Alongside Jonas Andrulis: Aleph Alpha appoints Co-CEO

The AI company is restructuring its leadership and bringing a manager from the Schwarz Group to the top alongside founder Jonas Andrulis.

The Heidelberg-based AI company Aleph Alpha has appointed Reto Spörri as co-CEO. The former Schwarz Digits manager will lead the company in the newly created position alongside founder Jonas Andrulis . Manager Magazin first reported this. Spörri most recently served as divisional director of the IT division of the Schwarz Group and as head of e-commerce at Lidl.

In addition to the new dual leadership, there are further changes in management. Chief Customer Officer Ramin Mirza is leaving the company. Ilhan Scheer, who previously led AI programs at Accenture as Managing Director, joins as the new Chief Growth Officer. Christopher Kränzler, a long-time veteran of Aleph Alpha, is promoted to Chief Product Officer.

According to Manager Magazin, the new management team's mission is clear: to grow Aleph Alpha. Criticism of Aleph Alpha has grown increasingly loud in the past, for example, due to unexpectedly weak sales , a poorly communicated mega-financing round of over €500 million , managers leaving the company, and the significant influence of the Schwarz Group .

In an interview with Gründerszene this spring, CEO Andrulis dismissed this criticism as largely unjustified: It's normal for a fast-growing tech startup to not make a profit or for employees to leave the company. After all, 400 people now work for the Heidelberg-based AI company . Nevertheless, the criticism hasn't left him unscathed. He has taken it to heart.

"It's not easy for such a special company as ours to find the right CEO," he said in an interview at the time. "I believe that, overall, I'm doing well at the moment and that I've built an executive team that complements me well."

Apparently, the Schwarz Group, one of Aleph Alpha's main financiers, felt that further additions were necessary.