Obituary: Arthur Kolb

Arthur Kolb, 87, died on Dec. 29, 2018, in Schmitten, Germany.

“Dr. Kolb was one of the pioneers in the early days of electronic information services, and his work helped shape the scientific information enterprise as we know it today. He was managing director of Internationale Dokumentationsgesellschaft für Chemie (IDC), a consortium of 10 chemical companies, from its founding in 1967 until his retirement when IDC was closed in 1993. IDC played a key role in developing innovative electronic databases and associated data creation, management, and retrieval technologies to improve the range, depth, and timeliness of patent information. Through a unique business arrangement with CAS, a division of the American Chemical Society, IDC licensed the abstracts of patents from CAS, enhanced them in a variety of ways, and made the data available in electronic form to all the IDC members. IDC and Dr. Kolb were influential in CAS’s decisions to put more emphasis on patents in its databases, both by expanding the scope of its coverage internationally and by including content from patent claims.”—Ron Dunn, friend and colleague

Most recent title: Managing director, Internationale Dokumentationsgesellschaft für Chemie

Education: PhD, chemistry, Heidelberg University, 1960

Survivors: Wife, Ingeborg; son, Andreas

To recognize your late loved one or colleague, submit obituary information at cenm.ag/obits.