27-28 April 2021
Online Event
We are excited by the opportunities our new event platform provides to deliver you the same high-quality content, expert speakers and unique networking opportunities you have come to expect; all of which will now be available to access remotely from your home or office.
About GOCarbonFibre: Europe's only conference dedicated to carbon fibre
Smithers has been organising the world renowned Global Outlook for Carbon Fibre conference for over 20 years. As the only conference focused solely on carbon fibre, the event provides a unique global forum for carbon fibre producers, converters, composite industry executives, researchers, technologists and new entrants to receive a comprehensive update on the outlook for growth, supply, demand, use and recycling of carbon fibres.
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Dr Maurice N. Collins is a Senior lecturer at the School of Engineering, Principal Investigator at the Bernal Institute and Funded Investigator as the Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) AMBER centre at the University of Limerick, in Ireland. Currently, he is the Lead Principal investigator (PI) and coordinator of the H2020 funded LIBRE consortium (lignin for carbon fiber), the largest consortium in biobased carbon fibre research in Europe as well as being Co-PI on multiple national funded projects. He has published widely in all the leading journals in his field, is the holder of multiple patents, multiple research awards and has won in excess of €13 million worth of competitive research funding. He has been invited speaker in Europe, Asia and the US. He acts as consultant for various multinational organisations and he is editor of the international journal of biological macromolecules published by Elsevier.
Dr. Christian Vogl is working at Fiberline Composites A/S as Product Manager in 2020. In this position, he is strengthening Fiberline’s technology lead in carbon and glass pultrusion for the wind turbine industry. 2018 he joined Envision Energy in Shanghai, China, where he led several projects about rotor blade technology. He worked for Nordex Energy GmbH from 2014 as Project Manager Rotorblade and was responsible for the development of Nordex’s latest rotor blades. All recent blade developments at Nordex were carbon blades. From 2012 he was Head of Process Engineering and Commissioning for Carbon Fiber and Process technology and Carbon Fiber Expert at Eisenmann Anlagenbau (now: One Joon). He was responsible for all the process engineering for carbon fiber plants, including the oxidation ovens, carbonisation furnaces and the waste gas treatment. From 2011 he was Technical Project Manager Rotor blade Development and in this position responsible for the development of rotor blades for multi-MW-class wind turbines (2.4 to 6.5 MW). One of the main topics was the first serial implementation of carbon fibers into rotor blades for wind turbines at Nordex. From January 2007 to December 2010 he worked for SGL Carbon as project manager in the field of carbon fiber production and development.
Roberto Cicalò joined Automobili Lamborghini S.p.A. in 2015 as external consultant for the R&D department. He follows as Project Manager different projects in the “Development Composites Centre” in particular focused on composite applications related to Lamborghini’s “Corporate Social Responsibility” in collaboration with various Scientific Institutes, Universities and Industrial Partners.
Prior to joining Lamborghini, Roberto worked as responsible of electric-electronic department in other consultant companies where he gained wide experience in the development, validation and put into production of motorcycle vehicles for different wide world companies.
Doctor of Philosophy (Sep 2006 ~ Dec 2010)
School of Polymer, Textile and Fiber Engineering, Georgia Tech, GA, USA
MS (MAR 1997 ~ FEB 1999)
Fiber and Polymer Science, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea
BS (MAR 1993 ~ FEB 1997)
Fiber and Polymer Science, Seoul National University, Seoul, Korea
Research Interests:
Carbon Fiber, CFRP, recycling of CFRP, fast curing thermosetting, Vitrimer matrix composites,
Nanocomposites, Cellulose nano-fiber, Cellulose nano-crystals, Injection molding of plastics, compression molding of plastics, paintings, water bone paint, solvent bone paint, Additive manufacturing,
Research Experience:
Senior Research Engineer (FEB 2011~) : Plastics for automotive exterior parts, CFRP
Exterior, and PT Polymeric Materials Development team, Hyundai Motor Company
Research Manager (Jun 2001 ~ Oct 2006) : Plastics compounding, Plastic characterization
Flame retardant ABS development team, LG Chem.
Research Engineer (FEB 1999 ~ MAY 2001) : fiber spinning, fiber interlacing
PTT (poly-trimethylene terephthalate) fiber spinning, Saehan industry
Dr. Balazs Zsigmond is the General Director of DeveloComp, Hungary, focusing for GFRP and CFRP mold and part production. Previously he led the Technical Fabrics Department at Metyx Hungary For almost a year he was the Technical and Quality manager of Sky Advanced Materials, Hungary, which company focuses for carbon fiber multiaxial fabric development and production. Between 2011 and 2016 he was the head of Product Development Engineering at HCC, Russia, where he focused for development of woven, knitted and braided fabrics as well as prepregs based mainly on carbon fiber. Before he led the Development group at Zoltek Hungary for 4 years, as well as be part of Zoltek Automotive team. He graduated as mechanical engineer and got his PhD at Budapest University and Technology, Hungary. After his studies he worked at NASA GRC, USA as an independent researcher.
2005 – 2011: RWTH Aachen University, Mechanical Engineering - Diploma Degree, Specialization in major study: Plastics Technology
2008 – 2012: RWTH Aachen University, Economics - Master of Business Administration (MBA)
2012 - 2019: Institute of Plastics Processing (IKV) at RWTH Aachen University, Research Assistant, Composites and Polyurethanes – Doctor Degree/PhD in the field of composites processing
Since 2017: Mitsui Chemicals Europe GmbH, Duesseldorf (HQ Europe), Business Development Manager, Responsible for Thermoplastic Composites Business and Development in Europe
Frazer has more than 30 years’ experience in the composites industry, and for the last 4 years has been heavily involved in carbon fibre recycling. After graduating with a materials science degree, Frazer first worked as a wind turbine blade design engineer before moving into the composites industry with SP Systems (now Gurit). After working on the design and development of composite structures for the marine, oil and gas and defence industries, Frazer moved to DML where he ran the composites business unit, which was a pioneer in the use of carbon fibre to rehabilitate existing civil infrastructure. From 2000 to 2010, Frazer worked for Cytec Engineered Materials in the UK, US and China, culminating in the construction of a composites manufacturing plant in Shanghai. From there, Frazer moved to Hengshen Carbon Fibre where he led efforts to position the company as a global supplier of carbon fibre. It was there that Frazer first became aware of the importance of recycling, leading to a cooperation with Adesso Advanced Materials to evaluate the possibilities of recyclable epoxies. After a short spell assisting Adesso refining its commercial strategies, Frazer returned to the UK to become Managing Director of ELG Carbon Fibre, where he has guided the company through the industrialisation of its carbon fibre recovery process and overseen the expansion of the companies capabilities to produce a range of recycled carbon fibre products for the composites and compounding industries.
As the Director of the Carbon Nexus research centre at Deakin University, Derek leads the strategic direction and capability development of the world’s only open-access carbon fibre research facility.
Prior to taking on the leadership of Carbon Nexus just over two years ago, Derek was the General Manager of SABIC’s Functional Polymers business unit, which led the development of the company’s carbon fibre venture. Derek was based in Saudi Arabia for several years for this role.
Before this Derek was the Global Market Director for automotive exteriors for GE Plastics, based in The Netherlands. In this role he led the development and commercialisation of new products and technologies in thermoplastic composites and lightweight polymer glazing. This followed two years in Shanghai establishing new product development and testing capabilities at the GE Technology Centre.
Buckmaster began his career with GE Plastics in Melbourne in 1988, as a CAE design engineer. He then moved to the United States, holding several roles in advanced design engineering and marketing. Returning to Australia in 1990, Buckmaster became sales manager for GE's Industrial Diamond division. He held several other roles with the company in Australia, including export sales manager and product technology manager, before moving to Singapore to GE Plastics’ Pacific Headquarters in 1998.
John has been in the Carbon Fibre manufacturing industry since 1982, working first on the development of Courtaulds large tow precursors and their conversion into Oxidised fibres for RK Carbon Fibres Ltd, which was closely followed by 3, 6, and 12k precursors for conversion to Carbon Fibres.
He became involved in plant construction in 1986 as part of a team working on Technology Transfer Projects in India, China and South Korea. In 1991 he left RK Carbon and was involved in a project in Russia after which, in 1995, he returned to India and China on Technology Transfer Projects for RK Carbon.
In 1997 RK Carbon was acquired by SGL Technic Ltd at which point he was appointed Project Manager for a £25m inward investment project to build two state of the art Carbon Fibre production lines in Scotland.
He left SGL in 2003 to form Milled Carbon Ltd, where they developed the world’s first commercial continuous carbon fibre composite recycling process. The company was later acquired by German metals reclamation company ELG Haniel.
In 2008 he began working on Technology Transfer Projects in Italy, Turkey and Portugal with US and European partners. Further Technology Transfer Projects continued over the next 5 years in China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, Thailand and India.
In 2014, after over 12 years of discussing collaboration possibilities, he joined Cygnet-Texkimp Ltd in Northwich, Cheshire, where he offers turn-key solutions for Carbon Fibre Production Facilities.
Daniel Pichler has more than 35 years experience in carbon fiber, composite materials, and other high performance materials and components. He is Partner / joint Managing Director of CarbConsult GmbH – specialists in strategy, restructuring and technical consulting in carbon fiber, composite materials, and other specialty materials. CarbConsult’s clients include carbon fiber and composites companies, chemical companies, investor groups and other interested parties in Europe, Asia and the US. Previously, Mr. Pichler has lead carbon fiber businesses and developed business with Hitco Carbon Composites (Armco Inc.), SGL Group, AKSA (now DOWAksa), HCC/Prepreg-ACM and others. Dan lives in Florida and spends summers in Sweden.
Andrew Mafeld has over thirty years of experience in the global composites industry covering the carbon, glass and natural fibre sectors. He is the founder and Managing Director of the Connectra group of companies, a Swedish based international business development consultancy working in composites materials.
Prior to founding Connectra in 1998, Andrew held Vice President positions in both commercial and technical areas at Owens Corning, in both Europe and the USA. Earlier in his career, Andrew worked for Procter & Gamble and Monsanto. Andrew has a chemical engineering degree from Imperial College, London, an MBA from INSEAD, France and speaks multiple languages.
He has authored numerous composites related reports for clients worldwide, including companies, government ministries and regional development agencies. His book on "The Automation of Polymer Composites Manufacturing" was published by JEC in 2010 and he regularly presents papers on the composites industry at conferences in Asia, the USA and Europe.
Dr. Hans Hansson has been working in the composite field since 1980. He has professional experience from the composite industry in different leading positions in R&D, production and marketing of composite components. Hansson has for more than 20 years been CEO of Swerea SICOMP, one of Europes leading research institutes focused on composite technology. He is now working as Senior Advisory for Swerea SICOMP.
