In this interview we meet Rikke Espe, Unwire’s CCO, learn about her unusual career path, her plans for Unwire in 2023 and what makes her tick.

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Rikke joined Unwire in October 2014 as CFO. However, she found that after seven years in a finance role, her interests lay elsewhere in the company.

“Being a CFO in a small company allowed me to try many different things. Over the years, I began to get more and more involved in the business development and marketing part of the business. This became increasingly interesting to me, and I found I was no longer motivated in the finance world. 

“In December 2021, I stepped down as CFO and dedicated myself to the business development of Unwire. The move was positive, and I am happy that Unwire had faith in me to fulfill the new position of CCO and support such a significant career change.

“I find I need to constantly develop and challenge myself in the workplace. As I found my career path in finance was ending, and I had become more motivated by personal interaction over the last five years, a change to a sales role seemed the perfect next step for me.”

Seeing the strength of the Unwire brand

Rikke’s new role showed her how much potential there is in the Unwire product and how more is needed to promote Unwire and its innovative solution. She saw that small changes could make a big difference for Unwire in the market.

“We began to see how the Unwire brand awareness was increasing and how we could onboard more new customers with a little more effort. It made me believe that we were on to something big with Unwire but that it needed to get more attention.”

Never a dull day

Rikke’s week is filled with various tasks, and although she likes to plan her week on a Monday, she needs to be flexible as new things come up or other tasks take longer than expected.

“I typically get in around 9am and spend the first half hour reading through my mailbox and catching up on the news. As I don’t have a vast sales organization, I have a lot of different tasks in an average week, from meetings with partners, colleagues and customers, preparing marketing materials, planning for conferences, following up on sales leads, responding to tenders, managing our partner portfolio, and so on. 

“As most of our customers and partners are based in North America, since the end of the pandemic, I have been traveling across the Atlantic for extended periods.”

In Denmark, people are often categorized as an A or B person or a morning or afternoon person. Rikke sees herself somewhere in between, mainly due to working in two time zones.

“I love to get up early in the morning, even at the weekend. On the weekdays, I usually get up at 5am or 6am and start the day in a relaxed way. I spend a couple of hours in the morning before I leave for work, not doing much – drinking coffee, reading the news, and petting my animals. On the weekends, I usually get up around 6 or 7am because I really enjoy the long days.

“I primarily work with US customers and partners, so my late afternoons and evenings are often packed with meetings I also need to prepare for. When I work in the evening, I lose all sense of time while focusing on the task without being disturbed.”

The Year ahead

Rikke and the team at Unwire have a busy year ahead with several conferences, trips to the US, a rapidly growing team, many promising customer and partner prospects and developments to the solution.

“I look forward to continuing to deliver on our ambitious and exciting strategy in 2023. We have been working on new features and integrations on the platform, and it is great to see them being activated by our customers, helping their riders to have more seamless journeys.

“In the first part of 2023, I will also spend a lot of time in the US, visiting customers and partners and attending conferences. And then I am looking forward to seeing the value of close working on business development between Unwire and Kuba in the coming months.”

The best place to work

Rikke has been with Unwire for eight years and has seen a lot of changes during that time which suits her forward-thinking personality.

“I enjoy the company culture and working with my colleagues. Unwire, as it is today, is the best place I have ever worked. It is also a huge benefit that we are now a part of Kuba Group, where I have gained a lot of new amazing colleagues. I am highly motivated by seeing that value is created, so as long as I feel we are moving forward in the right direction and I bring value to the company in what I do, I am happy to be part of the journey.”

Outside of work, Rikke has varied interests from her pets, with whom she spends a lot of time and money, reading at least one book a week and astronomy.

“I am very interested in astronomy and recently acquired my first observation kit, and I spend quite a lot of time mapping out the night sky. A good way to get my mind off work is to do something creative like painting and other crafts. Recently I have become addicted to building Lego – I am trying to detox, but not succeeding well on that front!”