Former minister of economic affairs Lee Chih-kung (李世光) will next month take over as chairman of the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI, 工研院), the institute yesterday said in a statement.
Lee had resigned in the wake of a major blackout that affected millions of households across the nation last month. Since stepping down as economic affairs minister, he has been teaching at National Taiwan University.
The Ministry of Economic Affairs yesterday confirmed that Lee has been appointed by the Executive Yuan to lead the government-funded institute, effective from Thursday.
The ministry, which received the Cabinet’s notification on Thursday, said Lee has served as ITRI vice president from 2007 to 2010 and has been a managing director at the institute’s board for more than a year, which makes Lee a good candidate to lead the organization.
Founded in 1973, the institute has played a vital role in transforming Taiwan’s economy from labor-intensive industry to high-tech industry.
Lee, who has a doctoral degree from Cornell University in theoretical and applied mechanics, worked as a researcher at IBM Corp for many years before returning home to teach at NTU.
Before being named as economic affairs minister in May last year, Lee served as the director-general of engineering and applied sciences at the National Science Council, which was in 2014 upgraded to the Ministry of Science and Technology.
On Aug. 15, more than 6 million households in 17 cities and counties were hit by a blackout, which was later determined to have been caused by human error at the Tatan Power Plant (大潭電廠) in Taoyuan operated by state-run utility Taiwan Power Co (台電).
Although Lee was not responsible for the incident, he assumed political responsibility as head of the ministry, which supervises state-run companies, and tendered his resignation soon after the power outage occurred.
Additional reporting by Lauly Li
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