Dr. Dirk Van Meirvenne appointed new Managing Director of Bayer Technology Services GmbH
Dr. Dirk Van Meirvenne (46) is to become the new Managing Director of Bayer Technology services GmbH effective June 1, 2010. Van Meirvenne, who is a Belgian citizen, is currently Head of Production and Technology Isocyanates at Bayer MaterialScience AG. He succeeds Achim Noack (50), who is to be appointed to the Board of Management of Bayer CropScience AG on June 1, 2010. Noack will assume responsibility for Industrial Operations & QHSE (Quality, Health, Safety and Environment) at Bayer CropScience effective October 1, 2010. He succeeds Dr. Wolfgang Welter (62), who will start his retirement on September 30, after many years of valuable service.
Dr. Dirk Van Meirvenne was born on September 19, 1963 in Sint-Niklaas, Belgium, and studied polymer chemistry at the University of Ghent, Belgium. In 1990 he joined Bayer Antwerpen N.V., Belgium, where he worked in titanium dioxide production until 1997, latterly as plant manager. He subsequently transferred to the plastics unit where he was responsible for polycarbonate production in Antwerp until 2001. Van Meirvenne subsequently served as site manager in Map Ta Phut, Thailand, which at that time was being expanded to become Bayer’s largest production center for polycarbonates in Asia.
Just over a year later he was appointed Head of Global Operations, Polycarbonates at Bayer Polymers in Krefeld-Uerdingen. When Bayer MaterialScience was formed in 2004, he was appointed Global Head of Production and Technology in the Polycarbonates business unit. Since 2007 Van Meirvenne has served as Global Head of Production and Technology, Isocyanates, at Bayer MaterialScience in Leverkusen. In this capacity he was responsible for the construction of the MDI and TDI facilities in Caojing near Shanghai, China.
Achim Noack was born in Hamburg on July 17, 1959. After studying chemical engineering at the University of Dortmund, he joined Bayer AG in 1986 as a process engineer with the former Crop Protection Business Group. After five years he transferred to the Engineering unit of the Central Technology Division. Two years later he moved to Kansas City, Missouri, United States, to serve as project manager for the Crop Protection Business Group.
Noack returned to Germany in 1997 as plant manager for the Organic Chemicals Business Group in Krefeld-Uerdingen. Two years later he was placed in charge of engineering support for agrochemical active ingredients in Germany. In 2000 he was named Head of the Corporate Engineering Department and, shortly thereafter, Chief Technology Officer of Bayer Corporation, U.S.A., in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. After the establishment of Bayer Technology Services (BTS) in 2002, he headed the Bayer Technology Services Americas office. Noack was appointed managing director of BTS in mid-2005. In this function he pursued a consistent growth strategy and transformed the former central technology division into a flexible and customer-oriented services provider.
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