[img_inline align=”right” src=”http://padnws01.mcmaster.ca/images/Loutfy_Rafik1.jpg” caption=”Rafik Loutfy has been reappointed as the Director of the Xerox Centre for Engineering, Entrepreneurship and Innovation. File photo.”]Harold Haugen has been appointed Chair of the Department of Engineering Physics and Rafik Loutfy has been reappointed as the Director of the Xerox Centre for Engineering, Entrepreneurship and Innovation. Both appointments are effective July 1, 2009.

Haugen is a professor of engineering physics in the Faculty of Engineering and has held a cross appointment in the Department of Physics and Astronomy in the Faculty of Science. He is co-leader of the Photonics Research Laboratories, which operates within the Brockhouse Institute for Materials Research.

Haugen received his B.Sc. from Acadia University in 1977, his M.Eng. from McMaster University in 1979, and PhD in physics from the University of Aarhus in Denmark in 1982. Post-doctoral work was conducted at JILA in the University of Colorado. After holding academic positions at the University of Toronto and Aarhus University in Denmark, he returned to McMaster University in 1992.

Loutfy is the founding director of the Xerox Centre for Engineering Entrepreneurship and Innovation, which was established in 2004 with the assistance of a $1-million contribution from Xerox Canada and The Xerox Foundation. Loutfy also holds the Walter G. Booth Chair in Engineering Entrepreneurship and Innovation, which was established that same year with a $1-million donation from Ontario-industrialist Walter Booth.

Loutfy has more than 30 years of experience as a research, development, business and strategic leader with the Xerox Corporation, where he served in various management positions, culminating with the post of corporate officer and vice president of the Xerox Research Centre of Canada. He has been Chair of the Board of Directors of Canadian Light Source Inc., Canada's national synchrotron research facility, since July 2008, and a member of the Board since 2006. Loutfy earned his PhD from the University of Western Ontario and an MBA from the University of Toronto.