Suggestions
Ophelia Brown
Founder, Blossom Capital
Ophelia is a passionate technology investor and venture capitalist. In 2018 she co-founded Blossom Capital with a mission to bring a highly differentiated approach to early stage venture capital. Blossom's mission is to bring relentless belief and powerful support to the most visionary founders in Europe, enabling them to build companies which compete on a global scale. Blossom has raised $1B since launch and is fortunate to have partnered with some of Europe's breakout successes such as Checkout.com, Pigment and Tines to name a few. In 2022 Ophelia was named to the European Midas List.
As a General Partner at LocalGlobe, she helped build their first institutional fund and invested in a number of exciting companies including Beamery, Cuvva, Debut, Echo, Tessian and Zego.
In 2016, with the mission to improve the ratio of women in senior roles in technology startups, Ophelia founded ALT "Ambitious Ladies in Tech" - a mentor programme that matches junior women in technology start-ups with senior functional leaders to provide them with valuable coaching, skills development and networking. The network now counts over 65 mentees and 130 mentors, including executives from some of the world's leading tech companies. Learn more here https://ambitiousladiesin.tech/
Previously, Ophelia was with Index Ventures for four years where she led investments in Big Health, Call9, MarvelApp, Osper and Typeform and worked closely with Credit Benchmark, Peoplevox and Robinhood.
Ophelia was named by Forbes magazine as a rising star in its inaugural Europe 30 Under 30.
Highlights
At Blossom Capital, we expect to find the majority of founders building exceptional companies outside of the hubs - cities such as Dublin, Helsinki, Prague, Warsaw… but if you had asked me where we'd expect to find a world-class 30 person engineering team building one of the most interesting products in AI today, I wouldn't have said Trondheim.
This is the true beauty of European venture - that ambition and talent is not confined by geography or language. Visionary leaders with a compelling mission and product can attract great talent from anywhere and their products can attract users and customers from all over the globe. In the case of Vespa.ai, they even acquired all of their users - the world's leading enterprises across financial institutions, FMCG, Retail and Software - for free.
When Imran Ghory heard there was an opening to convince Vespa to become a stand alone company, with one of us in New York and one of us in Faro on what was supposed to be a quiet long weekend, we instead 🚖 🛫 🛶 🛩 🚘 our way to Trondheim to convince Jon Bratseth, Frode Lundgren, Kim Omar Johansen, Kristian Aune to partner to support them in their ambitious quest to build the world's leading search and vector database. Today we're very proud to announce our $31M investment and partnership with this stellar team.
Vespa encapsulates many of the reasons Imran and I decided to build Blossom - to provide relentless belief and powerful support to Europe's most visionary founders, wherever we are fortunate enough to find them. On a personal note, there is no other person I would rather travel to other ends of the European continent with than my partner (and Trondheim is not the furthest north we've been!). Imran's technical expertise and depth of knowledge of databases, led us to this incredible team and prodcut. Part of Imran's excitement in founding Blossom was his frustration how highly technical founders felt overlooked in Europe, and so it brings enormous pride that together we enabled Vespa.ai to become an indepent company. It also would not have been possible without all the late nights and heavy lifting done by our talented Operating Partner Ksenia Kokareva, to whom we are very grateful.
And especially big thank you to Martin Abelson Sahlen for setting up that introduction on Easter Sunday!
Congratulations to Jon Bratseth, Frode Lundgren, Kim Omar Johansen, Kristian Aune and all of the Vespa.ai team to your independence and your next decades of success! 🎉
https://lnkd.in/ew6Vabf9
Blossom Capital is recruiting for a Network Partner ✨ .
We believe our relationships and network are critical to the quality of the support we can give to founders and teams with whom we are fortunate enough to partner. Founders choose Blossom for the strength of thoughtful introductions we are able to make, and we want a special person to amplify our existing networks and build new ones, especially in functional areas like sales, marketing, product, and engineering, both in Europe and the US.
Whether it be introductions to potential customers, hires, independent board members, advisors, mentors, or functional experts, we take pride in the impact these introductions have made on our portfolio companies like Checkout.com, Pigment, MoonPay and Tines.
At Blossom, our philosophy is a small, experienced, highly collaborative and close knit team. We're looking for someone who will thrive in a fast-paced, dynamic environment and in a new role where the methods and approach are undefined.
We're looking for someone exceptional who:
- has an overwhelming passion for connecting people for mutual benefit
- has a deep understanding of software, internet, mobile & web3
- can speak fluently across the various functions and stages of a start up/scale up
- can build rapport with people quickly
- loves travel
- is very ambitious & hard-working
- is a self-starter
- loves making an impact
- has at least 7 years work experience working in tech, tech advisory or tech investment role
If that sounds like you, please write to us at [email protected]!
Experience
Education
Location
People also viewed
Related People
Mesh is a relationship management platform that serves as a personal CRM, helping you organize and deepen both personal and professional relationships. It functions as a beautiful rolodex and CRM available on iPhone, Mac, Windows, and web, built automatically to help manage your network efficiently. Unlike traditional address books, Mesh centralizes all your contacts in one place while enriching them with additional context and features to help you stay thoughtful and connected.
Mesh works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Mesh offers several powerful features including:
- Comprehensive Contact Management: Automatically collects contact data and enriches profiles to keep them up-to-date
- Network Strength: Visualizes the strength of your relationships relative to others in your network
- Timeline: Shows your relationship history with each contact
- Smart Search: Allows you to search using natural language like "People I know at the NYT" or "Designers I've met in London"
- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
- Home Feed: Displays updates about your network including job changes, news mentions, and birthdays
- Groups: Organizes contacts into meaningful categories
- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Mesh is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
Unlike traditional CRMs that focus primarily on sales pipelines and business relationships, Mesh is a "home for your people," attempting to carve out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. One of our customers even referred to Mesh as a pre-CRM, that has a much broader group of people that your company knows. Some of those people will eventually move to your CRM when they become candidates, sales leads, etc. Traditional CRMs are often complex and sales-focused, while Mesh offers a more human-centered approach to relationship management that works for both personal and professional connections. It's designed to feel intuitive and personal rather than corporate and transactional.
Mesh takes privacy seriously. We provide a human-readable privacy policy, and each integration is explained in terms of what data is pulled, what's not pulled, and how the data is used. Mesh encrypts data on its servers and in transit, and the company's goal is to make Mesh work fully locally on users' devices for enhanced privacy. Mesh is also SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
Mesh is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Mesh is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Mesh offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Mesh offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Mesh for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Mesh accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Mesh offers extensive integration capabilities. Mesh introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Mesh supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Mesh also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
Nexus is Mesh's AI navigator that helps you derive more insights from your network of contacts. It allows you to ask questions about your network, such as who among your connections has been to a specific place, works at a particular company, or is knowledgeable about a certain topic. Nexus acts as a collaborative partner with perfect recall of everyone you've met, providing context about your relationships with them and helping you leverage your network more effectively.
Mesh makes it much easier to stay in touch with the people you care about. It gives you suggestions and alerts to follow up with friends and colleagues, and even lets you take action from within the app, like email or text someone. Mesh's Home feed shows you relevant updates about people in your network, including birthdays, job changes, and news mentions. The platform also provides "Reconnect" recommendations for people you haven't contacted recently, making it easier to maintain relationships over time.
Mesh is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Mesh stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Mesh excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Mesh is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Mesh offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Mesh's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Mesh has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Mesh is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Mesh beneficial.
Mesh offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Mesh offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Mesh's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Mesh offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Mesh focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Mesh also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Mesh offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Mesh isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Mesh instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Mesh is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Mesh can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Mesh is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Mesh helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
Mesh's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Mesh has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Mesh a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Mesh's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Mesh's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Mesh has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Mesh's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Mesh as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Mesh eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.