Kathryn Scheckel, managing director and head at Hines Global Ventures, is one of our Top 50 Emerging Leaders in corporate venturing for 2024.
Kathryn Scheckel joined Hines, the privately held real estate investment manager, in 2019. Since
then, she has played a key role in developing the company’s venture studio, partnerships
operation and venture investing arm.
Under Scheckel’s leadership, Hines is taking a thoughtful and patient approach to the venture investing side. She believes this approach will allow the company to place higher volume bets at the right time, in areas where there is high conviction.
In the meantime, the venture studio and partnerships team – made up of 40 people – is actively developing projects in areas such as decentralised fi nance and digital leasing, as well as designing a new decarbonisation marketplace
“Entrepreneurs and venture capital partners see Hines as a great testbed and experimenter. We want to be known for that in the community.”
“Entrepreneurs and venture capital partners see Hines as a great testbed and experimenter. We want to be known for that in the community and not just capital on your cap table, but actively working with you and with our assets, tenants, relationships and clients,” Scheckel says.
Hines is able to work with a variety of startups because of its vertically integrated model, which
means it has touchpoints across the real estate value chain.
Scheckel had her first start-up experience as an entrepreneur launching an edtech company while still a student at Arizona State University. She then went on to work on many new initiatives with the President’s Office at ASU, culminating in becoming director of Arizona State University’s strategic
partnership with Starbucks and launching the Starbucks College Achievement Plan, an educational benefit for employees of the coffee chain.
While her early work in academia may seem far from the real estate sector, Scheckel says a
common thread is wanting to solve problems that directly affect people.
“I love people problems. And real estate touches or impacts every aspect of one’s life,” she says.
