He is best known as the founder and CEO of the former venture capital investor German Startups Group, which is publicly listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and was transformed into a Private Equity firm in late 2020.

Later he was CFO and Co-Founder of CDV Software Entertainment AG (1999–2001), listed at the Frankfurt Stock Exchange from 2000 until 2010, before serving as general manager of Atari's German entity Infogrames Deutschland GmbH (2002).

In this capacity, he and two other members authored a position paper to support IPOs in Germany in July 2021 calling for the "disciplining of the press" to give a fair and balanced opinion, which led to fierce criticism.

[26] In July 2021, Christoph Gerlinger faced significant controversy due to a position paper he co-authored, which called for the "disciplining of the press" to ensure balanced reporting on IPOs in Germany.

This paper, published by the advisory board of the Young Digital Economy, suggested that the state should intervene to prevent what it termed "IPO and new-economy bashing" by the media.

The proposal was met with widespread criticism, including from the German Journalists Association and Economics Minister Peter Altmaier, who ordered the paper’s removal from the ministry’s website.