Tom Vanhoutte spent 12 years at PwC advising global investment funds before becoming a venture investor, giving him deep understanding of fund mechanics that most VCs lack. At imec.xpand, he writes unusually large early checks (€2.5-3m initial tickets targeting €10m rounds) for nanotechnology startups and directly integrates imec's 12,000+ m² cleanroom and pilot production facilities into his investment process to help hardware companies cross the lab-to-market gap.