New angel network founded by former Spotify employees

Three former Spotify employees founded the business angels syndicate "Spoti Angels" to support European start-ups. A special focus is on the creator economy sector.

Countless employees of Facebook, Paypal and Rocket Internet have led the way and are now successful business angels. Now three Spotify alumni are joining them: Katia Yakovleva, John Bonten and Axel Bard Bringéus have founded "Spoti Angels" in Berlin. With this, they want to support start-ups with up to 150,000 euros in Europe that are active in the areas of consumer tech, creator economy and the future of work. In addition to the money, however, the experience and knowledge of the three is primarily to be made available to the start-ups. Whether to invest individually or jointly will always be decided. First the Financial Times offshootSifted reported about the foundation.

"We are interested in the trends that are shaping the future. Questions like: How will we live? What services will we use? How will technology make our lives easier and more enjoyable?" says Jakovleva. Here's the advantage for her: "The big difference between an institutional investor and an angel is that you can be much more irrational," explains Bard Bringéus.

Above all, the Creator Economy, a trend that is currently spilling over from the USA to Europe, is interesting for "Spoti Angels". This sector covers everything to do with creators in social networks. According to estimates by the fund Signalfire, there are 50 million creators worldwide, two million of whom do it full-time. "Usually when you think of Creator you just think of Instagram stars or Youtubers, but there are also musicians, podcasters, meditation teachers, NFT creators, business influencers, designers and architects of the metaverse. There is so much potential for this space to transform and take many unexpected paths," says Yakovleva.

The three founders of Spoti Angels worked at Spotify between 2011 and 2015: Yakovleva was one of Spotify's first sales reps, Bonten and Bard Bringéus built Spotify's expansion team. Together they led the division, Bonten and Bard Bringéus launched Spotify in 60 other markets in addition to the DACH region. After that, Yakovleva and Bonten kept investing in startups individually. Bard Bringéus founded EQT Ventures in Germany in 2017, and today he is a board member in various startups.