Celebrating Hajni Kovacs on International Day of Women and Girls in Science

Integral LED’s Hajni Kovacs is at the forefront of inspection and testing in the lab. She plays a pivotal role in gathering performance data of Integral’s LED products, enabling the team to analyse and review this data against what they expect the products to do.

Last week, Hajni celebrated 5 years at Integral. As an established quality control professional, she began her journey on the Memory side before taking a leap to the bright side of Semiconductor technology with LED.

I was involved in Quality Control before I came to Integral, and am used to scrutinising data. I started out with exploring computer memory at the company before transitioning to LED. It actually started when I met a fellow Hungarian, Szidonia, in the lighting lab, who showed me the ropes. There was, and still is to this day, a lot to learn about LED!

So what’s a day in the lab with Hajni look like?

In the lab, we’ve got two big integrating spheres made of metal, which we use for testing our products. Now, part of a scientist’s skillset is gathering data consistently, under strict and consistent processes, which means I need to make sure that the two spheres are always stabilized in size (metal reacts to temperature). I usually first check the lab ambient temperature, which should ideally be at 25 Degrees Celsius. Next, to validate my data, I’ll check a reference lamp every day and compare results from the previous day. If there’s a similar light output, we’re good to start testing. If not, I’ll need to recalibrate the system or wait until the temperature stabilises.

We do all these checks for consistency, so when we start testing, we can use the data to assess the product. We want to make sure that when a product is 10 or 20 per cent off the mark, that it’s the product and not the equipment, which then allows us to investigate and make adjustments.

Basically, I am here to test and assess our lighting range, managing and controlling uncertainties to reduce error and produce consistent, robust, safe and secure LED products for our customers.

We are very lucky to have Hajni as part of our testing and inspecting set up, so we can keep delivering top quality products to our customers year in, year out.