The Top 25: #21 Jurgen Hornman, Shell Ventures
Jurgen Hornman is a venture principal at Shell Ventures, the UK-based corporate venturing vehicle for petroleum producer Shell. His primary role is heading the unit’s activities in London and overseeing the investment portfolio and investment committee.
Geert van de Wouw, a vice-president at Shell Ventures, said in his nomination of Hornman: “He has led four complex and noteworthy deals for Shell Ventures in 2017, including the investment in Sonnen, which includes a strategic collaboration agreement between Sonnen and several Shell businesses.
“Jurgen also led investment in three deals connecting underprivileged and underserved rural communities and developing countries to renewable power, which is a significant strategic play for Shell.”
Although he had no previous CVC experience, Hornman closed four deals in his first year at the unit, including a €60m ($70m) series E round for Sonnen, a $9m series B round for SolarNow, a $3m series A round for SteamaCo, and incubated venture Wonderbill.
Hornman drew up Shell Ventures’ investment thesis with insights from his two decades of experience in the sector. He has contributed to some of Shell’s acquisitions, advocated internally for new perspectives and played a role in training employees.
What Hornman finds challenging is navigating the slower pace and risk-averse nature of support functions such as legal, finance, ethics and compliance. But he said he would like to continue to invest in and help grow pioneering companies that will drive energy transition and make a real impact on a lower-carbon future.
And more broadly for the industry, he said he wanted to “be clearer in the societal role of CVCs and the substantial benefits – if executed properly – over pure VCs”.
He said this could be achieved better by moving the compensation structure closer to market-leading VCs with metrics that also captured non-financial aspects relevant to corporates and allowing complementary outside investors in to the corporate venturing structure to create better alignment, broader industry expertise and foster deeper investor familiarity with CVCs.
After completing his MBA at Erasmus University Rotterdam, Hornman started his career in utility and infrastructure M&A at Merrill Lynch before moving to cleantech startup management. Before joining Shell in 2017, he was involved in investing personal wealth capital in cleantech and energy efficiency seed-stage ventures. He also took interim C-level management assignments and advisory positions in cleantech fundraising and M&A.
