The aim of the donor companies was and continues to be the interdisciplinary training of engineers in the field of industrial image processing at the TU Ilmenau. The need for well-trained engineers in this field will continue to increase with the further automation and digitization. Industrial image processing is an interdisciplinary science, problems of optics, electronics, lighting technology, computer science play a role. Therefore, the course of studies Optical System Technology / Optronics, which is supported by the subject area, was initiated at the TU Ilmenau.

The Department Quality Assurance and Industrial Image Processing, where the founding professor is located, carries out basic research and applied research in industrial image processing. Methods, algorithms and system solutions for image acquisition, processing and evaluation are developed for application especially in the fields of quality assurance and process control in production, robotics, food industry, construction industry, medical technology and safety engineering.

Prof. Notni, the holder of this endowed chair is also Head of Optical Systems at Fraunhofer Institute for Optics and Precision Engineering (IOF) in Jena.

On 19.10.2015, Prof. Notni invited the founders to Jena to present his work area in Jena and to give an account of his work in the first year at the TU Ilmenau. The combination of the activities at the TU Ilmenau and the IOF lead to very interesting synergies. So a number of research projects are edited in the composite of the founder companies, the subject area of Prof. Notni and the IOF. In IOF also 22 students with a variety of work (internships, Bachelor, Master) are currently active. At the TU Ilmenau, Professor Notni's field of research has also been able to obtain important third-party funding for research projects. The specialist area is therefore at the forefront at the TU Ilmenau.

After an introduction by the Fraunhofer Institute and, in particular, the department, the representatives of the donor companies were able to visit the labs at the institute and to gain an impression of the outstanding research and development, especially in the fields of fast 3-dimensional measurement technology and scattered-light measurement technology.

In the discussion, it was found that there was a high demand for engineers, both for the founder companies as well as for the whole of Germany. Currently, the German universities can not meet this demand. The main reason for this is the low number of applicants for engineering degree courses, including optical systems engineering / optronics. Therefore, technically interested young people can only be advised to consider technical degree courses of study. Particularly in Thuringia, in the technology triangle Jena-Erfurt-Ilmenau, now and in the future good chances for attractive jobs are to be expected.