Assemblify CEO Oliver Grass: from hyperspectral imaging to industrial LED lighting and defense maintenance

By Grace Kim

Oliver Grass bought his first stake in Assemblify's predecessor in 2004, founded Inno-spec GmbH in 2005, and now runs a 20-person engineering firm in Nuremberg that builds mechatronic prototypes for Siemens, Continental/Vitesco, DEKRA, and Semikron Danfoss. In an interview with Antonio Castelo, technology manager at the European Photonics Industry Consortium (EPIC), Grass traced a career that spans two decades of industrial hyperspectral imaging and one cross-border merger.

How did Grass get to the CEO seat?

Grass joined RSK-elektronik in the early 2000s while completing an MSc in electrical engineering at the Nuremberg Institute of Technology. In 2004 he bought out a departing founder's share. A year later he set up Inno-spec GmbH to focus on spectroscopic measurement technology.

For 20 years he led Inno-spec into industrial hyperspectral imaging, building systems for automated sorting, recycling, process monitoring, material identification, and quality inspection. In 2024 Inno-spec merged with Headwall Photonics; Grass stayed as managing director of Machine Vision until 2026, when the company was fully absorbed and production and customer support moved to Austria. He then took the CEO post at Assemblify, the company that grew out of the original RSK-elektronik business.

What does Assemblify do today?

The firm specializes in mechatronic and electronic equipment prototypes, low-volume serial production, ramp-up, and maintenance of highly complex products. Services span the full chain from engineering to finished equipment, including electronic design, PCB layout, PCB assembly, testing, and quality control.

Assemblify stayed in the background during the Inno-spec years, supplying engineering knowledge for the optical and machine-vision product lines. Grass's strategy now pairs contract engineering for existing international partners with two growth pillars of its own.

What went wrong with hyperspectral pricing?

Grass entered hyperspectral imaging in 2005, when fiber-based spectrometers already had many providers and Specim held the high-end scientific market. Inno-spec chose a different position. "We decided to focus on 'fit for purpose' at the best possible price for industrial users," he said. Margins stayed low, but the company scaled with its customers.

Pricing remained the core problem. Costs did not fall as expected, and market access proved difficult, especially in food applications — the main market. "Food and beverage are still struggling with hyperspectral because the prices are too high," Grass said. He expects on-chip spectral filtering, snapshot architectures, and AI-based processing to resolve the pricing issue within 2 to 3 years.

On requirements, Grass reports a shift over 20 years: integrators now know where and what to look for, so specifications have tightened around specific wavelengths, lighting, resolution, and camera speed with enough throughput to recognize the material. He sees no demand for more pixels, throughput, or light for their own sake. Resolution, speed, and above all illumination must match the task, which is why customized lighting matters so much.

"AI and everything that comes with it will solve many of the remaining problems, so the core technology doesn't need to improve dramatically," Grass said.

What did the Headwall merger teach him?

The merger logic was straightforward: Headwall wanted Inno-spec's industrial expertise; Inno-spec wanted Headwall's scale. Grass's first advice for anyone negotiating a merger: hire a consultant, especially across a language barrier. Inno-spec used one to negotiate with an American private equity firm, and Grass called it "very important to have someone on our side."

He also underestimated the emotional cost of selling. He knew from the start he would no longer be the owner, but he should have thought earlier about what he wanted afterward and how much would change. Culture was the harder problem: "Culture eats strategy for breakfast," he said, noting that after the merger the culture inevitably changed and keeping the team's efficiency and alignment at the same level became a real challenge.

Early management lessons came hard. In his first year running Inno-spec, the customer providing 70% of income went bankrupt, forcing a pivot toward own products and partnerships. Earlier, selling training equipment directly to schools and universities taught him that a product needs a manual, packaging, logistics, and a sales and marketing department behind it.

What comes next for Assemblify?

With partner CREATIVE LED, Assemblify is developing an industrial LED line light for the infrared region that Grass calls smarter and brighter than conventional solutions. The company also offers halogen and ring lights, and presented the range under the customized industrial lighting theme at VISION Stuttgart in October 2026.

The second pillar is maintenance and calibration services for optomechanical devices, cameras, and lasers. Grass sees defense as a natural fit: "Mission readiness means maintenance readiness." Assemblify already works with well-known European defense companies and plans to expand into other sectors, because firms under economic pressure are downsizing and struggle to run maintenance in-house — it is hard to plan, staff is short, and backlogs build up.

Assemblify also wants its own products again, returning to the independence Grass chased after that first bankruptcy two decades ago. The open question is whether a 20-person Nuremberg contractor can build a product business in a lighting market where hyperspectral veterans already learned how thin hardware margins run.

More information: www.assemblify.de