That’s me! Everything (i.e. my life) began on the 6th of December 1978 in Donauwoerth close to my home town Monheim where I grew up. Monheim has around 3000 inhabitants and lies half way between Augsburg and Nuremberg in Bavaria/Germany. Some small farms in the outskirts still show the village character of this rural region.

My Family

I grew up in Monheim within a (for Germany) big family. I want to give you some more information on my family as this part of my life currently becomes more important for me. My Mum (a housewife), my father (a mechanical engineer for agricultural machines), my younger sister Carina and my older brother Stefan are still living in Monheim. During the last months we could celebrate some family events: My brother Stefan married his long-term girl-friend Bianca. They became parents of a daughter named Jule and they are awaiting their second child this year. My sister Carina and her husband Jürgen are proud parents of two boys, Lukas and Lennard. My eldest brother Gerhard’s wife Kerstin (they live in Munich) gave birth to a sweet young boy named Finn Felix and to a little girl named Lotta. Since 23rd of June 2006, I am enjoying my life together with my girl-friend Maryam.

New York

I moved from Monheim to New York in the year 2000. I worked in the ‘Big Apple’ for a freight forwarder at the ‘John F. Kennedy Airport’ that ships pharmaceuticals mainly from New York to Frankfurt and back. I stayed in this city for a few months and the way of living (and working) influenced me immensely. In the beginning I really had a hard time as the modern way of living in New York was totally different to my cosy life in my home town. But very soon I was facscinated by the cultural richness and the open-minded, liberal people of this fast city.

My Studies

Back in Monheim I soon moved to Freising in the north of Munich as I decided to study Bioinformatics at the University of Applied Sciences in Weihenstephan/Freising. The city itself has about 45000 inhabitants and is a world-wide known scientific centre for biotechnology, landscape architecture, horticulture and brewery. It is also famous for the world’s oldest brewery founded in 1040. The river Isar streams through the heart of the city and many green areas let the citizens enjoy the beauty of nature. Munich’s ‘Franz Josef Strauß Airport’ is located next to the city which is (besides the good scientific infrastructure) one reason for the prosperity and the low unemployment rate of the region.

I studied Bioinformatics in Freising. As part of my studies, I worked for Amersham Health as a statistical programmer evaluating clinical studies. In my second practical semester I went to India for 7 months and worked as a webbased programmer for the bioinformatics company ‘Strand Genomics’. After finishing the last theorectical semester of my studies I worked again for Amersham Health before I started my diploma thesis at the Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe. At the Institute of Toxicology and Genetics (ITG) we investigated the influence of environmental toxins on the gene expression profile of zebrafish embryos. I set up models using mulitivariate statistical analysis. After finishing my thesis, I continued to work for the ITG in order to fine-tune our statistical approaches and to prepare the publication of our research findings. Finally, in October 2007 we our paper was accepted by the high-ranked journal ‘Genome Biology’. In November 2007, my contributions to the scientific community were awarded by the Ministry of Economics and Technology.

My Job

In December 2006, I was offered some quite attractive opportunities to work for the healthcare industry. As I already had some experience in clinical research, I was eager to focus more on my knowledge and ambitions in pharma and healthcare. Among the best job offers were quite interesting though different openings by Boehringer Ingelheim, CeRES and IMS Health. The position at Boehringer Ingelheim appealed to my major interests in SAS programming and biostatistics while the CeRES position was an interesting opportunity to shape and promote businness within a small though experienced company. In addition, IMS Health’s offering comprised a position in healthcare industry which combines data analysis, consulting and client contact. Though all of the three (and others) offerings were very attractive to me, I finally decided to join IMS Health (also due to private reasons). You can read more about IMS and my role in the Career section.

IMS German office is located in Frankfurt. After moving from Karlsruhe to Frankfurt, I started to get a acquainted to the city. Many Germans would reply with buzz words or catchphrases like ‘City of Banking’, ‘City for Working rather than Living’ or “German Capital of Crime” if asked about their opinion regarding Frankfurt. As always, there’s more behind it! For instance, I like the international atmosphere in Frankfurt (alike Berlin) as many different cultures meet and arrange with each other. Additionally, Frankfurt offers boundless possibilities regarding culture and leisure.