Jost Stollmann

Tyro Payments works with 10,000 Australian medical practices, pharmacies, universities, and retailers. In 2013, Tyro processed more than $5 billion in credit- and debit-card transactions and more than 50 per cent of Medicare Australia rebates through the EFTPOS system. While Tyro boasts a small 1-per-cent share of a $480-billion market, the company has made a significant splash in Australia’s highly regulated and dominated industry.

The CEO Magazine recently spoke to Tyro Payments’ CEO Jost Stollmann about the astonishing revenue growth it has seen in recent years, and Tyro’s path to prosperity.

“I was born and bred in Germany. I then did a French law and political science degree, a Master of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School, and then I worked for the Boston Consulting Group in Chicago. In 1984, I started my first business in Germany called CompuNet, which translated the belief that with microcomputers and networking, the whole IT world was going to change. We became the leading system integrator for the German Fortune 500 companies. We sold CompuNet to GE Capital in 1996.

I became the shadow minister for economy and technology in Gerhard Schröeder’s shadow cabinet. With an inspiring campaign, we achieved a landslide victory, but I finally declined to join the government because the competencies of my ministry were unduly curtailed. Instead, I built the high-performance sailing Yacht Alithia and took my wife and five children on a two-year world circumnavigation” states Jost.