Epic, the European Photonics Industry Consortium, has appointed Carlos Lee as its next Director General, succeeding Thomas Pearsall who has led the association since its founding in 2003.
Lee, who will take up his position immediately, is currently Director General at Semi Europe, where he leads the advocacy program. He brings 15 years of industry association management with extensive experience in building membership value through standardization, collaboration, networking platforms and events.
“Carlos’ appointment comes at a time of growth for Epic. Carlos has a real passion for collaboration and is excellent at engaging members into working together to create value, said Drew Nelson, CEO and President of IQE, and current President of Epic, in a statement.
“Carlos emerged as our first choice because of his experience and his energy to drive new initiatives to benefit our members. I will be working with Carlos throughout 2012 to help ensure a successful transition,” said the current Secretary General Thomas P. Pearsall.
“As Director General I will further expand the solid value proposition for our members active in displays, lasers, lighting, optical fibers, optics, semiconductor, photovoltaics, sensors, telecommunication and other critical photonic related fields," said Lee.
At Semi Europe, Lee successfully programmed the ISS Europe Executive Symposium in February on the challenges of 450mm wafers.
"I am pleased to announce that Epic will open an office in Brussels. We will implement closer collaboration with the EU in order to better represent the interests of our members and photonics, a key enabling technology and future EU Public-Private Partnership.”
Epic is Europe’s leading photonics industry association with 80 voting members and over 400 associate members. Epic members have played a leading role in creating and operating the European Technology Platform, Photonics-21, as well as many influential European projects, such as Lift for fiber laser development, and Nexpresso which supports commercial innovation by SMEs.