Ken Aitchison, Ph.D.
President and CEO

Dr. Ken Aitchison has served as President and CEO of AMST since January 2008. Prior to joining AMST, Dr. Aitchison was Vice President and General Manager of Temescal (a division of Edwards Vacuum, formerly BOC Edwards), the leading supplier of electron beam deposition equipment to the compound semiconductor industry. Previously at BOC Edwards, he served consecutively as Vice President of Semiconductor Applications and Vice President of Process Enabling Technology. Prior to joining BOC Edwards, Dr. Aitchison was at Novellus Systems for 9 years, where he held a number of senior management positions including Senior Director of Systems Engineering and Director of Chemical Systems. Dr. Aitchison additionally spent 7 years in technical and managerial roles at The Aerospace Corporation as Manager, Thin Films and Advanced Processing Section and as a Member of the Technical Staff. Prior to the Aerospace Corporation, Dr. Aitchison was Director of Technology for the Material Sciences Division of Genus.
Dr. Aitchison holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry from Queen Mary College, University of London, and a B.A. in Chemistry from New York University. Dr. Aitchison holds two patents and has published numerous technical papers.

Michael Grimes, Ph.D.
Vice President of Research & Development

Dr. Michael Grimes has led R&D at AMST since April 2006. Dr. Grimes has held a variety of scientific positions during his career in the chromatography, biotechnology, and pharmaceutical industries. Prior to AMST, Dr. Grimes served as a Principal Scientist in the Analytical Sciences Division at Alza Corporation (Johnson & Johnson). Previously, Dr. Grimes worked at both Ciphergen Biosystems and Dionex Corporation where he contributed to the successful commercial release of several products, including polymeric and silica-based chromatographic stationary phases and surface-modified biochips.
Dr. Grimes received his Ph.D. in Chemistry from Stanford University where he was an NIH Biotechnology Fellow. Dr. Grimes has multiple patents pending and has published 6 technical papers.

Mike Khosla
Vice President of Engineering

Mike Khosla joined AMST in July 2011 as the Vice President of Engineering. Mr. Khosla has over 20 years of product development experience and has focused on both new technology development and equipment productivity enhancements. Previously, Mr. Khosla was Director of Engineering at Novellus Systems where he led the development and commercial release of several new semiconductor equipment products in the areas of ALD, CVD, PVD, Plasma Etch, and Wafer Handler Systems. Mr. Khosla contributed to significant market share gains for Novellus with disruptive technology developed using ALD and CVD processes. He was also responsible for Wafer Handler Engineering and Product Support where he set new levels of excellence in wafer handling throughput and equipment reliability. Prior to Novellus, Mr. Khosla was Senior Scientist at Thermo Finnigan where he led the development of electrospray and electron ionization source technology that enabled new market share growth in the pharmaceutical and environmental analyses markets. Mr. Khosla received his M.Sc. in Physics from the University of Toronto in Canada and has authored multiple patents.

Emiel Thijssen
Senior Director of Sales and Service Operations

Emiel Thijssen joined AMST in March 2010 as the Senior Director Sales and Service Operations. Mr. Thijssen comes to the company with more than 15 years experience in the Semiconductor Industry, during which he lived and worked in the U.S., Germany and the Netherlands. Mr. Thijssen has strong experience in managing a broad range of disciplines including Service and Technical Support Management, Product Marketing and Account Management. Most recently, Mr. Thijssen was responsible for Service Product Development, Marketing and Sales in his role as Director of Service Product Management at Cymer, Inc., the world's leading supplier of excimer light sources for semiconductor lithography. Prior to this role, he was responsible for Sales and Service as Cymer's Account Director Northern Europe. Mr. Thijssen started with Cymer in 1999 as Product Marketing Manager introducing 193 nm excimer light sources into volume production. Before joining Cymer, Mr. Thijssen worked for Lam Research, the leading supplier of plasma-etch equipment for the semiconductor industry in a Technical Support/Technical Sales role. Mr. Thijssen holds a B.S. equivalent in Electrical Engineering from the Netherlands.