Stephan is a distinguished expert in McKinsey’s Munich office and a core member of the European product development and procurement practice. He helps industrial companies improve product development, cost efficiency, and sustainability with deep expertise in automotive engineering, appliances, and machinery equipment. His special focus is on lightweight design and carbon-abated products.
Since joining McKinsey in 2008, Stephan has served clients across automotive, consumer goods, packaging, aerospace, and machinery. His work focuses on Design-to-Value design optimization, product portfolio modularization, complexity and cost reduction, target costing, and design for sustainability.
He leads Resource Cleansheet, a solution that combines carbon footprint and product should-cost analysis. He coleads Product OS, which uses generative AI to support ideation, product optimization, and specification-book optimization. His work helps organizations understand how early design decisions affect manufacturing cost, material use, and lifetime emissions.
His recent work includes:
- optimizing combustion-engine vehicle and battery-electric vehicle designs through recent physical teardown analysis of more than 20 vehicles and original equipment manufacturers in Europe, North America, and China
- conducting product benchmarks and cleansheets across advanced-industry products, including automotive commodities, trucks, appliances, and defense products
- developing global platform and module strategies that reduce parts complexity while maintaining the range of products offered
- creating modular, cost-optimized product portfolios for industrial and farm-equipment clients
- establishing cost and carbon optimization, thought-guided product optimization complemented by updated product-development processes, and setting up a broadly designed client-training program
Stephan serves as the dean of McKinsey’s Operations Excellence Program (OEP), actively leading the design and delivery of operational capability-building and training initiatives within the firm. Dedicated to fostering education and professional development, he also regularly lectures and conducts seminars at external universities.
Stephan holds a PhD in automotive engineering from the Technical University of Munich, a diploma in mechanical engineering and a master’s in mechanical and process engineering. He studied mechanical engineering at Technical University of Darmstadt and UC Berkeley.
In his free time, Stephan pursues offshore and bluewater sailing, having completed three Atlantic crossings, including two as captain or skipper.
He is fluent in German and English, with a good command of Spanish.
