Nov 11, 2015 · 19m · 20vc
20 VC 087: From The Investors Of Spotify, TrustPilot and Klarna with Jeppe Zink, General Partner @ Northzone
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gold bands on the timeline = statements, start to end. Hover to read, click to jump. CC turns on captions
In this episode of The 20 Minute VC, host Harry Stebbings interviews Jeppe Zink, General Partner at Northzone, to discuss seventeen years of European venture capital evolution, strategies for managing portfolio value across market cycles, and upcoming trends in fintech and Nordic tech hubs.
How this conversation actually went
Every chapter scored 0–10 on four independent dynamics. Hover any point for the reasoning behind the score. Harry holds 29.5% of the talking time here. How this is scored →
Harry as informed peer 4.0 Guest teaching 4.7 Guest disagreement 2.2 Harry pushing back 2.8
speaking balance: gold is Harry, purple is the guest (3 minute bins)
Sharpest disagreement ▶ 6:43 Dismissing blanket market peak claims
Jeppe pushes back on the claim that the market is at a peak, calling it too blanket a statement and distinguishing between tourist capital and core venture funding.
Hardest push from Harry ▶ 8:41 Challenging fintech disruption narrativeHarry refuses to accept Jeppe's easy narrative of bank disruption, pointing directly to incumbent regulatory moats and structural barriers to entry.
Biggest teaching moment ▶ 3:30 Historical analysis of European VC mortalityJeppe provides an in-depth breakdown of early European tech investing, explaining how 90 percent of firms failed because buyout financiers lacked founder alignment.
Harry holds his own ▶ 8:41 Harry highlights banking regulatory moatsHarry demonstrates sector knowledge by challenging the guest on structural bank protections and regulatory hurdles in fintech.
the scores for every segment, with the reasoning behind each
| Chapter | Topic | Harry as informed peer | Guest teaching | Guest disagreement | Harry pushing back | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jeppe Zink's Background and Entry into Venture Capital | 3 | 4 | 1 | 1 | Harry prompts Jeppe on his 17-year career path in European venture capital. Jeppe educates the host on the early history of European tech investing, explaining why over 90 percent of 2000-era European VCs failed due to applying buyout-style transaction models. | |
| Navigating Economic Cycles and Fund Vintages | 4 | 5 | 4 | 3 | Harry cites Chris Sacca to probe whether market downturns clear out weak players. Jeppe gently reframes the point to emphasize 10-year fund vintage cycles and explicitly rejects the blanket notion that the market is at its peak. | |
| The Fintech Opportunity and Disruption of Incumbents | 5 | 4 | 2 | 6 | Harry offers strong counter-arguments regarding incumbent bank moats and regulatory barriers to entry, asking if Jeppe is overly optimistic. Jeppe validates the concern while pointing to recent London successes like Funding Circle and SOPA. | |
| The Nordic Tech Scene and Ecosystem Success | 4 | 5 | 1 | 1 | Harry brings up top Nordic unicorns to ask what makes the region so successful. Jeppe provides a comprehensive breakdown of structural factors from early broadband deployment to hub flywheel effects. | |
| Deal Sourcing, Ambition, and Impatient Venture Capital | 4 | 5 | 3 | 3 | Harry quotes past statements from Jeppe on ambition and questions how to measure VC performance. Jeppe offers a contrarian reframe, rejecting the conventional wisdom that VC is patient capital and arguing instead for extreme impatience. | |
| Quickfire Round: Tools, Leaders, Books, and Crosslend | 4 | 5 | 2 | 3 | Harry conducts a quickfire round and presses Jeppe on how Crosslend differs from Lending Club. Jeppe explains the fundamental structural differences in European capital markets versus US peer-to-peer models. |
Statements from this episode (13)
Zink: 1990s European VCs failed because partners had buyout mindsets
“And obviously that's possibly a reason why so many failed, because if you look at the VC strategies, there were simply two transaction focus, given that the talent came from the buyout side. And that was too far removed from entrepreneurial realities.”
Zink: Over 90% of European VCs active in 2000 have died
“So, so I think if you go back 1015 years ago, I think literally I saw a study that said that over 90% of the VC firms, ah, that were in existence in Europe in 2000 have died or cannot raise new funds today.”
Jeppe Zink: VC fund vintage returns depend heavily on exit market conditions
“And I think people often forget that the best vintage years are driven as much by how good the exits markets are when you're ready to sell out of the companies as anything else.”
Zink: Northzone backed Spotify at bull peak and Avito in bear market
“And if I look at our current biggest winners Spotify and Avito, we invested in the A-round and Spotify just before the party finished in, in September of when the bull market was still very strong. And Avito reinvested in, in the deep bear market.”
Zink: Tourist investors like hedge funds will exit VC during downcycles
“I see a lot of valuation bubbles in certain subsectors or in late stage VC investments, and that's really because you have a lot of tourists coming in, like hedge funds and other, other non-consistent players putting money into the VC game, and I think as you …”
Zink: Second-wave fintech startups will soon disrupt first-wave pioneers
“I think if you look at the next five, 10 years, I think we're going to have a second wave of companies that say, compared to this first wave, isn't there a better way of doing it? And I think you will find much more sophisticated setups structurally within the…”
Zink: High demand is driving bubble-like valuations in fintech startups
“Yes. I, in many ways, I find it scary, but that's supply and demand speaking. I think we spoke about the cycle. I think we will see that changing as the cycle changes.”
Zink: Stockholm and the Nordics produce more tech winners than London
“We see very few of the current crop of great winners coming from here, whereas clearly Stockholm, the Nordics are punching way above their weight.”
Zink: Nordic Tech Success Is Driven by Role Models and Serial Talent
“Now that no longer matters. Now what matters is the fact that we have all these great successes up there. That act as heroes to the rest, and you have management second layer teams that have been watching that success firsthand and saying, hey, I can do that. …”
Zink: Northzone intentionally turns over staff continuously to emulate startups
“Inside Northstone, we try to emulate the startup. So we make sure we never static. We always have people arriving and leaving. We make sure hunger is always present and getting new input.”
Zink: Venture capital should be impatient, not patient capital
“I often hear about the notion that venture capital is supposed to be patient capital, and I always smile, because I think the opposite is all about being impatient. If something is not working, change it. Don't wait and see if it improves.”
Zink: Momentum is the most critical metric for evaluating startups
“It's so different from startup to startup, but for me, it's all about momentum. If I don't sense there's momentum, and momentum can be In product development, if I don't sense things are happening, then I always push, because I think momentum is, when you have…”