Bill Banholzer, chief technology officer and executive vice president of The Dow Chemical Company has elected to retire.
“Bill has restored Dow’s Research and Development organization to its strong historic reputation and capabilities, and has taken our innovation performance and pipeline to a new level of performance – bringing it among the best in the world and well beyond our industry, which will have tremendously positive business impact for many years to come,” said Andrew N. Liveris, Dow’s chairman and chief executive officer.
“Most importantly, Bill has revitalized our research and development leadership and talent pool, ensuring we will continue to have strong generational capabilities, and he has cultivated key external relationships that will further enable our business success.”
Banholzer has a strong history of technical excellence and innovation, spanning his more than 30 years of industrial experience. Under his leadership the value of Dow’s innovation pipeline tripled from $10 billion to more than $32 billion. His efforts to accelerate Dow’s technology development were recognized by R&D Magazine, where Dow was ranked in the top ten for R&D in all industries, and a recent Booz Allen study ranked Dow’s innovation portfolio management as “Best in Class.”
A.N. Sreeram, vice president, Research & Development, Advanced Materials, has been named corporate vice president of Research & Development, effective August 1, 2013 reporting to Liveris. “Sreeram has a tremendous in-depth market and customer orientation. Since the Rohm and Haas acquisition, he has made a significantly positive impact on the Dow Advanced Materials portfolio,” said Liveris.
“He is an energizing and determined leader who is poised to take Dow Research and Development to its strong market-driven and technology-enabled future, which will continue to lead to Dow’s transformation and achievement of our strategy.”
Sreeram joined Dow in June 2006 as the Vice President of Core R&D, where he initiated innovation in the application of advanced materials to a number of areas including automotive, infrastructure, and health.
He has extensive experience in the electronics, chemicals and materials industry. Before joining Dow, Sreeram served as the global technology director and chief technology officer for DuPont Electronic Technologies. Prior to this, he served as Vice President of Worldwide Technology for Cookson Electronics, New Jersey, and before that, led the Electronic and Flat Display Program for Sarnoff Corporation in Princeton, New Jersey.
Sreeram holds an undergraduate degree in ceramics engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology–BHU, Varanasi, India; a master’s degree in glass science from Alfred University; and a doctorate from the Department of Materials Science & Engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He holds more than 20 U.S. issued patents, with others pending, and has contributed to many publications.
About Dow
Dow combines the power of science and technology to passionately innovate what is essential to human progress. The Company connects chemistry and innovation with the principles of sustainability to help address many of the world's most challenging problems such as the need for clean water, renewable energy generation and conservation, and increasing agricultural productivity
