Joachim Schaper
From IRF 2007
Dr. Joachim Schaper is vice president EMEA at SAP Research. He oversees Research sites throughout Europe (Darmstadt, Dresden, Belfast, Karlsruhe, Pretoria, St. Gallen and Sophia Antipolis) and has overall responsibility for six research programs. His current focus is on aligning the SAP Research strategy with the European Research strategy of DG Information Society and Media regarding FP6 (2003-2006) and FP7 (2007-2010). Schaper is also closely involved with the definition of an industrial initiative (European Technology Platform) with several strategic research partners (Atos, BT, Nokia, IBM, Siemens, Thales, Telecom Italia and Telefonica). From 2003 through 2005 he was part of the management of the SAP Research Center at Palo Alto and the group in Montreal. He oversaw the restructuring of the North American group and change management of the SAP INSPIRE team. He set up a new focus on Homeland Security in collaboration with SAP America (Public Sector and Public Affairs). Schaper also engineered the extension of the research partner eco-system (Intel Research Labs and HP Research Labs) and the re-alignment with major universities such as Stanford, UC Berkeley, CMU and Rutgers. He pioneered regular scientific talks at the local SAP Labs inviting thought leaders from the eco-system in Silicon Valley. Prior to his moving across the Atlantic, Schaper was Manager of Corporate Research Groups at SAP Labs France and SAP Africa, focusing on the following research programs: E-Learning, Smart-Items, Mobile Computing, Technology for Application Integration, and Advanced Customer Interfaces. Schaper first joined SAP in 1999 as a manager of the European Research Centre, CEC Karlsruhe, whose transition into SAP he oversaw.
At SAP Joachim Schaper has held several leading architecture roles: he led the Live-long Learning – L3 initiative within a consortium of 25 partners and customers. Schaper also developed a transfer strategy and guided the implementation of the SAP Learning Solution. Additionally, he was instrumental in driving the Auto-ID transfer into SCM and leading the architectural blueprint for next generation Smart Items Architecture.
Schaper started his career as a system developer with Daimler Benz AG in 1988, after internships at Porsche AG and Bayer AG. Later he worked at the European Research Centre of Digital Equipment GmbH in Karlsruhe. There he was responsible for user interfaces and object-oriented modeling and programming of teaching and learning systems, rising to center director in 1997. Joachim Schaper is member of the advisory board of DFKI and FZI, as well as member of the advisory group for IST and of various small and midsized businesses. He is also Mini-Track chair of the HICSS conference regarding “Next Generation Learning Platforms”.
Schaper holds a diploma in Computer Science and a PhD in Natural Science from the Technical University in Karlsruhe. He is married and has three children.
