{PERSIST} WRITTEN AND DESIGNED BY {NATHAN LUTZ}
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s soon as Lutz learned that his boss, Dr. Zechnal was asking for him, he was worried, while trying to keep his expression confident. For he knew, that being asked to speak with his superior required nothing but that. Zechnal addressed Lutz in a fair manner. An opportunistic motif of Zechnal, its fairness: debatable. The fact was, he had to choose between two moves, both containing great potential. Moments like these show Lutz’ most powerful quality, his confidence. In response to Zechnall’s skepticism, Lutz stood his ground, 2
and didn’t even consider about stepping down. This prevailing persistence has not only helped him through small pickles like this, but also through his career. V e r y importantly, Lutz has proven to be an adaptive human, learning new methods, using only the most effective. He was taught through time that no matter the assignment, the output, or the pay, the effort one puts in is what matters. This is shown very clearly when he illustrates one of his assignments before his graduation at the Technical University of Munich (Technische
Universitaet Muenchen). This assignment was to create a product, and illustrate this product in the form of a 70page report. Sleepless nights, what some may consider fruitless days flooded his schedule. This had become a parasitical relationship between the longest days he had ever worked, and the most intelligence packed into his brain during a short period of time. One may think that from this he must have gotten an award, or at the very least should have been recognized by his professor. In contrast with this assumption, he never actually found
out if anyone had ever read it, including his lecturer. Lutz has spent a large portion of his life exploring multiple aspects of technical engineering, perfecting his problem solving skills and applying them in different jobs. As a child, he was involved with his father’s job in the engineering quality control at a company in Germany called Wandel & Goltermann. This being a very common topic of conversation at their dinner table, gave him his first introduction into his future profession. School wasn’t taken extremely seriously by Lutz during
high school, and his weaknesses had started to appear blatantly in front of him. His brain worked in a way that could be depicted as: “Easy to learn rules and numbers, but to learn names and words was very difficult.”(Lutz). Evidently, his fortes were subjects involving logic-based fields. Although showing deficiency, he was accepted into what was widely regarded as the best University in Germany, Technische Universitaet Muenchen. While speaking of his choice in his major he voiced “... I still did decide to go to double E (electrical engineering), because
I thought it is one of the basic engineering topics which allows you to specialize in any field [later]”(Lutz). At the time, technology and electronics were erupting into one of their greatest ages of all time, and as a result the demand and competition for electrical engineers was at a high. During Lutz’ time in college, he decided not to dorm with his classmates, who were typically men. Instead, he chose to join a more diverse, fun, “college”like room. Here, most if not all of his “college” happened. Ranging from cooking dinner together to going skiing in the
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alps together, this group of friends always enjoyed themselves. During an organized skiing trip, he happened to run into a woman who he really enjoyed spending time with, a Brazilian. This woman, Maria Christina Borges, later became his wife. Borges-Lutz provided a unique perspective to his prominent confidence and persistence. Her reflection on this quality of his was the only one which included a “cons” side, illustrating it sometimes even as a sort of stubbornness. I found this very intriguing, how such an esteemed attribute can be viewed as a barrier. Directly out of college, Lutz applied for a
j o b at the offices of Bosch in Stuttgart, where he was then offered a more generous location in Reutlingen, his home town. After some time at Bosch, he was put into a group of 5 who were to research specifically on MEMS (Microelectromechanical 4
Systems) technology. This group researched very thoroughly towards the goal of the utilization of silicon based microchips in common electronic products. Previously, these sensors were thought to only be used in automotive applications, such like airbag sensors. As a result of this group’s success, he was offered an office in the latest “big time” of the Engineering world: Silicon Valley. Thrilled by this offer, Lutz immediately threw his now family of 4 into a Business Class aisle of a KLM plane,
involving himself with very successful entrepreneurs had led Lutz to give in to a popular ambition: He wanted to create a start-up. Since his most knowledgeable field was now MEMS technology, it was essential for this startup to be of the same, or neighboring subjects. Unfortunately for him, his entire mastery of silicon based timing had been under the name of Bosch, who were not prepared for discreditation. This was a stark hurdle that Lutz had to leap over, what ended up being a 2 year lawsuit. Eventually, he achieved his complete detachment and freedom from Bosch. After going through h e l l and
back, Lutz was dropped into a competitive environment of tycoons. The next obstacle standing tall in this environment was expansion. During a n d interview with moved into an apartment an Piyush Sevalia, he on Castro street. After years of hard work painted the process of in the Silicon Valley, building a startup as
“...if somebody gives me a goal, I will try my hardest to achieve [that] goal.“ attempting to build an airplane while already traveling down a runway, which represented the funding of the startup. Initially, Lutz felt as though he had the correct idea for the plane, but the runway wasn’t long enough. Although being highly educated in the mechanics of what he was getting involved in, he had a more minute comprehension of funding, and the business of a startup. Through trialand-error techniques, the conclusion was brought about that a more informed entrepreneur was needed to get them on
their feet, someone who had done this before. After some time, the startup was doing well, but not as well as he wanted. A new objective had formed: to wipe out the current leader in electromechanical systems: Quartz. Quartz have been the most common material used for microelectromechanical systems, thus making such a large change in torchbearers very strenuous. Recently, however, a large step was taken in this direction. The runway of multiple funds was deleted, and a new runway was formed,
-Markus Lutz
an acquisition. 2014 marked the year in which Sitime was purchased by Megachips Corporation for 200 million US dollars, which came with their publicity in the Tokyo stock exchange. To this day, Lutz utilizes this persistence of his to his gain. He is currently still employed at Sitime, but now as a Vice President of Executive Business Development. His confidence helps him create partnerships, gather clients, and he still hopes to take over the Quartz industry. 5
{WORK CITED} Lutz, Markus. Personal Interview. 15 Mar. 2016. --. Personal Interview. 30 Mar. 2016. Sevalia, Piyush. Personal Interview. 28 Mar. 2016. Borges-Lutz, Maria Christina. Personal Interview. 29 Mar. 2016. Valldorf, Jürgen, and Wolfgang Gessner. Advanced Micro systems for AutomotiveApplications 2006. Berlin: Springer, 2006. Print. “SiTime, Silicon MEMS Oscillators and Clock Generators.” SiTime to Be Acquired by MegaChips for $200M. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Apr. 2016.
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