Jean Schmitt-Jolt

As founder & Managing Partner, Jean has driven Jolt’s vision and led its development since 2012. The impetus behind the founding of Jolt was Jean’s realization that the best risk-adjusted returns typically come from late stage & growth rounds in companies that no longer face technology risk.

Prior to founding Jolt Capital, Jean was Managing Partner at Sofinnova Partners, running the IT practice with a focus on telecom and wireless markets. Preceding his career as an investor, Jean was the CEO and founder of 4 companies with successful exits, including SLP InfoWare, which he sold to Gemplus in 2000 for $60m and then became VP Telecom Solutions & Applications for the larger group.

Jean graduated from Telecom ParisTech and has a post-graduate degree in Artificial Intelligence. He is senior lecturer at Telecom ParisTech and HEC Paris, a former Chairman of the International Venture Club and a Member of Henkel’s Henkel X mentorship program.

Jean is currently a board member of Sinequa, NIL Technology, Interel, Blackwood Seven, and Verimatrix (EURONEXT:VMX). Previously, Jean was a board member of; Esmertec/Myriad (SIX:MYRN), Authentec (NASDAQ:AUTH) before its acquisition by Apple in 2012 for $356m, Heptagon before its acquisition by AMS (SIX:AMS) in 2016 for close to $1b, FOGALE Sensation before its sale to a consumer electronics giant, and most recently Skill & You before its sale to Andera Partners.