Dr. ir. P.J.M. van Laarhoven was appointed by the General Board of NWO as new chair of the governing board of the Stichting Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica in Amsterdam per 1 May, 2009. He succeeds Prof. dr. P.W. Adriaans. Peter van Laarhoven is Group Strategy Director at TNT in Hoofddorp. He has much experience in the field of societal logistics, which is one of the main topics of the Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica.
Van Laarhoven was previously affiliated with Philips Research Laboratories, the Philips Center for Quantitative Methods, McKinsey & Company and KLM Cargo. From 1996 until 2000 he was a Professor of International Distribution and Logistics at the Eindhoven University of Technology. He is Chair of the 'Commissie van Laarhoven', an independent advisory board that advices the Minister of Transport on innovation in logistics, especially supply chains.
The previous chair, Pieter Adriaans (University of Amsterdam), was appointed to the Board at 1 March, 2002. From 1 March, 2003, he was chair and being reappointed twice.
Founded in 1946, CWI is the national research institute for mathematics and computer science. It is located at Science Park Amsterdam and is part of the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO). The institute holds a strong international position. More than 160 researchers conduct pioneering research in about 70 projects, and share their acquired knowledge with society. Some 30 researchers are professor at a university. The institute generated 16 spin-off companies.
