Early Years

Carl Zeiss is a company with a long tradition that was founded by Carl Zeiss in 1846 in Jena as a precision mechanics and optics workshop.

From 1872, microscopes made in Jena were built on the basis of scientific calculations and therefore displayed considerably improved optical properties. This technological lead, which earned the company global recognition, is attributable to the physicist and mathematician Ernst Abbe, who became a dormant partner in the optical workshop in 1876.

Abbe’s theory of image formation in the microscope and the “sine condition” that bears his name form the basis of all high-performance optics.