Michael Jastram
Verified Expert in Product Management
Product Manager
Düsseldorf, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
Toptal member since September 7, 2021
Michael is a product and technology leader with 20+ years of experience in complex product development. He works across product management, systems engineering, software, and technology strategy. He is particularly effective where software, physical products, organizational constraints, and technologies such as AI come together, turning ambiguous problems into clear decisions and executable plans.
Project Highlights
Expertise
- Architecture
- Consulting
- Customer Success
- MBSE
- Product Management
- Requirements
- Software Architecture
- Systems Engineering
Work Experience
Open Source Project Lead & Product Owner | Eclipse RMF
Eclipse Foundation
- Co-created and led the Eclipse Requirements Modeling Framework (RMF), an open-source implementation of the OMG ReqIF standard, serving as project lead and product owner.
- Built RMF into an interoperable requirements platform and validated compatibility with major commercial tools through the ProSTEP ReqIF Implementor Forum.
- Established RMF as reusable open-source infrastructure, with its libraries subsequently incorporated into commercial requirements-management products.
Managing Director | Product & Technology Consultant
Formal Mind GmbH
- Built Formal Mind GmbH as my consulting and product platform for complex product development, working across product strategy, systems engineering/MBSE, requirements, software, and AI-enabled engineering.
- Led the development and commercialization of Semiant, an AI quality assistant for product development; managed a 3-person team, conducted 100+ stakeholder interviews, and deployed it at customers including Mercedes and Vaillant.
- Led a requirements-engineering maturity assessment for Google ChromeOS, prioritized improvement initiatives, and led the evaluation and pilot of a commercial replacement for its internal requirements tool.
- Introduced MBSE at thyssenkrupp Marine Systems based on ISO/IEC/IEEE 15288, refined and documented the method, coached a pilot team, and created training; delivered the project on time and on budget.
- Acquired and led the Toolchain Development work package for Deutsche Bahn's openETCS program, coordinating an 18-person-year effort over three years and leading platform selection and Scrum-based toolchain development.
- Turned technology originating from my prior open-source work into commercial products, consulting, and training, with reqif.academy growing to 19,000+ registered members.
Senior Solutions Architect
Jama Software
- Helped establish and grow Jama Software’s European operation, working with enterprise customers on requirements management, product development, and solution architecture. Contract engagement via Formal Mind GmbH.
- Supported complex enterprise sales as a Senior Solutions Architect, contributing to €4.5 million in recurring software revenue during the engagement.
- Translated customer development processes and requirements into Jama Connect solution architectures, demonstrations, evaluations, and deployment approaches for regulated and complex product organizations.
Researcher | Systems & Requirements Engineering
Heinrich-Heine Universität Düsseldorf
- Completed doctoral research on requirements traceability and systems engineering, graduating magna cum laude.
- Contributed to the EU-funded DEPLOY research project, applying formal modeling and requirements-engineering methods in industrial pilot projects.
- Co-authored Eclipse RCP, a German-language technical book published by entwickler.press, translating hands-on Eclipse platform experience into practical guidance for software developers.
Senior Consultant | Head of Software Division
Hood Group
- Built and led HOOD Group’s software division, growing it to a five-person team of consultants and developers and delivering requirements-engineering tools and services to customers including Daimler.
- Supported Volkswagen and HELLA in improving automotive requirements engineering, including modular specifications, requirements data models, system specifications, processes, standards, and training.
- Developed a Rational DOORS solution for Siemens VDO, now Aumovio, for incremental specification updates, including an automated functional-testing framework for the tool.
Lead Software Engineer
Vitae Pharmaceuticals
- Designed the internal software platform, which was used by chemists to manage their molecular data and to process it further on our server farm.
- Implemented the user interface after eliciting input from the relevant stakeholders. This included a 3D subsystem based on OpenGL for visualizing molecules with stereographic glasses.
- Designed the architecture for distributed computation, which eventually took place on a cluster consisting of 196 CPUs. The database scaled without problems to a volume of 8 million molecules.
Client Engineer | Senior Software Engineer | Senior Solutions Engineer
Netcentives, Inc.
- Contributed to the ongoing development of our core email delivery system. In particular, I executed the internationalization of our software, which was completed on budget and on time.
- Took on additional responsibility and refactored the software architecture for our customers’ profile pages, and acted as lead engineer in customer negotiations.
- Acted as a client architect and intermediary between customer teams and software development, which resulted in improved business processes and helped to manage the dramatic growth of customer teams.
Project History
Systems Engineering Trends – News Website for Systems Engineers
Created a weekly blog in 2015 in German to demonstrate my skills in systems engineering; as of August 2021, I've published over 300 posts.
Systems Engineering Trends has become one of the leading news sources for systems engineering in Germany and significantly strengthened my profile as an expert. It consists of a mix of interviews with known industry experts, book reviews, industry analysis and much more.
ReqIF.academy
Created an online portal for the Requirements Interchange Format (ReqIF).
I created this site in 2016 to commercialize my accomplishments regarding the Requirements Interchange Format (ReqIF). I was part of the group that made ReqIF into an international standard.
ReqIF.academy has thousands of registered users who take advantage of the training courses and other materials.
A key asset is the software ReqIF Studio, which is based on the Eclipse Requirements Modeling Framework (RMF), an open-source project that I co-founded.
ReqIF Studio is a commercial ReqIF editor that is used extensively in the industry for requirements exchanges and data exchange debugging.
Product Velocity
https://productvelocity.org- 100% — 100% Book Manuscript Completed
- 27 — Case Studies Collected
- 30 — Product Velocity Mastermind Members
Complex product organizations often remain slow despite adopting agile methods, new engineering tools, and AI. The problem spans business decisions, engineering, architecture, delivery, and organizational interfaces. I wanted to understand what actually determines development speed in complex and regulated products, and turn those findings into a practical approach.
I developed Product Velocity by combining more than 20 years of experience in software and complex product development with research across 27 industrial case studies. I created a model connecting business, engineering, delivery, and system stewardship, then tested and refined the ideas through consulting work, workshops, interviews, talks, and a 30-member practitioner mastermind. The resulting work became the basis for a book with MIT Press.
Product Velocity packages what has been proven to accelerate complex product development into a consistent, rigorous, and practical body of work that leaders and teams can apply.
Education
Doctorate Degree in Computer Science
Heinrich-Heine Universität Düsseldorf - Düsseldorf, Germany
Master's Degree in Ocean Engineering
Massachusetts Institute of Technology | MIT - Cambridge, MA, United States
Diplom-Ingenieur Degree in Naval Architecture
University of Hamburg - Hamburg, Germany
Skills
Tools
Eclipse IDE
Paradigms
Change Management
Other
Jama Connect, Architecture, Systems Engineering, Teaching, Research, Requirements, Software, Java, Software Design, Software Architecture, MBSE, Technical Writing, Consulting, Software Development, Customer Success, Web, Eclipse, Business Strategy, Discovery, New Product Development, Thought Leadership, Solution Architecture, Technical Product Management, Technology, Product Development, Product Velocity, Management Consulting, ReqIF, Technical Leadership, Presales, Technology Consulting, Sales Engineering, Requirements Management, Business Architecture, Product Discovery, Business Analysis, Technical Business Analysis, Business Requirements, Business Transformation, Full-stack, Product Management, Project Management, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Engineering, Tech Sales, Product Strategy, Startups, Model-based Systems Engineering (MBSE), Leadership, Product Ownership, Cross-functional Team Leadership, Formal Verification, Stakeholder Management, SaaS, SaaS Sales, Enterprise Software, Workflow Diagrams, Molecular Biology, Pharmacy, Customer Acquisition, Head of Product, Solution Design, AI Product Strategy, Eclipse RCP, Open Source, Technical Sales, Lean Product Development, User Experience (UX), Process Mapping, Salesforce
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