From the Back Cover
Today, early-stage investors and entrepreneurs find themselves in a dilemma in which they must choose between profit and impact; between traditional, for-profit-only models on the one hand, and multiple-bottom-line structures with a positive social or environmental impact on the other. To help them, and in response to a time in which climate change, exponentially growing technologies, and COVID-19 are calling into question humanity's priorities, the author proposes a new investment paradigm, namely Integral Investing.
Integral Investing incorporates and transcends the best practices of both traditional venture capital and impact investing. It provides a seamless integration and shows how technological progress need not be our rival, but can instead be our ally in ensuring the prosperous society we all want. Drawing on her own investments and stellar track record in Silicon Valley and Germany over the past 25 years, the author reveals the mechanism of Integral Investing. At the heart of it is a powerful, 360-degree de-risking tool called the Theta Model, which reveals how to make smart investment decisions based on the comprehensive integration of traditional due-diligence criteria, sustainability metrics, and assessments of the founders' and team culture. But it doesn't stop there.
In turn, the book demonstrates how to use human-centered AI to scale and digitalize the investment process. The goal here is to accelerate the use of exponential tech, capital, and consciousness leadership to transition to a sustainable global society: a process the author refers to as the Investment Turnaround. The 21 principles of Integral Investing, which she defines using Ken Wilber's Integral Theory, lead to her manifesto on how to implement the UN Sustainable Development Goals within Planetary Boundaries by 2050 through early-stage investing and entrepreneurship.
Similar to the 15th century, when the Medicis inspired the Renaissance, today humanity is once again at a crucial turning point where pioneering financiers, investors, entrepreneurs, and other committed individuals have the opportunity to leave behind the legacy of a prosperous society. This handbook provides a source of inspiration, and shows how self-actualization, a positive mindset, and a consciousness that is backed by a world-centric desire can become the driving force for solving the global grand challenges.
Dr. Bozesan is best known as an integral investor and serial entrepreneur. She was named Europe's Female Angel Investor of 2019 by BAND (German Business Angel Network) and BAE (Business Angels Europe), as well as Best European Early Stage Investor of the Year 2017 by EBAN (European Business Angels Network). In her work, she focuses on exponentially growing technologies with the intention to address climate change, unsafe AI, and other existential threats through the implementation of the UN SDGs within planetary boundaries by 2050. Dr. Bozesan was awarded full membership in the international Club of Rome, where she co-authored the 2017 bestseller and Club of Rome report Come on: Capitalism, Short-termism, Population and the Destruction of the Planet. She is also a Fellow in the World Academy of Art and Science (WAAS) and was National Advisory Board Member for the G8/G20 Social Impact Investment Task Force. Bozesan serves as a strategic advisor on safe AI as well as ethical and integral finance and sustainability to various organizations, businesses, and governmental as well as non-governmental bodies. She is also a futurist, published researcher and author, environmentalist, and human rights activist. As a prominent keynote speaker and an inspiring lecturer on the future of investing and entrepreneurship, she lectured at prestigious organizations including Stanford, Oxford, and INSEAD as well as the United Nations, TEDx and RIO+20. She has an outstanding track record as an integral investor by de-risking early early-stage investments in exponential technologies using the Theta Model, which she architected based on Ken Wilber's integral theory. Her investment portfolio includes more than 40 successful investments to date and supports more than 38 humanitarian organizations worldwide.
Together with the co-presidents and other members of the Club of Rome, she launched the Investment Turnaround and was joined by numerous like-minded investors. As a serial entrepreneur, she is the founder of several organizations including AQAL Capital, a single-family office, and the AQAL Foundation, to name a few. Educated at Stanford University and KIT (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology), Dr. Bozesan earned an MSc (Dipl.-Inform.) in Artificial Intelligence and Computer Science from KIT and a PhD in Psychology.
