Michael Bornhaeusser

Michael Bornhaeusser is a Swiss serial entrepreneur and technology investor who has spent roughly three decades in the ICT sector. He began in 1994 by co-founding MMK AG, which became Pixelpark Switzerland and was floated on the German Stock Exchange in 1999. In 1998 he co-founded SDC AG (a pre-merger spin-off of MMK) with Rolf Brugger and others; SDC was later acquired by PacketVideo/NTT DoCoMo in 2007. He was an early venture investor in Ubiquisys, the femtocell company sold to Cisco in 2013. He reportedly earned an undergraduate degree at the University of Cambridge and an MBA at Cranfield University, and has lectured at the Institute for Media Management at the University of St. Gallen (HSG).

Before founding his current firm, Bornhaeusser led the private-equity, products and services business of the Swiss private bank Sallfort Privatbank AG, where he ran venture-capital club deals beginning around 2012, and earlier worked with 5 Continents Consulting Group. He co-founded Bulb Capital (with partners including Dominik Joos and Patrick Dreyfus), where he serves as Chairman and Managing Partner and leads the firm's Venture Capital Club Deals.

Bulb Capital operates a flexible "club deal" model in which Bornhaeusser and his partners invest their own capital alongside co-investors on equal terms, concentrating on later-stage technology companies in the US, UK and Latin America, plus Swiss real estate development. According to the firm and press coverage, since its 2019 launch Bulb has invested roughly $180 million across about 12 startups and 16 financing rounds, with several successful exits. He is also a frequent commentator, writing op-eds for finews on venture capital, SPACs, fintech and esports, and has served on the board of UK robotics company Karakuri Ltd. (non-executive director, from 2019).

• Invests via club deals, putting in the firm's own money alongside co-investors on equal terms rather than running a traditional blind-pool fund.
• Focuses on later-stage / growth opportunities — "from a mature A round to B, C and D rounds" and growth-stage secondary transactions — though he also makes earlier angel-stage bets.
• Looks for companies with "a clear USP, market leadership potential and a technical advantage over their competitors," typically with ≥ $10M in revenue and professionalized management.
• Targets a "3 Years / 3X" return — roughly threefold value within three years.
• Sector emphasis on telecom technology, digital media, e-commerce/e-services and enterprise software, with conviction bets on esports/gaming as it professionalizes "from gamer-dominated underground communities into professionally managed media firms."
• On the 2020 NRG Esports deal, he argued pandemic lockdowns would accelerate digital adoption and predicted top esports orgs would "pull away from smaller orgs" and be acquired by major media companies like Disney and Viacom.