DirectSmile appoints Raaphorst

Harry Raaphost has returned to the front line of personalisation and cross-media automation software development by taking the top job at DirectSmile.

Raaphost’s new role will build on his previous experience as managing director of Atlas Software, developer of the PrintShop Mail variable data printing software. In his new role, Raaphost said he was on a mission “to make personalisation easy”.

After Atlas’s PrintShop Mail became part of Objective Lune, Raaphorst oversaw the transition of the business for two years and then retired and took leave for six months. “I needed to fully recharge the batteries,” he said.

DirectSmile approached him in 2007 to become their partner manager, offering him an chance to make good use of his experience in the industry. Succeeding Axel Marciniak now as managing director is a “unique opportunity”, according to Raaphorst.

“DirectSmile is a great company – very technology-driven and very fast-moving. I’m looking forward to focusing all this energy on ‘keeping it simple’. I see IT as a service: listen to what customers want and offer them a system that makes it easy,” he explained.