About Me

Jeremy Theocharis

Hi, I’m Jeremy. I’m the Co-Founder and CTO of the United Manufactruing Hub (UMH), where we take factories to the future by putting the most powerful IT & OT tools into the hand of the engineer. With a background in Mechanical Engineering and Business Administration from RWTH Aachen, I bridge the gap between engineering and IT to enhance manufacturing processes.

In my free time, I enjoy exploring tech books like Designing Data-Intensive Applications and staying current with industry discussions on Hacker News. You’ll also find me unwinding with games like League of Legends, Stellaris, or Kerbal Space Program.

Professional Journey

Since 2021: Co-Founder & CTO, UMH

I’m responsible for the architectural design and implementation of our product that helps build large-scale IT/OT infrastructures.

Previously:

  • Founder & CEO, ia: industrial analytics GmbH

    After discovering my passion for IT/OT convergence while working at the Digital Capability Center Aachen, I founded ia: industrial analytics GmbH, a system integrator specializing in manufacturing analytics and automation. Leading a team of 10, we successfully delivered over 20 projects across various industries.

  • Technical Project Manager, Digital Capability Center Aachen

    Led projects focused on digital transformation in manufacturing, which sparked my interest in IT/OT integration and set the foundation for starting my own company.

  • Junior Knowledge Analyst, McKinsey & Company, Singapore

    Specialized in digital manufacturing and Industry 4.0 strategies, gaining valuable insights into global industry trends.

  • Chairman of the Local Board, bonding studenteninitiative e. V.

    During my studies, I served as chairman of the local board, organizing events that connected students with industry professionals and honing my leadership skills.

Recent Blog Posts

Things I have written recently in my personal blog.

View all posts →

Selected Articles

Below are some selected articles that have been published on other platforms. For a full list of my publications on our company blog, check out my personal profile.

  1. AWS and Azure are At Least 4x–10x More Expensive Than Hetzner
    2024-10-17
    An analysis of cloud infrastructure costs, highlighting why we recommend Hetzner for trying out the UMH.

    Featured on HackerNews - 131 points, 138 comments

  2. Why Most Manufacturing Software Sucks — and What We Do Differently at UMH
    2024-10-11
    Exploring the shortcomings of traditional manufacturing software and how our approach addresses these challenges.

  3. Cloud-Native Technologies on the Edge in Manufacturing
    2024-07-08
    Discussing the integration of modern cloud-native technologies with the traditional automation pyramid.

  4. Opinion: OPC UA is the Peak of All That Is Wrong in Manufacturing
    2024-04-21
    A critical look at OPC UA and its impact on the manufacturing industry.

  5. The Unified Namespace as the Strongest Architectural Proposal for Industry 4.0
    2024-01-22
    An introductory course on Unified Namespace and its significance in IT/OT convergence.

  6. Integrating the Unified Namespace into Your Enterprise Architecture: An Architect’s Guide
    2023-06-22
    The article delves into the different data requirements of frontline workers and business analysts, the roles of OLTP and OLAP databases, and the concept of Lambda Architecture for managing large volumes of real-time and historical data.

  7. The High Compression Deception: A Reality Check on Historians vs Open-Source Databases
    2023-05-31
    Explore the pros and cons of Historians versus open-source databases in sectors like oil & gas, pharmaceutical, and chemicals. This article discusses compression algorithms, storage costs, and modern compatibility.

  8. Why Designing Your Own IT/OT Infrastructure is Harder Than You Might Think - 10 Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them
    2023-05-15
    Navigating the design of IT/OT infrastructure without MQTT, Kafka, and Kubernetes? We embarked on that journey too and confronted numerous challenges. Our hope is that our experiences can provide you with insights towards better solutions.

  9. Flatcar as the Operating System of the Industrial IoT
    2023-02-14
    Discover why we chose Flatcar as the operating system for the Industrial IoT. We want to guide you through our thought process—from our requirements to selecting the operating system.

  10. Comparing MQTT Brokers for the Industrial IoT
    2023-01-17
    Are you looking for the best MQTT broker for your IoT or IIoT project? In this technical comparison, we evaluate four popular options: Eclipse Mosquitto, VerneMQ, EMQx, and HiveMQ. We consider factors such as reliability, scalability, and maintainability to help you make an informed decision.

  11. Historians vs Open-Source Databases - Which is Better?
    2022-08-09
    OSIsoft PI, Canary, InfluxDB, TimescaleDB, and Ignition—the number of tools you can use to store your data from your machinery is endless. This article provides an overview of historians and open-source time series databases.

  12. Tools & Techniques for Scalable Data Processing in Industrial IoT
    2022-05-23
    The industry is shifting from use-cases to being technology-driven. We provide a look behind the United Manufacturing Hub and into our experiences for tools & techniques for data processing.

  13. Node-RED in Industrial IoT: A Growing Standard
    2021-07-14
    How an open-source tool is establishing itself in a highly competitive environment against billion-dollar companies.

    Featured on HackerNews - 91 points, 28 comments

  14. Why We Chose TimescaleDB over InfluxDB
    2021-07-06
    TimescaleDB is better suited for the Industrial IoT than InfluxDB because it is stable, mature, and failure-resistant. It uses the very common SQL as a query language, and you need a relational database for manufacturing anyway.

Talks & Conferences

Contact

You can find me on LinkedIn. Also feel free to contact me via email.