Patrick De Vos
Born in Belgium, holds a master’s degree in production technology & production economics.
Since 2006, he leads the creation of the Seco Technical Education Programme STEP and drives technical education and consulting activities for Seco customers worldwide.
Patrick developed the NEXT STEP production model that describes the relation between the machining process, manufacturing organisation and production economics. Throughout the years, Patrick has published numerous technical articles, papers and technical books on machining processes and systems, tooling technology and production economics. His book publications comprise following titles: Metal Cutting, theories in practice; Tool Deterioration, Best Practice; Applied Metal Cutting Physics, Best Practice; NEXT STEP, a practical model for efficient HMLV production and Knowledge, Insight and Skills for Sustainable Machining.
Gary Meyers
Experienced Product Manager with a demonstrated history of working in the mechanical and industrial engineering industry. Skilled in SolidWorks, Industrial Engineering, Continuous Improvement, Manufacturing Engineering, and Kaizen. Strong product management professional who studied Business at Davenport University.
Maria Strömberg Bylund
My personal mission is to get youngsters to understand how fantastic our machining industry is!
I have 30 years of experience in this business, a broad profile reaching from machinist to production engineering to R&D to teacher.
I have had the privilege to learn the industry by taking all kind of different courses throughout the years, done a lot of trial-and-error, but I think the most important source of knowledge have been all the experts I met, from the old and experienced guys at the shop floor to the professors :-)
Vladimir Dolgikh
Vladimir holds a PhD in metallurgy (Thesis on Forming diffusion coatings based on Titanium, Chromium, Vanadium on cemented carbides).
Vladimir is working for Seco since 2005. He started his professional career in Seco in Russia and neighbor countries as a technologist. Since then supporter customers and business partners in trouble solving and optimizing machining processes. Vladimir was for more than 10 years STEP Master in Russia and neighbor countries and organised and has let numerous STEP courses and classes for the local machining industry.
Vladimir is at present Corporate STEP Course Owner and Trainer at the Learning and People Development Department. Vladimir is passionate about supporting people in building their knowledge and personal development by creating learning courses, learning games and practical workshops.
