The Startnext team 

in order of appearance and stay
In 10 years, many people have already accompanied and enriched Startnext. The organizational structure and cooperation is to be understood organically, where hierarchies hardly play a role. That's why you can see the team here in chronological order.

There are actually 5 teams, represented by the colors yellow, blue, pink, green and orange.

  • Yellow - Team Business Management
  • Blue - Team Platform Development
  • Pink - Team Public Relations
  • Green - Team Cooperation
  • Orange - Team Project Consulting

Denis Bartelt
CEO & Founder

Denis founded his first company in 2003, the software agency tyclispo.net. In 2009 he started to develop Startnext together with Tino and in 2010 the company was founded. Denis is a trained photographer and co-founder of the Entrepreneurs Pledge.

Tino Kreßner
Founder

During his studies in media technology and communication sciences Tino founded his first company together with friends - an agency for film productions. For Startnext he is on the road a lot and continues to expand our network.

Cathleen Knohf
Backend Developer

Cathleen has been on board as backend developer for Startnext since the beginning and takes care that all functions run on Startnext. Before that she studied media production in Dresden.

Markus Streichardt
Cooperation Manager

Markus started as a project advisor at Startnext and is now responsible for the realization of our cooperations and contests. Prior to Startnext, Markus worked for the Suhrkamp Verlag. He studied culture and technology as well as literature.

Lisa Rudolph
Project Advisor & Payment

Lisa makes sure that all Startnext starters are verified and that the payment processes run smoothly. She also deals with numbers in her business studies, which she is currently completing.

Ricarda Delock
Management Assistant

Ricarda holds everything together, is responsible for organizing our events and for the team development. She studied Cultural Work and Arts Management and co-founded the non-profit organization Kultür Potsdam.

Lilli Landmann
PO & Tone of Voice

Lilli is corporate philosophist. She is an experienced conceptionist and project manager with a focus on creative production. Lillis special ability: She feels sense within complexity and leads the team to a blissy solution.

Amos Bühler
Frontend Developer

Amos develops and optimizes Startnext so that you can use our platform on all devices and in all browsers. He has studied media and information science.    

Michael Schmidt
Project Advisor

Michael originally comes from Erlangen, the "smallest big city in Germany", as he says. Before he came to Startnext, he studied film and lost his heart to documentaries - and since they can be financed very well by crowdfunding, he is exactly right with us!

Lukas Haas
Social Media Manager 

After working as a consultant in an agency, Lukas has come to Startnext to bring your ideas into the world and tell your stories. He studied politics and social sciences. 

Friederike Klasen
Cooperation Manager

Friederike develops new ideas and concepts for our cooperation partners to increase the success of the crowdfunding starters. After her studies in communication and language she worked at the food startup Kochhaus in Berlin for three years.  

Charlott Roth
Project Advisor & Events

Charlott works as a project advisor and assists our starters with the implementation of their projects.  
She studied Nonprofit Management and worked for nebenan.de and Doctors Without Borders.

Wiebke Herger
Communication (parental leave)

Wiebke takes care of our external communication through campaigns and events. Prior to Startnext she worked in the agency world as a concept developer and project manager. She studied Cultural Studies, English Literature and German as a Foreign Language.  

Ben Richter
Frontend Developer (parental leave)

Ben designs the front end and ensures a modern presentation of the projects. He completed his bachelor's degree in media informatics at the University of Cooperative Education in Dresden. He was able to gain a lot of experience in the agency environment in order to get off to a full start at Startnext!

Marie Seiler
Project Advisor (parental leave)

Marie supports our starters in getting their projects off to a successful start. She studied International Development in Vienna. Before joining Startnext, she worked at WeWork in the Community Team and as an Impact Lead.

Jörg Jenke
Test Engineer

Jörg automates and coordinates the quality management for our software. He finds faults before you find them. He studied media informatics in Dresden and Brandenburg.

Kira Rudolph
Feelgood Manager

Kira lives with Lisa and is a charming dog lady with lots of energy. She loves to go for walks and also lying on cuddly things. When she comes by one of the Startnext offices in Dresden and Berlin, it instantly lifts the mood and she spreads joy in the room.

Rosalie Mesgarha
Project Advisor

Rosalie is a happy person, empath and passionate hobby cook. She studies cultural work in Potsdam and primarily supports the project consulting at Startnext. With a lot of imagination Rosalie finds a creative solution for every challenge.

Christine Moder
Scrum Master / OKR-Manager

Christine is responsible for ensuring that various interests come together in a cooperative and targeted manner at Startnext. She is a business graduate, loves her family and is involved on a voluntary basis in her spare time.

Christian Bläul
Backend Developer

Christian brings a lot of experience to further develop the technical applications for Startnext. He's actually a physicist. Hence his preference for small experiments in everyday life. Christian works at Startnext because he sees his life being put to good use here.

Cheyenne Lindemann
Data Analysis & Bus. Development

Chey came to the world of social entrepreneurship through the On Purpose program. With us, she transforms data into information and creates new knowledge from it.

Caro Stübler
High Priest of Datafiction

Encourager, real talker, tinkerer and taboo fighter. Caro has worked in the fashion industry and is also a coach & trainer for potential development. She loves to support and empower people. Above all, she is a storyteller with heart and soul. She is driven by the desire to inspire and excite others.

Hans Mündelein
Site Reliability Engineer 

After excursions into semiconductor research and automotive industry, Hans finally arrived at Startnext to take care of the IT infrastructure. He studied Electrical Engineering and Physics and has still a passion for thinking through abstract systems, and he enjoys it when all IT cogs are well oiled to allow all starters a frictionless start.

Alisha Umrath
High Priest of Datafiction

Alisha studied American Studies and History. In addition, she is a trained yoga teacher and bodywork practitioner. She finds her balance in nature, cooking and being creative. Alisha loves people - their stories and ideas. Social responsibility, especially towards marginalized groups and the earth are close to her heart.

Alexander Katzmann
High Priest of Datafiction

Alex has been a Best Boy on film sets and a lighting technician at the theater, dropping out of six majors to go on to study social and business communications. After his Master's, Alex started two crowdfunding projects and now works for us as a crowd agent.

Elisa Palacios
High Priest of Datafiction

What Elisa loves about working at Startnext is getting to know new and nice projects and people. Elisa has been living and studying in Leipzig for almost 2 years, before that she was in her home country Nicaragua. When she's not advising starters at Startnext, Elisa can probably be found at the lake with friends, swimming and standup paddling.

Joy Lange
High Priest of Datafiction

Joy is a newly qualified crowd agent since 2021 and can therefore be found in project consulting and in the Startnext Academy. In her free time she likes to pursue creative projects like music, macramé or jewelry making. Because of her personal context, as a queer Afro-German woman, she is passionate about topics around Black Culture, Womanism, LGBTQIA+.

Karl Johann Schubert
High Priest of Datafiction

After several startup projects, Kajo found his way to Startnext. He gained experience as an administrator in his school days and subsequently studied business informatics. At the same time, he became involved in the development of responsible managers. Now he hunts well-hidden bugs and wants to stay one step ahead of the adversities of a networked world.

Lukas Karsten
High Priest of Datafiction

As a student of media informatics in Bremen, Lukas strengthens our team from the "far north". Previously working in software development, he has fallen in love for the operations part of IT and so he ensures that our infrastructure runs smoothly. Lukas is also part of the voluntary association Kune e.V. which supports people in need.

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A Job with Startnext

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