Martin Hacks

Martin Hacks is a global network uniting elite management consultants and business advisors. 
Our primary mission is to foster opportunities for members to learn from each other, enhance their careers, acquire new skills, and leverage AI to deliver exceptional value to their clients.

- Community with Spaces
- Live coaching sessions
- Consulting Academy: Consulting MBA and topic-specific training
- Templates
- Job Portal and X-selling engine
- 3rd party software discounts

Apply today to www.martinhacks.com

Partner

Stealth Climate Startup

Stealth Climate Tech Startup
Batteries + AI + Web3

Forecastly AI

Advisory Board

BrightDay

BrightDay is an ecosystem of life enhancement apps https://brightday.app/
Download iOS BrightDay
https://apps.apple.com/no/app/brightday-habit-tracker/id1636308273
Download iOS SuperHabits app
https://apps.apple.com/no/app/superhabits-1-habit-tracker/id6452316201

Founder

PwC Norway

Outcomes
- Designed and run a ScaleUp program www.slingshot.no for the region
- Grew Innovation & Growth Offering to 7 figures

Innovation & Digital Director

Head of Innovation & Digital Delivery | Sr. Manager @ EEC PwC Stavanger

University of Stavanger

Imparting lessons on Design Thinking for Green Energy Transition at the University of Stavanger

Visiting Lecturer

Accenture Song

-> Leading the Digital Energy Hub for Accenture in Stavanger, Norway 
-> Inspiring business leaders with the latest trends in ways of working and technological disruption 
-> Design thinking workshops, brainstorming sessions, prototyping, value chain opportunity mapping, digital strategy roadmaps and product development sprints (1 day, 5 days and several weeks) 
-> Digital advisory & training to executives

Digital Hub Lead | Innovation and Digital Transformation Manager

Accenture

-> Leading the development of a Digital Hub for Accenture in Stavanger, Norway
-> Inspiring business leaders with latest trends in ways of working and technological disruption
-> Design thinking workshops, brainstorming sessions, prototyping, value chain opportunity mapping, digital strategy roadmaps and product development sprints (1 day, 5 days and several weeks)
-> Strategy Lead of a RPA (Robot Process Automation) program

Digital Hub Lead | Innovation Manager

Vertical Strategy

VERTICAL is a new breed of strategy advisors catalyzing growth for a fast paced future

- New venture digital product sprints
- New digital products concept development
- New business model and strategy development
- Corporate entrepreneurship
- Digital transformation / Digital roadmap for industrial clients
- Service design (UX/UI/Design Thinking Workshops)
- Idea generation and innovation workshops

Innovation Senior Consultant / In-house entrepreneur

martinhacks.com

Innovation coach @ youtube and writer (sci-fi, business)

Hi 👋 My name is Martin

As a management consultant, I built an Innovation Agency for a Big4 to 7 figures. I have consulted in nearly every industry, from disruptive Startups to fast-growing Scale-ups, B2C, B2B, and Enterprise SaaS, from The World Bank to Fortune500s, from shaping regulations in the US to implementing agile at a $60Bn revenue corporate, from designing battery tech spin-outs to medical tech IPO pitch decks.

If you are a scaleup CEO with annual revenues over 5 mUSD, feel free to reach out (DM) to discuss:

- Strategy execution
- Increasing margin play through revenueops (e.g. pricing) and cost optimization

I am an Entrepreneur (40%) and Management Consultant (60%).

As an entrepreneur, I run a portfolio of Life-enhancement apps (www.brightday.app), a digitally-driven Innovation Consulting and a stealth-mode climate startup. I do not invest at the moment.

Martin Gallardo

Everything in "Europe is better than US except 1 thing" he said and continue:

Manhattan is a tough place

I work 9-9-6

I live in 46 sqm, and pay 6000 euros a month

I make 150,000 grand a year
yet I barely save any money

Food sucks... even trying to eat healthy... I put on weight.

I think there is something wrong in the food even in vegetables.

Tap Water... undrinkable

People are highly transactional

Dating can easily drain most of your time

Dining and Taxis cost like 5x versus Europe

Safety?... just search on insta "NYC metro crazy"

But there is one thing you get here

"The Learning"

If you have a dream, strangers are willing to bet on you.

They let you build... and pivot... and fail... no questions asked.

And then you have the best market on the planet.

It is a jungle, survival mode.

But noone can take this experienced out of me.

I paused, reflected for a second,
and kindly asked him, one of my best friends:

"Would you stay there for the rest of your live?"

"I am retiring in Europe"

No alternative text description for this image

Current status of my inbox daily: {{primary_intent_signal}}

Timothy Armoo has one of the coolest bio in Entrepreneurship.
Are you failing enough? Literally all really successful people I know are risk takers. You can t have outsized returns without 100% risk of failure.

10 Eye-Opening Insights from 885 European VCs 🚀

I dumped into Google Gemini3 all Marc Penkala's comprehensive EU VC survey, and the data reveals fascinating patterns about how European venture capital actually works. Here's what stood out:

Deal Flow Reality Check 📊
European VCs see an average of 851 investment proposals annually but close only 38 deals - that's a 4.5% conversion rate. The funnel is brutal: only 37% even get a management meeting, and just 6% make it to closing.

Key insight: Independent VCs receive 3x more proposals than governmental VCs, yet governmental VCs have significantly higher closure rates.

What VCs Actually Care About 🎯

When selecting investments, it's all about the team:

96% say management team is critical (this isn't just talk - it's universal)
72% prioritize product/service/technology
Only 21% consider industry a key factor

Most surprising? The investor's own contribution ranks dead last at just 12%.

Founder Qualities That Matter 💡

VCs look for competence (75%) and passion (73%) above all else. 

But here's the nuance:

Family Offices care less about ability but MORE about commitment/passion
Governmental VCs prioritize industry experience
Only 28% cite competence as THE most important factor 

The Valuation Reality 💰
71% use comparable transactions as their primary valuation method, yet more than 60% don't use ANY formal valuation methodology!

Late-stage VCs are more likely to apply formal methods, while health-focused VCs rarely use IRR calculations.

Target ownership? 63% aim for 10-20% stakes, with a required IRR of 29% and cash-on-cash multiple of 6.4x. 

Half of late-stage VCs target ownership above 20%.

Deal Terms Tell a Story 📝

80% demand pro-rata rights (especially important in mature markets)
68% require anti-dilution protection

Western VCs push harder for anti-dilution than Northern VCs

Health-focused VCs care more about participation liquidation preferences and cumulative dividends

Success Factors: It's Not Just Luck 🎲

What actually drives successful exits?

Management team: 96% (again, the team!)
Product/offering: 72%
Timing: 56%
Good luck: 33%

Interestingly, late-stage VCs mention luck less often (26% vs 33% overall), 
while Northern VCs rate timing and luck as more critical than other regions.

Decision-Making Styles 🤝
36% use majority voting
31% require unanimous decisions
Only 4% allow individual partner decisions
Health-focused VCs use unanimous voting more (50% vs 31% average), suggesting higher-risk tolerance requires broader consensus.

The Exit Landscape 🚪
40% of exits are trade sales, but only 9% achieve 10x+ returns. 

The reality:
22% of investments fail outright
7% exit via IPO
28% exceed investment objectives

More insights in the comments

Full credit to Marc Penkala for this comprehensive research. 
#VC #fundraising #insights

I am tired of LinkedIn clickbait. 20 year old saying Founders pay $30k for TAM. Let s dismantle this bull€&"!

LinkedIn has become a clickbait funnel towards Founders

Archetypical criminal:

20 year old school dropout

Learned about GTM 6 month ago

Copy lead magnet from someone else

Never done consulting before

Just asked last night GPT how much McKinsey charged for TAM

Discovered AI can produce a decent outcome if well prompted

Figure out he can get hundreds of comments and leads towards a sensitive group like Founders

So he can sell them something he has never really done before

The problem is... 

You are lying boy

In the business of serving... trust is the coin.

You ll get desperate founders, a 2% conversion rates and more problems than income.

I have worked with 100s of founders, even at a Big4 we will never serve a Founder on TAM. They wont buy. And I was PwC. 

Now you can earn $20k for TAM, maybe even more.

I know because I am part of many top strategy networks with daily engagement requests. 

Btw, comment "secret network" to get access to it 🤣🤣🤣 just kidding but you can DM me

So yeah, boring, saturated mid-market companies are willing to pay $20k for a TAM because market share and location does matter when allocating capex.

Even $1000s to review an IPO pitch deck (been paid for that).

They can pay me $30-50k for a 5-day "Strategy sprint". Btw my next book coming out soon, DM for early access.

But they are not startup or early stage Founders... unless SanFran?

So please liberate me from commenting and start also calling out this behaviour. So should make LinkedIn great again... is f€&"?!' becoming Instagram

graphical user interface, text, application

I have the pleasure of serving Saudi Arabia Government, and it is one of most incredible transformations in the world. Very inspiring message from HRN at KAUST (King Abdullah University of Science and Technology) about meritocracy and the welcoming nature of Saudis.

KAUST (King Abdullah University of Science and Technology)

View company: KAUST (King Abdullah University of Science and Technology)

Our Class of 2025 steps into the world at a time when Saudi Arabia is writing one of the most ambitious chapters in its history, defined by curiosity, innovation and an insistence that talent—not background—shapes the future. It’s a moment built by people who believe possibility is a resource, and progress is a collective act, reflecting the spirit of #SaudiVision2030. 

No one expresses this spirit more powerfully than His Royal Highness Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, Minister of Energy and Chairman of the KAUST Board of Trustees. At our 16th Commencement this week, he delivered a powerful message that captured the momentum of this new era: 

This is the new Saudi Arabia — a nation built on meritocracy and talent, welcoming everyone who wants to live, build and dream with it. Those who wish to share this ambition, contribute to its future, or be part of its accomplishments are warmly welcomed. 

This message reflects the very heart of our university and 2025’s graduating class. Whether you grew up here or traveled from the other side of the world to join our community, you are part of a culture of openness, collaboration and scientific ambition that is reshaping this nation and the world. 

#KAUSTClass2025 #KAUST #Classof2025 #Commencement #NewSaudiArabia

This is what GTM engineering actually looks like: PLUMBING!
I engineer multi-GTM CRMs for multi-million dollar revenue scaleups.

As a COO deploying AI across entire business functions... it s clear that there a new job in town: Observability! My friends at Eyer are tackling that problem. I struggle with observability and alerting across entire stacks:

- Prosgres
- Azure
- Fillout
- Attio
- n8n
- Gleap
- APIs
and more

The stack is amazing but there is an entire job keeping the machine oiled and ensuring endpoints, webhooks and stuff has lights on.

Any startups out there fixing this problem?

I want a dashboard with all the integrations and connection health and alerts on real time

AI powered Observability. Headless AI powered observability that works with your existing tech stack. Conversational AIOps powered by Claude & MCP. Scalable - Sustainable - Affordable.

Your monitoring stack produces thousands of alerts. 90% are noise. Your team is drowning.

We're hosting a live webinar: Cut Alert Noise by 70% With Your Own Stack

What you'll learn:
- Deploy AI-powered anomaly detection without replacing existing tools
- Integrate with Grafana, Prometheus, Telegraf in hours
- Eliminate false positives through baseline learning
- Route only critical alerts to your team

Bonus for attendees - Free Reliability Maturity Assessment including:
- Online diagnostic with instant maturity score
- Personalized PDF report
- 45-minute consultation ($$$ value)

This is for IT Ops, DevOps, SRE, and manufacturing teams running mission critical systems, or process control environments where alert fatigue kills productivity.

Register: https://shorturl.at/jkhJw

#AIOps #Observability #SRE #DevOps #ITOperations

When Management ask for 200 Metrics a month they are doing Management. When they Get Hands Dirty with 1 Metric that Matters... That s Leadership!

MILIEU

My team and I have built an active investment company specialising in company building, investment management, corporate restructuring, and transactions. We support our portfolio companies in developing strategies, sourcing, and connecting with partners, companies, and investors.

I am concentrating on growth and collaborate closely with key partners to expand Milieu’s technology, financial services, and real estate portfolio.

With a team of 30 co-workers specialising in software engineering, data science (AI/ML), financial services, and marketing, we also ensure quality in culture and service while growing rapidly.

Beyond internal business operations, I serve as Chairperson or Member of the Board for various portfolio companies, advising and serving CEOs and managers on everything from strategic decisions to day-to-day operations.

Managing Partner & Chairman of the Board

I've always dreamed of taking a sabbatical year or two to learn and understand more about how the world works before deciding on a new venture. Then I realised that having a research lab would allow me to do that without taking a sabbatical.

With the Milieu Research team, I get to explore and learn more about how the world works. 

I am a highly curious person, and I am fascinated with economics, behavioural science, technological development (from the emergence of civilisation to AI), health, physics, history, geopolitics, and sociology. A broad field of interest keeps me humble about how little I know, and sometimes, it allows me to see systemic inefficiencies, causal networks, and strategic opportunities.

We think that all world components are relevant to one another as interconnected systems when zooming out. Like a mosaic, each system is easier to understand and extrapolate from when you know the adjacent systems and see the greater picture. In all dimensions, including time.

When understanding how society’s needs will look tomorrow, we must understand the past, the playbook, and what drives us forward. Considering today’s rapidly evolving society, knowing which direction things are moving has never been more critical.

Chairman of the Board, Milieu Research

Real estate investment firm with approx. 80.000 sqm under development.

Partner & Chairman of the Board, Milieu Property

People Made Machines

People Made Machines is a hybrid technology consultancy specialising in AI, Machine Learning, Cloud, and Backend Development. It works with clients such as the Central Bank of Norway, the Norwegian Tax Administration, Mastercard, Cognite, and Aker.

As chairman and investor, I regularly engage with the management team to provide them with any support they require.

Chairman of the Board

Quantik

With Amesto as our first investor, we established an AI-driven business automation platform to simplify transactions and contract lifecycle management for key clients by integrating and automating bookkeeping, payments, and financing, making business processes up to 80% more efficient.

With the support of partners like PwC, Amesto, Microsoft, DNB, StartupLab, Innovation Norway, and more, the team and I conceptualised the product, managed internal recruiting, led partner sourcing, led the platform's development, and raised € 2m+ in funding. We are currently setting up management and raising funding for the next phase of the business.

Co-Founder & Chairman

Neural Codex

Neural Codex is a non-profit providing the general public and decision-makers with resources to understand the benefits and implications of AI.

figures.no

Figures is a dynamic accounting firm that aims to transform the accounting industry by making it more accessible and efficient. They believe that accounting is about more than just numbers and reports.

As a forward-thinking company, they combine industry expertise with advanced technology to exceed clients' expectations by offering tailored solutions. With a team of experienced accountants and industry experts, they strive to serve as a strategic partner for companies.

From traditional bookkeeping to advanced financial analysis and AI-driven insights, they place people and innovation at the center to meet the ever-changing accounting landscape.

Board Member

Kidlin Corporate

Advising family offices and investment firms. Engaged in multiple interim C-level positions and boards.

Advisor & Investment Manager

Following the distress of a client's portfolio companies, I was brought on as an advisor.

To recover the client's assets, I prepared and executed an organisational and debt restructuring plan to gain controlling rights in the asset. This was done through a leveraged buyout process involving a series of high-yield bonds in addition to regular bank financing.

I entered several boards and led a team of corporate financiers, auditors, and legal advisers, executing 100+ transactions, analyses and valuations with PwC and Newsec. Eventually, relaunched two real estate projects (€900m) for up to 2,000 residential units with new management, contractors, and financing, and with politicians and the public eye shifting from a sceptic stance to a positive one.

Interim CEO, Client

Amesto

After selling a financial services firm to a Scandinavian family-owned specialist in financial services, technology, and corporate advisory, I stayed on to advise corporations on corporate services like growth financing, restructuring, tax planning, capital raises, digitalisation, and more. I sourced, analysed, and executed client projects and M&A cases, contributing to Amesto Group’s €100M revenue.

Advisory Manager, Board Member & Co-Owner

Chairman of the Board & Co-Founder, Tillit Financial Services

Meidell-Hagewick Consulting

After acquiring a few properties and advising businesses, and seeing potential in real estate and investment advisory for HNWIs and investment firms, I set up a consultancy firm to acquire, develop, and manage clients' residential buildings and financial assets. I hired and developed a team of 5 employees to oversee portfolios totalling €100M and stepped into interim roles at clients as required, including Managing Director.

After tailoring and programming customised enterprise management solutions for a client, we started an advisory and financial services agency focused on digital transformation that we sold to Amesto Group, early adopters of innovative technology and investors in intrapreneurs.

From building my first computers at age 12 (with a 64MB Nvidia GeForce MX) to investing in real estate and companies in my early 20s, I have always been a hard worker, avid learner, and a determined explorer with a passion for building companies.

Now, with over a decade of experience as an entrepreneur, investment manager, corporate advisor and interim exec, I still love challenging established truths and applying complementary technologies to solve difficult problems, unlocking and facilitating strategic opportunities that contribute to positive societal development.

I am currently building an active investment firm focusing on venture capital and private equity within software, health, and real estate. We are in the final stages of developing a proprietary deep neural network and platform for sourcing and filtering that uses causal inference to identify hidden patterns and relationships. 

taplio

The Battle

Martin Gallardo

Aleksander Meidell-Hagewick

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taplio

The Battle

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Aleksander Meidell-Hagewick

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Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Martin Gallardo's LinkedIn Performance

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