Coburg
Industry and science: collaboration promotes innovation and progress
Peter Weidinger (2nd from left) with the students of the master programme "Materials Science and Engineering" at the "FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg" as part of the lecture "Failure Analysis".
Our family-owned company works with regional universities around the world. The exchange with young people is part of our understanding of innovation and progress. This is because we benefit from research results and scientific expertise. In return, we provide insights into the day-to-day work and challenges of a globally active industrial company.
One person who is particularly committed to cooperation between industry and science is Peter Weidinger. He is head of the central materials technology department at our Coburg site and has also been an honorary professor at the Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nuremberg (FAU) and a lecturer at the University of Bayreuth and Coburg University of Applied Sciences for over 10 years.
Peter Weidinger (center) holds a broken steel truck leaf spring in his hand and explains a fatigue fracture of the material to the students.
Mr. Weidinger, what makes working with students so exciting for you?
You stay young – at least in spirit. My work as a lecturer allows me to understand what young people think and what moves them. This is crucial in order to follow the changes in society and adapt my work at Brose accordingly.
How can Brose benefit from your work as a university lecturer?
Thanks to its long-standing and intensive contact with universities, Brose has direct and rapid access to young talent. This is an important key factor for the future success of our family-owned company. As far as my job is concerned, we can benefit from the scientific expertise of universities, especially in the field of materials technology, and have access to sophisticated analysis methods. This is an often underestimated success factor, but it helps us enormously to better understand materials and optimize their use.
Do you have an example for us here, such as a specific research project?
In cooperation with various universities, we have been working on a specific phenomenon of lubricants in electric motors. Nuremberg Institute of Technology was able to develop a method to "watch the lubricants move" – i.e. the path they take inside the electric motor. In addition, Coburg University of Applied Sciences gave us the decisive clue as to how we can reliably identify the lubricants. These simple-sounding results made extensive groundwork necessary. This works particularly well with universities due to their long-term and theoretical orientation.
You can find more exciting projects and collaborations between Brose and local universities here .