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Origin story

UniVCC emerged from practice. While building and operating university venture capital structures, we encountered a recurring institutional gap: fragmented visibility across the ecosystem, limited benchmarking, and inefficient pathways between UVC managers and institutional capital. What began around fund formation evolved into a broader realisation. University venture capital was becoming globally relevant, but the coordination and intelligence layer around the asset class remained underdeveloped. UniVCC was created to help structure that layer.

Mission

Structuring the institutional layer around university venture capital. UniVCC exists to strengthen how university venture capital is benchmarked, understood and accessed at ecosystem scale — through shared intelligence, stronger GP-LP connectivity and more coordinated capital pathways. UniVCC is building the institutional coordination layer around university venture capital.

Ecosystem Builders

Platforms, ecosystem architects and technology partners contributing directly to the execution and development of the coalition. These collaborators contribute expertise, infrastructure, intelligence and operational capabilities across the UniVCC platform.

Károly Szántó

Károly Szántó

CEO & Founder

A serial entrepreneur with extensive experience, having been instrumental in the design and launch of three Venture Capital firms, including a University VC. He has also founded a venture studio, a startup accelerator, and several startups.

Thijmen Meijer

Thijmen Meijer

COO & Co-Founder

Dutch serial entrepreneur with a background in talent and operations. He founded an EMEA executive search firm and is a partner in a top 40 global search network, and co-founded the venture studio behind UniVCC after building talent and leadership functions inside large international organisations.

Emily Palmer

Emily Palmer

Strategic Advisor

A strategic advisor in international higher education strategy, governance, policy and funding. Based in Brussels, she combines 20 years of experience at the interface of universities and the EU institutions, as well as 12 years in executive roles within two major mission-driven alliances of research-intensive universities. Building on a large network of institutional leaders and policy actors, she brings extensive expertise in reputation building and stakeholder engagement.

Collaboration partners

The Next Leap
Media Partner

The Next Leap

Media Platform

A dedicated global media platform for the university venture capital community, providing visibility through podcasts, interviews and in-depth coverage of the asset class.

Deep Ecosystems
Ecosystem Partner

Deep Ecosystems

Ecosystem Advisory

A global innovation advisory firm designing and operating ecosystem-scale venture and innovation programs, contributing strategic ecosystem intelligence to UniVCC.