Provider of AI driven software solutions

Arndt Neuhaus

Senior Advisor, Former CEO (RWE Germany/RWE Retail)

Arndt studied Chemistry and Business Administration in Marburg, Bristol and Berkeley. After graduation to Ph.D. in Natural Sciences he worked for McKinsey & Company, Inc. in the basic materials sector and utilities, before he became head of Corporate Development/Strategy at RWE Group. He worked over 15 years in various management positions at RWE as member of the Group Business Committee, CFO of downstream divisions, CEO of the German downstream business (grids, retail) and CEO of the international retail division. After leaving RWE in 2016 he works as a senior advisor and investor in startups.

Joseph Sirosh

Chief Technology Officer at Compass

Joseph is the Chief Technology Officer for Compass, where he leads the development of the real estate industry’s first end-to-end platform. Until Dec 2018, Joseph served as Microsoft’s Chief Technology Officer for AI. During his five years at Microsoft, he also held product and engineering responsibility for all enterprise database, big data and AI products, with 1,700+ engineers.

Prior to Microsoft, Joseph spent nine years as a VP of Technology at Amazon where among other things he managed the Global Inventory Platform for Amazon’s Consumer Business, and built the machine learning and Transaction Risk Management teams. Joseph holds a PhD and MS in Neural Networks from the University of Texas at Austin and a Bachelors from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras.

Nils Ole Krekling

Group Vice President at Kongsberg

Nils Ole Krekling is Group Vice President of Corporate Business Development at Kongsberg Gruppen ASA. He has held several positions in strategy, business development and finance since he joined Kongsberg in 2009, and has extensive industry experience in M&A and strategic partnering arrangements. Nils Ole holds a master’s degree in finance from the Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration and an executive program in strategy from INSEAD.

Erik Åsberg

CTO at eSmart Systems

Erik is CTO at eSmart Systems with 20 years’ experience in software development within the energy space, mainly using Microsoft and Oracle technologies. The last four years he has been focusing on architecture and design of Big Data technologies, all on the Microsoft Azure platform.

Erik Åsberg was appointed Microsoft Regional Director-Norway in 2019, for a second consecutive two-year period. This is a program that consists of 150 of the world's top technology visionaries chosen specifically for their proven cross-platform expertise, community leadership, and commitment to business results, and therefore nominated as trusted advisor to the developer and IT professional audiences and Microsoft.

Eivind Egeland Olsen

Chief Investment Officer at Nysnø

Eivind Egeland Olsen is Chief Investment Officer at Nysnø He previously held the position as head of corporate finance for SR-Bank Markets. Eivind has extensive financial and investment experience from his time as partner in ABG Sundal Collier, Jefferies & Company’s Cleantech team and The Royal Bank of Scotland in London. Eivind holds a Master of Science in Finance and Economics from the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH) and Warwick Business School (WBS).

Michael Donnelly

Partner and Chief Risk Officer at Energy Impact Partners

Michael Donnelly is partner and Chief Risk Officer at Energy Impact Partners. Mr Donnelly spent a 25-year career at General Electric focused on energy in various management functions, most recently acting as Head of Business Development for GE Energy-Industrial Solutions. Before that, he led the Energy Technology Group for GE Equity, where he focused on investments in power and energy technology companies in storage, distribution and energy management.

Mr. Donnelly also served as a Risk Officer for the Equity Group where he ensured proper underwriting for a broad array of equity and debt investments. He also served as a Risk Officer at GE Global Sponsor Finance where he underwrote and managed a portfolio of over $1B. Mr. Donnelly holds a Bachelor of Science Degree from the U. S. Merchant Marine Academy and an MBA from the Darden Graduate School of Business Administration, University of Virginia.

Thor Olav T. Egeland

Investment Manager at Equinor Ventures

Jan Palasinski

Investment Partner at Future Energy Ventures

Jan Palasinski is Investment Partner at Future Energy Ventures since its inception in 2020. He has more than 15 years’ experience in cleantech and finance.

Before joining Future Energy Ventures, Jan has been part of E.ON's venture capital team since 2017, after having spent the previous 4 years at Innogy Venture Capital, both in Germany.

In the first phase of his career, Jan used to be an investment banker, driving renewable energy growth in Italy with project financing instruments.

Jan holds a Master's Degree in Economics and Management of Public Utilities from Milan's Bocconi University and a B.A. in History and International Relations from Roma Tre University.

Currently Jan serves as board member/observer in Future Energy Ventures’ portfolio companies Cuculus, eSmart Systems, Kiwigrid, Lumenaza, Nuventura, tado° and Thermondo.

Tor Ø. Frydenberg

Senior Consultant at Smart Innovation Norway

Siri Kalvig

CEO at NYSNØ

Knut H. H. Johansen

eSmart Systems' previous CEO

Knut has more than twenty years’ experience innovating, developing and delivering IT solutions to the energy industry world-wide.  He has delivered IT solutions to physical and financial power exchanges in Europe, North America, Asia and Australia beginning with the deregulation of the Norwegian power market in 1991, a precursor for deregulation processes worldwide. Knut has also delivered IT systems to the balancing, spot, and financial energy markets, as well as the clearing of exchange products and OTC to Nord Pool, the Nordic power exchange. He’s been responsible for ETRM and grid system deliveries to a large number of prominent energy companies, including E.ON, Statoil, Hydro, Statkraft, Fortum and Mercuria.

Knut was the initiating driver behind of the Norwegian Centre of Expertise – Smart Energy Markets. NCE Smart Energy Markets is supported by the Norwegian Authorities.

Moritz Jungmann

Investment Principle at Future Energy Ventures