Richard van den Hof has delivered a valuable and crucial contribution to the Dutch Polymer Institute. Since the foundation of DPI he has had a lot of influence on the growth and success of the institute. He played an essential role in the innovations in DPI activities. DPI is very grateful to Richard for his long term commitment and efforts.
Having reached the retirement age he will leave the institute. In the spring of this year he resigned from his position as scientific chairman of Performance Polymers and per 1 October he officially resigned.
Richard van den Hof has written a personal note:
After more than 13 years involvement in DPI I will leave for retirement per 1st October 2011. I hope you agree with me that this fare well and thank you note per e-mail is appropriate for a virtual institute like DPI
My involvement dates back from before the actual start of DPI. In my research position at DSM in many discussions then, mainly with Leen Struik, I was able to emphasize the importance of incorporating polymer processing research and soon after that I was asked to help realise this in a position as Industrial Contact Person, supporting the PC representative from DSM. That went well enough apparently to be nominated as PC member for DSM in the Engineering Plastics cluster. That eventually culminated into becoming Program Manager for that area, of course refraining from voting rights for DSM. On a temporary basis I also fulfilled the role of Program Manager for the Corporate Research Program and the newly started Bio-Inspired Polymers cluster. Very busy but interesting period.
With the further growth of DPI the current Technology Area structure emerged with a new challenge for me: Scientific Chairman of the Engineering Plastics area. After the merger with the Rubber Technology Area I kept that role for the engineering polymers, together with prof. Jacques Noordermeer who took care of the rubber technology. Spring 2011 our chairmanships were taken over by prof. Costantino Creton.
The DPI formula of an industry driven program as the basis for fundamental research has proven to work very well. Industry relevant disciplines and cooperation were kept or built with sufficient critical mass, many well educated people found their way in academia or industry, the scientific quality of the research surpasses that of non-industry driven research in the same area and a vast and thriving network of people in industry and academia became the backbone of DPI as a whole.
It is with much pleasure that I could contribute to this formula, both from industry and DPI management positions. In the cooperation with industry partners and researchers I met full trust that we worked well on the right things, even when, no doubt, competitive issues played a role as well.
I like to thank everyone for this trust and the good cooperation and I wish DPI to have a bright future. The formula might need modifications in changing situations but the core of industry driven fundamental research deserves continuation and growth.
On behalf of the entire DPI community we thank Richard for his efforts to make DPI into the successful institute it is today. We say goodbye to a true DPI icon.
We wish Richard all the best, health and pleasure in this new phase in his life.