Nelson Casata
Nelson is one of our Vice Presidents based in London. While committed to supporting founders across Europe, Nelson has a particular fondness for the French tech ecosystem and a passion for Fintech and AI.
I grew up in Switzerland and had the privilege of growing up in a multicultural household. My parents always encouraged me to follow my curiosity, but with a clear emphasis of getting to the bottom of things - whether it was coding my first programs on LEGO Mindstorm robots or diving deep into new hobbies like basketball.
Tea preparation was an early iteration of it all
At 13 (and 1.96 meters tall), I enrolled into one of France’s best basketball academies, balancing 2-3 daily training sessions on top of a regular high school program. From pre-dawn shooting practice in dark gyms, to yearly 4-week summer camps in Serbia, this chapter was all about discipline and dedication.
One of the two pictured was drafted 8th by the New York Knicks in 2017 - it wasn’t #14.
After deciding against a professional basketball career, I entered business school, where I had to somewhat rebuild my academic foundation. Those first months were challenging, but I managed with a persistence that has become foundational to my work and life.
During my university years, I started reselling sneakers. What started as a passion project – it was a great way to finance my own, ever-growing, collection (400 pairs at one point) – soon snowballed into a fully-stacked venture involving bots, payment infrastructure, and warehousing on three continents. This side hustle allowed me to fund most of my studies, and gave me perspective into what it takes to build a successful business.
Sneaker delivery between classes
The commitment founders have towards building their companies is what truly excites me about working in venture capital. This energy is contagious, and a privilege to be a part of. Reflecting on the last four years working at Doctolib, a french healthtech unicorn and at Headline and Seedcamp on the investing side, I get excited about teams that have strong clarity of thought around the hypotheses they are currently validating - be it on the market, the next features they are building out, or a new GTM approach.
Nelson enjoying the slopes with his Creandum team mates