Ingrid Vanderveldt, Dell Corporate Ventures' entrepreneur-in-residence and co-founder of The Billionaire Girls Club
Dell opened its Centre for Entrepreneurs in Ireland today, with a €10m fund to support promising start-ups. We caught up with Dell entrepreneur-in-residence and co-founder of The Billionaire Girls Club Ingrid Vanderveldt.
The Dell Centre for Entrepreneurs in Ireland, which launched this morning at the Digital Hub in Dublin, will offer support for Irish start-ups to grow and scale quickly using Dell’s technical expertise and infrastructure.
Vandervelt, whose mission it is to empower 1bn women worldwide entrepreneurially and technologically by 2020, told Siliconrepublic.com that her core observation is that start-up businesses that foster greater diversity have what it takes to come up with more creative solutions to problems.
On her mission of empowerment, she said: “It is about empowering (women) and enabling them to see themselves as successful leaders and successful entrepreneurs. The way we are doing that is by providing them with access to the tools, technologies and resources to be successful.”
Vanderveldt serves as the CEO at Green Girl Energy. She has been adviser of Current Motor Company since October 2011. As an entrepreneur-in-residence at Dell Corporate Ventures, she created and oversees the US$100m Dell Innovators Credit Fund for Entrepreneurs and The Dell Center for Entrepreneurs.
She is the co-founder of The Billionaire Girls Club and is a Dell Women’s Entrepreneur Network (DWEN) member. She is working on legislation with State Senators to bring out a State-wide EIR (entrepreneur-in-residence) bill in 2013. She is a seasoned business television personality and is the creator of the CNBC series American Made and On the Road with iV.
Vanderveldt said diversity is the engine for start-up success and common sense in business in the 21st century. “If you don’t have representation of that diverse population on your team then there’s no way you can create solutions that ultimately affect the people that you are trying to do business with.”
Women Invent Tomorrow is Silicon Republic’s year-long campaign to champion the role of women in science, technology, engineering and maths
