The people building YOUNG Foundation

A foundation is not a mission statement. It is the people who choose to show up for it.

YOUNG Foundation was not built from a strategic plan. It grew from a shared belief held by a group of people who had seen, firsthand, what happens when young entrepreneurs and young athletes have access to the right support at the right moment. And what happens when they do not?

That belief is what brought this team together. Not titles or obligations. A genuine conviction that experience is most valuable when it is shared.

Nanne Veenstra — Board Member

Nanne learned to build by building. As co-founder of Rebirth Development and with a background in tourism and shared platforms, he navigated the early stages of entrepreneurship the way most founders do: without a formal structure, learning in real time from the people around him.

That informal proximity to experience shaped him. It also showed him how much depends on who happens to be in the room. YOUNG Foundation, for Nanne, is about making that less accidental.

Sara Driessen — Board Member

Sara brings a perspective that connects the human side of entrepreneurship with the structural side of support. Her belief in mentorship is grounded not in theory but in what she has observed across careers and organisations: that the founders who grow fastest are almost always the ones with someone honest in their corner.

Jorge Hortelano — Board Member

Jorge’s involvement in YOUNG Foundation is rooted in a simple conviction: that access to guidance should not depend on geography, background, or network. That a young entrepreneur in one city deserves the same quality of perspective as one who grew up inside a well-connected ecosystem.

That belief in equity of access is one of the threads that runs through everything the Foundation does.

A collective, not a hierarchy

What brings these four people together is not a shared industry or a shared background. It is a shared sense of responsibility toward the next generation of builders.

YOUNG Foundation operates as a collective. Decisions are made carefully and collaboratively. Support is given with intention and long-term thinking. And the team is involved not because it looks good on paper, but because they believe in what they are building and are willing to invest real time in it.

That is the only kind of foundation worth building.