Thijs Aarten joined KEMA on May 1, 2006 as the firm’s second executive director. Aarten joins Pier Nabuurs, KEMA CEO and sole executive board member since January 2002. While Nabuurs retains the helm as CEO, he believes that KEMA’s wide range of services and its continued strong international growth make it important to diversify the executive team.

Prior to joining KEMA, Aarten served as global discipline leader of Operations and Asset Management Consulting with Shell Global Solutions. At Shell, Aarten was a member of the consulting management team responsible for consultancy activities and implementation of improvement programs in the fields of asset and operational management, product management and energy management. Before taking up his current position, he held various management posts at Shell and at Pakhoed/Vopak, which involved working in several countries. Aarten is a graduate of Delft Technical University, where he read Civil Engineering.