News

A Meeting Place for Business: Networking at Alb-Schwarzwald Business School

Networking trade show takes place for third time in Rottweil

Lots of people say they want to innovate, but let’s be honest: how many of us really do innovate? No company that sits in a corner twiddling its thumbs will ever innovate. Alb-Schwarzwald Business School, which is part of Steinbeis University Berlin, can call itself innovative. So can some of the companies with specialists and managers studying at the business school in Rottweil. So what’s better than to bring everyone together at a small but excellent trade show established to motivate participants to engage in informal conversation. And what can be more satisfying than taking in the most amazing ideas that pop up in all kinds of fields. It is now the third time that Alb-Schwarzwald Business School is organizing the Meeting Place for Business event, which will take place next time on Saturday, March 25, 2017 in the town hall in Rottweil. Open sesame – time for people to network in all areas of industry!

More than 60 companies and organizations will be exhibiting and presenting their latest products at the trade show. There will also be a program of specialist events to coincide with the show, including a visit from Dr. Klaus Doppler, a leading author in the field of change management. The experts welcome all kinds of visitors to the talks and encourage everyone to share their own experiences. The topics that will be covered include compliance, data security, patents, future prospects in international markets, consumer trends in Asia, funding programs for innovation, and lots more. Guests from all areas are welcome to attend the event, which is free.

InnovationQuality Summit 2017

Event combines conference program and meeting platform

From May 9-11, 2017, Steinbeis, the aerospace forum Luft- und Raumfahrt Baden-Württemberg (LRBW), the Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering (IAO), and the National Industrial Association of Baden-Württemberg (LVI) are hosting the Innovation- Quality Summit (IQS) at the house of commerce (Haus der Wirtschaft) in Stuttgart. The platform for innovation offers a first-rate conference as well as a chance to meet experts and companies working in innovation and quality. The focus of the IQS lies in current innovation developments in the industry sectors of aerospace, automotive, railway, medical engineering, energy, and 3D printing applications.

19.5 billion euros are invested in research and development in Baden-Wurttemberg each year. That represents 5% of the gross domestic product and thus more than the 3% stipulated by the EU. And the percentage of people working in research and development in Baden-Wurttemberg is also higher than in any other region in Europe. Large corporations – leading innovative companies – are headquartered here and they are supported in their research by a network of SMEs, universities, and research facilities. The IQS looks at the question of how innovation and quality can be maintained or enhanced in these companies.

The first conference day (May 9) will focus on many specialist topics in the area of innovation and quality:

  • Innovation and quality from an international perspective
  • Risk management and innovation
  • Horizon 2020: Future opportunities and challenges
  • Modern travel solutions: High-level innovations combined with sophisticated technologies
  • Industrial innovation and state supervision
  • How is innovation financed?
  • Advanced management methods/advanced innovation management
  • The quality of innovation: points of differentiation

The two subsequent days (May 10 and 11) will be set aside for one-onone meetings with suppliers and buyers. There will also be a workshop program for companies at the event. The face-to-face meetings can be planned in advance through an online catalog.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil. Prof. h. c. Eberhard Kallenbach

Obituary

Steinbeis mourns the loss of Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil. Prof. h. c. Eberhard Kallenbach, who passed away in October after a long illness. He founded the Steinbeis Transfer Center for Mechatronics at the Technical University in Ilmenau, where he served as director for many years. The center was one of the first to be established in former East Germany after reunification. Eberhard Kallenbach didn’t just bridge the gap between science and business there. Through his transfer projects and dedication to research and teaching, he also made a significant contribution to integration between East and West and to regional economic development.

Eberhard Kallenbach studied theoretical electrical engineering at the Technical University in Ilmenau and remained there for the whole of his academic career. Until 2000, he was a regular university professor and head of the institute for microsystem engineering, mechatronics, and mechanics. The Steinbeis Transfer Center he founded in 1992 focused primarily on electrical drive components, especially engineered electromechanical drives and electronics technology as well as magnetic technology. In 2010, projects at the center led to the founding of Steinbeis Mechatronik GmbH.

The first Steinbeis House in Ilmenau was established in 2005 following an initiative of Eberhard Kallenbach, and it is now home to several Steinbeis Enterprises. It is not only a testament to the many successful transfer projects that have been carried out there, it also symbolizes Eberhard Kallenbach’s dedication. With it, he opened the door to a different future for well-trained young people in his region, and, as an entrepreneur, he assumed responsibility for people’s social welfare. One example of this is when he supported the founding of Steinbeis innomas GmbH, a spin-off of his Steinbeis Transfer Center.

With Eberhard Kallenbach’s passing, Steinbeis has lost a committed colleague who embodied the traditional values of an entrepreneur with his modesty, patience, and his sense of responsibility for his employees. His exceptional work with technology transfer and his dedication to Steinbeis was honored by the foundation in 2004 and 2008 with the Steinbeis Foundation’s Transfer Award, the Lohn Award. We will deeply miss the trustworthy and reliable collaboration with Eberhard Kallenbach. Our thoughts go out to his family and loved ones.

Prof. Dr. Michael Auer | Manfred Mattulat
Steinbeis Foundation Board of Directors

Starting shot for the 2017 Baden- Württemberg Competence Award

Now accepting applications

The ability to innovate and high standards in companies are all a part of the global competitive edge held by the Baden-Württemberg economy. The Baden-Württemberg Competence Award honors outstanding contributions and achievements and provides an incentive to tap into further innovation and quality potential. The award, which will be bestowed for the tenth time in 2017, is an initiative of P. E. Schall GmbH & Co. KG and the TQU GROUP, an enterprise from the Steinbeis Network.

The award is presented each year as part of the Control trade show, a specialist fair for quality assurance held in Stuttgart. The Steinbeis Foundation sponsors the award. The next award ceremony will take place on May 9, 2017. Companies and organizations based in Baden-Wurttemberg are invited to apply for the award by February 6.

The award requirements are demanding: a strong entrepreneurial drive and innovative spirit alone won’t cut it. Instead, the award is bestowed each year on companies that successfully bridge the gap between innovation and quality, have integrated this into their daily operations, and can show evidence of outstanding results.

The Software Engineering Discussion Forum

TZM and Hanser organizing convention in Göppingen

TZM and Carl Hanser publishing are inviting people to a “Software Engineering Discussion Forum – Technology, Methods, Best Practice” on the Göppingen campus of Esslingen University of Applied Sciences on March 8, 2017. The event is part of jubilee celebrations at the TZM marking 25 successful years in business.

The forum actually kicks off the evening before (March 7) with a general get-together. Live music in the relaxing atmosphere of a snack bar will set the right tone for casual conversation. The after-dinner speeches will be given by Edgar Grundstein (managing director of TZM) and Prof. Dr. Jurgen van der List (former director at TZM).

The specialist forum itself will take place the next day. It will include three sessions that revolve around automotive technology (with a focus on software quality and testing automation), manufacturing (with a focus on user experience and the IoT), and medical technology (with a focus on system networks and connectivity). The advisory board is made up of leading figures, underscoring the quality of the line-up. A keynote speech will be given by Dr. Eberhard A. Veit (former chairman of the management board at Festo AG & Co. KG).

A Visionary Excursion

Steinbeis co-organizes trip to the Vision trade show in Stuttgart for schoolchildren and college students

It’s never too early to reach out to the next generation of managers and specialists. It was this thought that motivated six organizations to set up a trip to the Vision trade show in Stuttgart: the Ilmenaubased Steinbeis Quality Assurance and Image Processing Enterprise (SQB GmbH); Vision & Control GmbH from Suhl; the Ilmenau-based image processing company TechnoTeam Bildverarbeitung GmbH; GBS mbH, also from Ilmenau, which is a specialist in image signal processing; the department of quality assurance and industrial image processing at Ilmenau University of Technology; and the trade fair organizer itself, Messe Stuttgart. Together, they made it possible for a group of schoolchildren and students from Thuringia to visit the world’s leading fair for industrial image processing.

Image sensors, optical systems, and processing algorithms are not just the kind of technology you find in SLR cameras, they are also needed in manufacturing along with the right software for things like spotting errors during live production. To discover how and explore the latest technology first-hand, a group of more than 60 schoolchildren and students went on a day trip to the Vision trade show on November 9, 2016. The sponsors organized everything from bus transportation to Stuttgart to free entrance tickets, lunch, and guided tours in small groups. The idea was to provide the group with insights to the world of industrial image processing.

The overall goal of the trip was to allow everyone to forge new contacts – not just the group of schoolchildren and students, but also any companies looking for potential recruits. Summing up the trip, Max Bunge, a student at Carl Zeiss High School in Jena, said: “I was totally taken aback by the number of ways image processing is used in industry. It makes you really want to get involved and develop those kinds of hightech devices yourself. So I also hung around at lots of booths and tried to get in contact with the companies. Most of them were really open and told me about the job prospects at their company.”

There was plenty of positive feedback for the team of organizers on the trip back home. Here too, lots of new contacts were made between the group of students and the companies on the trip. “As organizers, it certainly met our expectations. It made a great contribution toward reaching out to young people in Thuringia,” says Steffen Lubbecke, managing director of SBQ GmbH, drawing an extremely positive line under the trip. So it looks like this will not be the last trip of its kind for young enthusiasts!

Share this page