Bj. Habibie

Habibie was born in pare-pare, South Sulawesi  june 25th 1936.  Province to Abdul Jalil Habibie and R. A. Tuti Marini Puspowardojo. His father was an agriculturist from Gorontalo and his mother was aJavanese noblewoman from Yogyakarta. His parents met while studying in Bogor. When he was 14 years old, Habibie's father died. Following his father's death, Habibie continued his studies in Jakarta and then in 1955, he moved to Germany.

In 1960, in Germany, Habibie received a 'Diplom-Ingenieur', a degree in engineering. He remained in Germany as a research assistant under Hans Ebner at the Lehrstuhl und Institut für Leichtbau, RWTH Aachen, to conduct research for his doctoral degree.

In 1962, Habibie returned to Indonesia for three months on sick leave. During this time, he was reacquainted with Hasri Ainun, the daughter of R. Mohamad Besari. Habibie had known Hasri Ainun in childhood, junior high school and in senior high school at SMA-Kristen, Bandung. The two married on 12th May, 1962, returning to Germany shortly afterwards. Habibie and his wife settled in Aachen for a short period before moving to Oberforstbach. In May 1963, they had a son, Ilham Akbar Habibie.

When Habibie's minimum wage salary forced him into part-time work, he found employment with the automotive marque Talbot where he became an adviser. Habibie worked on two projects which received funded from Deutsche Bundesbahn.

Due to his work with Makosh, the Head of Train Constructions offered his position to Habibie upon retirement 3 years later, but Habibie refused.

In 1965, Habibie delivered his thesis in aerospace engineering and received "very good" for his Doktor der Ingenieurwissenschaften). During the same year, he accepted Hans Ebner's offer to continue his research on Thermoelastisitas and Habilitation, but refused to join RWTH as a professor per se. His thesis about light construction for supersonic or hypersonic states also attracted offers of employment from companies such as Boeing and Airbus which Habibie again declined.

Habibie did accept a place with Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm in Hamburg. There, he developed theories on thermodynamics, construction, and aerodynamics, known as the Habibie Factor, Habibie Theorem, and Habibie Method, respectively. Habibie's time in Europe may have contributed to his interest in the Leica cameras.

Career

On his return to Indonesia in 1974, Habibie was made Chief Executive Officer of the new State owned enterprise, Industri Pesawat Terbang Nusantara (IPTN). (In 1985, PT. Nurtanio changed its name to Indonesian Aviation Industry and is now known as Indonesian Aerospace Inc. (Dirgantara)). By the 1980s, IPTN had grown considerably, specializing in the manufacturing of helicopters and small passenger planes.

Habibie became a pilot, assisted in his training by A.B. Wolff, former Chief of Staff of the Dutch Airforce. In 1995, he flew an N-250 (dubbedGatotkoco) commuter plane.

In developing Indonesia's Aviation Industry, he adopted an approach called "Begin at the End and End at the Beginning". In this method, elements such as basic research became the last things upon which to focus, whilst actual manufacturing of the planes was placed as the first objective.