Dignity Fund II Advisory Board
Mathias Schilling
Co-Founder and Managing Partner of BV Capital Partners
Mathias Schilling is co-founder and Managing Partner of BV Capital Partners. BV Capital is a venture capital firm specializing in early stage media, consumer internet and social media companies in the US and abroad. Mathias is also the founder and Managing Partner of a collection of international venture funds with a similar investment thesis but in various markets worldwide; eVenture Capital Partners (Western Europe); eVenture Russia (Russia and Ukraine); BV Capital Asia (China and Japan); BV Americas (Brazil and Latin America). Mathias currently oversees the firms’ investments in Groupon, Angie’s List, Sonos, Yume Networks, AppFolio, Eucalyptus, BlueKai, HiMedia, Xango, and others.
Mathias was born and raised in Switzerland and is a German citizen. He attended boarding school near St. Moritz in Switzerland. Mathias earned a degree in Business from the prestigious St. Gallen University where he graduated with Distinction.
Mathias started his career at Bertelsmann in the selective High Potential Executives program. He later worked for Bertelsmann Strategic New Ventures group working on a number of significant M&A and joint venture transactions including AOL Studios, Amazon, Barnes & Noble and CompuServe. He subsequently joined the founding team that spun out of Bertelsmann to create Bertlesmann Ventures, an independent venture firm focused on new media. He served as its founding CFO and became a partner at the age of 25. Bertlesmann Ventures subsequently became BV Capital after raising its second fund. Mathias became Managing Partner of BV Capital in 2003.
Mathias is a Director of the Dignity Fund, an innovative fund mobilizing investment dollars for Microfinance and small businesses in developing countries. He is also involved with Endeavor, an innovative program that promotes entrepreneurship in developing economies, where he is a member of their Investor Network and has been appointed to be a member of their entrepreneur Selection Panel.
Mathias serves on the Board of the Discovery Museum in San Francisco, is an active participant in the 800-member Schilling Family Association in Germany, and is a Director of “German Aid Prince of Baden.” He currently serves as President of the Alumnus Club of his boarding school, Lyzeum Alpinum Zuoz. He is a frequent speaker at industry events and a regular guest on Bloomberg’s “Tech Talk.”
Mathias is an active Cresta competitor, an exclusive sports club in St. Moritz. He has a passion for reading and studying the politics, culture and history of Europe. He played cricket during school and was the Bavarian National Champion in Tennis and served as a ski instructor for several winters. He is the founder of Municher, introducing the famous German currywurst and other German specialties to California. He is married with three young children and lives in San Francisco.