Jerry Kucharczyk, PhD, past president of ATEK Metal Technologies Inc., has been posthumously awarded the Ray H. Witt Award by the Advanced Casting Research Center (ACRC) at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). The biannual award recognizes individuals who have made significant contributions to the metal casting industry.
Kucharczyk's family received the Witt award on June 3 during ACRC’s biannual meeting on the WPI campus. Kucharcyzk, who passed away in November, was recognized for his leadership in the aluminum casting industry, the resources he invested to broaden the technology base, the techniques and concepts he introduced to advance the field, and his mentoring of future talent.
"Jerry was a great business leader, a wonderful colleague, and most of all, a very dear friend," said Mark Osmanski, president and chief executive officer of ATEK Companies. "In the time he was with us, he had a profound impact on our company and employees. He consistently set high standards for himself and the company, and always delivered. While we miss him very much, we are committed to continuing to build on his successes, as we know he would expect nothing less."
Few people have had a more far-reaching impact in the world of metal technologies than Kucharczyk, who spent more than 30 years directing metal casting operations in Europe, North America, and the Middle East before joining ATEK Companies in 2011. A native of Poland, Kucharczyk received his PhD in materials science from Warsaw University of Technology in Poland.
The Ray H. Witt award was established in 1999 in memory of one of the founding members of ACRC and a prominent player in the global casting industry. It commemorates Witt’s outstanding contributions to the industry.
About Advanced Casting Research Center (ACRC)
ACRC is an academic-industry partnership headquartered on the campus of Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Mass. Built on the university’s strengths and focused on helping industry solve technical issues, the center provides a collaborative environment in which members, faculty members, and students discuss challenges in the metal casting industry, specifically in the areas of light metals, nonferrous alloys, and semisolid processing. For more information about ACRC, visit wpi.edu/+acrc.
