As of November 6, 2026, co-founder Dirk Petzoldt is CEO of explai GmbH. He succeeds Dr. Andreas Junghanns, who had led explai since October 2024. Andreas took us to market with our first successful enterprise project and steered the product towards sovereign AI on your desk. We are deeply grateful to him.
Dirk has shaped explai from day one. He built the product hands-on, first in stealth as Data Stories, and has led our customer and development projects ever since. As CEO he will focus on bringing AI to companies of every size through AI engineering: connecting the systems they already run, while they keep sovereignty over their data and their AI.
He brings more than 20 years of turning data science into business outcomes. As Executive Director Data & Engineering at Glovo, he led more than 250 data professionals and engineers, from a data mesh serving 3,500 data consumers to marketplace optimisation, routing and courier compensation. At Zalando he grew Applied Science & Engineering for marketing, traffic and pricing to 120 scientists and engineers, steering €2.5bn of annual investment algorithmically. Earlier roles at OTTO, SAS and SAP spanned predictive modelling for banks and insurers and product management for enterprise software.
That matters for our customers. explai's agents only earn trust if they understand the business behind the data: its definitions, processes and exceptions. Dirk has spent two decades on both sides, building the models and leading the organisations that rely on them.
In his words: "Every company I worked for had more questions than its data team could answer. explai closes that gap, including for companies without a data team. I thank Andreas for leading our first chapter as an experienced founder, and for preparing me for this role as a mentor and role model."