The PDMA DACH Team

Prof. Dr. Sebastian Gurtner

Vice President of the board – Academic Liaison

Sebastian Gurtner is a Professor of health care management, strategy and innovation at Bern University of Applied Sciences, Switzerland. Here he is head of the Institute of Innovation & Strategic Entrepreneurship and serves as the Deputy Director of the Business School. His research centers around value-oriented innovation and technology management, in a variety of industries. Prof. Gurtner was recognized with several teaching awards and academic awards throughout his career.

His research has been published in internationally recognized journals such as the Journal of Product Innovation Management, Long Range Planning, the Journal of Business Research, R&D Management, Technology Forecasting and Social Change, Medical Decision Making and Social Science & Medicine or Health Policy, among others.

Dr.-Ing. M.Sc. MBA Victor Vargas

Vice President of the board – Industrial Liaison

Victor Vargas is Lecturer, Module Leader and Supervisor at Arden University Berlin Centre (UK University), where he started in August 2020 after a long experience in the industry in Germany and Brazil, with missions around Europe, North America and Asia. His industry experience involves fields like Mechatronics, Biomedical Engineering, Project & Product Management, Innovation and Entrepreneurship. He is volunteer in different initiatives as coach for MassChallenge Switzerland, evaluator for InovAtiva Brasil, and at Project Management Institute (PMP-PMI holder).

He holds different degrees in different levels of Academia in Electronics, Mechanical Engineering, Biomedical Engineering, Business & Finance, Innovation, Project Management and Corporate development from different institutions like EMERITUS Institute of Management (Singapore), in collaboration with MIT Sloan (USA), Columbia Business School Executive Education (USA), and Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth (USA); COPPE (Brazil), Getúlio Vargas Foundation (Brazil), RWTH Aachen (Germany), and TU Berlin (Germany).

Dr.-Ing. Tanja Eckardt

Board Member

Tanja Eckardt has 25 years of experience in Product Development at applied research institutions like Fraunhofer Society and technology-oriented industries like the lighting company Osram, and the technology Group Heraeus. During her career in several Research & Development positions she focused for the last 10 years on Innovation Management. After leading the global Innovation Management at Heraeus, Tanja is now Senior Innovation Management Consultant at Sopheon, a global provider for Enterprise Innovation Management Software.

Prof. Dr. Christian Hopp

Board Member

Christian Hopp is a Professor at Bern University of Applied Sciences, Switzerland. His research interests are primarily in the areas of technology and innovation management, start-up management, and start-up financing. His research appeared in leading international journals such as Journal of Business Venturing, Journal of Product Innovation Management, Journal of Management Studies, Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, among others.

Prof. Dr.-ing. Sven Schimpf

Board Member

Sven Schimpf is an interdisciplinary researcher and thought leader at the Fraunhofer Gesellschaft in the topic area of technology and innovation management with a focus on strategic planning and dealing with potentially disruptive innovations. Managing Director of the Fraunhofer Group for Innovation Research, Director of the Institutes for Human Engineering & Empathic Design HEED at the HS-Pforzheim and Professor for Innovation and Interdisciplinarity Research in the Endowed Chair of the Karl Schlecht Foundation.

Prof. Andrea Badura

Board Member

Andrea Badura is a Professor of Industrial Goods Marketing and Technical Sales at Landshut University of Applied Sciences and Head of the part-time BA in Industrial Engineering and the extramural degree programme in Industrial Engineering Energy & Logistics at Hauzenberg and Straubing.