Henk Lombaers


Henk Joseph Maria Lombaers was a Dutch mathematician, Professor at Delft University of Technology and a pioneer in the field of operations research in the Netherlands.

Life and work

Lombaers undertook teacher training, and earned a degree in mathematics. From 1945 to 1956 he employed by the Royal Netherlands Army, where he was involved in the introduction of radar-aircraft artillery.
In 1956 he joined Koninklijke Hoogovens as operational researcher. At Hoogovens he conducted research in the transhipment capacity of the port installations using computer simulations. He also looked into the statistical aspects of simulation.
In 1968 he was appointed Professor of Quantitative Aspects of Business Administration at the Technical University of Delft, where he held his inaugural address on "Voorzien en verzinnen. In 1985 he retired with the speech, entitled "Daar moet je maar niet te hard op rekenen". In Delft Lombaerts was succeeded by Joop Evers, who had been Professor at the University of Twente.
The PhD students under Lombaers were Jack P.C. Kleijnen, who graduated in 1971, Hendrik van der Meerendonk also in 1971, Johannes Botman in 1981, and Jaap van den Herik in 1983.

Selected publications