Prof. Angela Schoellig has accepted the Infineon Endowed Chair “Safety, Performance and Reliability of Learning Systems” at the Technical University of Munich (TUM). An internationally recognized expert in the field of robotics and artificial intelligence, Angela Schoellig conducts research in robotics, control engineering and machine learning, most recently at the University of Toronto’s Dynamic Systems Lab. Her focus areas include self-driving cars, flying robots and mobile platforms with robotic arms, known as mobile manipulators.
The professorship at TUM’s Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology is based on an endowment from Infineon Technologies AG. Science and industry have established the professorship as a joint contribution to strengthening German AI expertise, in recognition of its importance to society. “Security, reliability and performance of learning systems are forward-looking topics and are very significant for Germany as a business location,” said Prof. Schoellig. “If we succeed in making progress here and combining it with our traditional strengths in engineering, automation technology and robotics, we have a very good chance of taking the lead worldwide.”
In conjunction with microelectronics, AI is a key research area for Infineon. “Artificial Intelligence is possibly the most significant technology in the field of digitalization. We want our commitment as a sponsor of this chair in this important research area to strengthen AI expertise in Munich as a research and business location and to help train the experts of tomorrow,” said Constanze Hufenbecher, Chief Digital Transformation Officer at Infineon.
TUM President Prof. Thomas F. Hofmann acknowledges Infineon’s commitment to the future-oriented development of the university: “Once again, our ‘TUM Partner of Excellence’ Infineon has placed its full trust in us to attract an international scientific personality to Munich with this endowed professorship. We have succeeded in bringing Prof. Angela Schoellig, a leading expert in the field of robotics and artificial intelligence, from Canada to TUM. As a member of the future TUM School of Computation, Information and Technology, which will be established in October, and of the Munich Institute of Robotics and Machine Intelligence, Prof. Schoellig will give strong impetus to the development of powerful, safe and reliable autonomous systems.”