Lee Sang-cheol, a professor in the Department of Smart Aviation Mobility at Korea Aerospace University, has been appointed as the next director of Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KAI).
According to the science and technology community on the 17th, KAI held its fourth board meeting at the Coreana Cosmetics hotel in Jung-gu, Seoul, on the 16th, and elected Professor Lee as the 13th director. The board conducted a vote among the three final candidates, and Professor Lee received the most votes. He will officially be appointed by the Space and Aeronautics Administrator on the 20th, and will lead KAI for a term of three years.
The newly appointed director graduated from the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Seoul National University in 1986 and obtained a master's degree in aerospace engineering from the same graduate school. He later earned a Ph.D. in aerospace engineering from Texas A&M University in the United States. He has served as a senior researcher at Samsung Aerospace Research Institute and as Director General at KAI, and has been a professor at Korea Aerospace University since 2006. He has also held roles as the director of the Aerospace Systems Testing and Certification Research Center and the head of the BK21 Smart Drone Convergence Education Research Team at the university. He currently serves as the 36th president of the Korean Society for Aeronautics and Astronautics.
The new director is a figure who has traversed both academia and industry. With the establishment of the Space and Aeronautics Administration last year and the advent of the New Space era led by private corporations in space development, he is regarded as a suitable candidate for the KAI director position. However, there are many challenges as well. He must resolve the intellectual property dispute regarding next-generation launch vehicles with Hanwha Aerospace, and he must successfully lead the planned fourth launch of Nuri this year. Addressing the internal conflicts that intensified during the tenure of Director Lee Sang-ryul is also an important task.