He has just successfully completed the sale of his company after a decade of highs and lows as a builder.

Now, Alexander Hjertström is switching sides, stepping in as an investor at venture capital firm BackingMinds.

“It’s going to be incredibly exciting to work with entrepreneurs again - but from the other side,” he says in an interview with Breakit.

There’s something almost poetic about that arc: build, struggle, scale, exit - then reinvest the scar tissue back into the ecosystem. The best investors often carry operating experience like a well-worn toolkit.