People

Markus Wagner
Born in Vienna, Markus has worked in mobile & internet communication from the outset of his career. In 2000 he founded Xidris and acted as the company’s managing director until 2004. Xidris soon became one of Europe’s leading providers of mobile communication services. It was subsequently merged into the 3united AG which was sold to the US company VeriSign Inc. in early 2006. As Vice-President for Product Innovations & Business Development of VeriSign Markus divided his time between Vienna and New York and worked with US media companies such as NBC, CBS, FOX and ClearChannel to launch new interactive and content services. In 2007 Markus founded the business incubator i5invest (CEE). He hold several supervisory board positions in European venture capital funds as well as startups. Markus was awarded as the Austrian Business Angel 2010 and won the Austrian Private Equity & Venture Capital Award 2010. Markus is co-founder of the Austrian web/mobile/high-tech cluster InitialFactor located in Vienna and co-organizer of the STARTUP WEEK.

i5invest’s investments include:

3united AG: (Exit to VeriSign Inc.2006)
123people.com: (Exit to Pages Jaunes Group 2010)
tripwolf.com: (Joint Venture MairDumont Media Group, Dieter von Holtzbrinck)
tupalo.com: (Joint Venture European Directories Group/Herold)
wikitude GmbH: (Grand Prize Winner of the 2010 NAVTEQ Global LBS Challenge EMEA, second at Austrian Private Equity & Venture Capital Award 2011)
adaffix GmbH: (Global Mobile Award 2010 for Best Mobile Internet Service)

Alexander Igelsböck
Alexander Igelsböck has spent most of his career in the internet and mobile communications world. After working in traditional marketing and PR, he joined a small startup called Xidris in Austria.  Early 2004, Xidris merged with 2 additional companies to become 3united which was then acquired by VeriSign in February 2006.

After relocating to Boston, Mr. Igelsböck worked in a variety of project and product management roles including international project management for small to large sized projects, and managing an international product management team in VeriSign across Europe and the United States.

As Vice President of Mobile Messaging in VeriSign Inc, Mr. Igelsböck had responsibility for products including VeriSign’s “Mobile Content Delivery Network” (mCDN), Enterprise Messaging Services and Media & Entertainment Services for the top companies in the Media, Enterprise and Mobile Content space.  Annual revenues for Alex’s lines of business exceeded USD 50m and he was responsible for 250 staff.

In 2008 Alex moved back to Vienna to lead the divestiture process for VeriSign’s European mobile assets. After its successful completion, at the end of 2008, he left VeriSign to join The Merger.

In the last 3 years Alex helped as an incubator a range of Startups focused on  financing, product and corporate strategy and  business development.

Mr. Igelsböck has an MA in Business and Information Management from the University of Applied Sciences in Salzburg, Austria.

Bernhard Lehner
Bernhard Lehner is a communication professional through and through. His work with and for the media has always been the centre of his professional life. During his communication studies in Vienna he gathered work experiences as a journalist for print and online media. By the End of the 90ies he had changed the site and worked successfully as a PR advisor for agencies but also for in house relations. His references from the last few years include Apple, Samsung, Motorola, Ikea and Cisco. i5invest appreciates Bernhard’s expertise for strategic communication development measurements and their realisation for old and new media with a focus on Europe.

Paul Weinberger
Paul has over 8 years of experience in structuring, negotiating and leading Venture Capital (VC) transactions in the internet/mobile space. 2005 to 2011 he has worked with the Austrian VC Gamma Capital Partners (GCP) as Principal and Investment Manager, where he successfully funded and sold several companies such as: Fatfoogoo (lead-investor and board observer, exited to nasdaq listed Digital River in 2010), or 123people (lead-investor and chairman of the board, exited to French Pages Jaunes Group). Since 2010 Paul is lead-investor and chairman at world’s leading augmented reality provider Wikitude (AUT). In 2011 he invested in the mobile start-up 42matters (social app discovery based in CH), where he acts as lead-investor and board member. Since 2011 Paul is Partner with the internet incubator i5invest and Venture Partner with GCP.
The exit of 123people has won the Austrian Private Equity & Venture Capital Award 2010. The investment into Wikitude was awarded second in 2011.
Paul was member of the Selection Committee of the European Tech Tour 2011 and is lecturer and coach at Vienna University of Economics and Administration, the Technical University Vienna or at the government funded incubator INITS.

Dirk van Quaquebeke
Dirk has extensive entrepreneurial and financial experience. In late 2009 he co-founded Brandmile, one of India’s leading private shopping clubs, where he successfully set up & grew the company as interim CEO until June 2011 and since then continues to act as an advisor. In parallel he co-founded and acted as advisor for VFM Consulting Pvt. Ltd., the leading provider of a 360 degree e-commerce & virtual inventory solution for brick and mortar jewelers in the UK which he exited in October 2011.
Before relocating to India Dirk worked as an investment professional at Zouk, a leading UK venture capital firm focused on Pan-European cleantech, where he substantially supported the investment in & monitoring of Triton Water Ag as well as Trilliant Inc. He held board observer positions in both companies. He joined Zouk Ventures coming from Moor Park Capital Partners another London-based private equity house. During his 5 years career in private equity he has managed the origination, assessment, investment and monitoring of private equity holdings in the smart grid, water, solar, e-commerce and real estate space with the total investment sums per deal ranging from €10m-800m.
Prior to private equity he worked for Deutsche Bank Asset Management London as a portfolio management professional investing mainly into European IT, renewable and media equities as part of a 10 people team with responsibility for €13bn.
Dirk holds a BSc. in Computer Science from Hildesheim University and a dual MSc. in Finance & Economics and International Management (CEMS) from Copenhagen Business School and ESADE