1988: First degree programmes offered in Göppingen
A lack of space in Esslingen led the Council of Ministers of Baden-Württemberg to pass a 1987 resolution to establish a campus in Göppingen for Esslingen University of Applied Sciences. The great level of commitment demonstrated by all parties concerned meant that the first students were able to begin their studies in Göppingen in 1988: in the Department of “Mechanical Engineering / Manufacturing Systems (MS)”, whose aim was to do justice to the existing economic structure of the region, and in the Department of “Microelectronics/Micromechanical Engineering (MM)”, which was tailored from the very start towards one of the biggest growth markets of the future, the microtechnologies.
Investments of more than DM 10 million (EUR 5.1 million) enabled a laboratory environment to be created which was unique among universities of applied sciences; at its heart were the manufacturing automation laboratory with its mechanical engineering focus, and the microelectronics laboratory where the emphasis was on the microtechnologies. A key element of the latter and unique among universities of applied sciences is the cleanroom covering an effective area of approx. 250 square metres, which will become the nucleus for the further development and restructuring through to the upcoming expansion of the campus to focus more on microsystems technology.
Today: Mechatronics and Electrical Engineering
Today, the Faculty of Mechatronics and Electrical Engineering in Göppingen is among the best in Germany. This is confirmed time and again by independent rankings and surveys of personnel managers.
Mechatronics is at the heart of the teaching in the faculty - this is where students can specialise and over seven semesters they are thus trained to become engineers whose skills are in great demand and who are well equipped to deal with the challenges facing industrial companies.
Mechatronics is a combination of mechanical engineering, electronics and information technology -and the teaching and research undertaken at Göppingen bring together these three disciplines.