What does an operating partner do?

An investment manager decides where capital goes and guards it. An operating partner makes sure the company it is in actually grows. Gitte Van Hasselt complements an investor team to lower operational risk and raise the success rate across the portfolio.

Who does Gitte Van Hasselt work with?

Two kinds of partners. Investors: VC, private equity, family offices, start-ups and scale-ups. And companies: mid-market businesses, SMEs and corporates, mainly in food and FMCG, across Belgium, the Benelux and Europe.

Gitte Van Hasselt · VOLVOX · Operating partner and venture builder, Belgium

Q: What is the growth formula?

Growth = f(Potential x Perspective x Execution). Most organisations have the potential. What they miss is the perspective to see it, and the execution to build it.

Q: How can you work with VOLVOX?

Operational due diligence on targets, a strategic session to set direction, a short-term venture sprint to problem-solution fit, product-market fit or scaling, coaching for a founder or a team, or a long-term operating role inside the business.

Growth vision

After 17 years of building ventures, I cracked the formula.

Growth = f(Potential×Perspective×Execution)

Potential

The upside is already sitting inside your portfolio or business. It just needs unlocking.

Creating the right product-market fit
Go-to-market to scale
An existing product, a new market
A business model with untapped revenue

Perspective

Seeing it is the rare part. That takes objective eyes and an outside-in view.

Founders lean technical or commercial, rarely both
From the outside in you see more than from within
A business leader from within finds it hard to see growth outside

Execution

Building it. A craft of 17 years: moving between product, model, team and market until it is right.

A venture building process that works
Agility and the art of pivoting
Desirability, feasibility, viability
Ecosystem activation

My work

I turn a limit into growth

Traditional business, made smart

Hoverfly

An intelligent 'Bloomberg' terminal for fresh produce trading.

Own venture

New category, new customers

Mr. Beet

A novel fermented vegetable charcuterie range: plant-based, planet-friendly, made for a new generation of eaters.

Own venture

Existing product, new market

From flooring to solar

Proven flooring tech taken to bifacial solar farms, for a 10% energy uplift. Launched in the US.

New product, declining market

VRT Go

Led a corporate venturing team to develop a new media platform for the next generation.

New tech, existing market

A new beer system, NY

Co-founded UBrew, brewing at the point of consumption, in the ZX Ventures accelerator in New York. Significant seed funding raised, pitched to 3G Capital.

New York

Growth through biotech

Set up GROW, an investment arm for Vandemoortele to invest in biotech start-ups across Europe, creating new plant-based categories such as Mr. Mundi.

New product, new customers

A new segment at Philips

Led the MyKidsroom global product launch, which grew into a global licensed range with Disney.

PHILIPSGlobal

Trusted by, and built inside

PHILIPS

For whom

I work with those who want to unlock growth

Most organisations have the Potential. What they miss is the Perspective to see it, and the Execution to build it.

Investors

VC, PE, family offices, start-ups and scale-ups. I join your team as an operating partner: lowering operational risk, raising the success rate across your portfolio.

More growth potential in your portfolio. The capital is there. What is missing is the operational support that raises the success rate.
Due diligence on team and operations. Beyond the numbers: is the team real, and does the execution hold up?
Buy-and-build or a new venture. That needs someone to actually build it.

Corporates & SMEs

Mid-market companies, SMEs and corporates. I step in as a hands-on growth partner to unlock potential that has stalled or was never tapped.

A core business slowing down. New revenue streams are needed.
A new market or channel. A proven product that is ready to travel.
A range that is stuck. It needs to be reinvented.
A project that never lands, or a team that cannot decide. Growth or innovation that does not get off the ground, and a leadership team that needs to agree on direction.

Why VOLVOX

Cells that move as one

VOLVOX is one of nature’s oldest forms of collective intelligence: hundreds of tiny cells moving as one. It is also how I see growth. Bringing strategy, people, technology and execution together, and getting them to move in the same direction.

About me

Why is growth harder to achieve than we think?

At Philips and AB InBev, I learned how to turn ideas into products, from first concept to global launch. As a trendwatcher, I trained myself to spot patterns and opportunities across industries, often where others were not looking.

Corporate venturing taught me the other half: how to make new things happen. Building businesses from the ground up, navigating complex organisations, winning leadership support and funding, and bringing together the people and ecosystem needed to execute.

Today, that gives me a sixth sense for where growth potential lies and what it takes to unlock it. I am a visionary by nature, balanced by a pragmatic view of how to build it into reality.

That is what I am, in the end: a business architect. I design how a business gets from where it is to where it could be, and then I make sure it gets built.

Potential. Perspective. Firepower.

Share your idea of how to grow. Fifteen minutes.

Due diligenceOperational due diligence on targets.

Strategic sessionA strategic session to set direction.

Venture sprintShort-term venture sprint to problem-solution fit, product-market fit or scaling.

CoachingCoaching for a founder or a team.

Operating partnerA long-term operating role inside the business.

I shape the engagement around what you need, and that flexibility is the point.

Book a Growth Call

gittevanhasselt@volvox.be · +32 471 61 23 87 · linkedin.com/in/gittevanhasselt