the found podcast

Hugo Paquin and Kyrylo Korsun
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  • Entrepreneurship
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Hamburg is building something. These are the people doing it. Every month, Hugo and Kyrylo sit down with the founders, operators, and investors shaping Hamburg's startup scene. Honest conversations. Real stories. The stuff that doesn't make it into the press release.

Episodes

  1. May 27

    Fenja Vespermann — Why enterprise AI fails, working with Audi & Adidas, the cringe rule

    Fenja Vespermann is the co-founder and CEO of mimikry AI — a Hamburg-based studio building custom AI pipelines for enterprise creative production. In less than a year, she's worked with Audi, Adidas, and Otto Group. Without raising a single euro. Before mimikry, Fenja ran her own 3D animation agency. Then Corona hit, the studio closed, and she borrowed 15K from a friend to start over. In this conversation we discuss: 🔹 How she landed Audi, Meta, and Otto Group as a one-year-old bootstrapped company 🔹 Why she refuses to raise — "scale the money, not the people" 🔹 Her contrarian thesis: there is no AI tool, AI is just a technology 🔹 The night her studio shut down and she called her mom to say "I have no idea what to do" 🔹 Being mistaken for the PM, not the CEO Timestamps: (00:00) Intro (02:30) Why most enterprise AI deployments fail (06:10) "There is no AI tool — AI is just a technology" (08:00) Origin story: 3D animation, Corona, the studio shutting down (10:00) Borrowing 15K and getting into Midjourney's beta (17:00) Why standardizing client data is 40% of the work (19:00) Landing Audi, Meta, Otto Group, BMW, and Replit in year one (21:00) "Get over the cringe" — the go-to-market (24:30) Europe vs America: speed and risk appetite (28:30) Why Mimikry refuses to raise (30:00) "Stay as small as possible. Scale the money, not the people." (31:00) How an AI-native company actually works (ComfyUI, Claude Code) (33:30) VibeCon NYC and the Replit installation (40:40) Being a female CEO in a room full of men Find Fenja: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fenjavespermann Find mimikry AI: https://www.mimikry.ai Check out found: Newsletter: https://www.foundhamburg.com Kyrylo: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kyrylokorsun Hugo: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hugopaquin

    44 min
  2. Iskender Dirik — Storymaxxxing, investing in Parloa, Hamburg tech scene

    Apr 26

    Iskender Dirik — Storymaxxxing, investing in Parloa, Hamburg tech scene

    Iskender Dirik is a German entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and tech executive with 20 years of experience in the digital world. He founded his first company at the age of 21 and built and exited a couple of tech startups afterwards. He is a prolific angel investor with dozens of investments, including in German AI unicorn Parloa. He led a €100M CVC Fund at Bauer Venture Partners and is currently a venture partner at leading European VC Earlybird. He also founded and led ‘’Microsoft ScaleUp" in Berlin and led Europe for Samsung NEXT, Samsung’s global startup and innovation unit, and was the head of Wix Germany. Besides his enthusiasm for tech, Iskender is also known for being a design-lover and creative mind. He is a regular content writer and contributor and known for publishing thought-leadership articles around AI, technology, startups, venture capital, impactful presentations, marketing and leadership principles. — In this episode, we discuss: 🔹 How he knew within 2 minutes that the founder of German AI unicorn Parloa was special 🔹 From humble beginnings in a Turkish household in Wilhelmsburg to building and selling multiple tech businesses 🔹 Going from being an extreme introvert to pitching in front of thousands at OMR 🔹 The rise of storymaxxxing and the importance of style and sending the right signals in business 🔹 Co-founding 2hearts, Germany’s largest tech community for people from immigration background — Where to find Iskender: LinkedIn: /iskenderdirikWebsite: id.vcDealMacher Podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/4Th7rV4JGpGdKEn839KIMq— Links to found Hamburg: Newsletter: https://www.foundhamburg.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/foundhamburg/Hugo’s LinkedIn: /hugopaquin Kyrylo’s LinkedIn: /kyrylokorsun — Referenced: Iskender’s LinkedIn post about the classic business outfit: https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7419670877237133312/ His website where he whimsically lists all the mispronunciations of his name: iamiskender.com2hearts: www.2heartscommunity.com

    1 hr
  • 2 Episodes

About

Hamburg is building something. These are the people doing it. Every month, Hugo and Kyrylo sit down with the founders, operators, and investors shaping Hamburg's startup scene. Honest conversations. Real stories. The stuff that doesn't make it into the press release.

Information

  • Creator
    Hugo Paquin and Kyrylo Korsun
  • Years Active
    2K
  • Episodes
    2
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Hugo Paquin and Kyrylo Korsun
  • Show Website
    the found podcast