Carl Zeiss AG, branded as ZEISS, is a German manufacturer of optical systems and optoelectronics, founded in Jena, Germany in 1846 by optician Carl Zeiss. Together with Ernst Abbe and Otto Schott he laid the foundation for today's multinational company. The current company emerged from a reunification of Carl Zeiss companies in East and West Germany with a consolidation phase in the 1990s. ZEISS is active in four business segments with approximately equal revenue in almost 50 countries, has 30 production sites and around 25 development sites worldwide.
Headquarters in Oberkochen
First workshop of Carl Zeiss in the center of Jena, c. 1847
Carl Zeiss Jena (1910)
One of the Stasi's cameras with the special SO-3.5.1 (5/17mm) lens developed by Carl Zeiss, a so-called "needle eye lens", for shooting through keyholes or holes down to 1 mm in diameter
Jena is a city in Germany and the second largest city in Thuringia. Together with the nearby cities of Erfurt and Weimar, it forms the central metropolitan area of Thuringia with approximately 500,000 inhabitants, while the city itself has a population of about 110,000. Jena is a centre of education and research; the university was founded in 1558 and had 18,000 students in 2017 and the Ernst-Abbe-Fachhochschule Jena counts another 5,000 students. Furthermore, there are many institutes of the leading German research societies.
Jena skyline (2008)
Lobdeburg Castle above Lobeda district
Jena in 1650
The battle of Jena in 1806