Dr Ronald de Bruin was appointed Director of the COST Association on 1 June 2016.
Before joining the Association, Ronald was Director of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) and Head of Department of the European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA). For almost eight years, he played a key role in managing and setting up these European Union agencies from scratch.
Prior to this, he was Deputy Director of a public-private partnership platform for the Information Society in the Netherlands for over three years. His main responsibilities included drafting the annual work programs including public-private partnership projects, managing the implementation of national multi-stakeholder projects, and coordinating EU-funded projects.
For almost three years, he worked for a global .COM company with top-100 clients. During his one-year stay as manager at KPMG, he worked on developing e-security services for the growing e-commerce market. He started his career as Policy Advisor for the Dutch national government, where, for three years, he was responsible for developing a national policy on e-security services, and scenarios for introducing digital TV.
He is Ambassador to Brussels for the Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership Europe and Founding Director of the Greenleaf Center in Brussels.
Dr De Bruin has also authored several books on servant-leadership, digital television, online consumer trust and computer security. He holds a Ph.D.in Law and Computer Science, an M.Sc. in Technology Management and a B.Sc. in Electronic Engineering.