Student Excursion to Rohde&Schwarz (May 2014)

Extracurricular activities are important elements of a student’s career, since they are well suited to complement and enrich the regular study courses. With this in mind, the Institute of Communications organized a student excursion in May 2014 to visit the company Rohde&Schwarz in Munich. Rohde&Schwarz is a company which manufactures wireless-communications test and measurement equipment, as well as television-broadcasting equipment and devices for secure communications, radiomonitoring and radiolocation. It currently has around 9,300 employees worldwide (5,650 in Germany), and its headquarters are located in Munich.

In total, 17 students took part in the trip, most of whom were attendees of the lectures “Information Theory and Coding” and “Mobile Communications”, offered by our department. Together with the institute’s academic staff, the group met at Hamburg-Harburg railway station on May 26^th to start a long but smooth 6-hour train ride to the south.

The following day was mainly devoted to the visit of Rohde&Schwarz headquarters. For that purpose, the company had compiled a comprehensive program of talks and demonstrations. To start off, a presentation was given by Ms. Carolin Hockenholz, who accompanied the group throughout the day as our host. She outlined the main facts and figures of the company profile. This talk was followed by three different sessions, each of which covered several options, such as: presentations about microwave technology, the typical work of an HF engineer, software defined radio, as well as the communication standards UMTS and LTE. In addition, a guided tour to the showroom was given. The displayed hardware represented an impressive overview of the wide range of equipment in the R&S portfolio. The visit was concluded by a talk about job opportunities and career perspectives at Rohde&Schwarz.

Excursion group at the premises of Rohde&Schwarz

In the evening of the first day, the group came together again for a joint dinner. For this occasion, we had chosen the Bräuhaus “Tegernseer Tal”, which offered a variety of delicious Bavarian specialties, ranging from “Fleischpflanzerl” over “Käsespätzle” to “Bayrische Bauernente”; not to forget the “Kaiserschmarrn” which was served as a desert. This social event provided a good opportunity for the students to have discussions in a relaxed atmosphere and also share their interests and opinions about the lectures with the teaching staff of the institute.

Joint dinner at Bräuhaus “Tegernseer Tal”

Clearly, a trip to Munich would not be complete without taking into account the touristic aspect. So on the third day, the participants had free time at their disposal until the afternoon. This period was used, among others, for a stroll in the city center, and for enjoying the stunning views towards Marienplatz and city hall from the tower of St. Peter’s church. As an alternative, some students spent the time at the famous “Deutsche Museum” of Science and Technology. At 3 p.m., the group convened to undertake the train trip back.

It can be concluded that the experience and the feedback from the students regarding the excursion were very positive. These impressions will certainly encourage us to organize more events of this kind also in the years to come.