Mister Liberty: Palantir CEO Alex Karp stylizes himself as a fighter for Western values
Photo:Bloomberg / Getty Images
Dark wood, wide glass front - once a year Palantir erects a rectangular functional building over the most important 400 meters in the world. Well-calculated strategically, Alexander Caedmon Karp (52) has his camp set up here, on a meadow next to the library and across from the Evangelical Free Church in Davos. Every January, corporate executives, billionaires and heads of state walk past Karp's pavilion for four days; it is the shortest walk between the congress center and the "Grandhotel Belvédère", the backdrop of the world economic summit.
Main transhipment point: the Palantir Pavilion in Davos
Photo: Bloomberg / via Getty ImagesThe name of Karp's company is emblazoned in white letters on the pavilion: Palantir, inspired by the seeing stones from the "Lord of the Rings" saga. It does not fail to have an effect - this year, among many other Bavaria's Prime Minister Markus Söder (53; CSU), EnBW boss Frank Mastiaux (56) and EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen (61; CDU) sought the proximity of the software CEO .
Davos is Karp's main hub for the important European market. Here he wants to offer his software to top politicians and CEOs in combination with high-value consulting services, as he has already sold to the secret services CIA and NSA or the US Federal Police FBI. Karp sees himself on a state-supporting mission: "The core task of our company has always been to make the West, especially America, the strongest in the world - for the sake of global peace and prosperity." The weapon of choice: Palantir's big data analytics. Karp's software called Gotham - the city of Batman - is supposed to filter insights from masses of data in order to fight crime successfully.
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