Life, and professional life too, occasionally takes interesting turns. Over 20 years ago, a door opened and launched me on a career in IT. I turned my back on my field of research and focused from then on on bits and bytes instead of amino acids and gene sequences. What followed was an amazing time of disruptive technological change. I was able to witness the triumph of virtualization from the very beginning and was a VMware fan from the beginning. I still remember very clearly the first migration of a VM with vMotion. It was a kind of magic and would fascinate me for the next 20 years.
Over the past year, profound changes in the world as we know it have once again become apparent. We are once again witnessing a radical transformation in the world of data centers. The market and technology leader of the last two decades is strategically realigning itself and the cards are being reshuffled. Many customers are no longer willing to go down this new path, or simply cannot afford to do so. I’m not talking about small customers here, but about upper mid-sized companies with up to 100 hosts and several thousand VMs. It’s time to recognize the iceberg on the horizon and make another course correction.
After two decades of intensive work as a freelance IT consultant, virtualization architect, and passionate trainer, I am starting a new chapter. In January 2026, I will take up a position at the Center for Organismal Studies (COS) at Heidelberg University—marking a return to my scientific roots.
A review
Over a period of more than 20 years, I have built up my expertise in the field of IT infrastructure and VMware virtualization and, as a freelancer, have supported numerous companies in setting up and modernizing their data centers, implementing cloud strategies, and operating hybrid environments.
VMware vExpert
The vExpert program not only opened the door to one of the friendliest global IT communities, but also boosted my reach and networking opportunities. For a long time, I considered my blog to be rather insignificant. It was only the encouragement of others that prompted me to join the program. Since my first application in 2017, I have been awarded the vExpert designation nine times in a row in several disciplines.
vExpertPro
The vExpert Pro initiative was launched to pave the way for new talents to join the vExpert community. Like me before, many potential candidates lacked external encouragement. A vExpert Pro is a mentor who prepares interested parties for their application and helps them maintain their status.
VMware Certified Instructor (VCI)
It is not only my passion to discover new things, but also to pass on the knowledge I have gained. That is why I have been a certified VMware trainer since 2018. It is a passion that I have pursued with particular joy. Being a trainer also meant always having to (and being allowed to) deal with the latest technologies. I considered it a privilege to come into contact with technological innovations very early on and (after an agreed embargo period) to write about them.
VMUG Germany
The VMware User Group (VMUG) is a community of VMware customers and users for direct exchange of experiences.
Together with my two fellow leaders Markus Gehm and Jens Klasen, I head up the VMUG group in Kaiserslautern and organize regular vCommunity meetings there. Regardless of my move, this will not change in the foreseeable future.
Thanks to colleagues, companions, and mentors
Success does not happen in a vacuum. That is why I would like to take this opportunity to thank all those who have accompanied, inspired, and supported me along the way:
- The spark was ignited in the late 1990s by Professor Ulrich Schurr, who was then IT officer at the Botanical Institute of Heidelberg University. By transferring administrative tasks within the institute’s network, he laid the foundation for my future IT career.
- My colleagues at idicos GmbH, with whom I carried out many early virtualization projects.
- To the entire vExpert community – In late summer 2017, I attended VMworld in Barcelona alone, without any significant network. You welcomed me with open arms into your midst. Your warmth and knowledge sharing enabled me to join the global VMware community. Many of those initial contacts have remained close friends and companions.
- Prof. Dr. Jens Söldner and the team at Söldner-Consult in Nuremberg – we have enjoyed a close partnership on many exciting projects for many years. The phrase “working with professionals” really hits the nail on the head here. No matter how difficult the projects were, I always had several experts at my side whose expertise helped me broaden my own horizons. It was Jens Söldner who encouraged me to apply to become a vExpert and paved the way for my career as a trainer.
- My Danish VMUG colleagues—thank you very much for the repeated invitations to Nordic VMUG and to speak at your Tech-X 300 events. Your open culture and the opportunity to share knowledge in an international setting have honed my presentation skills and helped me make valuable contacts. “Tusind tak for alt. I er fantastiske.”
Back to the roots: fundamental biological research
Before embarking on my career in IT, I worked in the field of plant molecular biology research. My work at the Botanical Institute of Heidelberg University and the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology in Golm (MPI-MP) laid the foundation for my passion for understanding and optimizing complex systems—a mindset that has served me well in IT architecture to this day.
The new challenge at COS Heidelberg
The Centre for Organismal Studies (COS) Heidelberg has set itself the goal of researching the biology of organisms across the boundaries of biological organizational levels. Research and teaching at COS are dedicated to the biology of organisms, from molecular fundamentals, cell biology, developmental biology, and physiology to evolution and biodiversity, as well as systems biology and biotechnology in plant and animal systems.
In my new role, I will maintain and further develop digital infrastructures for research in order to simplify data management, analysis workflows, and collaborative platforms.
As a bridge between science and IT, I will link the needs of researchers with state-of-the-art technologies and implement innovative virtualization and cloud solutions that make access to research data scalable, highly available, and secure.
I see this task as the ideal symbiosis of my two professional worlds: the analytical precision of molecular biology meets the scalability and flexibility of modern IT architectures.
What does this mean for the community?
As the long-standing leader of VMUG Kaiserslautern, I will continue to advance the group with my co-leaders and support it to the best of my ability. I will
also continue to maintain my blog, elasticsky.de. I plan to write more about the interfaces between science and IT in the future, thus combining my two passions. The focus will certainly shift a little. In addition to VMware, other areas of the open-source landscape will also be covered in the future.
What happens next?
First of all, I am looking forward to the new challenge of a long-term project. Cutting-edge research produces enormous amounts of data. A large number of different systems need to be operated, expanded, replaced, protected, and kept available.
Next stop: VMUG Connect
Some time ago, I applied to be a speaker at VMUG Connect in Amsterdam. The topic was accepted, and I am looking forward to meeting many old friends there again.
