Atlanta, Ga. – TAPPI is pleased to announce this year’s winners of its most prestigious awards.

The 2019 recipient of the Gunnar Nicholson Gold Medal Award is Shih-Chin Chen, Corporate Executive Engineer at ABB.

Chen has been a member of TAPPI since 1988. In his work, Chen is responsible for the development of control solutions for the pulp and paper industry. His development work includes scanning measurement processing, MD, CD, and Color controls, scanners, sensors, and process diagnostics, and control performance optimization. He holds more than a dozen patents and has published various technical papers on paper machine controls. He received two Jasper Mardon Memorial Awards and three Process Control Division best paper awards and was named TAPPI Fellow in 2011. He is also a life-time member of IEEE Control and Signal Processing Societies.

The 2019 recipient of the Herman L. Joachim Distinguished Service Award is Kerry Figiel, Engineering Fellow specializing in Process Control, Quality Control Systems and Web Inspection Systems at International Paper.

Figiel has been involved in TAPPI for over 25 years and was the Process Control Division Chairman from 2007-2010, receiving the Process Control Division Leadership and Service Award in 2012. He has served as Division Awards Chairman, Technical Program Chair, and the Conference Chairman for PaperCon 2013. He was a co-author of the TAPPI Process Control Division’s Handbook, “Paper Machine Quality Control System Vol I, Measurement Systems and Product Variability”. Figiel is a member of the 2015 Centennial class of TAPPI Fellows.

The 2019 recipient of the Paul W. Magnabosco Outstanding Local Section Award is Richard Olsen, who recently retired from his position as Vice President of Western District Sales at Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.

Olsen has been a member of TAPPI since 1973. He has been a member of the Chicago TAPPI Local Section since 1978, was Chairman from 1985 to 1990, and remains on the Chicago Local Section board. He was one of the founders of the Southeast TAPPI Local Section for Corrugated and an active member of the Minnesota Local Section. He was National TAPPI Corrugated Local Section Advisory Committee Chairman 1993-1994 and received the TAPPI Outstanding Local Section Member Award in 1995.

The 2019 recipient of the TAPPI-PIMA Executive of the Year Award is John D. Williams, President, Chief Executive Officer at Domtar.

Williams has been President and Chief Executive Officer of Domtar since January 2009 and is also a member of the Board of Directors. He has more than 40 years of experience in both consumer products and packaging. He began his career in consumer product sales in 1976, gaining insight into key market dynamics in the U.K. and the U.S. Since joining Domtar in 2009, Mr. Williams has led Domtar’s transformation from a strictly paper manufacturing enterprise to a significant player in the absorbent hygiene market. At the same time, he cut costs and invested in new and innovative technologies to help grow their pulp production to the third largest producer in the world.

The awards will officially be presented May 6 at the annual PaperCon conference in Indianapolis, IN, USA. For more information on these awards as wells as how to nominate a future winner, please contact us at [email protected].