June 29 was a memorable moment for the University of Groningen. That day, Marco Oosterhaven was the first student of the new Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering to complete his studies. As part of the Faculty of Science and Engineering, this Master's degree program offers students the opportunity to explore the needs of digital technology in the digital society. 

Marco submitted his thesis earlier this year with the title Overtaking control systems for autonomous vehicles and completed his studies with a graduation project at Philips in Drachten. He successfully defended his design project last Tuesday, which he carried out in collaboration with Daan Koopmans, Process engineer at Philips. On behalf of the entire ME team Innovatiecluster Drachten, Bayu Jayawardhana, Director of the master's degree program Mechanical Engineering, thanks Bayu Jayawardhana with this beautiful milestone, Pietie Kloosterman from the Province of Fryslân and Wim Burgers from the municipality of Smallingerland for their support to the Smart Factories project in the Northern Netherlands. In the coming weeks, more ME students will complete their master's degree and we are looking forward to the festive ceremony for the first graduation ceremony in the new academic year.