Simon is looking relaxed as he leans against the glass door to his office and looks into the corridor.

ZEISS Stories | Simon

Reaching the next level

Digital Innovations

"You can do so much with data!" As a Data Engineer, Simon deals with a lot of the technical details of modern information logistics at ZEISS Digital Partners, all while keeping an eye on the major benefits. For example, improving services or optimizing a machine's operating life. It's this significant added value that makes working with the smallest units of information so appealing to Simon. As a data engineer, he lays the foundation for all data work. He builds the digital pipelines needed to collect and retrieve data. This makes him one of the first in the company to come into contact with data. A resource that is being increasingly required pretty much everywhere.

Simon is sitting in front of his computer at his desk and chatting to a male colleague.

Communicating, coding, winning

"Every new project presents plenty of challenges," Simon says, adding that there are also new technical innovations almost every day. As a Data Engineer, Simon therefore takes a similar approach as when he's playing recreational soccer, his motto is: "You only win when you play as a team." His teammates at ZEISS are colleagues from all over the world, for example other data engineers in Bengaluru or Budapest. Their communication with each other, whether in the tech chat or elsewhere, is very important to him and is part and parcel of daily work at ZEISS. The best ideas evolve through teamwork. No wonder that the next use case is something that ignites Simon's passion for sports, enables the team to bond and, on top of all this, makes the tinkerer in him very happy. Because no matter how much Simon learns every day, it ultimately takes many players to score goals. And this is what makes it fun for this team player.

Did he always know what he wanted to do for a living? "Not at all," he exclaims. Back when he was studying business informatics, Simon wanted to head toward a career in IT management. But at some point, he realized he could make work easier for so many people and actually generate new insights as a data engineer.

At ZEISS, you can start small and grow with the work.

Simon Data Engineer

The other side of data work

Coding itself constitutes roughly half of Simon's work. Before that, he has to find out what the experts from other ZEISS segments need, what their intentions are and which perspectives they require. Have all customers using this ZEISS product received the necessary updates? Which machine parts need to be replaced and when to prevent downtime? Maintaining the data infrastructure later becomes an important part of the work. Systematic monitoring ensures that everything runs smoothly, both now and in the future. And that data analysts and data scientists can do their work, new data can be fed back into the system in real time and websites are up-to-date.

Simon is standing at his desk, smiling and leaning in a relaxed stance.

The tech stack that has this data engineer swooning

Tech stacks include all technologies used to create and implement data processing methods. Simon swoons: "As a data engineer, you love the latest technology – the tech stack has to be just right. And the people at ZEISS are very open to modern applications." When he first started working at the company, he needed to learn how to use parts of the tech stack: "At ZEISS, you can start small and grow with the work." After just a few years, Simon can already look back on a steep learning curve.

And after work? He lets the technology do its thing and focuses on his training. He's looking for new challenges here, from soccer with work colleagues to other sports. After all, a person's brain and muscles are pretty similar: the main thing is to focus on the right training incentives to reach that eagerly anticipated next level.