Competence Center "Digital Transformation"
Ferdinand Porsche FERNFH pursues applied research in cooperation with national and international partners. In addition to research projects specific to study programs, the overarching priority of FERNFH's interdisciplinary research is on the topic of "digital transformation in all areas of society".
Within this scope, the research department for "Digital Transformation" is particularly dedicated to questions of "digital transformation in knowledge and information transfer".
The department focuses on the following goals, among others:
- Empowering individuals and companies to actively shape the digital transformation by promoting digital competencies.
- Development and evaluation of innovative approaches to increase flexibility and interactivity in teaching and learning processes, especially in a university and corporate context.
- Development of methodological competencies, e.g., for evaluation and decision support in projects and processes related to digital transformation.
- Knowledge and method transfer between business, research, and teaching.
Research topics
Research activities are currently focused on the following topics:
Development and application of innovative approaches to communicating techniques for shaping digital transformation; including in the following areas:
- Software engineering, such as requirements engineering, programming, or software modeling.
- Application of digital technologies, e.g. artificial intelligence and virtual reality
- Process, innovation and startup management.
- Use and combination of established tools, especially regarding digital knowledge transfer.
Design and software-technical development of intelligent mechanisms, among others regarding to the following aspects:
- adaptive learning environments and personalized learning paths.
- digital competence and knowledge management.
- analysis and optimization of learning/teaching processes by means of learning analytics.
- Development and application of approaches for the gamification of learning and collaboration processes.
- Applying and testing virtual worlds (virtual/mixed reality) in knowledge transfer, e.g., for the implementation of Digital Twins or theme worlds on digital transformation.
- Application and development of methods and metrics for the evaluation of interaction designs and processes as well as of the underlying technical architectures, especially in the context of digital knowledge transfer.
- (Further) development of quality and evaluation standards and their application in practical projects.
- Scientific support of companies/startups for the evaluation of digital products, especially in the areas of Educational and Human-Resources Technologies (EdTech & HRTech).
Promoting exchange and networking between academia and industry, including through practical projects as well as feasibility and case studies on the following topics:
- Methods, strategies, communication processes in companies, on digital transformation in general and digital knowledge transfer in particular.
- Organizational digital training and promotion of digital competencies.
- Requirements and consequences of the integration of digital technologies (e.g., AI, VR) for the optimization of business processes.
The research activities are carried out in cooperation with FERNFH's degree and executive programmes and departments as well as with national and international partners from academia and industry.
The resulting findings, including the developed and evaluated approaches in form of processes, models, and software applications, are integrated into the teaching of the FERNFH as well as scientifically published on an ongoing basis.
FERNFH students can participate in research via project work as well as via BA or MA theses.
… funded by the GFF NÖ with means of the Province of Lower Austria
Thorsten Händler