Julia Nitsch began her technical career as a teenager in a robotics competition, which later led her to study telematics at the TU Graz, specializing in autonomous robotics. This was followed by research periods in the field of environment perception at the Universities of Zurich, Stanford and an industrial PhD at ETH Zurich in cooperation with the German LiDAR specialist Ibeo Automotive Systems GmbH to explore perception capabilities of autonomous vehicles. After working in the automotive environment, she will now work on algorithms and solutions for environment perception of drones in a start-up context. While working in industry and academia, she was often one of the few technical female experts. That’s why Julia Nitsch volunteers in youth programs to foster enthusiasm for technology and in networks to increase the visibility of women in technical professions.