EAT. SLEEP.
BUILD AN EMPIRE.
REPEAT.

CODE CAPITAL HOLDING is an operational holding and investment company founded by Benjamin Ruschin, with a core focus on highly scalable tech startups.

BENJAMIN RUSCHIN

  • Ben discovered his passion for building communities for recruiting purposes early on, founding Marketing Natives (largest youth marketing community in the GSA region) and Manageers (a community connecting young leaders and C-level decision makers), which led up to WeAreDevelopers, a community for software developers.

  • In 2017, WeAreDevelopers was incorporated. Ben and his team transformed WeAreDevelopers into Europe’s leading IT recruiting platform and launched WeAreDevelopers World Congress, the world’s largest event for software developers, which takes place each year with >10,000 participants at Messe Berlin.

  • In 2022 Ben co-founded Big Cheese Ventures, an accelerator and M&A boutique for tech startups in order to help talented startup founders reach their fundraising milestones and exit/earn-out goals whilst executing their operational management roles.

  • Education: Ben completed his BA in Management at Leeds University and his MSc in Marketing & Strategy at Warwick Business School (with distinction, top of the class). He continues to specialise his knowledge with executive education modules at Harvard Business School and other top-ranked institutions.

  • Ben has a particular strong expertise in the fields of B2B sales in general, B2B SaaS business models and HR tech. He leverages his strong network of high-level decision makers in order to accelerate his portfolio companies and business partners.

Other noteworthy engagements:

  • Founders of Europe: Together with 6 experienced startup founders (most of whom are in the post-exit phase), Ben launched Founders of Europe, a pre-seed & seed investor for tech startups.

  • Startup Portfolio: Ben has co-founded a number of other startups in the meantime, including the fintech startup Savings Labs, the HR- and EduTech startup apprentigo and has invested in startups such as Salesy (B2B SaaS), Notarity as well as eyeson & Rebel Meat (the latter two via Founders of Europe).

  • Ben is a Forbes 30 under 30 list maker. He was chosen to work with the World Economic Forum as a European Digital Leader.

  • Ben is an Advisory Council Member of fit4internet, the Austrian government’s digitalisation association, which aims to increase the digitalisation competence level of the Austrian population.

  • Ben is an active jury member of Austria Wirtschaftsservice, a bank & funding body of the Austrian federal government, which provides grants and loans to startups and commercial organisations.

REFERENCES

  • “As first time founder guidance and advice on respective matters is urgently needed. Ben gained experience in building his own start up. With his experience he is excellent at giving you direct and constructive feedback. Working together with Ben I enjoy his hands on mentality, his commitment to hard work and being successful as well as his availability at any time.”

  • “Ben is among the very few founders & angel investors here in Austria who have a profound understanding of international scalability & outreach. He has successfully established Europe's biggest developer platform WeAreDevelopers and is an expert in business development on global stage.”

  • “Ben is - and will always be - the first person I contact, when big business-decisions need to be made. I always appreciate his advice and love to learn from his experience (sounds kitschy, but true story). I am happy to have him as a mentor.”

  • “I’ve been working with Ben for more than 10 years and together we’ve built up several teams, communities and companies. With his forward-thinking mindset and his strong vision he is pushing organizations to long-term success.”

  • “Beim Aufbau eines Startups muss ein Gründer viele Challenges überwinden. Dabei ist Ben die beste Unterstützung. Als erfahrener Founder behält er in jeder kritischen Situation einen kühlen Kopf und erkennt immer Opportunities in jedem neuen Abschnitt des Startups. Ich bin sehr dankbar dafür, mit ihm arbeiten zu dürfen und kann es nur jedem Founder empfehlen!”

  • “Ben ist ein sehr kompetenter Partner, wenn es darum geht, ein Start-Up auf das nächste Level zu heben. Ich bin in stetem Austausch mit ihm weil er mit seiner langjährigen Erfahrung viele wertvolle Erfahrungswerte hat, welche gesamtheitliche Geschäftsprozesse betreffen.”

  • “Ben is on the advisory board of our start-up and supports us with strategic partnerships and fundraising. He is also the investor of the first hour. He has been supporting us for only the first week and already has opened a lot of doors for us. Ben has also been able to help us tremendously with the entire strategy so far. He takes his work very seriously and gives everything to do it well and professionally. But what is also important to me in a cooperation is, of course, the person. Everything fits with Ben. He is very likeable, ambitious and always thinks positively (which is very important for start-ups in my opinion). All in all: absolutely great collaboration, I'm looking forward to further adventures!”

  • “In my position as founder of a start-up in the seed phase, it is important to have a mentor. In Ben, I have found someone with extremely wide-ranging expertise. Through the experience of his own start-ups, he knows the problems first-hand and helps with practical solutions. It is especially noteworthy that he actively addresses issues and has a solution suggestion up his sleeve. This helped me a lot to set the right course for successful growth. I can therefore recommend Ben without reservation and would like to thank him for his excellent guidance.”

 

Contact

Code Capital Holding GmbH
Windhabergasse 12/6
1190 Vienna, Austria
office@codecapital.at
LinkedIN