Aptos, a recognized market leader in retail technology solutions, announced today that Thilo Freund has been appointed General Manager EMEA. In this role, Freund will oversee Aptos’ sales, solution consulting, professional services and software delivery teams in the region.
Reporting to Aptos President and COO Steve Towe, Freund will be an integral member of the executive leadership team. He represents the most recent top-tier software executive hired by Aptos, following the previous appointments of new chiefs across finance (David Bertolino), human resources (Terry Geraghty) and product (Karthik Mani) as well as General Manager Americas Jeremy Grunzweig, earlier in 2021.
Freund brings to Aptos more than 20 years of experience at leading multinational software companies, with a majority of that time focused on supporting retailers’ technology needs. Prior to Aptos, Freund served as Senior Vice President of Sales at GK Software SE, a provider of software for the retail sector. He also held multiple leadership roles at MICROS Systems (now Oracle), including serving as Managing Director for its retail business in Central Europe.
Based in Frankfurt, Germany, Freund has a track record of customer-focused, results-driven leadership and a deep background in retail technologies, which Towe felt would be the ideal fit for Aptos’ newly created general manager position in EMEA.
“Thilo is a strategic and entrepreneurial leader who has a clear customer focus and a history of driving profitable growth for software firms,” said Towe. “With a passion for sales and customer service, Thilo has what it takes to manage the entire Aptos customer journey — from go-to-market strategy and professional services to customer delivery and ongoing customer success. We are delighted to have him join the team and help take Aptos to new heights in Europe.”
With over 1,000 retail brands leveraging Aptos solutions — and about half of those brands located in Europe — Freund arrives at a company that has a strong foundation in the region he will oversee. Still, Freund explains, his interest in Aptos was also fueled by its rising potential.
“The opportunity to work for a company that is investing heavily in its product roadmap — and accelerating those investments to reflect the shifts in post-pandemic retailing — is very exciting,” Freund said. “Aptos is well on its way to becoming the leading global provider of advanced unified commerce solutions and services. I welcome the opportunity to lead that charge in Europe, ensuring at all times that customer success remains our number one priority.”
Reflective of its growth trajectory, Aptos recently shifted to a territory-based organizational structure to bring greater speed and agility to its localized operations in the Americas, EMEA and Asia-Pacific.
With Grunzweig and Freund serving as Aptos’ general managers of the Americas and EMEA, respectively, Zaki Hassan, who joined the business in 2015, serves as general manager for the Asia-Pacific region.