Frank Thelen

Who they are

Frank Thelen is Founder & CEO of Freigeist — he wrote two bestselling books on exponential technology ('Startup-DNA' and '10xDNA') and was a judge on Die Höhle der Löwen, Germany's Shark Tank.

Person

Frank Thelen has been building and backing tech companies from Bonn since 1994 — he started internet businesses in the mid-90s, studied at Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied Sciences, and has operated in hybrid founder-investor mode ever since. He launched Freigeist (originally e42) in January 2010 as a seed-stage deep tech fund when European venture capital was thin and the term 'deep tech' barely existed. Before that he served as Chief Research Officer at TEQ Capital, which he later co-founded as a separate investment vehicle in 2022. He was a TV investor and judge on Die Höhle der Löwen — Germany's Shark Tank — and held board seats at Lilium, KRAFTBLOCK, and Xentral ERP Software. He also founded companies named Freigeist Capital and TEQ Capital. The through-line across three decades is a conviction that technology compounds faster than institutions can adapt, and a willingness to put his name and capital behind that view early. He publishes the Innovation Pulse newsletter on LinkedIn and has written two bestselling books — 'Startup-DNA' (2018) and '10xDNA' — covering startup culture and exponential development; he posts frequently on AI, autonomous driving, robotics, Bitcoin, and European tech.

Network

No direct edge data is available from the network probe. From public engagement signals, Frank has met with Benedetto Vigna, CEO of Ferrari, for an extended discussion, and publicly cites Elon Musk as an influence on his thinking. His portfolio board roles at Lilium, KRAFTBLOCK, and Xentral ERP Software would place him in overlapping circles of European deep tech operators.

How they likely show up

  • Long tenure at Freigeist since January 2010 → thinks in decade-long thesis cycles, not fund-by-fund opportunism.
  • Hybrid role pattern (founder, board member, CRO, TV investor, author simultaneously) → operates across multiple contexts at once and likely expects high-density, efficient interactions.
  • Active LinkedIn publisher (Innovation Pulse newsletter, frequent posts on AI, robotics, autonomous driving, Bitcoin) → comfortable broadcasting views publicly and probably responds better to people who engage with specific positions he's taken rather than generic flattery.
  • Hands-on testing of Tesla FSD and Waymo → forms opinions from first-hand experience, not just desk research; expects the same rigour from others.
  • Two bestselling books and a newsletter → uses writing as a thinking tool, not just marketing; ideas are likely well-formed before he raises them in conversation.
  • Board roles at Lilium (eVTOL), KRAFTBLOCK (industrial energy storage), and Xentral (ERP) → portfolio spans hard tech and software, suggesting he evaluates on technology depth rather than sector focus.

Conversation tips

  • → Come in with a specific claim about AI, robotics, or autonomous driving — he has stated views and engages with people who push back or add a new angle, not those who nod along.
  • → Reference a specific Innovation Pulse issue or one of his LinkedIn posts by topic — it signals you did the work and gives him a concrete entry point.
  • → If you want to discuss European tech, frame it around a structural or regulatory challenge, not a cheerleading narrative — his public writing focuses on disruption and obstacles, not easy optimism.
  • → Don't treat '10xDNA' as his defining credential and move on — ask what he thinks has shifted in the exponential technology thesis since the book, because that's where he'll actually engage.
  • → He tests ideas hands-on (he drove Tesla FSD and Waymo himself) — concrete demos or specifics land better than slide-deck abstractions.

Toolbox

Openers

  • Open on the Boston Dynamics Atlas post — he publicly amplified Atlas lifting a fridge and framed it as a signal, not a stunt. Ask what robotics milestone would actually change his investment thesis.
  • He sold Bitcoin positions (documented in a LinkedIn post) — a specific, public move that invites a genuine question about how he thinks about crypto as an asset class versus a technology bet.
  • He co-founded TEQ Capital in 2022 alongside running Freigeist — a second investment vehicle launched mid-career is an unusual structural choice worth asking about directly.

Discovery questions

  1. You've backed hardware-heavy bets like Lilium and KRAFTBLOCK — how do you think about the capital intensity mismatch between European seed funding and what deep hardware companies actually need to reach scale?
  2. Your '10xDNA' thesis is built on exponential technological development — which curve is currently being underestimated by European investors, and which one is being overhyped?
  3. You tested Tesla FSD and Waymo hands-on — from an investor's perspective, does the gap between them change how you'd think about backing autonomous-driving infrastructure plays in Europe?

Avoid

Don't open with generic questions about 'what it was like on Die Höhle der Löwen' — it's a decade-old chapter and he has moved well past TV personality territory into deep tech investing.

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Sources

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Generated by briefthecall.com from public web sources on June 5, 2026. Each claim is linked to its source above.

Automatically generated by AI from public sources. May be inaccurate or out of date. Remove or correct this profile →