Panelist on the Innovation Panel and 2023 IEEE Robert N. Noyce Medal Recipient
Luc Van den hove has been with imec, a world-leading research and innovation hub in nanoelectronics and digital technologies since its founding in 1984 and has been president and CEO since 2009. In his time with imec, Van den hove has been instrumental in building the organization into a world-leading center for semiconductor and nanotechnology R&D, creating knowledge that has benefitted not only those industries but society at large. His contributions span the domains of technology, business, and education. In the technical realm, he’s made fundamental contributions to the development of new materials, including self-aligned silicides and novel metallization schemes. As EVP and COO of imec, he steered the organization to the most impactful areas of semiconductor research, benefitting the industry. In the business arena, he’s shaped imec into one of the largest and most influential industry partners in the semiconductor R&D ecosystem, with a business model that enables companies to benefit from sharing IP and talent while also sharing the high costs and risks of semiconductor R&D. In his years as CEO, Moore’s law has come under intense pressure and Van den hove has played an essential role in keeping it alive. Convinced that semiconductor technologies hold the potential to create disruptive innovation in many other domains, he committed heavily to R&D in strategic applications where he believed imec’s expertise could bring transformative innovation. Under his management, imec expanded its research to leverage its semiconductor technologies knowhow for disruptive innovations that span domains such as healthcare, mobility, industry 5.0, clean energy, and agri-food. A prominent example is its multidisciplinary research lab on life science technologies to leverage the power of nanotechnology to advance medical and pharmaceutical research. Breakthrough achievements by the lab include the Neuropixels probe, a tiny brain implant with 5,000 recording sites enabling neuron recordings across brain regions, the mRNA-based breath test for Covid-19, and the smallest finFET-based biosensor for high-sensitivity molecule detection. Recently, imec along with other partners began exploring how nanotechnology can advance biopharma through the automation of quality control and through disruptive innovation in vaccine production. At its core, the purpose of technology is to create innovations that improve life for all people. Van den hove and imec have played a vital role in achieving that goal.
Van den hove is president and CEO, imec, Heverlee, Belgium.