About me

I’m Alessandro Ravanetti, Italian, based in Barcelona since 2017. I’ve spent fifteen years in tech and finance: writing about the industry, co-founding a company in it, and assessing the companies and projects that apply for public and philanthropic funding. Fintech is where most of my writing sits. The evaluation work runs wider, from deep tech to climate and sport for development, and that range is part of what I bring to the writing.

How it started

Economics at the University of Parma, a master’s in finance at Regent’s University London, and a first job in credit research at Bloomberg. In 2012 I co-founded Crowd Valley, later rebranded as Difitek, which built the infrastructure behind digital investment platforms, from real estate and equity crowdfunding to peer-to-peer lending. I ran marketing and communications there for seven years with a fully distributed team. That is where I learned what content has to do for a business, and what it costs when it doesn’t.

Writing and editorial

I’ve worked as a freelance writer and communications consultant for the past decade. Clients have included N26, Solaris, Penta (now part of Qonto), SumUp, Thunes, Clearpay, Enel X and Messe Berlin, where I work with the FIBE media team on financial articles, the fortnightly briefings and on-site coverage of their annual European finance ecosystem gathering in Berlin. I have curated the fintech edition of the Techstars Startup Digest since 2019, and my bylines have appeared in EU-Startups, Finance Magnates, and other tech publications.

Evaluation

I’ve been an independent expert evaluator since December 2017, starting with the European Commission’s SME Instrument, now the EIC Accelerator. Today I assess applications for the European Commission and the European Research Executive Agency, for the Eureka Network as evaluator and rapporteur on Eurostars and Innowwide, and for the Cyprus Research and Innovation Foundation. Since 2024 I have also evaluated grant proposals and programme delivery for Common Goal, across Move For The Planet with adidas, the Berlin City Climate Contribution Fund and the FIFA Foundation Community Programme, and I sit on the expert evaluation committee of the Smart City Expo World Congress.

My scope is the business and commercial case: market, model, team, the credibility of the plan. Not technical feasibility. In 2024 I completed Terra.do’s climate fellowship to deepen my knowledge of climate change and the solutions being built for it.

Independence

I work on the funder’s side only. I don’t write, review or advise on applications to any programme I assess, and I don’t take payment or pitches for coverage in the newsletters I curate. If you’re applying somewhere I evaluate, I’m not the person to ask for help, and I’ll say so.

Board and advisory

I’ve sat on the advisory board of SXSW Pitch since 2019, judged the Banking Technology Awards, and served as an advisory expert for the Solar Impulse Foundation’s 1000 Solutions programme. I’ve mentored founders through AngelHack, where the team I worked with, the Barcelona savings app Goin, went on to win the Global Demo Day in San Francisco, through Bridge for Billions, and through The Break, an EU-funded fellowship for female entrepreneurs in Spain. I’m open to board and advisory roles where an operator’s view of fintech, payments or impact is useful.

Practical

I work in English, Italian and Spanish, and understand Catalan, from Barcelona on Central European Time. If you have something in mind, feel free to reach out and we can discuss it further!