Comments from the departing editor
It was early in 2005 when the idea of starting Optimization Letters came to my mind. It was excellent timing for the launch of a new journal since optimization had been expanding in all directions at an astonishing rate during the preceding decades. Due to the interdisciplinary nature of optimization, new algorithmic, computational, and theoretical techniques had been developed and the need for a new journal to chronicle these techniques was apparent. Dr. Werner A. Mueller from Springer welcomed my idea of a new journal and enthusiastically supported Optimization Letters (OPTL) from its inception. The first issue of OPTL appeared in January 2007 with papers from world class leading scientists in optimization. During the first 5 years OPTL published four issues per year and in 2012 moved to eight issues with a corresponding increase in the number of pages. My term as the founding Editor-in-Chief of OPTL came to an end with the last issue of 2012. I am very happy to pass the editorship to Pavlo Krokhmal and Oleg Prokopyev, very capable and enthusiastic young researchers. Both Pavlo and Oleg have served as members of the editorial board of the journal and in doing so have gained good experience with OPTL. It is often said that a change also presents an opportunity and it is my firm belief that the new editors will attract new authors and identify additional exciting areas of research to be published in the journal. It was a unique and fortunate experience for me to start Optimization Letters. During my years as editor, I have come to understand better the diversity of communities working on different aspects of optimization and to appreciate the richness of optimization as a scientific discipline and as a tool to solve many problems from a