After an Apprenticeship as a Bank Officer Marc Kley graduated from the University of Amsterdam in "American Studies". Since 2001 he is working in the field of entrepreneurship as a start-up coach and, for some years, was CEO of his own start-up. Marc is currently head of the GATEWAY Gründungsservice at the University of Cologne and used to be the Managing Director of the hochschulgründernetz Cologne (hgnc) until March 2018. He is a freelance author for various start-up-magazines and speaker on start-ups topics and owns a certificate as Innovation Manager.