George Hooper — Executive Director

Dr George Hooper, formerly Manager of Commercial Development at New Zealand Forest Research Institute Ltd, was appointed as CAE's second Executive director in April 2000.

While at NZ Forest Research, Dr Hooper was involved in the development of business opportunities that aligned strategic science and business goals to achieve financial returns to shareholders. In this role, a major focus was technology commercialisation and the encouragement of private sector investment in new technology ventures.

He is a Fellow of the Institution of Professional Engineers New Zealand (IPENZ) and was involved in establishing resource management law reform policy for the Institution. As a previous Chairman of the Society of Chemical Engineers New Zealand (a technical group of IPENZ), Dr Hooper has also assisted the development of the Institution's response to a number of engineering risk issues.

He holds a Bachelor of Engineering degree (Chemical and Process Engineering) from the University of Canterbury and a PhD from the University of Melbourne.