Before specialising in intellectual property Stefan was a management consultant with McKinsey & Co. and a research fellow at Harvard Medical School and the Klinikum rechts der Isar. For several business plan competitions he has served as a juror.

Stefan has studied physics and biophysics at the Technische Universität München, the University of Oxford, and Harvard University. He was awarded a PhD for his work in the field of nano­bio­technology.

Stefan has received his education in intellectual property law at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, the German Federal Patent Court, the Higher Regional Court of Düsseldorf, and with the Japanese patent law firm Okuyama & Co. in Tokyo. He is the author of numerous publications and a frequent speaker at international conferences on the subject of intellectual property law and strategy.