Michael Kowalzik

Chief Executive Officer of the TynTec Group

Michael Kowalzik joined TynTec during the company’s initial phase of operations in 2003. He brings extensive experience in management consulting and has a broad background in the financial and telecommunications industry.

Prior to joining TynTec, Michael Kowalzik was a director within the Bertelsmann CIO team, leading international strategic projects in the IT and wireless connectivity areas.  He also played a major role as an investment manager and technical advisor in the venture capital sector.  Previously, he was an investment manager and the interim CEO of internal start-up at Apollis AG, a venture capitalist firm of McKinsey & Company.  Before that, Mr. Kowalzik had five years of extensive experience in consulting at Accenture.

He holds a masters degree in Electrical Engineering from University of Bremen in Germany and has received his MBA from INSEAD, France in 2000.

Thorsten Trapp

Co-founder and Chief Technology Officer

Thorsten Trapp co-founded TynTec in 2002 and was responsible for the development of the company's mobile messaging platform architecture. He serves as the CTO of TynTec and is responsible for technical strategy, innovations, R&D and intellectual property.

Trapp has more than 10 years experience in the management of companies in the communication and software fields. In 1995 founded Evision GmbH and served as Managing Director until 2000. After handing over the successful company to his successor Trapp joined a VC-backed enterprise as CTO, where he developed major components of the world’s first search engine for mobiles.

As a specialist in mobile data, Trapp was involved as a key resource in projects with major European enterprises such as Daimler-Chrysler, Deutsche Bank, Bertelsmann, MTV, and Nokia.

Dr. Ralph Eric Kunz

Co-founder and Chairman of the Board

Dr. Kunz co-founded TynTec and serves as Chairman of the Board. 

Dr. Kunz has more than 15 years of experience in top-level management, strategy consulting, and venture capital investments in the IT and telecom industries.  Following various assignments as project leader of the Boston Consulting Group in Germany, France, Spain and the USA, he ran a Neue Markt listed technology holding company as Managing Director. Subsequently, he was in charge of building and co-heading the venture capital branch of Bertelsmann AG, the large media conglomerate. Most recently he held senior executive position within Nokia Corporation, initially as head of Nokia's Business Development unit and ultimately as the Vice President and General Manager of Nokia’s Navigation and Search business. In this position he reformulated Nokia’s strategy in the mapping, navigation and search areas and was instrumental in Nokia’s acquisition of gate5 AG in 2006. Dr. Kunz’s responsibility areas also included Voice-Over-IP and Instant Messaging. Today he is an active investor and consultant in the technology, media and communications industry, holding shares in companies like beLocal GmbH, SightseekerMedia GmbH or vPaper Technologies GmbH.

Dr. Ralph Kunz holds a PhD in physics and a Masters in economic policies from the Berlin Institute of Technology/ University of Chicago.