Meet Viktoria Oushatova, Partner at Contrivance Ventures

Viktoria is one of the three co-founders at Contrivance Ventures, an early-stage, angel investment network in Central and Eastern Europe. Contrivance Ventures was founded in 2019 and so far, has completed 6 angel investments across different sectors and countries within the region. Viktoria co-founded Contrivance Ventures shortly after she completed her MBA at INSEAD. Prior to transitioning to venture investing, she spent 5 years working as an equity analyst in London.

How was the idea for Contrivance Ventures born?

Post my MBA, I joined a VC fund full-time when a friend of mine reached out with the idea to facilitate angel investing in the region. I immediately warmed up to the idea as I have always believed the CEE region has a lot of potential and is still one of the most underfunded regions in terms of private capital. I was lucky to be introduced to my partners, Evgenii and Bjoern, who had successfully invested in the region for the past 2 years and laid the groundwork for what later became Contrivance Ventures. United by the same vision, we joined forces to facilitate angel investing in the region.

What is your industry focus at Contrivance Ventures?

Contrivance Ventures is an industry-agnostic investor. However, we have a strong preference for investing in sectors where we have some prior experience and can offer support and mentorship to our portfolio companies. Given my background as an Automotive equity analyst, I have always been interested in mobility trends such as autonomous vehicles, shared economy and automation at scale. In addition to that, I am also very interested in fintech, cloud computing and telehealth.

What do you think is the most interesting sector/trend in the region and why?

I think we are yet about to see a fintech and enterprise software revolution which has already occurred in North America and Western Europe and I am looking forward to it.

What technology/company you would like to see that does not exist yet?

I would like to see fully autonomous Level 5 vehicles on the roads in the next couple of decades. Although most of the technology is already there, I think we still have a long way to go when it comes to regulation and data management.

Most exciting moment at Contrivance Ventures so far?

Closing our first big angel investment after I joined the team.

What makes a good angel investor?

One that brings more than capital to the table such as operational and strategic advice, network and mentorship.

Best/worst thing to see in a pitch deck?

I love seeing in-depth data metrics on the company’s performance so far, which is still rare to find in pitch decks. I don’t like seeing a competitor’s table or positioning map with the start-up clearly exceeding on all metrics vs competitors, it always looks implausible.

Favorite metric when analyzing a company?

Strong growth in something, could be revenues, customers, etc.

Interesting book you read lately?

I loved ‘Shoe Dog’ by Phil Knight, it’s a great entrepreneurial story and I am crazy about running.

Favorite podcast/series to recommend?

I am a big fan of NPR’s podcast ‘How I built this’ as I think it is a genuine and honest portrayal of entrepreneurship. I loved watching the ‘Black Mirror’ series and the follow-up ‘Bandersnatch’ movie, which has a strong resemblance to some of the trends we start seeing in gaming.