Inga Zins was born near Wiesbaden in 1983. She grew up with a younger sister in a small village with just under 300 inhabitants. Whether it was the music club, the youth fire brigade or the dance group, Inga was involved in many areas in and for her village. And yet she was drawn to Mainz to study, where she did her doctorate on gold and silver nanoparticles after obtaining her diploma in chemistry and a stay abroad at the University of Toronto. In 2011, Inga joined Siemens in Munich, where she initially worked in materials development. Her communication skills and strong sense for working in teams brought her to the Siemens Research and Innovation Ecosystems department, where she coordinates the collaboration between Siemens, universities and startups. And it is certainly not only her colleagues who benefit from this, but also her two kindergarten children at home.

What drives you, Inga?

I want to see how ideas and concepts become things. That’s what I found so exciting about studying chemistry: new materials are created in the lab from dry theory and experimental instructions. And that’s what I want to see in my everyday work: From the idea for a project to its implementation to the result. This can be a research project at a university or the implementation of a change in a software or a website that goes online. The motivation from a visible result is extremely high for me.

That’s why I find it exciting to report on people and topics from research. I can satisfy my thirst for knowledge and science, put a product on paper and in the end make a supposedly complex topic understandable to the reader. Right now, I am dealing with topics of sustainability and digitalisation. How can we use today’s technologies to make the world a better place? How can we explain these complex technologies so that everyone understands them and can benefit from them individually? But at the same time preserve the ethical aspects of data and artificial intelligence? I am curious to see how ideas and concepts are put into practice here.

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