We are specialised on bioacoustical solutions. We help to improve the acoustical acquisition of animals in the wild through intelligent methods and automation. Most recent statistical tools allow elaborate classification of recorded signals on high confidence levels.

Our history

The beginning

It was obvious to Ulrich Marckmann and Volker Runkel – when both started their PhD work in 2002 at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Professor von Helversen‘s lab – that solutions were needed for the automated, acoustical acquisition and monitoring of bat activity. In spring 2004 they had the first batcorder prototyp – at that time based on a mini-pc – finally assembled and running. They managed to develop this prototyp on their own. In the following years up to nine of these mini-pc based batcorders were used for data collection (PhD thesis and such).

Runkel, Marckmann und Schuster GbR

A cooperation with the LIKE-Lehrstuhl of University Erlangen-Nuremberg allowed Claus Schuster to join the team to develop an end-user solution. By funding through the German state and its Exist-Seed program we managed to get the batcorder finally into an easy to use product. The Runkel, Marckmann und Schuster GbR existed from May 2007 until December 2009.

ecoObs GmbH

Since January 1st 2010 ecoObs exists as a limited liability company, lead by the managing directors Claus Schuster and Dr. Volker Runkel. We continue to produce first class detection and recording hardware and sound analysis software. We are your partner regarding batcorders. Ulrich Marckmann as director of the NycNoc GmbH is offering services related to batcorder usage in a tight cooperation with us.

Our Know-How

Amongst our PhD theses we were accompanying different studies on influence of bat activity through landscape changes. The intensive work on the ecology of European and some work on tropical bats in the last years give us a rather good overview of the demands bats have on their habitat. Furthermore we know about the possibilites modern technology holds for the acquisition of bats in the wild. Since most of our scientific work was based on bioacoustics of bats we intensively work on bat calls, echolocation and call design since more than ten years.

In our scientific work we had to develop and establish different hard- and software solutions for being able to use innovative approaches. We thus had to gather knowledge in fields like electronics or software development that now acts as established base for the solutions development within ecoObs.