EU-Startups Podcast

In this exclusive interview, we sit down with Lena Hackelöer, founder & CEO at Brite Payments, to explore the company’s growth, the future of European payments, and the challenges facing fintech founders.

Lena shares how Brite has evolved from a Swedish startup founded in 2019 into a leading pay-by-bank provider operating across 27 European markets. Following its Series A round, the company expanded into Germany and France.

She reflects on how her early career shaped her entrepreneurial approach. Her experience at Klarna during its hypergrowth phase taught her how to build and internationalise a fast-moving fintech company, while a later role in a listed financial services business exposed her to operating in a highly regulated environment.

Lena also discusses European payment sovereignty. Brite is building a pan-European instant payment network that reduces reliance on non-European infrastructure, but she argues that sovereignty alone will not drive adoption. Merchants and consumers ultimately prioritise convenience, reliability, conversion rates, and lower processing costs.

The conversation examines the difficulty of scaling across Europe. Differences in language, culture, banking systems, regulation, and consumer behaviour mean the continent cannot be treated as a single market. Although licences can be passported across the European Union, requirements may still vary between regulators.

Lena explains why localisation is essential. German consumers often place greater emphasis on security and data protection, while Swedish users are more comfortable with digital transparency. Brite therefore combines centralised technology with local expertise, adapting its strategy to each market.

Looking ahead, Lena sees convenience as the main driver of pay-by-bank adoption. Improvements in mobile banking, app-to-app authentication, and instant payments are making the experience faster, enabling instant confirmation, rapid refunds, and quicker payouts.

The interview concludes with a discussion about female entrepreneurship and representation in fintech. Lena believes progress is being made as more women gain senior experience and professional networks. However, funding inequalities, limited access to technical careers, and low female participation in engineering remain significant barriers.

Key Points
• Brite Payments has grown from a Swedish startup into a pan-European pay-by-bank platform operating across 27 markets.
• Lena’s experience at Klarna helped shape her entrepreneurial approach and payments expertise.
• European payment sovereignty matters, but adoption depends on convenience, reliability, conversion rates, and commercial value.
• Fragmented regulation, banking infrastructure, and consumer behaviour make European expansion complex.
• Mobile banking, instant payments, and app-to-app authentication are making pay-by-bank services faster and more attractive.
• Greater female representation will require better access to funding, technical careers, and senior leadership opportunities.

In this exclusive interview, we sit down with Tim Schumacher, the visionary co-founder of saas.group and General Partner at World Fund, to explore the journey, philosophy, and future of his founder-friendly SaaS acquisition platform and his ClimateTech investments.

Tim shares how saas.group evolved from its first acquisition, DeployBot, to a thriving ecosystem of 18 independent SaaS brands spanning 30 countries. He dives deep into the core values that drive saas.group’s success: a commitment to preserving the bootstrapper mindset, fostering cultural alignment, and ensuring every acquisition is tailored to the founder’s personal and professional goals.

Tim also reflects on the unique challenges and opportunities in the SaaS acquisition space. He discusses why saas.group focuses on niche, revenue-driven companies often overlooked by traditional private equity firms, and how their model prioritises autonomy, transparency, and long-term partnership over purely financial metrics.

From the importance of honest conversations about founders’ motivations to the practicalities of due diligence and integration, Tim pulls back the curtain on what it takes to create a dream exit for entrepreneurs.

Beyond SaaS, Tim’s passion for sustainability and climate action shines through as he discusses his role as a General Partner at World Fund, a climate tech VC backing scalable, emissions-reducing technologies.

He shares his perspective on the progress of decarbonisation, the role of technology in addressing climate change, and the lessons learned from building and supporting impact-driven ventures like Ecosia, the search engine that plants trees.

As the conversation turns to the future, Tim paints a picture of the ecosystem he aims to cultivate over the next decade - one where founders retain their identity, teams thrive in collaborative environments, and businesses drive meaningful change.

Join us for a deep dive with Job van der Voort, CEO and co-founder of Remote, as he explores the evolution of work, the challenges of global employment, and the principles behind scaling remote-first teams.

From his transition from neuroscientist to startup leader, to the lessons learned at GitLab and Remote, Job shares insights on mindset shifts, cultural nuances, and the future of distributed work.

Job discusses the practical challenges of building a globally distributed team, the importance of asynchronous communication, and why treating all employees as equals - regardless of location - is key to fostering a cohesive culture.

In this conversation, Job reflects on the hidden costs of traditional office work, the importance of flexibility, and how Remote is transforming global employment infrastructure. He also addresses the remote vs. in-person debate, the role of time zones in global collaboration, and what founders should prioritise when hiring talent worldwide.

Join us for a conversation with Jos White, co-founder of Notion Capital and serial entrepreneur, as he reflects on his journey - from building pioneering companies like Star and MessageLabs to investing in the next generation of European B2B SaaS and cloud startups.

Jos shares the lessons learned around his family dining table, the pivotal moments that defined his entrepreneurial path, and what it takes to identify and support exceptional founders.

Discover how Notion Capital is shaping the European tech landscape and Jos’s perspective on the future of software in Europe.

Join us for a conversation with Tarek Müller, co-founder and co-CEO of ABOUT YOU, a leading European fashion and lifestyle e-commerce platform and Hamburg’s first unicorn.

Tarek shares his journey from building websites at 13 to scaling one of Europe’s fastest-growing tech companies, and dives deep into the future of digital commerce, AI, and sustainable retail - and his close brush with a scammer!

In this interview, Tarek reflects on his entrepreneurial roots, the evolution of ABOUT YOU, and the strategic shifts shaping e-commerce today.

He also explores the role of AI, the balance between personalisation and sustainability, and how ABOUT YOU fits into the broader ecosystem of modern commerce infrastructure.