Who are you and what do you do? Who are your partners?
I am a research associate and PhD student in the Embedded Systems and Applications Group at the Technical University of Darmstadt. I am doing research on compiler construction and architecture and programming of parallel, heterogeneous systems. My industrial partner is Huawei with its research centre in Munich.
When did you join the Software Campus and why are you in the program?
I have been in the Software Campus program since 2019. I applied for the program because I see it as a great opportunity to combine the implementation of a research idea within the research project with the further development of my personal skills through the training and the exchange with my mentor. Furthermore, the cooperation with the industry partner also offers the opportunity to find a practical reference for your own research.
What is the content of your IT project and how could it be applied in the future?
My project deals with accelerated computation in probabilistic models. Probabilistic models come from the field of artificial intelligence or machine learning and offer some advantages over other models. In order to use them in as many areas as possible, it is important to be able to calculate the models quickly. In my project we want to develop a compiler that maps the models to different platforms (CPU, GPU, FPGA), so that the models can provide a fast answer and can process large amounts of data efficiently. There are applications for probabilistic models in many different areas, e.g. in image processing or robotics.
What fascinates you about computer science?
What fascinates me about computer science is that it is so versatile on the one hand and on the other hand gives you the possibility to build cool things very easily. With code, you can build many different fun and useful things in a very short time.
What skills do you think a top manager needs today to be successful?
It certainly takes more than one quality to be a successful manager, but in addition to technical and organisational skills, human and social skills are also extremely important. In my opinion, the goal should be to create an environment and assign all employees the tasks that allow them to bring their strengths to the team in the best possible way.
Imagine: Internet breakdown for 1 month – what do you do?
I fortunately have enough printed books to bridge well over a month of reading.