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December 9, 2025

NATO Innovation Fund forced to pay €52k to former partner

Founding partner Thorsten Claus earned almost €700k a year at the taxpayer-funded firm, court documents from August reveal

Anne Sraders and Freya Pratty

3 min read

The NATO Innovation Fund was forced to pay a founding partner €52,500 following a legal dispute over a partially-paid discretionary bonus, Dutch court filings from the summer show. 

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Anne Sraders

Anne Sraders is a senior reporter at Sifted, based in Berlin. She covers the venture capital industry and deeptech startups, including robotics, spacetech and defence tech. She also writes Sifted's weekly VC newsletter Up Round. Follow her on X and LinkedIn

Freya Pratty

Freya Pratty is a senior reporter and investigations lead at Sifted. Follow her on X , LinkedIn and Bluesky

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