Dr. Rob Hardeman holds the post of senior director at Seagate’s recording heads manufacturing facility (wafer fab) in Springtown, working on technology transfer with external suppliers and partners, together with management of major capital projects.
He gained MA and PhD degrees in Metallurgy & Materials science from the University of Cambridge. He is Visiting Professor at the University of Ulster (NIBEC), an elected Fellow of the Institute of Physics and a Chartered Engineer. His particular technical interests are in nanotechnology, magnetic materials and thin film devices. As a trained Master Black Belt in Six Sigma he has also taken a keen interest in Business Process Improvement.
His career includes periods in industry, with British Steel, start-up magnetic disk manufacturer Eurodisk and, currently, Seagate, government research laboratories (RSRE Malvern) and academia (senior research fellow at the University of Keele). He has also acted as a consultant in process & product development for major multinational research and manufacturing organisations. In addition he has extensive experience in DTI, EPSRC and EU assessment and strategic panels.