The rest of the 50 (in alphabetical order): Moran Levinovitz, investment director, HSBC Strategic Innovation Investments
Moran Levinovitz is an investment director for UK-listed financial services firm HSBC’s corporate venturing unit, Strategic Innovation Investments, having joined the bank in 2008 as an investment banker based in the UK and Israel. He concentrates on financial technology developers, especially in bank-oriented enterprise software for big data, security, infrastructure and compliance.
Ore Adeyemi, managing director and head of Strategic Innovation Investments, said: “Moran is an ultimate example of a go-getter who has been instrumental in completing key deals for the team especially in the cybersecurity space, for example, [cybersecurity software developers] CrowdStrike [which achieved initial public offering in June 2019], Menlo Security and Kenna Security.”
Levinovitz serves as a board observer for the latter two, and he was also involved in the investment in software automation technology provider CloudBees’ $10m May 2019 round.
Adeyemi continued: “He has built an excellent relationship with internally at HSBC and a trusted adviser and also externally with various partners in the UK, Israel and the US. As the most senior investment professional on my team based out of the UK – he continues to set the pace for the Europe team leading by example and he is a trusted partner for me.”
The investment unit brought Levinovitz on board in 2017 as a UK-based investment director to seek out enterprise software opportunities, who added: “I have always been passionate about the crossroad of large enterprises and emerging technology. You get both the scale and complexity of a large global financial institution, and see how that can work with young, dynamic and tech-savvy technology companies. I find it one of the most efficient ways to innovate if the corporate can do it right.”
He believes combining fast-moving startup companies and pace of VC rounds with the complex regulatory processes HSBC has as a large international bank could be difficult, saying: “This is particularly challenging at HSBC where we only invest in companies we partner or are technology vendors.”
Having served as a captain at the Israeli special forces and intelligence for five years, Levinovitz earned his business administration degree at IDC Herzliya’s Zell Entrepreneurship Program.
