From 2003 to date President and founder of Astor Ventures, a leading private venture capital investment firm, with 20+ investments, focused on providing seed capital to innovative companies BA with honors majoring in Economics at the University of California in Santa Barbara, Francesco started his career at Bank of America in New York, followed by Shearson Lehman Brothers in Montecarlo; he developed several  years of investment experience in sophisticated and alternative asset-classes. Among others he contributed to the development of the first fund of hedge funds in Italy and financed the early development of Yoox, the leading Italian listed e-commerce company. Co-founder and Executive Chairman until 2005 and still Honorary Chairman of IAG – Italian Angels for Growth (the first and largest angel Investors' group in Italy). Previosly Founder an Chairman of DECALIA Asset Management SIM Spa (formerly Astor SIM), the Italian arm of a leading Swiss asset management company and Fund Manager of Thema, a multi-asset class, multi- thematic Italian alternative investment fund. Currently he sits on the following board of Directors: Sportswear Company Spa (leading clothing company), Sedicidodici (diagnostic company) and Voxnest (leading podcast Us company)