New Supervisory Board Member at cplace: Maximilian Brandl

Munich, 24/07/2024 – cplace welcomes a new member to its Supervisory Board. Since July, Maximilian Brandl has been joining the board, taking the place of the previous member Hartmut Schaper, who has been serving as Board Member and Co-CEO at cplace since early July.

Maximilian Brandl has many years of experience and expertise in the software sector and has worked for companies such as the Boston Consulting Group, SAP, and Accenture. Additionally, he served as CEO of a software provider with over 1,000 employees for eight years. In the following interview, he provides insights into his professional background, his future role as a Supervisory Board member, and reveals what makes cplace special. 

Max, you bring a wealth of experience in the software business and the field of digital transformation. How did your journey lead you to this point?

Yes, I have been fascinated by software ever since my physics studies – both at university and in various holiday jobs. I have learned many programming languages, from Assembler, Basics, Fortran, PL1, and Cobol to C++. I didn’t quite make it to the newer world with Java and Python, but I am now looking forward to the increasingly prevalent Low-Code/No-Code applications. Joking aside, over 20 years ago, I worked for the first time in a software company at SAP. There, as a member of the German management team, I was able to accompany the transition from ERP to the digitalization of many specialized areas, including HR, Sales & Marketing, SCM, and MES applications. As CEO of EPLAN, a global market leader for software in electrical engineering, I became even more enthusiastic about the software business, as it allows for quick and international growth, and the customer benefit, such as higher efficiency, becomes very transparent. In my most recent CEO roles at IPS AG and SALT Solutions, which was later acquired by Accenture, I primarily focused on the implementation and services around software. 

How did you come to cplace? Why did you decide to take a seat on our Supervisory Board?

I have known Hartmut Schaper, the new Board Member and Co-CEO of cplace, since my early career days at the Boston Consulting Group. Despite living in different locations and having diverse career paths, we managed to stay in touch. This connection led to me being considered as a candidate for his succession on the cplace Supervisory Board. During the selection process, my enthusiasm for cplace grew significantly. Therefore, I was very pleased when the General Assembly officially appointed me to the Supervisory Board on July 4th. 

How do you see your role as a Supervisory Board member? What are your expectations?

In my professional career, I have had the opportunity to accompany many software companies through their significant growth phases. Depending on the size of the company, structures, processes, systems, communication tools, and leadership styles vary. At the same time, it is exciting and crucial to always stay one or two steps ahead of the competition, whether it was with mobile devices many years ago, cloud and subscription models a few years back, or today with Artificial Intelligence. My aim is to use my experience to provide the right insights so that cplace remains optimally positioned. 

What do you find special about cplace?

From my perspective, there are already many excellent and sophisticated software solutions from various providers in many specialized areas, such as marketing. However, the focus is increasingly shifting towards project-specific collaboration across different departments and sometimes even between companies. Many projects or programs are growing larger and more complex, and this is precisely where cplace can create significant value through management and coordination. In addition to these substantive aspects, I am also impressed by the people and teams, as well as the culture I have experienced at cplace and with our investor, the Schattdecor Group and Retis Holding. I am very much looking forward to contributing to this dynamic environment. 

Thank you for the conversation!