Leonardo Manfrini

About Me

In summer 2022 I joined Impssbl (now Pensiero) - a VC-backed company for which we raised $1.38M -, as Co-founder, helped designing our business model and repivoting. 

I hold two PhDs, both awarded with the highest marks and honors, but my career shifted toward the startup tech world after working as a Headhunter. At Everli, I played a critical role in scaling both the team and revenue by 5x, significantly contributing to the company’s rapid expansion. My passion lies in the web3 and crypto space - the space with the highest standard deviation between geniuses💡and pirates 🏴‍☠️! I'm a Degen in the space, well connected to key people and projects in the industry.

I believe tech is the new esoteric, which is why I'm so passionate about it. I'm a very curious and determined person. I practice mixed martial arts in a Dojo. I spent years in academic research studying classical German philosophy (Hegel in particular), alchemy, Kabbalah, astrology, deep psychology, tarots and the comparative history of symbols and religions. I practice some of those ancient disciplines. 🌒♋ 

I love stories and am a nerd for RPG, LARP and manga, especially One Piece. 私はレオナル・D・ワンダースターだ！ワンピースを見つけて、海賊王になる！LOL

The Memeism Manifesto (2024)

One century after Breton’s Surrealist Manifesto (1924), Memeism reclaims virality as a sovereign tool of cultural rebellion — shifting from dreams to memes, from unconscious writing to autonomous replication.

→ Read the Manifesto
The Memeism Manifesto

Nakama Syndicate (2025)

A venture project born from my love for stories, IP, and worldbuilding.
We back studios, own culture, and scale sovereign IP across webtoons and tokenized rights.

→ Visit nakama.fund
→ Join the Nakama as LP

My Publications

• Veneri plutoniche: il corpo desiderante e il mito delle origini [Plutonic Venuses: The Desiring Body and Myth of Origins], in: Minima Astrologica, Issue 10, La boîte a joujoux, Milano 2021, 107-117.
• Il peccato originale come figura del conoscere. Studio a partire dal Manuskript der Philosophie der Religion di Hegel [The Original Sin as Figure of Knowledge. Study based on Hegel's Manuscript of Philosophy of Religion], Aracne, Roma 2021.
• Mario Dal Pra e l’incontro con la «gnoseologia pura» di Giuseppe Zamboni [Mario Dal Pra and the Encounter with Giuseppe Zamboni's "Pure Gnoseology"], in: «Rivista di storia della filosofia» (Per i 100 anni dalla nascita di Mario Dal Pra), Franco Angeli, Milano 2016, 481-499.
• El Sócrates de Hegel: héroe del espíritu y obra de arte trágica [Hegel's Socrates: Hero of Spirit and Tragic Work of Art], in: Sócrates, el enigma de Atenas, Editorial Universidad Libre, Bogotà 2015, 89-140.
• La metafísica como ciencia especulativa: Hegel y el intento de construir un sistema de la vitalidad [Metaphysics as Speculative Science: Hegel and the Attempt to Build a System of Vitality], in: [H. Ferreiro, T.S. Hoffmann, A. Bavaresco eds.] Los aportes del itinerario intelectual de Kant a Hegel. Comunicaciones del I Congreso Germano Latinoamericano sobre la Filosofía de Hegel / Os aportes do itinerário intelectual de Kant a Hegel. Comunicações do I Congresso Germano-Latinoamericano sobre a Filosofia de Hegel, Edipucrs - Editora Fi, Porto Alegre 2014, 979-998.
• Review of G.W.F. Hegel, Il bisogno della filosofia (1801-1804), [C. Belli, J.M.H. Mascat eds.], Mimesis, Milano-Udine 2014, in «Filosofia italiana», Issue 2 (2014).
• Comunicare l’esistenza: una lettura «mimico-patetico-dialettica» [Communicating Existence: a «Mimic-Patetic-Dialectic» lecture], in: Communicating Existence: Singularity and its Languages. On the 200th Anniversary of Søren Kierkegaard’s Birth, in «Rivista di Filosofia Neo-Scolastica», Issues 3-4, (2013), 449-461.

My Hobbies

• Daydreaming Unicorns 🦄
• Imagine dragons 🐉 where others spot just dots 💬
• Burger hunt 🍔
• Football ⚽ (Inter FC 🖤💙 & Venezia FC 🧡🖤💚)
• Fantasy Football 🧙🏼⚽ with my friends
• One Piece 🏴‍☠️ with my favorite Creators 🟪🟥
• Electronic music 🎛️🎶
• Cocktails and nightlife 🍸🌃

Investments

I personally invest along with my Co-founder in pre-seed and seed stage startups. Are you raising funds?