Recipient: Daniel Ciganovic on behalf of Dr. Sebastian Groh

A creative mind and stubborn by birth. A dreamer who never accepts and questions everything. Daniel has a background in Monetary Economics and Social Psychology and almost ten years of experience in business development and international development projects.

Daniel holds a Master degree in Economics from the University of Trier and has gained working experience in Germany, Serbia, and Bangladesh. For his Master thesis about “Hedging Investments in Microfinance Products against Currency Risks - Analytical Consideration of a Monetary Fund” was awarded with the 2nd place at the University Meets Microfinance Master Thesis Award 2013. During his university studies, he was an independent business advisor on business development for IT start-ups.

As Co-Founder and Business Development Director of the Bangladeshi company ME SOLshare Ltd (SOLshare), Daniel is leading the business and company development activities. He joined the company in January 2015, only three months after the incorporation, and lives in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Since joining SOLshare, Daniel has played a major role in the fast development of the company, which was awarded with the Intersolar Award in June 2016, the UN Momentum for Change Award in November 2016, and the Start Up Energy Transition Award from the German Energy Agency in March, 2017. Before joining SOLshare, Daniel worked as a consultant for MicroEnergy International in Germany as well as the KfW Development Bank and GIZ in Serbia, where he was involved in energy and private sector development projects.

Recipient: Prof. Yogi Goswami

Renowned researcher, entrepreneur and solar energy expert D. Yogi Goswami of the University of South Florida has been named the 2016 winner of the Karl W. Böer Solar Energy Medal of Merit.

Goswami's work focuses on reducing costs and developing efficient, effective storage methods for solar energy as well as harnessing solar energy as a catalyst to address environmental problems. Read the full article on the University of Delaware website.

Prof. Robert Pitz-Paal is the recipient of this years Farrington Daniels award and will give a special Lecture on Tuesday 31 October at 16:00 in the ballroom.

Prof. Robert Pitz-Paal is the Director of the Solar Research Institute at the DLR-German Aerospace Center. He further holds the Chair for Solar Technology in the Department of Mechanical Engineering of RWTH Aachen University in Germany. The DLR's Solar Research Institute, which he co-founded, is the largest institution in Germany in the field of concentrating solar technologies, comprising a staff of more than 150 scientists and engineers with state-of-the-art laboratories in Cologne, Stuttgart, Jülich, and Almería.

He received his PhD degree from Ruhr University of Bochum in 1993. His main research areas are the technical analysis and optimization of concentrating solar power systems for generating electricity and fuels. His scientific publications won awards from the American Society of Mechanical Engineers and a variety of his research results were transferred to industry and led to the creation of spin-off companies. In 2008 he was a visiting Professor at ETH Zurich and from 2009 to 2010 he was Deputy Director of the DLR’s Institute of Technical Thermodynamics. As an internationally recognized expert on concentrated solar technologies, he serves as associate editor of ISES’s Solar Energy Journal and as vice-chairman of the International Energy Agency’s SolarPACES-Solar Power and Chemical Energy Systems implementing agreement.  He is member of the board of the German Industry Association of Concentrated Solar Power.