I studied Business Information Systems, as the interplay between pure IT and its applications has always interested me. I then worked in a variety of industries, such as consumer goods, sportswear and the food industry, before I joined the LÄPPLE Group in 2014. Here my main responsibilities are in the field of IT.
I’ve always been involved in IT in some capacity prior to this job, but it has never been related to the automotive sector. So sheet-metal working, standard parts, rotary tables and so on were all quite new to me.
What excites me about the job the most is that I have the opportunity of dealing with a wide range of technologies first-hand. This of course includes office equipment such as desktop PCs and printers, but it also involves networking infrastructure, various applications such as cloud technology, and the interface between IT and machine engineering, which is the focus at LÄPPLE. Industry 4.0 has become an entirely new field which links together various technologies in a completely different dimension. I find it really interesting to be involved in this kind of field.
I find technology so exciting because I always get to experience first-hand how it’s going to be put into practice. So once I’ve built something, I get to see how it works out in the end. And if everything works as intended, that’s obviously cause for celebration!
I don’t think we really have a full sense yet of all the possibilities this trend will introduce. After all, artificial intelligence is only just emerging, while big data, data mining and analysis of these areas are still in the early stages. I require knowledge from two different fields: computer science and mechanical engineering. What excites me about working at LÄPPLE is that all of these elements are brought together. For example, we have gas springs, in which intelligence certainly plays a part, as well as a system element such as a rotary table, which is also becoming an intelligent component. The optimum level of intelligence is also applied to an entire installation built by FLT. And thanks to LÄPPLE Automotive, we can apply this technology in-house and build these very systems into our series production lines.
I think it’s really great that all of these applications can be planned, built and optimised in-house. This allows us to monitor the entire creation process, giving us a clear and stable platform for success.
The great thing about IT is that you get to interact with all the companies in the Group in some form or another. There are hardly any areas in the business – commercial or administrative – that do not involve the use of IT systems. So at the IT department we talk to all areas of the business, and that involves all companies in the LÄPPLE Group. This means we always have a good overview of what is up to date and important in the Group.
