Previously

SVP Product, Eigen Technologies
VP Product/Head of Product Portfolio, Eigen Technologies
Commercial Director, Eigen Technologies

Company

Phrase (formerly Memsource) is a leading translation management system and software localization platform that supports 500+ languages, 50+ file types and covers the full range of enterprise localization use cases. With a global team across Europe, the US, and Japan, Phrase serves thousands of customers, including leading brands such as Uber, Shopify, Deliveroo, Zendesk, Supercell and Vistaprint.

Search Background

Having been bootstrapped until 2020, The Carlyle Group, acquired a majority stake in Memsource and acquired Phrase in 2021, merging both businesses to accelerate rapid growth plans globally. In March 2022, the Founders took the decision to take a step back from the executive running of the business and hired Georg Ell as CEO to lead the growth of the company. Erevena were retained to find an inspirational Product leader based on the good work we had completed for them in the past, successfully placing VP of Global Marketing (now CMO), VP of People, and VP of Global Sales (now CRO).

Requirements

Phrase were seeking a proven, international B2B SaaS product leader to drive the company’s product growth and play a crucial leadership role as a representative of the Phrase product suite. The ideal candidate needed a range of responsibilities such as developing the product vision and strategy, creating a closer relationship to the customer to guide the roadmap, building a delivery roadmap, evolving product analytics, improving the product management function including expansion of the product and design teams, and collaborating with the CEO to achieve the larger product vision.

Result

Erevena introduced Simone Bohnenberger-Rich to the business. With her previous experience at Eigen Technologies, she has a strong affinity for language software and translation. Given Eigen’s focus on AI/ML for NLP, Simone quickly grasped the Phrase business case and product and was drawn to the desire to leverage AI/ML technologies. With a PhD in International Relations from the London School of Economics Simone began her career in Strategy Consulting before moving into SaaS with Eigen where she learned her Product Management craft. After almost six years with Eigen which saw them go from Seed to Series B and raise almost $60m, Simone sought the challenge of scaling out a business with an emerging market leadership position.

Georg Ell

CEO

We were very happy with the support we received from Grant, Tim and Ruby throughout the process to find our perfect candidate.  They listened carefully to our brief and helped us to zero in on potential candidates that credibly met our requirements, and we couldn’t be more pleased to have found Simone and welcomed her to the Phrase leadership team.

Our experts

Grant Hayward, Partner

Specialisms: Product, Engineering, Marketing, B2B SaaS, Bottom Up SaaS

Tim Horslen, Principal

Specialisms: Product Leadership, Commercial Leadership, B2B SaaS

Ruby Kaur, Senior Associate

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