Prof. Dr.-Ing. Armando Walter Colombo joined the Department of Electrotechnical and Industrial Informatics at the University of Applied Sciences Emden-Leer, Germany, became Full Professor in August 2010 and Director of the Institute for Industrial Informatics, Automation and Robotics (I2AR) in 2012.

Prof. Colombo worked also during 17 years (2001-2018) as Manager Director for Collaborative Innovation Projects and also as Edison Level 2 Group Senior Expert at Schneider Electric, Industrial Business Unit.

Prof. Colombo received the BSc. on Electronics Engineering from the National Technological University of Mendoza, Argentina, in 1990, the MSc. on Control System Engineering from the National University of San Juan, Argentina, in 1994, and the Doctor degree in Engineering from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany, in 1998. From 1999 to 2000 was Adjunct Professor in the Group of Robotic Systems and CIM, Faculty of Technical Sciences, New University of Lisbon, Portugal. During the last 15 years he has also been working as Invited Professor at the University of Loughborough and University of Warwick (UK), University of Tampere (Finland), ITMO University (Russia), Universidad Tecnologica Nacional (UTN) (Argentina), BUAP (Mexico).

Prof. Colombo has extensive experience in managing multi-cultural research teams in multi-regional projects. He has participated in leading positions in many international research and innovation projects related to the area of Industrial Informatics. His research interests are in the fields of industrial cyber-physical systems, industrial digitalization and system-of-systems engineering, Internet-of-Services, Industry 4.0-compliant solutions.

Prof. Colombo has over 30 industrial patents and more than 300 per-review publications in journals, books, chapters of books and conference proceedings (see here). With his contributions, he has performed scientific and technical seminal contributions that are nowadays being used as one of the basis of what is recognized as “The 4th Industrial Revolution” and are penetrating the daily life, producing visible societal changes and impacting all levels of the society.

He is member of the IEEE IES Administrative Committee (AdCom), member of the Fellow Committees of the IEEE IES, IEEE SMS and IEEE CS, and IES representative by the IEEE Systems Council. He is co-founder of three IEEE IES Technical Committees (i) on Industrial Agents, (ii) on Industrial Informatics and (iii) on Industrial Cyber-Physical Systems. 

Prof. Colombo served/serves as advisor/expert for the definition of the Research and Innovation priorities within the Framework Programs FP6, FP7, FP8 (HORIZON 2020) and FP9 (Horizon Europe, ECSEL SRA) of the European Union. H is working as expert/evaluator in the European Research Executive Agency (REA), ECSEL Platform, Eureka- and German BMBF/DLR Programs, as well as Digital Supercluster Canada, National R&D-Programs in Sweden, Denmark, Italy, Switzerland, Norway, etc.

Prof. Colombo is listed in Who’s Who in the World /Engineering 99-00/01 and in Outstanding People of the XX Century (Bibliographic Centre Cambridge, UK).