About Stephan Rasp

A passion for software

Software has fascinated me since school. Before PCs were invented, I wrote programs in BASIC on notepaper. When microprocessors became available and still at school, I started my first company in my friend’s basement building a multiprocessor machine to test BTX, the German precursor to the internet. The customer was Deutsche Bundespost now Deutsche Telekom. It was a tour de force designing the hardware, writing the operating system and the test software itself.

During my National service I trained and worked as a paramedic on ambulances and in emergency rooms. Emergency medicine is a great place to learn about being prepared and not to panic whatever happens. At that time, it was not conceivable to me that software would grow into the business it is today. So, I studied medicine and kept the company I had started on the side.

After a few years, time at the hospital was competing with the time I still needed to put into the now 30-person software company. I had to make a very tough choice. Be a doctor or pursue my passion of software. I chose software.

Since then I have founded several software companies, expanded into new markets, turbocharged hyper-growth, turned failing companies around and have managed acquisition on both by side and sell side. Responsibilities have included Head of Services, Sales and Marketing and CEO or to use a contemporary phrase: growth hacking.
Companies I have held senior management positions include: ObjectDesign, Cognos, BMC/Remedy, Concur, Ariba, SeeTec, Qognify