News releases 2014

Heriot-Watt University honours Atkins' CEO with doctorate - 25 November 2014

Prof Dr Uwe Krueger, Atkins' chief executive officer, has been awarded an honorary doctorate from Heriot-Watt University Dubai Campus for his exemplary entrepreneurial leadership and contributions to the application of science, engineering and technology to business and industry across the globe.

The award was made following a keynote lecture Uwe made to 600 engineering students at the Heriot-Watt University campus. In his speech, Uwe described how by 2050 the world is expected to become home to nine billion people, up from the current seven billion, with the rise in population most significantly felt in our cities.  

He said: "We will need to find solutions to unprecedented challenges, some of which, we don't even know exist yet. Doing what we did before is no longer an option. Meeting the challenges of the 21st century requires a new kind of design and engineering.

"Globally, some 2.2 million more engineers are needed in the next decade and there is no more exciting time to be working in engineering.   But engineering firms don't just want engineers, we need business people, scientists, town planners, architects and ecologists, to name just a few."

Professor Steve Chapman, principal and vice-chancellor of Heriot-Watt University, who presented Uwe with the doctorate, said: "Since his early days in academia Prof Dr Krueger has understood and appreciated how academia and industry can work together to solve world challenges.

"This approach aligns very well with Heriot-Watt University and indeed a formal partnership between our two organisations to develop railway research was signed last year at our Edinburgh campus. This partnership will result in new advances in railways and a significant impact in the future development of the railway industry."

Prof Dr Uwe Krueger

Prof Dr Uwe Krueger was appointed an executive director of Atkins in June 2011, taking up the post of chief executive officer in August 2011. He is a physicist who studied at the University of Frankfurt, graduating with a PhD in complex system theory. He also studied at Columbia University (New York), the Ecole Normale Supérieure (Paris), at Harvard (Boston) and he holds an Honorary Professorship in Physics from the University of Frankfurt am Main. Uwe has spent the majority of his career leading engineering and consulting organisations in North America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia Pacific.

He began his career at international strategy consulting firm, A. T. Kearney, followed by leadership positions at Hochtief AG, an international provider of construction services, including chief executive officer of central and eastern Europe, and senior vice president and chairman of Turner International based in Dallas, USA.

More recently he was chief executive officer of Swiss company, Oerlikon, one of the world's leading high-tech industrial companies specialising in machine and plant engineering. He joined Atkins from Texas Pacific Group, a private equity investment firm based in London and San Francisco and Cleantech Switzerland, a trade promotion organisation in the area of sustainability which operates on behalf of the Swiss Federal Government. He is currently on the boards of ONTEX S.A. (Zele, Belgium) and SUSI Partners AG (Zurich, Switzerland).

Ends
For more information:

Matt Graydon
Group PR director

matt.graydon@atkinsglobal.com
+44 1372 752088

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Notes to editors:

Atkins

Atkins (www.atkinsglobal.com ) is one of the world's leading design, engineering and project management consultancies*, employing some 18,000 people across the UK, North America, Middle East, Asia Pacific and Europe. Our people's breadth and depth of expertise and drive to ask why has allowed us to plan, design and enable some of the world's most complex and time critical projects.

*15th largest global design firm (Engineering News-Record 2014) and the third largest multidisciplinary consultancy in Europe (Svensk Teknik och Design 2013).

Recent projects from across the Group:

Atkins is working across urban regeneration, master planning, national energy programmes, major transport schemes, water and environment projects - applying smart design solutions on projects including:

  • Central Planning Office - helping to co-ordinate Qatar's National 2030 Vision for world class transport infrastructure, which will bring major benefits to the economy;
  • The London 2012 Games infrastructure transformation - as technical advisor to London's boroughs as the Olympic Park moves into its legacy configuration as a follow-on role to our work as the Games' official engineering and design provider;
  • 's peaceful nuclear new build programme - providing technical assurance to lenders backing the United Arab Emirates' most ambitious energy infrastructure projects;
  • North Sea and Gulf of Mexico oil and gas platforms - extending the operational life of critical oil and gas platforms to allow cost-efficient and safe recovery of fuel sources from mature fields;
  • offshore wind alliance - provision of expert engineering and design support for the UK's biggest offshore wind alliance with Scottish and Southern Energy;
  • - designing the Central London twin tunnels and station architecture for Europe's biggest civil engineering scheme which will see tunnels passing beneath 470 listed buildings and critical infrastructure;
  • Railway - providing multidisciplinary design expertise on the 1,200 km Rail network which will passenger and freight transport in the ;
  • Denmark - providing signalling expertise on the first countrywide installation of an train control and management system in Denmark;
  • Hong Kong-- Bridge - lead consultant on this integral part of the new Hong Kong link road scheme which will significantly boost land connectivity in the region;
  • Sixth Form College - design of the energy consumption College in the UK which aims to reduce operational energy use by more than 60% compared to previous designs;
  • UK National Composites Centre - providing technical expertise to bring the latest lightweight carbon fibre materials to all engineering sectors, helping to develop innovative applications and reduce costs and carbon;
  • US Environmental Protection Agency - providing technical assessment and analysis of national water-related resources and ecological systems in North America;
  • Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) broadband - providing technical, commercial and procurement support to help deliver broadband to one of Europe's most remote regions.


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