Shai Agassi
Shai Agassi (Hebrew שי אגסי; * 1968 in Ramat Gan, Israel) is an Israeli software entrepreneur.
He belonged to the 2001-2007 SAP AG, where he was a member of the Board since 2002.
Shai Agassi left the company, despite a running until 2010, the Treaty of 2007. Since then he is committed to alternative drive systems from vehicle with the project Better Place, which is to provide a comprehensive infrastructure for the mass production of electric cars available, as well as in the field of environmental policy for the future of Israel. On May 26, 2013 Better Place has requested trial in Israel of using a liquidator to initiate an orderly winding-down after last financial negotiations had failed.
Life
Shai Agassi was born in 1968 in Ramat Gan near Tel Aviv in Israel. He came from a Jewish family that moved to the founding of the state to Israel. Agassi's father, Reuven Agassi ( born 1941 ) was a colonel in the Israeli army and later worked in telecommunications. Agassi's parents live in Raanana, he has a sister and a brother.
Already in his childhood Shai Agassi began to be interested in computers, collected with five hole cards and finished with seven years at the University of Tel Aviv, a computer course for children, where he learned to program in Fortran. At the age of 18, he was hit by a car and broke his right leg. A long-term consequence of this accident are chronic back pain.
In 1986, Agassi his military service as a programmer at the military intelligence of the Israeli army. He then studied at the Technion, where he completed his bachelor's degree in computer science in 1990 with honors.
Agassi lives with his wife, the former managing director of Quick Soft Media, and his two sons (* 1996 and * 2000 ) in Los Gatos, California since 1996.
Before Agassi was a board member at SAP AG, he was CEO of SAP Portals, which was fully integrated into the SAP AG 2002.
SAP Portals in turn emerged from the Israeli company Top Tier produce software that was acquired by SAP AG in 2001 for 400 million U.S. dollars. Top Tier was founded in 1992 by Shai Agassi. Top Tier developed Portal software based on Microsoft technologies. Agassi launched this technology development and later had also held the company's management. He sat down in 1996 for the relocation of Top Tier to California.
Besides Top Tier Agassi founded in Israel together with his father three more companies:
TopManage was purchased in 2002 by SAP AG, the product of the company formed the basis for SAP Business One solution for SMEs.
As the SAP founder Hasso Plattner mid-2003 left the Executive Board of SAP AG, Agassi was traded by the media already as his successor for the CEO. Agassi 2003 by TIME Magazine and CNN as one of the 20 most influential business was elected in 2003.
Agassi has announced to provide infrastructure for electric cars with a new company. On 29 October 2007 he founded the company Project Better Place. In May 2008 the company presented a prototype of the car. In early January 2009, he announced I am the end of the oil. He wanted to bring the major automobile manufacturers to produce many new electric cars in the next 15 years.
In 2011 he was awarded the Bertha and Carl Benz Award of the city of Mannheim.
October 2012 Agassi stepped from his executive position back. The company had a total of 750 customers in Denmark and Israel.