Supervisory Board

Lukasz Gadowski, Chairman of the Board and Founder

Lukasz had the idea for Spreadshirt in 2001 while attending University of Mannheim, where he worked for junior enterprises Campus Consult and integra e.V.. As a student, he saw an opportunity to deliver printed t-shirts to those who wanted them in smaller quantities - a market of millions of individuals and small groups that was being ignored by standard textile printers. He decided on a business model that offered a shirt selling platform to these individuals and small groups, who would then, in turn, do their own marketing. From this idea, Spreadshirt was born, and thrives today.

At first, Lukasz ran Spreadshirt as a sideline to his studies. Since he considers studies more than an opportunity to attend classes, but a great opportunity to get to know people, he relocated to Leipzig Graduate School of Management. During that time, he also spent a semester at Georgia Institute of Technology (Atlanta, USA).

During his time at university, Lukasz also worked for Mundwerk, Procter & Gamble and Infineon – experiences that prepared him well for the challenges as Spreadshirt's CEO and in growing Spreadshirt into a successful, profitable global corporation. Based on this success, Spreadshirt has now been recognized in the HP Business Vision Award program, Red Herring Europe's 100 Most Innovative Companies, and Business Week's Europe Top 500 Growth Companies.

On the August 1st, 2007, Lukasz handed over his role as CEO to Jana Eggers, thus shifting his own role within Spreadshirt from an operational to a more strategic one. In February 2008 Lukasz took over the chairmanship of the Supervisory Board. Besides this, he is continuing to develop his activities as a business angel; investor and advisor to start-up firms, to the point where he can support young companies with his networks and experience. In 2005, he was awarded the "Middle-Germany’s Entrepreneur of the Year" accolade. A year later, he received the Online-Star-Special-Prize "founder of the Year" award.

Lukasz is a co-founder of studiVZ as well as founding parter of Team Europe Ventures (imedo, amiando, mister spex, brands4friends, absolventa, käuferportal, among others). He writes on his blog lukaszgadowski.com and is a writer/editor at gruenderszene.de.

Personal profiles can be found on xing.com and facebook.com.

 

Rezzo Schlauch

Rezzo Schlauch, born in 1947, studied law in Freiburg, im Breisgau and Heidelberg. He has been an established lawyer since 1975. He went to Heidelberg during the student movement of 1968 and was engaged in the public penal system in Berlin. He gathered business experience in Toronto while working at the German-Canadian Chamber of Commerce.

Schlauch has been a member of the Green party since 1980 and was elected into the Lower House of the German Parliment in 1994. At the beginning of the first red/green coalition in the Fall of 1998, he took over the chairmanship of the Green fraction with Kerstin Müller which he ran until the end of legislation in 2002. In the second legislation until October 2005, Schlauch was named parlimentary state secretary by the federal minister of business and labor Wolfgang Clement.

Schlauch did not re-enter the Lower House in the 2005 elections. Since then he has been working as a lawyer and as of December 2005 has cooperated with the Munich-based office Mayer & Kambli. He is also a member of the Energie Baden-Württemberg (EnBW) board.

 

Harry Nelis

Harry Nelis has been involved with technology start-ups and large technology companies within Europe and the USA for the last 15 years. He works on the investment team from Accel Partners, and is the experienced venture-capital donator for the sprd.net AG. Nelis was at Perry Capital and part of Goldman Sachs Technology Invesment Banking in London before going to Accel.

Nelis lived for almost 10 years in Silicon Valley and established the company E-motion, with its HQ in Palo Alto, where the solution for digital asset management was developed. While in Palo Alto he also worked for 3 years as an engineer for Hewlett-Packard.

Nelis has a master and PhD in electrical engineering from the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands. Following that he completed a post-graduate degree at the Harvard Business School where he received his MBA with honors.

 

Max Bleyleben

Max, originally from Munich, has been working for the private equity company Kennet Partners since 2000. Kennet is a growth equity investor which helps companies expand their presence in the global mainstream and become global market leaders. Before joining Kennet, Max held a management position for the investment bank Broadview International.

Max is thrilled to support Spreadshirt’s strategic growth with his expertise and experience. Spreadshirt’s focus on self-expression and creativity as well as the democratizing potential of The Long Tail are especially important for Max.

Max has an MBA from the INSEAD University in France and a BA from Bard College in New York. He lives and works in London and regularly writes in his blog Technofile about developments in the areas of investment, corporate governance and technology companies.