Svoboda

Jakub is cooperating with Air Ventures and his primary focus is to scout startups. He has worked with many founders and has experience with both international and local startups. He can help you with investor communications and give you great feedback.

Akos Szepvolgyi, Central Transdanubian Regional Innovation Agency 
Managing Director

Akos is experienced in the management consulting industry. He is also skilled in Innovation Management, Entrepreneurship, and Strategic Planning. Akos operates currently ALBA Accelerator together with partner Széchenyi Tőkealap-kezelő Zrt. / Venture Capital Fund. Akos will also represent the fund during the Investor challenge.

Vít Šoupal, Detecon International GmbH
Managing Consultant

Vit is passionate about innovation and product marketing. He joined recently Detecon consultancy team after several years at Deutsche Telekom and T-Mobile, where he was successfully leading European M2M/IoT and Big Data marketing related activities. Detecon itself is a subsidiary of T-Systems International, the key account brand of Deutsche Telekom. Since 2015 he is also involved in startup mentoring.

Štěpánka Uličná, Ph.D.

Graduate of the Mathematical Department at VŠB Technical University in Ostrava focused on the implementation of tools LEAN and KAIZEN. She has more than 15 years of experience in introducing change through coaching and mentoring. Stepanka is Focused on Industry 4.0 and she is a Google Certified Trainer for Design Thinking.

Aleksandar Vladimirov, Thales
Technical Project Manager

Aleks’s specialities are technologies, product development and delivering training sessions. He worked in many industries for the leaders in the market, such as SAP and Barclays. In his current position in Thales, he manages SW Development Projects for key government customers. He has experienced organizing conferences and training events. He had won startup competitions and public speaking contests. He volunteers his time and supports the startup community.

Tomáš Votoček, Graphic designer

Tomáš has more than 8 years’ experience as a graphic designer. He is working in all areas of graphic design from logo design, brand design, brochure design, flyer design, business card design and social media content design. His goal is to come up with creative ideas to create a better presentation of the client. He likes teamwork and enjoying the creative process.