As a graduated apothecary he completed his studies in 1901 at Tübingen with a dissertation in chemistry on "Polymerisation products of the acrylic acid".
When he died in 1939, his company Röhm GmbH employed 1800 workers and the annual revenues exceeded 22 million Reichsmark.
After the university he started as a researcher at the Merck company, later he worked for the Stuttgart city gasworks.
This led to a substitute (brand name Oropon) for the fermented dog dung which was formerly used for bating leather (part of the tanning process).
At the same time in Germany Röhm moved the company to Darmstadt where a larger plant was set up being closer to the leather industry of the Rhein-Main Region.