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May 31, 2023

YCN Newsletter 17 - Research in Industry - Entrepreneurship in Materials Science by Daniela Gehrisch

Founder of MAF, a material analysis laboratory, is Daniela Gehrisch. She was born in Freiberg and grew up the Ore Mountains in Germany. Having been enthusiastic about maths and physics at school, she decided to look for a place to study in the silver city Freiberg. That's how she found the course in materials science and technology and graduated with a diploma.

But how does one actually come up with the idea of founding a laboratory for materials analysis?

After successfully completing her studies, her path first led her to a work as an employee for application technology and further in project management in the area of coating technology. Daniela  recognised the need for a lab here in the district. "My employers at the time had a need for material analysis. As there were no internal facilities, the samples had to be sent externally.“ The waiting time was at least three weeks until the results were available. Apparently, there were capacity problems in the existing laboratories, which led me to the idea of founding my own.“ But Daniela didn't have the real courage to start up at that time. Two years later during time of Covid-19-Epoch in Spring of 2021 the journey to self-employment thus continued. "Sometimes there is a luck in life and you meet people who are happy to help you and from whom you receive support." Nevertheless, not everything goes smoothly. The first bank refuses a loan. Construction is delayed and machines have to be put into operation. The schedule has to be thrown over. "When you start, you still have motivation and see a lot of things positively and casually, everything has to go quickly and that's how you plan it then." Far from it.  Today Daniela stands proud and happy in her own laboratory. She did not want to turn back.

The thing about funding...

"Equity was a challenge. I didn't have enough available." But here, too, help was waiting. Private Investors were found who were willing to support the project with capital. Today, these investors are limited partners of MAF Materialanalytik Freiberg KG. Without them, the project would not have been possible.

What MAF has to offer ...

MAF Materialanalytik Freiberg KG offers a wide range of services, from sample preparation, structural and microstructural analyses, hardness tests to determining the cause of component defects and the cause of damage: „Where is the cause of the defect? Where and how could we intervene in the process to optimise it?“

           

MAF Materialanalytik Freiberg

Hornstraße 10, 09599 Freiberg, GERMANY

Dipl.- Ing. Daniela Gehrisch

Daniela.gehrisch@materialanalytik-freiberg.de

 

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