#49: Inside the Mind of a Space Engineer Turned VC (feat. Koen Geurts, Senior Investment Manager at HTGF)

He helped land a spacecraft on a comet. Now, he decides which space startups get funded. Koen Geurts went from operating one of ESA’s most iconic missions to becoming a Senior Investment Manager at HTGF - one of Germany’s most active early-stage investors. In this episode, we cover: What it’s really like to land on a comet (and bounce multiple times) The transition from space engineer to VC How HTGF thinks about early-stage space investments Where Europe is falling behind - and where it can win Contrarian bets (like propulsion) vs overhyped ideas (like space data centers) Why government contracts are critical for scaling New Space companies A rare inside look at both engineering and capital within the space ecosystem. Follow Koen & HTGF:https://www.linkedin.com/in/kgeurts?originalSubdomain=dehttps://www.linkedin.com/company/high-tech-gruenderfonds/https://www.htgf.de/en/venture-capital-investor-2/ Follow NewSpaceVision: https://de.linkedin.com/company/newspacevision https://twitter.com/newspacevision https://www.instagram.com/newspacevision/ https://www.facebook.com/newspacevision/ https://www.meetup.com/de-DE/newspace/ This podcast is sponsored by LiveEO. For more information on how Earth observation can help your company, contact: [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]