Founded in 2018, LEGO Ventures is the newly formed unit within the LEGO Brand Group and invests at the intersection of Creativity, Play, and Learning. LEGO Ventures is tasked with helping to deliver future growth and mission-driven impact for the LEGO Brand Group. This will happen through strategic investments, acquisitions and incubation of new companies – all focused within distinct strategic verticals.
The purpose of this role is to support the execution of the LEGO Ventures investment strategy and be a driver of the identification and execution of deals across all maturity stages, including supporting portfolio companies and helping them succeed. The position reports to the Partner for US.
Role & Responsibilities
Sourcing & Origination:
- Spearhead new education investments to feed and grow our venture pipeline
- Deeply understand LEGO organization, business units, priorities to understand which investments will best fit in with the LEGO mission and investment strategy
- Tap into your extensive education space network to identify and source hot investment opportunities that are strategically relevant to the core investment areas of LEGO Ventures
- Review and analyze market maps and understand the basic technical underpinnings of start-ups operating within sub-sectors of the LEGO Ventures Opportunity Spaces
- Attend industry events and conferences to build top of funnel and network with relevant entrepreneurs and partners that would be of strategic value to LEGO
Due Diligence & Portfolio Management:
- Apply your education space knowledge to benchmark the startup with the competition
- Ability to understand and interpret LEGO principles and long-term strategy to assess alignment of potential investees.
- Identity and analyze target start-ups in the education space with a view to both financial viability and alignment to LEGO core values and principles
- Build robust financial models for potential opportunities
- Develop investment insights and hypotheses by conducting market, product, customer, and financial due diligence
- Provide optimization in tracking portfolio company KPIs, including defining and tracking portfolio company KPIs
- Maintain qualitative and quantitative assessment information of follow-on investments
Value-add & Strategy:
- Shape the on-going development and understanding of LEGO Ventures Opportunity Spaces and the fund’s core investment thesis in the education space
- Cultivate strong relationships with network of education entrepreneurs, academics, and investors
- Foster internal network across the existing LEGO branded entities so you can champion investments internally
Education and Certifications
- Bachelor’s Degree is necessary
- Master’s degree in Business Administration is preferred
- CFA or ACA designation is preferred
Experience and Skills :
- 5 + years of related work experience in the education space with proven track record of performance
- Entrepreneurial, start-up, or operational experience highly regarded
- Demonstrated strong technical and analytical skills
- Foster a good working relationship across all teams to facilitate flawless execution of plans
- Comfortable working in a team-oriented & collaborative structure
- Excellent verbal, presentation and written skills
- Exceptional organizational skills, multi-tasking capabilities and detail oriented
- Outstanding stakeholder management skills with a proven ability to drive results and influence outcomes.
If interested, please apply here.