Management Board
Dirk-Peter van Leeuwen
Chief Executive Officer
Member of the Management Board
Dirk-Peter van Leeuwen (“DP”) is Chief Executive Officer of SUSE and a member of the Management Board of SUSE S.A.
Prior to joining SUSE, DP worked at Red Hat for 18 years holding a number of senior executive positions. From 2010 to 2021, he was Red Hat’s General Manager in Asia Pacific and Japan and from 2021 to 2022 their General Manager in North America.
Before joining Red Hat, he held senior roles at Planetweb, BSDI and the Santa Cruz Operation.
DP is on the board of the Institute of Systems Science at the National University of Singapore and since 2017 has been a mentor for women in business with Protégé Business Mentoring. In addition to his technical education, DP holds qualifications from the International Institute for Management Development (IMD) and Harvard Business School.
DP lives in Switzerland with his family. He continues to program using open source code as a hobby.
Ian Halifax
Chief Financial Officer
Member of the Management Board
Ian Halifax is our Chief Financial Officer responsible for worldwide finance, accounting, tax and treasury operations, management reporting, procurement, forecasting and planning, and IT. Ian has more than 30 years' experience in senior financial leadership positions, including as Chief Financial Officer at leading global technology providers such as Trellix (McAfee Enterprise/FireEye), Riverbed Technology, Wind River Systems,Micromuse and Macrovision. He has substantial strategic and executional experience in public and private technology companies, and has extensive M&A and investor relations expertise.
Andy McDonald
Chief Legal Officer and Company Secretary
Member of the Management Board
Andy McDonald
Chief Legal Officer and Company Secretary
Member of the Management Board
Andy McDonald is our Chief Legal Officer & Company Secretary, responsible for all aspects of legal, regulatory and corporate governance. He has a wealth of experience in legal affairs and governance in a variety of companies, including Interserve, Premier Foods plc, Uniq plc and Spirent plc.
Andy worked as a corporate lawyer at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer before moving into Industry. He is based in the UK.
Executive Leadership
Frank Feldmann
Chief Strategy Officer
Frank Feldmann is Chief Strategy Officer for SUSE, where he focuses on the development and execution of long-term business strategies. In addition to his strategic planning and execution skills, he has a strong foundation in technology product management, sales and technology marketing and is a well-respected leader of people. Frank's distinguished 25 year career includes more than 15 years in several EMEA & APAC senior management roles at Red Hat, as well as at Novell where he focused on technology transformation, business change and growth.
Imran Khan
Chief Customer Officer
Imran is SUSE’s Chief Customer Officer and is responsible for Customer Renewals, Customer Service and Support and Customer Success. Imran has over 20 years’ experience building and leading successful customer success and services organizations for technology industry companies. With a passion for change and the customer experience, he is dedicated to delivering performance and value to customers, as well as to organizations and staff. Imran has held various global leadership positions at tech companies including BMC Software, JDA Software and Hewlett Packard.
Imran is a qualified accountant and holds a degree in business and finance from the University of Middlesex. Imran lives in the United Kingdom.
Ivo Totev
Chief Marketing Officer
As the Chief Marketing Officer at SUSE, Ivo Totev is focusing on better experiences for prospects and customers by elevating the brand value of SUSE, growing the demand for the SUSE solutions and fostering engagement with the various communities SUSE is participating in. His role is pivotal in equipping SUSE's sales and field marketing teams with the tools and messages they need to convert prospects into valued customers.
Prior to his tenure at SUSE, he held several senior positions, including President of Product Marketing at SAP, CMO and Head of Cloud Business at Software AG, and CMO of Unit4. Ivo's extensive 25 year background and expertise in the technology sector make him a driving force in SUSE's journey towards excellence.
Lisa Sherwell
Chief People Officer
Lisa Sherwell, our Chief People Officer, is a global strategy and transformation executive with 25 years in the B2B technology, Services and Business Process Outsourcing industries. Passionate about crafting vision and developing employee-centric strategies, Lisa has a strong track record of bringing transformation to life for organizations of all sizes.
Before becoming interim Chief People Officer, Lisa led the Strategy Management & Transformation team at SUSE – overseeing strategy execution, strategic M&A integration, organizational design and process optimization.
Prior to SUSE, Lisa worked at SAP and Merchants, a Dimension Data Company where she held various roles including General Manager and Global Sales Director. She has managed teams of up to 800 people and is a passionate champion of empowerment, transformation and people centric leadership.
Lisa has also served as board member for five years for BPeSA, driving foreign direct investment and job creation in South Africa.
Dr. Thomas Di Giacomo
Chief Technology & Product Officer
Thomas Di Giacomo is Chief Technology and Product Officer for SUSE, where he leads our global Office of the CTO and Product and Solution Management. His team covers SUSE’s entire portfolio of products as well as innovation priorities. He is also responsible for driving and guiding SUSE's current and future technology and solutions, and for sharing SUSE’s vision with customers, partners, and key industry stakeholders.
Prior to his role, Thomas was SUSE’s President of Engineering & Innovation and was responsible for the rapid growth of SUSE’s expanding portfolio. He has over 20 years of experience in the IT industry, serving in various global leadership and executive roles in engineering and product innovation.
Thomas holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Geneva, and lives in Switzerland.
Werner Knoblich
Chief Revenue Officer
Werner Knoblich is SUSE’s Chief Revenue Officer leading the global field organisation. His primary objective is to drive and expedite SUSE's growth trajectory.
Werner has been a field sales leader for more than two decades. Most recently, Werner was Global CRO at SaaS provider Mambu. During his tenure, he played a pivotal role in revitalizing Mambu's go-to-market strategy, emphasizing a stronger focus on strategic partner ecosystems. Prior to that he led the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) business at Red Hat for 18 years, where he and his team grew it from $20 million in 2003 to over $1.5 billion in 2021.
Werner holds an MBA from the University of Stuttgart-Hohenheim and currently resides in the Munich area. In his leisure time, he is a passionate sportsman.
Supervisory Board
Arun Oberoi
Arun is Chair of the Supervisory Board of SUSE.
Arun is the former Executive Vice President of global sales and services of Red Hat where he served from 2012 to 2021. Prior to joining Red Hat, Arun played key leadership roles in building software businesses across a diverse range of companies from early stage to mid sized and Fortune 100 companies. He was Chief Executive Officer at Viridity Software from 2010 to 2012 and Chief Executive Officer of Aveksa from 2008 to 2010. He served as Executive Vice President of global sales and technical services at Micromuse from 2004, and through their acquisition by IBM, til 2008. Prior to Micromuse Arun held a series of senior executive positions at Hewlett-Packard, including Vice President and General Manager worldwide software sales and marketing.
Arun serves on the Board of Directors and the Audit Committee of Schrodinger, Inc., a Nasdaq listed software company enabling discovery of therapeutics and materials. He is on the board of Paymentus, an NYSE listed cloud based bill payments company. He is also on the boards of Deeplite, an AI optimizer software company and Proofpoint, Inc a cybersecurity portfolio company of Thoma Bravo, L.P. He received his Bachelors degree from Delhi University and has an MBA from Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.
Stefan Gaiser
Stefan Gaiser is a member of the Supervisory Board at SUSE and Chair o...
Stefan Gaiser
Stefan Gaiser is a member of the Supervisory Board at SUSE and Chair of the Audit Committee at SUSE. Stefan was the CFO of TeamViewer from 2017 to 2022. Prior to that Stefan was the CFO at Kofax plc and P&I Personal & Informatik AG. Stefan has also served as the managing partner of Board Advisors Deutschland AG from 2012 to 2015.
Stefan has a degree in business administration from Berufsakademie Villingen-Schwenningen in Germany.
Sabine Bendiek
Sabine Bendiek is a member of the Supervisory Board at SUSE and Chair of the Nomination and Remuneration Committee at SUSE. She is also currently on the Supervisory Board of Schaeffler AG. Sabine was the Chief Operating & People Officer at SAP from 2021 and 2023 and before that held a number of senior roles, including at Microsoft, EMC, Dell, Siemens, Earlybird and McKinsey.
She received a graduate degree (MSc) from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a BA from DHBW Mannheim
Johannes Reichel
Johannes Reichel is Managing Director and Head of Private Equity Germa...
Johannes Reichel
Johannes Reichel is Managing Director and Head of Private Equity Germany at EQT, a member of EQT’s global Technology, Media and Telecoms team and a member of the Private Equity Investment Committee. He has held Board observer roles in EQT´s portfolio companies Automic Software, Lima Corporate and CBR and is currently a member of the Supervisory Board of Ottobock SE & Co. KGaA, IFS AB and WorkWave Holdings, Inc.. He is also a Managing Director at RFO GmbH & Co. KG and RFO II GmbH & Co. KG. Prior to joining EQT Partners, Johannes worked in Mergers & Acquisitions for Deutsche Bank.
Robert Maclean
Robert Maclean is a Partner at EQT Private Equity and a member of EQT’...
Robert Maclean
Robert Maclean is a Partner at EQT Private Equity and a member of EQT’s global Technology, Media and Telecoms team. He has directorships in EQT’s portfolio companies including RIMES Technologies, CFC Group Holdings and Acumatica Inc. Prior to joining EQT, Robert worked at Francisco Partners and Englefield Capital. He started his career in the TMT team at Goldman Sachs. Robert holds an MEng in Engineering Science from the University of Oxford.
Philipp Woerner
Philipp Woerner is a Director at EQT Partners and a member of EQT's gl...
Philipp Woerner
Philipp Woerner is a Director at EQT Partners and a member of EQT's global Technology, Media and Telecoms team. Prior to joining EQT, Philipp has worked at Providence Equity Partners in London and in the Investment Banking Division of Morgan Stanley in New York and Frankfurt. Philipp holds a Master's degree in Finance and Engineering from the Technical University of Munich.
SVPs & VPs
