Bio

1980: Growing up in a small rural village in "De Achterhoek", near the German border. Loving parents & big sister. I strugled making friends, and early on I felt like a werido in a place where it being different was not a positive trait... My best memories are going alone into the fields and woods, building small huts, going kiting, adventuring on my own. I was a loner, sometimes I was happy with that, sometimes not.

1992: After my "havo-advice" Cito test, I was told that I was lucky to have guessed correctly... This led to the mavo, followed by a vocational education in Electrical Engineering.

1996: I was initially advised against going to university (HBO). That is, until I achieved good grades in math and science, including the highest grade in the provence of Gelderland for the math exam itself. I also turned out to be good at programming: PLCs, Assembly, Pascal, C. Another story of being underestimated. Since my first grade in the programming courses was 'estimated' as a 6, like a 'gym grade' without any basis, despite a series of 12 tens, a 10 did not appear on my report. No worries, it does't keep me awake at night anymore 😉.

2000: I escaped my conservative small town by going to study in big city Enschede... There for me my my life began, I was seen, vibed with people on world view, being different was not a bad thing, I made friends and found love. Studying was just a side husle.

2003: Because of my interest in robotics and AI, but especially because of my fear of going to work, I decided to study Mechatronics at the University of Twente. In 2006, I graduated 3rd out of a class of 20. My greatest pride, however, was not my diploma, but the crowded student bar. Having arrived in Enschede alone with no friends six years earlier, I now had a bar full of friends. To this day, those people are in my life.

2007: A year of new beginnings: I moved to Eindhoven, my first relationship ended after 6 years, I became an uncle and found my first 'real' job at IPCOS and started doing what I had wanted to do for a long time: joining a theater group. The theatre group was even more fun then I imagened, going deep into your soul during repetitions and playing in front of an audience,  it's an adrinaline rush!

2008: The oil drilling models I made at IPCOS took me to actual drilling platforms in the North Sea and the Gulf of Mexico. I was rejected for assignments where I was the perfect match. Because of this I was sent to "attitude, presentation & communication" training. Or as I call it "De-nerding training". 

2009: Because the irregular work on drilling platforms clashed with building a new life in Brabant, I went to work at Vanderlande. My first project was at Schiphol Airport. There I experienced what it is like to work in a team. Building a baggage system from the ground up with colleagues, all of us going through fire for each other. And that beer with your colleagues that you see 12 hours a day for 9 months... after the acceptance test has passed... Oh my god, that was the most delicious beer I've ever had.

2010: I was scouted for the R&D department and went back to my interlectual passion: mathematical, mechatronic modeling and image processing. Because of my passion and enthusiasm, I quickly became lead engineer and had to set the course for the various image processing projects. Passion, interest and intelligence do not make a good leader, it turned out. I am proud of an early statistical AI model. Vanderlande hired an expensive engineering firm, 'bright minds', to develop an algorithm. After 6 months, the engineering team was left with a poorly performing model. In two weeks, I created a self-learning model from scratch... which outperformed the engineering firm's model. This also what I call lazyness, see if you can automate things in such a way that you can do in two weeks that another takes six months...

2016: A new manager. Not being seen. Being judged on side issues while you earn your salary back many times over. A spam message in my LinkedIn. Mmm, not so spammy after all... At the right moment, I was approached by Bosch. After a final assignment in China for Vanderlande and a holiday trip to Cuba, I started working at Bosch.

2017: At Bosch, I experienced what it does to be seen, to be respected for your combination of skills, acceptance that if you have skill A & B it is OK to fill the gaps on skill C with somone else. I went to a conference in Hawaii on behalf of Bosch about Image Processing... There I saw what AI was going to do, there was no more talk about classic image processing... everything is AI. This is way before ChatGPT...

2020: The first year of Corona, working from home. First I tried to get to the office as often as posible, however that became harder and harder. Together with my partner at the moment we lived 24/7 in a small appartment. My relationship didn't survive the lockdown. Also my motivation and passion dwindelled.

2023: I started a treatment against bore-out and depression. A bore-out can be all consuming, swallowing your life. 

2024: A new love - Imke - , mother of two men. She helps to reevaluate what is important in life, stimulates me to start pursuing dreams again.  Binge watching reality TV can be just as valuable and even more fun than being at the biggest parties. Because of her confidence in me I started with John Apollo to push myself again, the name I had come up with years earlier, but now I give it energy. I am going to make art with the technical skills I have and combine that with my own ideas! After six months, I was selected for a first exhibition at Willem Twee in Den Bosch.

2025: I notice that different people get value from me. I want to make this value more widely available offering mentorships at John Apollo.