About 59bits

Owner profile

Rene van Oostrum

My name is René van Oostrum. After having studied music for five years, I switched to computer science at Utrecht University in 1989, and received my MSc degree in 1995. Subsequently, I worked as an academic computer scientist, did research in the field of computational geometry (a specialisation of algorithms research), and received my PhD diploma in 1999. During the following years, I continued my research, and designed and implemented complex algorithms in C++. I also taught several courses, initially as a visiting assistant lecturer at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, later as postdoc and assistant professor at Utrecht University, where I received a teaching qualification. Topics of the courses I taught were a.o. object-oriented programming, C++, computer graphics, and mathematics for computer science graduate students. I enjoyed the teaching, and the students appreciated my courses, as evidenced by the generally very positive feedback from the course evaluations. The algorithms research (which basically boils down to solving challenging mathematics-flavoured puzzles) was also fun. Nevertheless, at some point I really wanted to apply my analytical skills and software design knwoledge and experience to more pratical problems, so I decided to move to industry. I worked several years as a consultant with ORTEC, designing systems and implementing algorithms for complex operations research problems. During these years, I noticed that there is a lot of potential for improving ICT projects by training both software developers and ICT customers in those areas that have the largest effect on project success. Given my experiences and skills as a researcher, practitioner, and teacher, founding 59bits was the logical next step in my career.

For more information, see my LinkedIn page..

What's with all the “we” and “us” nonsense?

Although I'm running this company alone, all references to it on this website are in plural: “we do this-and-that”, and “our such-and-so course ”. This is not to make the company seem larger or more important than it is, but merely to distinguish between the company and the person behind it. And, of course, I'm anticipating a healthy growth of the company.

“Cool but practical stuff that pays off. Effectiveness guaranteed. Period.”