 Every two weeks, we will post a blog about one of the Qlayers team members. This time, it's all about Derek.
24-year-old Derek Risseeuw loves to talk about aerodynamics. Whether it is about eddies, vortices or simulation programs, Derek knows it all. That’s why, when he first met co-founder Amber, they spent over an hour discussing the drag reducing mechanisms of Qlayers' sharkskin. Time well spent, because since March 2018 we can call Derek our Aerodynamics Engineer. At this moment, Derek is simulating the behaviour of paint particles in a flow to make sure that no particles will escape the protected environment of the Slash100. In the future, he will also help with what inspired him in the first place; determining the optimal microstructure for aerodynamic efficiency. Only one of the many interesting things Derek has done before joining the company is his work for the Formula Delft team in 2015. Here he helped designing the aerodynamics of that years universities small formula 1 car. He and his team travelled to the Silverstone circuit (GB), the Hockenheimring (DE) and the Red Bull Ring (AT) to see their car race against other others from universities all around the world! Next to his work at Qlayers, Derek is also writing his thesis on simulations of fluid structure interaction aimed towards flexible flapping wings. Conveniently enough his research and the work for Qlayers have a lot of overlap, which means he is in a constant learning process and many things he does has both value for the company and his own research. When Derek is not busy solving complex aerodynamic problems he loves to play rugby or to go to the gym.
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A new Qlayers newsletter is out! This month’s newsletter is all about microstructures. From a butterflies wing to a lotus leaf, microstructures are everywhere. Their functional properties are often amazing, and were the main inspiration of this company. Getting curious? Read the newsletter of last month here.  Every two weeks, we will post a blog about one of the Qlayers team members. This time, it's all about Birgit.  If Birgit is not busy keeping our ‘Green Wall’ alive or telling us about the benefits of veganism this green lady is engaged in her research into viable market entry strategies. Birgit Henrich started working at Qlayers in March 2018, and next to her research she helps out with the marketing and business development. Our business development intern used to be a pro skier, who spend endless hours waxing her ski’s to win milliseconds by resistance reduction. With her current research, Birgit tries to enable Qlayers to reduce the resistance of something much bigger, namely: Aircraft. She hopes that her research will help Qlayers provide a more sustainable way of flying.
Birgit’s research is the end of her study ‘Science Business and Innovation’ at the VU University Amsterdam. The study is a combination of Beta-sciences, social sciences and business courses. Birgit explains that the study is trying to bridge the gap between scientific research and the market by teaching you how to judge innovations by their market and societal value. She plans to start a master programme at the Delft University of Technology in September to deepen her knowledge in the field of technological innovation. In the meantime, she tries to absorb as much experience as she can get here at Qlayers; "it is quite amazing to have the ability to learn so many things at once, I’m gaining experience in the field of business development but at the same time I’m learning about aerodynamics, 3D printing, networking, coatings, marketing and so much more."  Get inspired and visit our stand at the Hannover Messe on 25-26 April to meet Bart, Ruben and Mees and get some insights about our current developments and projects.
Click here for more information about our stand. See you there! Every two weeks, we will post a blog about one of the Qlayers team members. This time, it's all about Mees.  Mees might not be a morning person, but for Qlayers our enthusiastic and resourceful mechanical engineer has absolutely no problem with the nine o’clock starting time. Mees is 21 years old and supports co-founder Ruben in the development of the Slash100, or as he likes to call it ‘The Slashie’. He finished his bachelors at the TU Delft in 2017 and now works full time for Qlayers. Mees got to know the company when he was studying abroad for a semester in Indonesia. By chance he followed a similar course as our co-founder Josefien and became intrigued by her story of Qlayers. Before he knew it, Mees used his Indonesian megabytes to skype with Ruben to discuss the possibilities of automated printing systems.
In February 2018, Mees van Vondelen officially started working for Qlayers. Mees is definitely an allrounder and spends his days alternating between experimenting, building components and doing theoretical research. One of the things Mees appreciates about Qlayers is the flat hierarchy. Having the opportunity to influence the decision making process of the management is quite rare but a valuable and educational aspect for a young engineer. Describing the atmosphere of Qlayers, Mees would like to say that he cannot imagine that any of our employees would ever wake up with a reluctance to go to work! The first Qlayers newsletter is out! This newsletter comes out every last Friday of the month and keeps you up to date about what's happening at the Qbase office. This newsletter is all about the new office, pitching in London and our current challenges. Getting curious? Read the newsletter of last month here.   Every two weeks, we will post a blog about one of the Qlayers team members. This time, it's all about Bart.
Bart’s love for functional coatings started a long time ago. He used to be a competitive swimmer that owned a shark-skin swimsuit. Even at the age of eleven, he knew that these riblet pants helped him to swim faster and win races! The former race swimmer is now part of team tech at Qlayers. He started his internship in February 2018 and is already a vital member of the team. Bart is designing a direct feedback system for our printing heads, to make the application of shark-skin riblets possible for way more than swim gear. Bart Bekkema is originally from a small town in Friesland called Wolvega and studied Applied Physics in Enschede. After more than four years of Enschede he decided it was time for a change and went to Delft looking for a start-up to conduct his research. As a student, Bart likes working at a start-up because he can add value to the company. ‘’My input is crucial in the development of our products, and we have deadlines that need to be met, these are great motivators to work hard. ’’ Bart hopes to see a future in which Qlayers coats an aircraft to help reduce the carbon footprint of flying.  After months of testing, Ruben was able to print our first sharkskin. Doesn't it look amazing? People have tried imprinting, machining, stickering and even lithography, since 1956, but they haven't been able to scale or customize. This might just be the first printing technique that can bring sharkskin to market! The qskin 1.0 helped us in making clients and investors fall in love with Qlayers in several speeddates we had during Meet the Startups event at YES!Delft.
 Sharks and lasers. Officially the best combination to describe a technology. Apart from applying sharkskin to any surface, our technology demonstrator qbot 1.0 occasionally engraves motivational messages in our notebooks. Do you want to have one of your own? Have a look at our jobs page!
Amber can't stop talking about qlayers anyway, so why don't we give him an audience? The incubator YES!Delft allows us to reach a wide audience and tease growing markets with our functional coatings. Aircraft and wind turbines would benefit greatly from a drag-reducing sharkskin coating. Step one is automating the painting process!
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Qlayers was selected as one of the 500 most promising deep-tech startups world-wide by the Hello Tomorrow summit in Paris.
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