Melania van Laack (nee Mateias) is a doctoral candidate at the Chair of Innovation and Entrepreneurship under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Malte Brettel. Between 2007 and 2011, Ms van Laack attended the Technical University in Bucharest, Romania and obtained her Bachelor degree in Engineering, specializing in Applied Electronics and Telecommunications. Starting 2012, she enrolled at the RWTH Aachen University, pursuing a Master degree in Management, Business and Economics. In 2014, Ms van Laack graduated in the top 5% of her class and was included on the Dean's list. Right after graduation she was offered a research assistant position at the Chair of Innovation and Entrepreneurship and became a doctoral candidate in the field of Strategic Marketing. Until 2017, Ms van Laack worked at the Center for Technology Transfer & Entrepreneurship as a consultant for technological start-up teams. During this time, she specialized in all aspects of building a business - from formulating a strategy and developing business models, shaping value propositions and optimizing processes, to finding financing and networking opportunities. She also served as an Entrepreneurship lecturer for the project DeafExist, a series of seminars developed in cooperation with the Competence Center for Sign Language and Gesture. Ms van Laack's research interests cover the fields of strategic marketing, entrepreneurship, digital marketing and customer interaction. She has presented her research work at various scientific conferences in Germany (the G-Forum 2014), the United States (Academy of Management annual meeting 2014, American Marketing Association conferences in 2016, 2017 and 2018) and Hong Kong (Global Marketing Conference in 2016). Currently, Ms van Laack is working in Paris, France as a digital marketing engineer at a renowned French company specialized in infotainment systems for the automotive industry.
