Gerald Mies and Urko Esnaola newly elected to IFR Executive Board
Robotics power added
Jul 16, 2025 — Gerald Mies and Urko Esnaola are the new faces in the IFR Executive Board - elected by the IFR General Assembly during automatica in Munich.
Gerald Mies, ESTUN Robotics Europe AG, will represent the IFR Robot Suppliers in the executive board, Dr. Urko Esnaola, AER Automation, will represent the IFR Associaton members in the executive board. Both have spent their professional careers in robotics and/or automation so far and will enhance the executive board with their experience.
Gerald Mies
Gerald studied mechanical engineering and started his career in the early 90s at Messer Griesheim. He held different positions at FANUC Robotics Deutschland and Europe, Cloos, FFG Amercias & Europe Holdings,and KUKA. Since August 2024 he has been President and CEO at ESTUN Robotics Europe AG responsible for the EMEA business. In October 2024 he was elected to the IFR General Assembly by the Robot Suppliers committee.
Urko Esnaola
Urko studied automation and industrial electronics and helds a phd in computer engineering. Linked to robotics since his final year project at the University of New South Wales (Sydney, 2000), he has researched various branches of robotics. In 2005, he joined the applied research ecosystem of Tecnalia, where he continues to work. He spent 6 months as a research visitor in the JSK humanoid robotics laboratory at the University of Tokyo (2013). He worked at the Airbus Puerto Real Plant (2014-2015) in a shared laboratory of Airbus and Tecnalia. After progressing through roles as a researcher and project manager, he is currently the head of the Flexible Robotics Platform at Tecnalia.
Urko has been a board member of the Spanish Robotics Association AER Automation since 2011 and was appointed Secretary of the Spanish Robotics Association in June 2024. He has actively participated in the IFR since 2011, representing the Spanish Robotics Association in different committees.
Gerad Mies and Urko Esnaola have been elected for a term of two year, together with Jeff Burnstein, A3 (Associations), Erich Schober, KUKA (Robot Suppliers) and Ennio Chiatante, Comau (Robot Suppliers), also representing SIRI, the latter three being re-elected.
IFR President Takayuki Ito, Fanuc Japan, congratulated the new Board members.
See the full lineup of Executive Board members
