Erik Buchholz awarded with the Berthold Vöcking Master Award 2020

At this year's virtual edition of the "Tag der Informatik", Erik was awarded with the Berthold Vöcking Master Award for his thesis "Privacy-Preserving Exchange of Process Parameters". The award's name is in honor of the former RWTH Prof. Berthold Vöcking who passed away way ahead of time.

The thesis topic that originates from the cluster of excellence "Internet of Production" was advised by Jan Pennekamp and Yannik Lockner from the Institute for Plastics Processing (IKV). In his thesis, Erik addresses privacy concerns in an industrial setting. More specifically, he proposes a secure and privacy-preserving platform that allows companies to exchange valuable production data with each other while addressing client and provider privacy alike. Erik further demonstrates the applicability of his approach using two use case (one in the domain of injection molding, and a second use case from the Chair of Machine Tools at the Laboratory for Machine Tools and Production Engineering (WZL)) His thesis also contributed greatly to our paper called "Privacy-Preserving Production Process Parameter Exchange" which is going to be presented at ACSAC 2020 in the next week.

Erik was also one of four finalists for the eurobits Excellence Award 2020. The final is available on YouTube.

We congratulate Erik to his award and wish him all the best for his future career in research!