Decision-making at Palas® GmbH

Dr.-Ing. Maximilian Weiß and Leander Mölter, the managing directors of Karlsruher Palas® GmbH (Photo: Palas)

As of January 1, 2015, Dr.-Ing. Maximilian Weiß (39) has been appointed as the managing shareholder of Karlsruher Palas® GmbH. He manages the company, which specializes in aerosol and particle measurement technology, together with founder Leander Mölter.

With the new shareholder and managing director, the Palas® GmbH, founded in 1983, has successfully completed the generational change in corporate leadership. Dr.-Ing. Weiß has been with Palas® since 2008 and has been authorized to represent the company since 2011. Under his leadership, the digitalization of the welas® and Promo® aerosol spectrometers for measuring particle size and concentration in aerosols in industrial processes, the environment, and filter testing—one of Palas®' core products—was realized. As head of the Research and Development Department and Production, Dr.-Ing. Weiß was responsible for new developments in nanoparticle and environmental measurements as well as fine dust monitoring through the Fidas® series. Fidas® is the world's only certified optical fine dust measurement system with single-particle analysis for simultaneous measurement of PM2.5 and PM10 fine dust fractions. It is approved by the Federal Environment Agency for official measurements. The certification was carried out by TÜV Rheinland. The collaboration with universities, especially in the field of aerosol generation, was further intensified through the supervision of master's and bachelor's theses.

As a result of expanding the product range, Palas® GmbH was able to increase its number of employees from 18 to 39 over the past six years. In 2014, the company achieved a 25 percent increase in sales, reaching five million euros. A significant contribution to this was also made by the implementation of lean management processes, which, along with the company's certification according to DIN ISO 9001:2008, was jointly implemented by the two managing directors.

Dr.-Ing. Maximilian Weiß earned his doctorate at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) in the Engler-Bunte-Institute in the field of combustion technology and is the father of three daughters.