Christian Ernst
AI Engineer, Designer, University Teacher
Principal AI Engineer at AstraZeneca / Evinova
About
Christian Ernst is an engineer and designer specialising in AI-centric product development and agentic systems. He is currently building internal AI automations with the AstraZeneca company Evinova. Before that, he was leading a seven-person team building next-generation event software at Sweap, where he architects and deploys production AI systems using technologies like Python FastAPI, PydanticAI, Prefect in multi-client architectures. He combines hands-on Python development with strategic product leadership. His expertise spans the full spectrum from UI/UX design to backend AI workflows, enabling him to bridge design thinking with technical execution. He also teaches 'Design with AI' and 'Extended Intelligences' at HTW Berlin and IAAC Barcelona, demystifying AI systems for the next generation of designers.
Skills
Design
Figma 11 years (Expert) Leadership
AI Automations & Agentic Frameworks
Langchain 3 years (Advanced) Langgraph 2 years (Advanced) 
Pydantic AI 1 years (Advanced) 
Google ADK 0 years (Beginner) 
Pytorch 2 years (Beginner) 
Jupyter 2 years (Beginner) Backend, DevOps, AIOps
Python 5 years (Advanced) 
FastAPI 4 years (Advanced) 
Flask 4 years (Advanced) 
Prefect 2 years (Intermediate) 
Docker 2 years (Beginner) 
IBM Cloud 1 years (Intermediate) Langsmith 2 years (Intermediate) Logfire 1 years (Intermediate) Langsmith 2 years (Intermediate) 
Pytest 2 years (Intermediate) 
Sentry 2 years (Beginner) 
Keycloak 2 years (Intermediate) Frontend Prototyping
Tailwind 5 years (Advanced) 
Next.JS 3 years (Intermediate) 
Nuxt + Vue 2 years (Intermediate) 
Streamlit 3 years (Intermediate) 
React 2 years (Beginner) 
Svelte/SvelteKit 2 years (Beginner) Other Skills
Ableton 8 years (Advanced) 
Arduino 4 years (Advanced) 
3D Printing 4 years (Beginner) Projects
Lead Companion
Description of Lead Companion, with a lot of words and then later, after two lines, link to Description of Lead Companion, with a lot of words and then later, after two lines, link to Description of Lead Companion, with a lot of words and then later, after two lines, link to official website
Teaching (Barcelona): Extended Intelligences '25
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Sonic Ecologies 2.0
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Prototyping with IBM
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Teaching (Berlin): Cabinet of AI Curiosities
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Teaching (Barcelona): Extended Inteligences
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Teaching (Berlin): Dreaming With Eyes Open
A 5-day design sprint with students at HTW Berlin understanding and critically investigating AI tools in a today's designer's workflow.
AI Headlines
An experiment using a fully-automated web platform that generates news headlines with ChatGPT and illustrates them with a finetuned StableDiffusion version every seven hours.Check out the concluded experiment and my thoughts on it.
Latent Space Walks
An AI animation with a StableDiffusion version, interpolating from Cezanne to Monet. Part of a longer video; upscaled to 2K, running at 25fps.
Woodstaco
A light installation designed and built for Woodstaco Festival 2023 in Chile. Standing more than two meters tall, the light installation takes the form of a flower, which sleeps during the day but wakes up with the nightfall.
AURA
A platform for authentically matching senior business owners with young entrepreneurs in Germany's rural areas.
DOTTOD
An image generation network journaling the Italian elections in September 2022 by visualizing politician's tweets.
This Flower Does Not Exist
Training StyleGan2-ADA from the ground up on flower image data. Included dataset preparation, training and finetuning.
Master in Design for Emergent Futures
A trans-disciplinary master with elements of computer science, electrical engineering and digital fabrication. Link to both MDEF Documentation and FabAcademy Documentation here.
Hybrid Ecosystems
An interactive audiovisual exhibition exploring the patterns that emerge in both natural and synthetic ecosystems.View the project website here.
Deep Tarot Cards
An exploration of how AI would interpret the mystical symbolism and creative associations of Tarot cards. View the project website here.
Plant B
An investigation into the intimate relationship between humans and plants through music, exploring how plants can make music.View the project website here.
Moodja
A platform making vast amounts of logistical information available to users in an accessible and actionable way.
Teaching: Web Design Doesn't Have To Be Scary
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Neulandia
A playful and approachable presentation platform for a social entrepreneur startup.
Teaching: Manipulation Machines
A university course investigating dark UX patterns and building playful digital contraptions that intend to manipulate the user. Taught completely digital and remote during the first 5 months of the COVID pandemic. View the project website here.
Mapify
A project focused on reducing friction and increasing retention for social network users across three platforms.
Teaching: Future Human Machine Interfaces
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Athena @ Goodpatch Berlin
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BA Thesis: Virtual Autonomous Automotive Realities
A speculative exploration of how virtual reality could transform the autonomous vehicle experience. This thesis examines the intersection of autonomous driving technology and immersive digital environments to reimagine transportation interfaces and experiences.
Drop for Airbnb
A speculative concept for Airbnb that connects travelers with local hosts offering unique, short-duration experiences. This conceptual mobile app design enhances the travel experience by facilitating authentic local connections through brief, meaningful encounters.
Remembering Le Mans 1955
An interactive, responsive memorial experience designed for the 60th anniversary of the 1955 Le Mans disaster. The project presents historical events through a carefully crafted blend of typography, imagery, and storytelling across both web and mobile platforms to educate new audiences about this significant motorsport tragedy.
New Eden
A handcrafted book about video game world design and environmental storytelling, exploring both classic and modern games. The publication features a unique wooden laser-etched cover and numerous custom illustrations analyzing how digital spaces are designed to evoke emotions and guide players.
Early Editorial Design
My professional start creating editorial designs for major clients including Bosch, Audi, Deutsche Bahn, and ThyssenKrupp. I was responsible for multi-language publication design, layouts, typography quality assurance, and complete project management for two publications.
Work Experience
Principal AI Engineer
As part of the Data Science team at Evinova, part of AstraZeneca, I am responsible for rapidly prototyping internal AI automations and maturing them to a 'product light' maturity. In this context,multi-agent architectures using Google ADK and deployed on AWS are most common.
Head of Innovation
Following successful validation of a prototype built together with IBM, I hired and lead a seven-person product development team delivering a multi-platform AI product (iOS, PWA, web). The product, currently in closed beta, employs technologies including Python FastAPI, PydanticAI, Prefect, Nuxt.js and Edge Functions across eight codebases. I drove technical architecture, product strategy, and cross-functional collaboration, while still actively contributing to the codebase.
Key Achievements
- Matured a prototype to a product with three clients and eight codebases, being tested by 20+ beta testers
- Achieved 90+% Test coverage across both backend and frontend repositories
- Repeatedly demonstrated the delivery of high-complexity features and product updates against tight deadlines
- Contributions to the IBM ecosystem were recognised as naming him an IBM Champion in 2025
Senior Product Designer
Led product strategy, design and frontend development for small and medium enterprises, delivering comprehensive digital solutions across several domains.
Key Achievements
- Assembled and led full-stack freelance teams to work on and deliver complex B2B and B2C platforms to clients
- Successfully managed projects from the private and public sector with up to 30 months duration
Education
MA Mention in Research
MA Design for Emergent Futures
BA Communication Design
Teaching Experience
Teaching: Extended Intelligences
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Founding Member
Founding member of a distributed design collective developing data installations across continents, focusing on innovative AI and technological solutions. Winners of the Distributed Design Award 2023.
Teaching: HMIs & Applied Artificial Inteligence
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Exhibitions
Sonic Ecologies 2.0
DOTTOD – cybernetic interpretations
DOTTOD – cybernetic interpretations
Hybrid Ecosystems
Human-Machine-Interfaces
Want to get in touch?
Made with ♥ in Barcelona. © 2025 Christian Ernst. All rights reserved.