Eight new professors at the THI

In the winter semester 2020/21, eight new professors have taken up their teaching and research activities at Technische Hochschule Ingolstadt (THI). This will further significantly expand Ingolstadt as a university location. Particular importance is attached to the field of computer science, where six of the eight new professorships are located. Above all, research on artificial intelligence (AI) will be strengthened as a result. The new THI professors with their scientific and professional backgrounds will make an important contribution to this.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Marc Aubreville, Research Professor for Image Understanding and Medical Application of AI at the Faculty of Computer Science, teaches in the Bachelor's programme Computational Life Sciences. Prior to his appointment at the THI, he researched the improvement of tumour diagnosis in microscopic images at the Friedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nuremberg, where he also obtained his doctorate and gained teaching experience. At the same time he worked as a system architect for a large hearing aid manufacturer, where he had previously been employed as a developer of algorithms for processing audio signals. The professorship is a five-year endowed chair at Ingolstadt Hospital.

Prof. Dr. Jürgen Bock, research professor for AI applications in innovative production and logistics systems, teaches at the Faculty of Industrial Engineering. After studying computer science at the University of Ulm and Griffith University in Brisbane, Australia, he did research in the field of semantic technologies at the Research Centre for Computer Science in Karlsruhe, where he headed the Knowledge Management department after completing his doctorate. Prior to his appointment at the THI, he worked in corporate research at KUKA in Augsburg, where he was most recently responsible for Smart Data and infrastructure. The professorship is a five-year endowed professorship of Audi AG.

Prof. Dr. Thomas Buckel, Professor of Business Informatics and IT Management, works at the Faculty of Informatics, where he teaches IT Management, Project Management and Digital Transformation. He completed his studies in business informatics at the Julius-Maximilians-University of Würzburg. During his doctorate in economics he worked as a consultant for adidas AG. Before his call to the THI, he worked as a Research Scientist at Siemens AG in Berkeley, USA, and in leading positions as IT Project Manager, Assistant to the CIO and Delivery Manager at Audi AG.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Munir Georges, research professor for speech and text comprehension at the Faculty of Computer Science, teaches and conducts research in the fields of speech, language and speaker recognition, speech comprehension and machine translation. He is an Intel Labs researcher and, before his appointment at THI, was, among other things, product architect/researcher at Intel Germany and technical director at Nuance Communication. The professorship is funded from Bavaria's high-tech agenda.

Prof. Dr. Sören Gröttrup, Professor for Machine Learning and Statistics at the Faculty of Computer Science, teaches, among other things, in the Bachelor's programme in Artificial Intelligence. Before his appointment at the THI, he worked in both research and industry. He worked as a data scientist at Miles & More GmbH, smaller start-ups and advised companies in the field of digitisation and machine learning projects. He gained teaching experience as an assistant lecturer at the University of Applied Sciences in Mainz. He completed his doctorate in mathematics at the University of Münster.

Prof. Dr. Stefan Kugele, Research Professor for Model-based Systems Engineering and Software Engineering at the Faculty of Computer Science, teaches in the bachelor's programme in Computer Science. Before being appointed to the THI, he was an Academic Councilor at the Technical University of Munich, where he also completed his doctorate. His research is in the field of formal, model-driven development of cyber-physical systems. Current work focuses on service-oriented architecture and methods of AI to keep systems operable in unknown environments or changing contexts. The professorship is a five-year endowed professorship of Airbus Defence and Space GmbH.

Prof. Dr. Torsten Schön, Research Professor for Computer Vision for Intelligent Mobility Systems at the Faculty of Computer Science, teaches in the areas of programming and computer vision with a focus on deep learning. He studied bioinformatics at the Weihenstephan-Triesdorf University of Applied Sciences and received his doctorate in the Computational Intelligence & Machine Learning Group at the University of Regensburg. Before his call to the THI he was a data scientist at Audi AG and worked on innovation topics for autonomous driving and intelligent interior monitoring. Most recently, he developed the AI strategy for the VW subsidiary Car.Software Org, where he helped build a central AI department. The professorship is financed from Bavaria's high-tech agenda.

Prof. Dr. Michael Sternbeck, Professor for Supply Chain Management and Logistics, teaches at the Business School. Before his appointment to the THI, he was responsible for transport, branch and reverse logistics at the dm-drogerie markt GmbH + Co KG in Karlsruhe. He completed his studies at the Faculty of Economics of the KU Eichstätt-Ingolstadt, where he was subsequently awarded a doctorate with a dissertation topic from the field of retail logistics. His research focuses on the development of integrative supply chain planning systems.