Meet our Graduates

Mark Carey graduated from Southampton in Summer 2008 with an MEng degree in Computer Science. After leaving University he began a Software Developer position with Orbis Technology based in Chiswick, West London

Orbis is a world leading provider of integrated gaming and betting solutions, developing both customer facing and back-office software ranging from unique, imaginative game concepts, to advanced management and reporting tools.

I was made to feel very welcome upon joining Orbis. The company has a substantial graduate intake each year (around thirty graduates joined at around the same time as me) and as a result the vast majority of Developers are in their twenties. This engenders a sociable yet professional atmosphere and fosters a mutual respect between employer and employee.

Dress is casual, working hours are flexible, and hard work is recognised and rewarded. The health of employees is paramount with breaks suggested and facilities provided to occupy the time - for example Pool and Table Tennis.

With customer teams having regular software releases (the customer I work with releases new content on a monthly basis) you can see your work being deployed to a live websites on a regular basis. My code is not something that is embedded in some vast system never to see the light of day. It is very satisfying to see something you have worked on being used by tens of thousands of users. This, coupled with varied and interesting projects makes going to work enjoyable.

Projects I have recently worked on include a refer-a-friend scheme, and a 30 million row data migration for the handling of loyalty card holders. These two projects alone show the diversity of the work you can expect at Orbis.

IN MAY 2007, ECS GRADUATE RICHARD JONES ACHIEVED SPECTACULAR SUCCESS. AS ONE OF THE THREE FOUNDERS OF LAST.FM, HE RECEIVED $38M WHEN THE COMPANY WAS BOUGHT BY CBS, THE US TELEVISION NETWORK, FOR $280M.

A crucial element in the success of Last.fm is the Audioscrobbler programme, which was Richard’s third-year computer science project in ECS. When he was undertaking the project in 2002, he wanted to develop a system that would create a way of discovering new music, allowing the popularity of new artists to grow by word-of-mouth via a web site dedicated to music enthusiasts. His ideas built on previous programs by including technology that could assess people’s tastes through monitoring what they actually listen to rather than relying on what they said they listened to.

‘Users of the system need to download software on to their computer that monitors what artists they listen to,’ Richard explained to the University Dolphin magazine in 2003. ‘The data is then collated and a pattern emerges by way of a technique known as “collaborative filtering”. The results are then recorded against a username and can be compared with the listening tastes of other members.’

At that time Audioscrobbler had 3000 users and Richard was planning to undertake a PhD in ECS to develop the service further. But when news of the Audioscrobbler was carried in The Guardian it stimulated the interest of Martin Stiksel and Felix Miller, who were trying to set up an internet site that would enable people to find music that they didn’t know about. They immediately took a train to Southampton to persuade Richard to join them in Last.fm.

After the initial development period, the site took off in 2005 and attracted growing listeners and success. The sale to CBS will enable the site to continuing developing: ‘We want to keep on growing and do some of the crazy stuff we wanted to build,’ Richard told the Financial Times.

‘We want to get every song that’s ever recorded on to the site.’

TSRS group services many areas such as Security, Privacy & Business Continuity, IT Governance & Strategic Alignment, Data Analytics & Decision Support etc. I work in different areas and interact with different colleagues across the business. Work is client-orientated and my roles depend on the area where the assignment falls into. For instance, in a typical IT governance assignment, responsibilities consist of organising meetings with the client to determine the IT control framework in place to support their business processes and identifying and reporting any IT risks.

Such a role involves a high degree of integrity and commitment and can be challenging at times. Personally, studying in ECS laid the foundation for my current job in EY from different perspectives. From the technical side, the contents of modules taught throughout my degree were very rich ranging from technical content such as computer hardware (computer architecture modules), software systems (real time operating systems modules, software programming and IT security, to managerial modules such as IT strategy, Accounting, Law and Management modules.

From the personal skills perspective, the degree included a variety of challenges and deadlines and was an excellent training for self motivation, self discipline, organization and commitment. These values are highly sought after in the competitive job market and ECS undoubtedly aims to instill these professional values to its students through its high quality teaching standards.

Achieving a degree in ECS is challenging? Yes - but it is definitely worth it!

Sabrina Nefti graduated in 2007 with First Class Honours in MEng Computer Engineering

My job doesn’t fit the traditional image of what a computer scientist does after graduating! Instead of programming I’m generally involved with visiting our clients and advising them on IT security issues facing their business. In this regard, the ‘soft skills’ side of the course at Southampton really helped me, as I gained a lot of experience in presenting and in business-style discussions. One example of this is the Multimedia Systems course, where I was a presenter and part of the organizing committee for the annual conference.

Most of the modules at Southampton are highly technical, and despite being in a very business-oriented job now, I constantly find the content learnt during my degree useful during client discussions (even from some of the more obscure lectures about old technologies, since many companies still use these systems).

However, it’s not just at work that ECS has played a large part. When applying for jobs I felt that ECS’s reputation in industry really helped me get through the initial application stage and, in interviews, the large team project during the second year was a great topic of conversation.

Departmental reputation isn’t everything though. Obviously the result of your degree is very important and the support I received from ECS, especially my third year project supervisor (who was always willing to have meetings and read the countless iterations of my final report) really helped me achieve the result I wanted..

Chris Porteous graduated from ECS in 2006, with a BSc in Computer Science. He now works for Ernst & Young’s Technology & Security Risk Services division.

Alan Ford did a 4-year Computer Science MEng at ECS, graduating in 2005. Shortly after, he began work at Roke Manor Research (Siemens R&D), nearby in Romsey.

My strongest interest in computing has always been in communications and networking, and the job with Roke Manor Research was an ideal fit. I immediately joined a team of experienced engineers working on mobile phone evolution. We had a wide-ranging brief to investigate ways to cut costs in mobile network infrastructure. We were particularly involved in how best to deploy cutting-edge broadband-speed mobile technology at an affordable level for both operators and users.

This project grew, involving teams in several countries, and led to regular travel to Germany to build and maintain a testbed, and later to demonstrate to customers. Travel on this, and other, projects has also taken me to Berlin, Prague, and Portugal!

Other projects I have been involved in include the development of a network protocol, which involved practical software engineering, and I have also been involved in some pure research.

The course at ECS provided a very broad grounding, and throughout my work I have found myself regularly referring back to topics covered. The wide range of courses allowed me to choose those most closely related to my interest of networks, which provided an excellent foundation for my work.

There were other topics too, in particular knowledge technologies, computer graphics, and compilers, that also provided me with useful, practical knowledge for my varied work.

But it was the whole broad ECS experience, and focus on practical knowledge, that proved perhaps most useful. Experience of juggling multiple projects, different kinds of deliverables, and group working have proved immensely useful. Summer placements at both the university and local companies throughout my degree allowed me to get a healthy experience of work after university. Experience of giving succinct presentations has directly helped me when now presenting work to customers!

Luke Westoby, BSc (Hons) 2003, created his future with a degree in Computer Science at ECS

I used the strong foundation that ECS's comprehensive Computer Science course provided to launch myself into the domain of software engineering, swiftly afterwards putting the concepts into practice in the commercial sector and beginning the arduous climb up the ladder of ambition in the City.

Soon after leaving the warm corridors of the Zepler building I became part of the 2003 graduate programme (with 6 other applicants) for the airline systems software-development arm of a company called Amadeus. I spent my one-and-a-half years there (programming in assembler, C and C++) applying the wide-range of fun damental concepts and best-practices that ECS taught me. The experience this yielded was more than adequate to propel me into my current position as an Analyst Developer in FICC Technology at Goldman Sachs.

One of the first things you notice working in an investment bank is that the business defines the software; not vice-versa. Consequently you have to be flexible enough to react to market conditions and to quickly produce a well-engineered, extensible system in the most appropriate technology. I found that the learning opportunities that were part of my courses at Southampton were ideal for preparing the skills required to work in this dynamic environment. Thanks to ECS, as well as becoming highly proficient in Java I also gained exposure to C++ and a range of languages from all the other programming paradigms.

This has given me the flexibility to be able to take up any development project and see it through to completion - whether I have had previous experience with the technologies involved or (more commonly) I’ve had to learn them on the job. Understanding the fundamental concepts behind how computer languages work means that this transition is smooth and rapid.

Attending ECS was always a pleasure - the facilities were fantastic (and are even better now!), the lecturers are knowledgeable, approachable and (quite often) very interesting characters in their own right. It also felt like there was a greater opportunity to socialise than many of my friends experienced at other universities - Southampton seems to have the balance just right!

Stuart Sexton graduated from Southampton in 2001 with an MEng degree in Electronics with German, immediately joining Invensys Process Systems, a global company that specialises in Control Systems for the Oil and Gas and pharmaceutical industries, as a graduate applications engineer.

Invensys attracted me because they are well recognised in the field of process control engineering; and, the global aspect of the company meant that I would be working with colleagues from across the world on a daily basis which would, hopefully, lead to some travel.

The role of applications engineer at Invensys predominantly involves designing hardware system architectures, and programming control strategies using a bespoke DCS (Distributed Control System) configuration environment, to design continuous, sequential and batch control schemes. Projects that I have been involved with so far include designing the control systems for running oil rigs and refineries.

The courses I took at University (especially control systems!) have given me a solid grounding in engineering theory and practice and it gives me a real sense of achievement when I realise that all that studying has proved valuable in my career. I also studied German at University, which has been useful on several occasions, both for me personally when travelling abroad on business and supporting others around me in translating technical and business-related documents.

I’ve been with Invensys for six years now and was recently promoted to the role of Senior Applications Engineer – a position that has given me increased responsibility and further challenges..

Following his BEng degree in Electronic Engineering (2002) where he took optional modules in Image Processing and Machine Learning, Alex Bazin stayed at Southampton to research computer vision and data fusion for biometrics in the Information: Signals, Images, Systems group.

My time at Southampton was a great foundation to my career: the BEng degree gave me plenty of options to pursue my interests and strengths and the courses were often based on current research within the department. In my third year I was able to take courses in Image Processing and Machine Learning which led to me applying for an EngD researching computer vision and data fusion for biometrics. I then joined the National Physical Laboratory, the UK’s National Measurement Laboratory, in their biometrics team. At NPL I conduct research, perform tests on biometric systems, and work on international standards used by government and industry; every day using skills I gained from my time in ECS..

I am a software engineer at Thales, working within the Aerospace division. For the past 20 months I have been working on a project that will allow the use of mobile phones on planes, during flight. This will allow passengers to make phone calls, send text messages and use GPRS services. Ever since joining Thales I have realised the benefits of the many courses provided during my years at ECS, for example; Programming Principles, Software Analysis and Design and Data Structures and Algorithms. The countless times I have referred back and even used the books recommended to me has proved how relevant the courses on offer were to the fast growing and diverse world of software development.

Bara Ayche graduated from ECS in 2004, with a BSc in Information Technology in Organisations. He now works for Thales.