2024 Institute Magazine

Innovative mobility, smart infrastructure, promising prospects: With solutions for automotive applications, intelligent transport systems, and civil security, researchers at Fraunhofer IVI achieve high effectiveness across industries and sectors. Since June 1, 2024, the new institute director, Professor Sanaz Mostaghim, has been adding further forward-looking expertise to the institute‘s portfolio. The renowned expert in artificial intelligence has been a university professor at the Chair of Computational Intelligence at the Faculty of Computer Science at Otto von Guericke University Magdeburg (OVGU) since 2014. Her research focuses in particular on multi-criteria optimization, decision-making and evolutionary algorithms, as well as collective intelligence and swarm robotics.

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What motivates young people to become a researcher at Fraunhofer?

After successfully completing their doctoral and master‘s theses, the institute was able to recruit Felix, Max Leon, Kai, and Max as committed young scientists. In the following interview, they provide insight into their projects and discuss the processes involved in finding their topics as well as the challenges of scientific work and writing.

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Fraunhofer IVI through the years
 

When the Fraunhofer Institute for Transportation and Infrastructure Systems IVI was founded in 1999, it had already been part of the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft since 1992 as Process Control Institute (EPS) of the Fraunhofer Institute for Information and Data Processing IITB (now IOSB). The decision to establish an institute for transportation research in Dresden opened up completely new perspectives for the branch office in Karlsruhe.

Initially, the newly founded institute operated as a research branch of Fraunhofer IITB. It was not until October 2013 that the Senate of the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft decided to grant Fraunhofer IVI the status of an independent Fraunhofer institute. Factors such as its balanced technical orientation, sustainable staff structure, university connection and positive economic development were decisive in this decision.

In 2013, the institute added a technical center with a vehicle hall and adjoining test oval to its assets.

In a quarter of a century, Fraunhofer IVI has grown into a high-performance institute that enjoys national and international recognition thanks to its expertise. Innovations in the fields of electronic ticketing, intelligent transport systems as well as vehicle and drive engineering have characterized it since its beginnings.

New focal points and areas of application, such as automation, civil defense or vehicle and road safety, were added. As a result, the institute has developed into a strong R&D partner in the fields of mobility, energy and safety.

Academic connections were further strengthened through the establishment of an application center at Technische Hochschule Ingolstadt in December 2019. The challenges of automated and connected driving and flying are a particular focus here.

While Fraunhofer IVI is celebrating its 25th anniversary, the institute building has been a research location since the 1960s. In order to offer employees a pleasant working environment and to meet the requirements of a modern scientific institution, the institute has made investments in recent years primarily in expanding the research infrastructure and modernizing the existing building.

Continuous growth, a balanced budget and stable earnings form a reliable basis for ongoing prosperous economic development. Last but not least, it is also its openness towards developing new research fields for tackling social challenges that puts Fraunhofer IVI in an excellent position for the coming years.