After nearly 20 years as a corporate venturer, Gerd Goette has left Germany-based industrials group Siemens.
Goette said: “I have decided to end my corporate career and transition out of Siemens. Excited about my next step: I plan to stay in the energy and sustainability ecosystem, working with startups and VCs in an adviser and board capacity.”
Since joining what was then known as Siemens Venture Capital (SVC) and now called Next47 in late 2000, after 13 years in the corporate’s engineering team, Goette has invested in more than 50 transactions and taken more than 25 directorships and board observer positions.
These board member or observer roles included BuildingIQ, ChargePoint, LO3 Energy, RePower Capital, Sensys, Sunverge, Tendril and Wirescan. He is a former board member or observer at ISE, Prenova, Reactive Nano Technologies, SmartSynch, Zolo, Broadlight, Covega, Dune Networks, Genband, IP Unity, Kagoor Networks, Myrio and Verimatrix.
Goette’s departure follows a changing of the guard at Next47 as it positions itself as more independent of Siemens’ business units and an evergreen fund able to reinvest profits from its €1bn ($1.2bn) fund.
Ralf Schnell, former head of SVC before its effective incorporation into Next47 at its launch under Lak Ananth in 2016, has become head of private equity at Siemens Financial Services, while new recruits include Susana Quintera-Plaza and Jack Eadie in Europe.
In the US, Ching-Yu Hu has joined Next47 as a principal based in its Palo Alto, California, office, together with Matthew Cowan, former co-founder of VC firm Bridgescale Partners, and TJ Rylander, who spent a decade as managing partner at In-Q-Tel, as partners.