The Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation in Stuttgart will have a new head in January 2020. After Professor Thomas Bauernhansl had managed the third largest Fraunhofer Institute on his own for years, he was most recently supported by Professor Fritz Klocke. On January 1st, 2020, IPA's Head of Resource efficient Production, Professor Alexander Sauer, will move to the boards room.
“The entire institute is very grateful to Fritz Klocke. But he has also been of tremendous help to me personally over the past 18 months,” says Fraunhofer IPA Managing Director Thomas Bauernhansl. “I am glad that my colleague Alexander Sauer is now on board the institute management. Since 2015 Alexander Sauer as head of the Institute for Energy Efficiency in Production at the University of Stuttgart (EEP) and as head of department at Fraunhofer IPA has been driving central issues related to sustainability in the production environment, and we have gained tremendous visibility. We were able to gain large projects and have won many new industrial partnerships. Alexander Sauer really did a great job,” said Bauernhansl.
Alexander Sauer completed a double degree in mechanical engineering and business administration from RWTH Aachen in 1997, where he also received his doctorate in 2005. After working as a research assistant at the WZL, Sauer joined Hoerbiger Automotive Komfortsysteme GmbH in 2006 as a member of the executive board. In early 2011, he accepted the call to the Munich University of Applied Sciences as a professor for manufacturing technology. At the beginning of 2015, he was appointed as a professor at the EEP at the University of Stuttgart and, in parallel, took on more and more management tasks at Fraunhofer IPA. Sauer is the inventor of the energy efficiency index of the industry, head of the Ultra-efficiency Factory and spokesman for the Kopernikus Project SynErgie, one of the largest scientific projects in the context of the energy transition. “I am pleased about the trust placed in me and look forward to the new task. The IPA is a great institute with a great team, in which I like to make my contribution to success,” replied Professor Sauer when the news was announced.
Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation IPA