The business graduate studied business administration with a focus on strategic planning and marketing as well as business informatics at the University of Cologne, in London and in St. Etienne. With around 30 years of professional experience in the IT and telecommunications industry, Berge has excellent contacts in the management levels of large software and IT companies, consulting firms and many large and medium-sized companies in various industries. He began his career as a consultant at the IT consulting firm Ploenzke, later as an account manager at General Electric IS, before continuing his career for many years as a key account manager and sales manager in the large customer area at o.tel.o. He then built up the German branch of the US start-up company StorageNetworks - one of the first players in the SaaS sector. Before founding SearchConsult in 2006, Berge was managing director at VIA net.works GmbH. In 2006, Karsten Berge founded the personnel consultancy SearchConsult GmbH with a focus on the IT and digitization industry. The clear focus and concentration on its own identity and research allowed SearchConsult to quickly grow to 50 employees and become one of the largest personnel consultancies with this focus. In 2015, Karsten Berge, as majority shareholder, sold his shares to the listed Allgeier Group. With NELEX AG, Berge and his team have already been awarded 5 stars by WirtschaftsWoche several times as the best personnel consultancy in the categories “Digitalization” and “IT” as well as “Consulting/Professional Services”. In addition, NELEX has also been ranked several times as a top personnel service provider in the “Executive Search” category by FOCUS magazine.