Rolling up sleeves: welcoming Holger Rothaug as a shareholder at Next Mobility Labs

Some people join a venture studio because it looks like a smart bet. Others join because they can't sit still. When Holger Rothaug came on board as a shareholder at Next Mobility Labs, it wasn't the financial calculus that drove him but the chance to build something from the ground up, hands-on, alongside founder teams who move fast and think big.

Holger is someone who, after more than 25 years at the intersection of technology, organizations, and business, chose the less comfortable path of entrepreneurship because he wanted more immediate impact.

Who is Holger?

Holger's career spans SMEs, consulting, corporates, and global high-tech environments. Across all these contexts, one thread connects everything: building software- and data-driven organizations in automotive and industrial settings that scale. From ADAS/AD platforms to global customer and data platforms. Today, he stands for responsible, pragmatic AI and technology transformations that create measurable value.

What drives him is a deeply held belief that technology only works when people, processes, and leadership are set up so that adoption and execution truly scale. It's never just about the tech but more about making organizations capable of learning faster, making better decisions, and growing sustainably.

The move into entrepreneurship was deliberate. As Holger puts it:

"There's no steady paycheck and less security, but the results of your own work become visible much more directly, because you choose your topics deliberately and follow through. My learning has become more immediate. Feedback and consequences hit faster. If you're considering the leap, you need to be clear about the value you bring, carry uncertainty consciously, and put impact over status."

Why join Next Mobility Labs as a shareholder?

Holger didn't stumble into Next Mobility Labs. He was looking for a place where he could build and have impact and the venture studio approach was exactly that.

"A venture studio doesn't just finance. It co-builds. Next Mobility Labs combines capital with entrepreneurial experience and systematic product and organizational development from day one. That's the key difference to classical VC, which enables but not necessarily shares responsibility in execution."

For Holger, ownership means being in the room when decisions are made: responsible for the business model, the team, the product and the network at Next Mobility Labs carries the same spirit. What he found was a collaboration that was direct, open, and grounded in real execution with people who genuinely want to build and change things.

“The network at Next Mobility Labs, the way people work together, the drive to build something and then actually follow up on it and make it happen… that’s energizing. You can't say no when people like that ask you to join.”

Hands-on from day one

From day one, Holger has been deeply involved with ventures in Next Mobility Labs pipeline, bringing his experience and turning technical possibilities into enterprise-ready offerings.

His contributions are practical and immediate. He helps build clear storylines from the perspective of procurement and operations. He sharpens go-to-market strategies, stress-tests business models, and brings growth-ready licensing and revenue logic to early-stage products. He makes enablement and adoption systematic rather than treating them as an afterthought or a simple tool rollout.

Holger also notices common blind spots that early teams tend to overlook. For example, IP rights issues that can quietly become deal-breakers if left unaddressed. Experience helps make those risks visible early, before they block growth.

And the exchange goes both ways. From working with founder teams, Holger takes away speed, pragmatism, and the infectious energy that comes from seeing progress in real time. As he notes:

"Teams organize execution remarkably well, even across distributed setups, without any presence-first logic. The enthusiasm is contagious because progress is immediately visible."

Looking Ahead

Holger Rothaug joins Next Mobility Labs at a moment when the studio is actively building across multiple ventures and deepening its operational model. His experience in enterprise technology, AI transformation, and scalable product development adds a dimension that strengthens the ventures he is directly involved in and our broader approach.