A hardware-implemented multi-layer perceptron model calculation unit includes: a processor core to calculate output quantities of a neuron layer based on input quantities of an input vector; a memory that has, for each neuron layer, a respective configuration segment for storing configuration parameters and a respective data storage segment for storing the input quantities of the input vector and the one or more output quantities; and a DMA unit to successively instruct the processor core to: calculate respective neuron layers based on the configuration parameters of each configuration segment, calculate input quantities of the input vector defined thereby, and store respectively resulting output quantities in a data storage segment defined by the corresponding configuration parameters, the configuration parameters of configuration segments successively taken into account indicating a data storage region for the resulting output quantities corresponding to the data storage region for the input quantities for a subsequent neuron layer.