Koen Willems has 30 years’ experience working in different technology industries. Before joining ST Engineering iDirect (former Newtec) he was Product Marketing Manager for Europe at the electronics giant TOSHIBA. Currently Koen holds the position of VP EU/NATO Programs at ST Engineering iDirect with focus on government, defense and humanitarian satellite communication applications. In this role Mr. Willems is in charge of developing the government and defense market with a particular focus on EU programs such as the EDF European Protected Waveform (EPW), EU GovSatCom and the upcoming IRIS2 constellation. Koen has a Master’s degree in English & Scandinavian Languages (University Ghent, Belgium, 1997) and a Master’s degree in Marketing Strategy and Management (Vlekho Business School in Brussels, 1998). More recently Koen also received the degree for ‘High Studies in Security and Defence’ at the Belgian Royal Higher Institute for Defence, the SERA degree (European Session for Armament Officials) for the Defence armament economy course focusing on European challenges at the French National Institute of Higher Defence in Paris and the degree for the ‘European Advanced Strategy Course on Security and Defence’ by the Egmont Institute. You may know Koen as a ST Engineering technology evangelist through his regular appearance in editorials in satellite focused publications, white papers and speaking slots at conferences around the world.