Prof. Hasso Plattner (born January 21, 1944 in Berlin) has been successfully linking business and science for decades. Plattner, majored in Communications Engineering at the University of Karlsruhe and graduated with an advanced degree in engineering.
He began his professional career in 1968 at IBM. Four years later, together with four former colleagues, Plattner founded the enterprise software group SAP. Today, the company has 80,000 employees worldwide.
In addition to his business career, Plattner is also passionate about research and science. In 1994 Plattner received an honorary professorship in Business Informatics from the University of Saarbrücken. Since 2004 Hasso Plattner has been active in this capacity at the University of Potsdam and as a member of the Board of Trustees of Stanford University.
Plattner’s Institute for Software Systems Engineering
In addition to his activities as professor, Plattner made plans to establish his own institute. In the summer of 1998, he announced the founding of the Hasso Plattner Institute for Software Systems Engineering (HPI).
The Berlin native chose the state capital of Brandenburg as the location. Potsdam is "the ideal location for future-oriented research and teaching, with the strong appeal of the Havel landscape and historical heritage," says Plattner.