Company News Jun 30, 2005 10:51 AM
Prof. Dr. Schulz receives honorary doctorate from RWTH Aachen
On Friday, July 1, 2005, Professor Dr.-Ing. Dr. h.c. Ekkehard Schulz, Chairman of the Executive Board of ThyssenKrupp AG, will receive an honorary doctorate from the RWTH Aachen University of Technology. The honor is being bestowed in recognition of his outstanding achievements in the building of a global technology group which holds leading positions in the production of steel and capital goods, for his promotion of new technologies in connection with the production of flat-rolled steel and the supply of components to the automotive industry, and for his forward-looking decisions in economic and ecological terms.
Ekkehard Schulz was born in 1941 in Bromberg, West Prussia and grew up in Germany's Palatinate region. After completing his higher school-leaving certificate (Abitur) in 1961, he studied metallurgy at Clausthal Technical University, gaining a doctorate "summa cum laude" in 1971. His career has been linked with the name Thyssen, and subsequently ThyssenKrupp, from the outset. Following positions as assistant to the Executive Board, chief of operations and plant manager, in 1985 he was appointed to the Executive Board of Thyssen Stahl AG as director of production in Duisburg, becoming Chairman of Thyssen Stahl in 1991 and at the same time member of the Executive Board of Thyssen AG. During the merger negotiations with the Krupp Group he was promoted to Chairman of the Executive Board of Thyssen AG, and from 1999 was joint Chief Executive of the newly formed ThyssenKrupp AG along with Gerhard Cromme. Following Gerhard Cromme's move to the position of Supervisory Board Chairman, Ekkehard Schulz has been Chairman of the Executive Board of the ThyssenKrupp Group since October 2001.
In his scientific work he was involved in developing new technologies for the production and processing of steel, in particular coating, as well as environmental protection and recycling. He later worked on the economic aspects of the material steel. His doctorate focused on "Studies of crystallization during the single-phase solidification of alloys, taking the copper-manganese and copper-nickel systems as an example".
In his various positions, Ekkehard Schulz has made key contributions toward creating one of the world's most advanced production sites for flat-rolled steel products in Duisburg. Under his leadership, the ThyssenKrupp Group has become a global producer of capital goods. One example of Ekkehard Schulz's courage in advancing new technologies on a technical scale is the start-up of a caster in Krefeld operating on the twin-roll principle. Preparations and work on optimizing this technology are being conducted in close collaboration with the RWTH Aachen, which also operates a pilot machine for this technology.
Professor Dr. Schulz has also provided support in many ways for young engineers, both in his own company and at German universities. Examples include his many years as a lecturer at Clausthal Technical University and his presentations to the Aachen Steel Colloquiums. More recently he has initiated close cooperation between ThyssenKrupp AG and several universities, on the one hand giving the company a presence among students and on the other hand providing financial, material and human resources to support engineering and scientific studies. The engineering faculties of the RWTH also profit from a cooperation agreement with ThyssenKrupp AG.
In the Year of Technology 2004, Professor Schulz launched the initiative "Discovering future technology". He is Vice President of the German Industry Assciation BDI, moderator of the "Initiativkreis Ruhrgebiet" Ruhr area initiative, member of the Senate of acatech and Governor of the Board of the International University in Bremen.