Team - copace

The Team

At co-pace, we bring concepts, people, departments, and products together to catalyze new solutions. We are made up of business developers, corporate strategists, designers, thought leaders, engineers, product managers and more.

We stand for absolute inclusion. We celebrate racial and cultural diversity, neurodivergence, gender and sexual identities of all kinds, and more. We do our very best to keep up to date and stay sensitive, and we accommodate physical disabilities to the best of our ability.

Jürgen Bilo

Function@co-pace	Managing Director co-pace GmbH
#	#leadership #FutureMobility #RelationshipBuilder #Frankfurt
Description	Jürgen is the biggest champion of startups at Continental, uniquely understanding their cutting-edge technologies and new business models. With his vast network both inside Continental and outside, he leverages relationships and holistic industry understanding to provide the foundation for strategic and operational partnerships between the startup ecosystem and Continental.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Jürgen on LinkedIn

Hiren Desai

Function@co-pace	Vice President Strategy and North America
#	#strategy #AI #ADAS #Autonomous #Skateboard #Robotics #Automation #Industry4.0 #AuburnHills
Description	Hiren joins the co-pace team after being our close advisor over the past 5 years. He has a fantastic track record of business development in autonomous mobility and services, having commercialized startup partnerships while leading strategy and innovation for the US market at Continental. Hiren is our architect when we want to translate a concept into a product.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Hiren on LinkedIn

Dr. Chen Zhang

Function@co-pace	Director Europe
#	#ADAS #UserExperience #Sensorics #connectivity #Frankfurt
Description	Chen is passionate about connecting with tech enthusiast and energic entrepreneurs to take emerging technologies to the product roadmaps of the startups and Continental. His background in ADAS is complemented by focus on sensorics, vehicle networking and connectivity technologies.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Chen on LinkedIn

Dennis Xu

Function@co-pace	Director China
#	#safety #autonomous #SOA #sensorics #China
Description	Dennis is the co-pace team member in China - a unique and divergent ecosystem that develops both locally applicable and globally relevant innovations. His gained experience in automotive and venture capital industries is ideally suited to translate business needs into innovation products and technologies and, together with startups, draw the execution path.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Dennis on LinkedIn

Wilson Khoo

Function@co-pace	Director APAC, excl. Mainland China
#	#Innovation #APAC #Singapore
Description	Wilson’s drive for innovation and deep tech makes him a key driver for engagement in the Singapore and APAC ecosystem. He is an explorer that bridges the ‘valley’ between technology & business, and between startups & corporates.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Wilson on LinkedIn

Neri Friedlander

Function@co-pace	Director Israel
#	#sensorics #fleet_services #smartMaterial #enablingtechnologies #datamonetization #Israel
Description	Neri joins the team from Tel Aviv, but he has always had his feet in multiple countries and cultures. While he is an explorer literally, he is also one metaphorically - by stepping into the unknown of innovation fields, he brings together diverse teams to translate consumer insights, data, and technology into customer benefits.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Neri on LinkedIn

Elad Goldman

Function@co-pace	Manager Startup Management, Israel
#	#innovation #smartcity #smartmobility #publicprivatepartnerships #Israel
Description	Elad is not new to partnerships. In fact, he brings experience from a variety of public-private partnerships and smart city initiatives. With his innovative business development skills, he helped those partnerships reach high-impact scale. And he is excited to continue generating win-win's at co-pace as well.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Elad on LinkedIn

Christian Beuther

Function@co-pace	Director Operations
#	#Sustainability #CorporateInnovation #Operations #Regensburg
Description	Christian’s experience in automotive innovation helps him build bridges between startups and the corporate world of Continental. At co-pace, he organizes all operational topics to ensure that the startup Proof-of-Concept projects run at high speed!
LinkedIn Link	Contact Christian on LinkedIn

Andrea Julian

Function@co-pace	Manager Operations North America
#	#innovation #Mexico
Description	Andrea is passionate about the complexity behind innovation, how it intertwines and reacts to markets, people, behaviors and understanding the effects that reflect in the daily life.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Andrea on LinkedIn

Vesta Dombrowsky

Function@co-pace	Manager Startup Management
#	#SmartMaterial #TrendScouting #innovation_management #Regensburg
Description	Vesta lives by the mantra ‘why not’ instead of ‘yes but’. This combined with her insights into Continental’s innovation roadmap, Vesta is incredibly quick getting projects going and turning ideas into concrete concepts.

Bruno Palma

Function@co-pace	Manager Startup Management
#	#FutureMobility #fleet_services #Tires #AI #Industry4.0 #Hannover #Berlin
Description	Bruno has very deep roots in the manufacturing world. With this knowhow, he is the ideal person to drive new partnerships in various Industry 4.0 domains. He has driven several key manufacturing projects, bringing digital technology in the otherwise mechanical and chemical tire manufacturing world. In addition to startups with Industry4.0 solutions, he is also looking forward to partnering with startups in the area of fleet services and predictive maintenance.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Bruno on LinkedIn

Ivana Pavic

Function@co-pace	Executive Project Assistant
#	#team_focus #efficiency #purchasing #Frankfurt
Description	Ivana is passionate about making processes lean in an agile and innovative work style. She ensures our purchasing processes run smoothly. But most importantly: without her, our team and MD will be lost!
LinkedIn Link	Contact Ivana on LinkedIn

Shubham Mishra

Function@co-pace	Junior Manager Analysis
#	#Entrepreneurship #DataAnalytics #Innovation #Collaboration_Enabler
Description	Shubham might be only in the beginning of his career but he is already committed to the startup ecosystem. He applies his logical thinking to build processes, tools, and analyses for the co-pace team.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Shubham on LinkedIn

Gopika Nair

Function@co-pace	Junior Manager Analysis
#	#Industry4.0 #MarketResearch #Networking #India
Description	Gopika is one of the newest members of the team, joining with enthusiasm for all things ‘analysis’ – she loves digging into topics, researching startups, and summarizing those findings.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Gopika on LinkedIn

Kevin Glaser

Function@co-pace	Junior Manager Operations
#	#Operations #Process_Mapping #Regensburg
Description	Kevin is the backbone of our PoC process – he ensures we don’t forget a step and all documentation gets filed in. He tracks every step of the way to ensure the PoC process runs smoothly for both co-pace and the startups.
LinkedIn Link	Contact Kevin on LinkedIn