Jülich’s End-of-Year Lecture 2024

was appointed Vice-Chair of the Board of Directors of Forschungszentrum Jülich on 1 September 2011 and was head of the Management Division for Infrastructure for 13 years. He was responsible for 11 divisions, including all business-related infrastructure, Human Resources, Law, and Technical Infrastructure. Before coming to Jülich, Beneke – who has a degree in economics – was State Secretary for Federal and European Affairs in the state government of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and until 2010 he was head of the NRW State Chancellory. Beneke also worked at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) – also a member of the Helmholtz Association – as head of corporate development and international relations and, from 2002, as director of space flight and transport. Before taking on this role in research management at a large Helmholtz centre, he worked at the Federal Ministry of Education and Research, where he became the head of a division in 1995.