EXIST Ambassador Dr Klaus E. Austmeyer

On 6 June 2007, Dr Klaus E. Austmeyer was officially appointed EXIST Ambassador for the North-West region. As Exist Ambassador, Dr Austmeyer will pass on his many years of experience as an entrepreneur to young entrepreneurs, both in teaching and in technology transfer issues. In detail, his position includes

• Teaching in the field of technology transfer at the University of Oldenburg
• Advice on strategy development for the Northwest start-up region
• Support and advice for start-up projects with a focus on technology transfer
• Participation in the Northwest Start-up Promotion Round Table
• Marketing the Exist III idea in the region

Even before his habilitation in the field of "Energy Technology in Food Technology", Dr Austmeyer had already made a name for himself, particularly in the sugar industry. He has numerous publications and patents to his name for analysing and optimising energy and process engineering processes and as one of the pioneers in the energy-related use of sugar. In 1985, Dr Austmeyer was awarded the Technology Transfer Prize of the Braunschweig Chamber of Industry and Commerce for his innovations and transfer achievements in his region at the time. The subject was the continuous evaporation crystallisation of sucrose (VKT). In 2006, he received the international SIT Crystal Award (USA) for his work in this field. As managing director, he headed the companies GEA Wiegand and Univam (Gestra). In the past 10 years, he was the sole managing director of Horn GmbH and German Tecalemit GmbH. Mr Austmeyer has been involved in university teaching for over 25 years. Until 1987, he worked as a research assistant and later as head of department (deputy head of institute) at the Institute of Agricultural Technology and Sugar Industry at the TU Braunschweig. In 1982, the TU Braunschweig gave him a lectureship, which he held until 1987. After his habilitation (1989), he held lectures at the TU Berlin until 2000 alongside his management activities.