Direction: Success. Since 1980.
Stay ahead of your peers –
together with Ipro
Ipro is the partner for opticians and hearing care professionals with intelligent and future-orientated software and hardware solutions that enable users to go their own way. We support our customers from the processing and handling of existing business to the development of new business ideas.
Ipro builds on a ready-made and immediately usable framework of solutions and applications that are customised to the customer's wishes, goals and ideas. It is always important to us to provide close and personal support during the digitalisation process. This is what we all stand for - especially the regional Ipro consultants and the central service hotline in Leonberg.
Alexander Schröder
CEO
Our history
Ipro GmbH was founded in 1977 by Manfred Gärtner, and in 1980 the decision was made to develop a programme for opticians. Programming of the first version started under the CP/M operating system. Two years later, Ipro GmbH acquired its first IBM PC. This marked the beginning of the development of Ipro-Optik, the first successful product for opticians. Martin Himmelsbach and Thomas Barth were among the first developers from 1981 and 1982. In 1988, the decision was made to enter the field of hearing acoustics. In co-operation with the Hamburg acoustician Peter Welm, his own solution PW-Akustik was gradually combined and integrated with IPRO-Optik.
The founder, Manfred Gärtner, retired in 1992. The founding developers Thomas Barth and Martin Himmelsbach took over the management of the company. This was followed by the first installation of the French- and English-language Ipro-Optik version and in 1998 the first winIPRO module, which was equipped with a graphical user interface. In the years that followed, all programmes and functions were replaced by new winIpro developments. In addition, new foreign language versions in Dutch and Hungarian were created, as well as a wealth of interfaces to the various devices and consulting solutions that were soon being used by over 2000 users.
By integrating board systems such as STARS from Luxottica or SMILE from Safilo, Ipro further extended its innovation leadership. With the revision of the winIpro contact lens module, Ipro consultants have also been focussing directly on pure contact lens studios since 2020.
From 2008, the Services division became an elementary component of the Ipro range. In 2014, not only the eighth version of winIpro was released, but also PASKAL 3D, a revolutionary 3D realisation of conventional refraction. This was followed by a nomination for the Silmo d'or in 2015. 1982 saw the market launch in Luxembourg, Austria and Switzerland. Over the years and the linguistically expanded functions, the Netherlands, France, Hungary, Italy, Belgium, Spain, England and Northern Ireland were added.
Today, over 3000 companies in the optometry and hearing acoustics sectors work with winIpro. Over 50 employees take care of development, sales and service on a daily basis. The company also launches new products and ideas such as brillen-online.de and MyEyeTrainer and pursues numerous lines of development together with interested users in various project groups.