Speakers

Boris Berleb joined Bertrand Ingenieurbüro GmbH in 2006 after studying mechanical engineering at the University of Applied Sciences in Deggendorf. He was involved in the implementation of pedestrian protection development activities at Bertrand and became team leader for functional design CAE and vehicle safety in 2013. Apart from vehicle development, he is also concerned with the interdisciplinary compatibility of requirements with regard to pedestrian protection.

Since 2011, Maxim Bierbach has been working at the Federal Highway Research Institute (BASt) in the department "Active Vehicle Safety and Driver Assistance Systems" on technical issues concerning electric mobility as well as vehicle lighting systems. During the implementation of national and international research projects he is involved in corresponding safety-relevant aspects. In addition to these two topics, another key activity of his work are "driver assistance systems". As an active member of the EuroNCAP working group, he is involved in further development of test methods and the development of test procedures (protocols).

Benjamin Buenger is working on Pedestrian Protection since 2004. Starting in the test lab at Opel, he moved on to do Pedestrian Protection development work. In 2011, he took on the role ‘Vehicle Performance Owner for Pedestrian Protection’, a global technical lead function for General Motors. In 2015, the responsibility for the Opel Pedestrian Protection team was assigned to him in addition. Complementing the leadership tasks, Benjamin Buenger was an active member of the working groups within VDA, ISO, ACEA, and OICA. In the year 2018, Benjamin Buenger joined the AUDI AG, where he now cares for all regulations regarding Passive Safety worldwide. In 2019, he was assigned with the responsibility of ‘Group Regulation Coordinator’ for the Volkswagen Group. Despite the focus shifting, the connection to Pedestrian Protection was possible to be maintained, and also the membership in the dedicated working groups.

Mark Burleigh is a senior engineer based in the UK who has been a crash test designer for 21 years. He has been involved in many European framework projects involving dummy development like FlexPLI, ES2, Q-dummies. Mark a member of ISO working groups 5 and 6 (Anthropometric Test Devices and Injury Criteria) and represent Humanetics in various Stakeholder Groups like the GTR9 group on Pedestrian Safety.

Jessica B. Cicchino is vice president for research at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. Dr. Cicchino conducts research in a number of areas, including collision avoidance technologies and older drivers. Prior to joining the Institute as a research scientist in 2012, she was a research psychologist at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Dr. Cicchino received a bachelor's degree from Vassar College and a doctorate in psychology from Carnegie Mellon University.

In 1991 Irina Dausse was awarded the "Diplôme Ingénieur / Master of Science" in "Mechanical Engineering" (Materials Specialisation) at the Compiègne University of Technology. After 8 years as a plastics & numerical simulation expert at Magneti Marelli working on instrument clusters, she joined Renault, where she was responsible for the production launch of a new vehicle model. Irina Dausse then worked on research and development topics relating to interiors, cockpits, seats and quality. Since 2010 she has been working as an expert in passive safety regulations for Renault in the Technocentre (Paris) and within the Passive Safety unit she is in charge of the current legal issues concerning GTR, Europe and UNECE.

Dirk-Uwe Gehring is co-founder and managing director of BGS Böhme & Gehring GmbH. BGS has over 20 years of experience in pedestrian protection. Dirk-Uwe Gehring is in charge of Euro NCAP testing, type approvals according to R(EC)78/2009 and UN-R 127 as well as development and research test programs. He is member of international working groups on pedestrian protection.

Dr. Peter G. Martin is a Mechanical Engineer with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and has many years of experience in motor vehicle safety research. At NHTSA, Peter works within the Office of Crashworthiness Research where he is the Chief of the Structures and Restraints Research Division. He leads research projects on occupant safety and new crash test dummies. Most recently, he has served as NHTSA’s subject matter expert on vehicle crashworthiness for pedestrian safety.

Adriano Palao has 9 years of experience in automotive engineering, within the testing and validation domain. After completing his bachelor and master’s degree in mechanical engineering at Universidad Politécnica de Valencia, he worked for Nissan Motor Corporation, Applus+ IDIADA, Punch Powertrain, and Mitsubishi Electric. In January 2022 took the role of Technical Manager ADAS/AD at Euro NCAP.

Peter Schimmelpfennig is managing partner of crashtest-service.com GmbH in Münster. He studied automotive engineering at the Hamburg University of Applied Sciences until 2007 and then worked as a project manager for development and design at Fahrzeugwerk Bernard Krone GmbH before taking over CTS as managing partner in 2010.

Stefan Schinke completed an apprenticeship in car body and vehicle construction before studying mechanical engineering at the University of Applied Sciences in Osnabrück. From 1998 he worked for IAV as a pedestrian protection test engineer. Since 2000 he has been working as a test and project engineer in vehicle safety at Volkswagen. Mr. Schinke is a pedestrian protection specialist and represents Volkswagen in national and international working groups in the field of pedestrian protection.

Andre Seeck is head of the division "Vehicle Technology" with the German Federal Highway Research Institute (BASt). In this position he is responsible for the preparation of European Safety Regulations. Furthermore he represents the German Federal Ministry for Digital and Transport in the Board of Directors of Euro NCAP and he is the chairman of the strategy group on automated driving and of the rating system. These positions enable him to gain deep insight into current and future developments in vehicle safety. In 2017 NHTSA awarded him the U. S. Government Special Award of Appreciation.

Holger Staack studied mechanical engineering with a focus on lightweight construction and plastics technology at the Technical University of Munich. He then obtained his doctorate in engineering from the Chair of Lightweight Design at the Technical University of Munich. His dissertation, entitled "Experimental characterization and parametric simulation of plastic components in partner protection," dealt with the simulative failure modeling of plastics in pedestrian protection development. Since 2016, he has been working in pedestrian protection development at AUDI AG in Ingolstadt.

Friedemann Voit studied aerospace engineering in Stuttgart from 1984-92. He then worked as a simulation engineer in a Stuttgart startup until 1998. He then moved to EDAG Munich where he was CAE team leader until 2008. Since 2008 he has been head of department CAE & Vehicle Safety and since 2017 he has been in charge of AI & Simulation as well as new computational methods. He is the driver for the mindset and the introduction of AI applications in EDAG's Vehicle Engineering segment.

Oliver Zander studied Safety Engineering at the University of Wuppertal and started his career as Safety Engineer at the JCI European Headquarters in Burscheid. Since 2002 he has worked as a scientist at the Federal Highway Research Institute (BASt), where since 2009 he has been Deputy Head of the Section Passive Vehicle Safety, Biomechanics. His main responsibilities are pedestrian protection (amongst others german representative of the GRSP Informal Group DPPS, EEVC Working Group 17 “Pedestrian Safety”, and the Euro NCAP Technical Working Groups “Passive Safety” and “Pedestrian Protection”), the Euro NCAP crash and pedestrian testing and European Research Projects w.r.t. passive vehicle safety.