Cornelius Boersch

Cornelius Boersch (born April 11, 1968, in Hannover) is a German serial entrepreneur, technology investor, business angel, and author. He is the founder of the investment companies Mountain Partners AG and Conny & Co. Boersch is considered as one of the most active and well-known investors in the (European) technology and start-up scene and is the initiator of the annual Entrepreneurs Day at Tegernsee, Bavaria, which takes place annually since 2007. His best-known investments are Alando.de (predecessor of eBay Germany), Lieferando, the Scout Group (Autoscout, Immoscout), wefox, Kavak, and reBuy.

Education and academic career Boersch studied business administration at the European Business School in Oestrich-Winkel, Paris Business School and the University of Colorado from 1989 to 1994. In 1998, Boersch completed his doctorate on "Mutual savings banks and Venture Capital" at the University of Essen. He later also served as an honorary professor there.

Investment career Cornelius Boersch is working as an entrepreneur in Germany since 1991. He already founded his first company "Sabeco GmbH" during his studies, which was the beginning of the German electronic health card, and from which the smart card broker and RFID manufacturer ACG AG developed in 1995. ACG AG was originally listed on the stock exchange segment Neuer Markt in Germany (NEMAX 50) in 1999 with a valuation of more than EUR 1 billion.

Boersch sold his shares in the company in March 2000 After Boersch withdrew from the operational business of ACG AG, he worked as an investment manager in the field of venture capital and subsequently initiated the development of other RFID-based companies such as Smartrac (IPO 2006) and Identiv (NASDAQ since 2006). Additionally, he is part of the European Angels Fund initiative of the European Investment Fund (EIF), a EUR 800 million program that mirrors investments of selected business angels on a pari-passu basis.

In 2004, he founded Mountain Partners AG together with Daniel S. Wenzel, which is an investment company focusing on investments in technology startups and venture capital companies. Mountain Partners AG is mainly active in growth regions such as Latin America, South-East Asia, but still invests in Europe as well. In Latin America, Mountain Partners is one of the market-leading funds through Nazca.

Authorship Boersch published four German books between 2006 and 2009, each co-authored with renowned personalities from politics and business. All of these are united in the book title by the word Summa Summarum, and the first three works deal in particular with topics from the everyday life of a manager. His fourth book in this series "Das Summa Summarum der Politik und Wirtschaft" ("The Summa Summarum of Politics and Business"), which he co-authored with Guido Westerwelle, was published in 2009. His latest book, "Zukunft verpasst_?" (“Future missed”), was published in 2020 together with Dr. Thomas Middelhoff. In this, the both authors discuss the state of digitalisation in Germany and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on it.

Publications Boersch wrote most of his books in German and therefore, the list includes the original titles in German language (except "ONE").

Cornelius Boersch & Friedrich Diest (2006). Das Summa Summarum des Erfolgs. Die 25 wichtigsten Werke für Motivation, Effektivität und persönlichen Erfolg. ISBN 978-3-8349-9251-2 Cornelius Boersch & Rainer Elschen (2007). Das Summa Summarum des Management. Die 25 wichtigsten Werke für Strategie, Führung und Veränderung. ISBN 978-3-8349-9320-5 Cornelius Boersch, Christian Holubarsch, Helmut Soikker, Hans-Reinhard Zerkowski (2008). Das Summa Summarum der Gesundheit. 20 wichtige Aspekte zu Gesundheit und Wohlbefinden für Manager und Führungskräfte. ISBN 978-3-8349-9683-1 Cornelius Boersch & Guido Westerwelle (2009). Das Summa Summarum von Politik und Wirtschaft. Ein Überblick über die wichtigsten wirtschaftlich-politischen Auseinandersetzungen der Gegenwart. ISBN 978-3-8349-1473-6 Cornelius Boersch & Thomas Middelhoff (2020). Zukunft verpasst?_. Warum Deutschland die Digitalisierung verschlafen hat. Und wie uns die Krise hilft, den Anschluss doch noch zu schaffen. ISBN 978-3-86334-284-5 Cornelius Boersch, Crina Ancuta & Dorina Serban (2024). ONE: Your Compass to Living Your One Life to the Fullest. ISBN 978-3-948615-35-2

Honors and awards

2000 "Deutscher Unternehmerpreis", awarded by Harvard Clubs of Germany. 2000 "Entrepreneur of the Year", awarded by Ernst & Young Consulting GmbH for the business concept of ACG AG.

Footnotes