softwaredeveloper Archives

Gavin #versatile

Posted on February 16, 2023March 25, 2026 by medina

Gavin joined the SUSI&James team in September 2017. As an intern at the time, he spent several weeks at the company and familiarized himself with the responsibilities of a software developer. For his bachelor’s thesis, he conducted a research project on natural language generation and strategies for humanizing voice assistants.

“SUSI&James is a family where we work together as a team to tackle problems and find solutions. It’s a small team that gives you a lot of responsibility.”

Gavin stands out for his creativity. Driven by his curiosity, he has always felt a strong urge to understand how things work. He decided to pursue a degree in applied computer science because he recognized the growing importance of technology and was eager to explore what goes on behind the scenes. From the very beginning, Gavin was particularly fascinated by the various aspects of technology and its diverse applications.

In this context, he is passionate about abstract thinking and exploring ideas. While in college, Gavin began an internship at SUSI&James. After graduating from college in Heidelberg, Gavin devoted himself to music. In September 2018, he began studying pop music design at the Popakademie Baden-Württemberg. Gavin continues to work with us as a student employee.

"I’d like to grow into a full-stack developer and have the opportunity to take on more responsibility."”

Right from his first job interview, Gavin sensed the family-like atmosphere and the relaxed rapport among the employees. Immediately after starting, he was given his first assignments, some of which he carried out independently. Gavin worked closely with management and helped further develop the “AI with a Heart” initiative. He turned the vision of making the digital assistant SUSI as human as possible into initial prototypes.

This led to the development of several components that are still used today on our EVA technology platform and in client projects. In addition to a proof of concept, Gavin developed prototypes for client presentations. For Gavin, it is particularly remarkable to be able to follow and experience the development and growth of our company. Thanks to our diverse team, which also includes experienced senior staff, young professionals like Gavin have the opportunity...

We’d like to thank Gavin for the interview and are thrilled to have him on board!

Leah #passionate

Posted on February 16, 2023March 25, 2026 by medina

Leah has been part of the SUSI&James team as a software developer since April 2022. Thanks to her unique experience gained from several years in research, Leah possesses specialized expertise in areas such as machine learning.

“For me, SUSI&James is about advancing the automation of work processes and the understanding of natural language in industry.”

Leah studied computer science at Mannheim University of Applied Sciences, completing a master’s program with a focus on software engineering. For her master’s thesis, titled “Reconstruction of a Complete Neural Model from the Data of Real Spiking Neurons,” her goal was to present an algorithm that can be used to construct neural parameters for a computational model based on measured spiking neuron data. Leah’s interest in technology stems from her enthusiasm for software development. Outside of work, Leah enjoys literature, painting, listening to music, and watching movies and TV shows.

Leah spent three years supporting various research projects at the Technical University of Darmstadt. During that time, she gained extensive exposure to the fields of neuroscience and high-performance computing. She also became familiar with some of the best practices in software development and published several papers on her scientific work.

In addition, she supervised students on their theses and assisted with the preparation of lectures and assignments. Through her research position, Leah gained expertise in various topics, such as persistence layers, data mining and analysis, information retrieval, Elasticsearch, and more. The programming languages Leah is proficient in include Haskell, Java, C/C++/C#, and Python, which she now primarily uses at SUSI&James.

Leah came across our company through a job posting on the SUSI&James LinkedIn profile.

“I want to continue growing both personally and professionally with SUSI&James and also be able to work with new technologies.””

As a software developer, Leah writes source code, tests software, and conducts code reviews. In this work, creativity and a willingness to learn are two key qualities for Leah: “Basically, I have to figure out what the requirements for the feature are. If it’s something complex, then I think through the architecture. And that’s exactly where you need to be somewhat creative.”

She attends project meetings almost every day, where they discuss who will take on which responsibilities within a project. “In the projects, we have weekly sprints where we work on prioritized tasks.” As follow-up tasks are added, these are expanded further, so Leah has already been involved in several exciting projects. These include projects such as the SUSI front desk, support for test drives in the automotive industry, bot development using Rasa, and the development of EVA.

Leah is particularly enthusiastic about the EVA project because it serves as a universal solution across all other projects and embodies a promising vision for SUSI&James. Leah also plays a key role in ensuring that EVA is continuously developed and that new features are constantly introduced. Leah stands out for her determination to drive the company forward, strengthen communication within the team, and establish development processes to improve SUSI&James’s overall work.

Leah is politically active. She is deeply passionate about various issues that matter to her, including climate protection, peace policy, and social policy. She is enthusiastic about the LGBTQ+ movement and equal opportunity.

We’d like to thank Leah for the interview and are thrilled to have her on the team!

Husam #Supporters

Posted on February 16, 2023 by medina

Husam joined the company on October 1, 2021, as an intern in software development. Thanks to his quick learning curve, Husam quickly settled into the team and his responsibilities.

Husam joined the company on October 1, 2021, as an intern in software development. Thanks to his quick learning curve, Husam quickly settled into the team and his responsibilities.

Husam describes himself as a curious person. He has a keen interest in different cultures, history, and languages. Thanks to this interest, Husam is fluent in three languages: Arabic, English, and German, and is currently learning Kurdish. To balance his daily life as a working student, he enjoys playing soccer. Husam recently completed his bachelor’s degree in medical technology and has been supporting the SUSI&James team as a full-time software developer since December 1, 2022.

He first learned about SUSI&James through a job posting on LinkedIn. He was an intern with us in software development and, at the same time, was writing his bachelor’s thesis on “Interacting with a graph database using natural language.”

During the first few weeks, Husam was assisted by, among others, our colleague Jan actively supported. During this time, he gained his first insights into database systems, APIs, and software architecture. “As part of the internship, I also learned the basics of front-end development and helped the team integrate services and develop user interfaces.”

One of Husam’s daily tasks is writing his bachelor’s thesis. To do this, he first gathers all the necessary information and compiles it so that, after consulting with the team, he can also conduct his own tests. Husam used the results for his bachelor’s thesis and analyzed them.

“Through my work, I want to gain a deeper understanding of the interaction between people and machines.”

In addition, it deploys graph databases that our developers have created for digital twins as part of a publicly funded project H2SkaProMo are required.

As part of this work, Husam also handles software development and implements database operations and access. In addition, he develops tools for visualizing and configuring the graphs and their elements in the database. This requires a great deal of patience on Husam’s part, as dependencies on data from different projects occasionally cause problems that then need to be resolved.

However, his willingness to learn and quick grasp of new concepts serve him well here, enabling him to tackle obstacles head-on and consistently overcome them. Husam is excited to be working on a project focused on the visualization and management of graph databases. He sees this project as involving a very steep learning curve, both for himself and for the entire team.

We’d like to thank Husam for the interview and are thrilled to have him on the team!