CONFENIS 2006

Keynote Speaker: Dr. Thomas Li, Director of IBM China Research Laboratory

Dr. Thomas Li is the Director of IBM China Research Laboratory . He received his PhD degree in Management Information System from the University of Texas, Austin, USA, in 1991. In addition to his many years of service with IT industry such as IBM, he is very experienced in managing startup companies, manufacturing facilities, as well as consulting practices. He is also very active in both research and higher education. He is an Adjunct Professor at top Chinese research universities such as prestigious Peking University and Tsinghua University where he offers courses "On Demand Transformation Technology". Dr. Li's technical expertise and innovative thinking has led to thirty-nine patents in object technology, digital communication, visualization tools, and database systems. In addition to publications in refereed journals, proceedings, and technical reports, he has been one of the key contributors in delivering eight commercial software products, three hardware systems, and a number of architectural designs and technical specifications.

Speech Title: Continual Business Transformation Technology

IBM China Research Laboratory

The IBM China Research Laboratory (CRL) was established in September 1995 and is one of the eight worldwide IBM Research laboratories. Located in Beijing, CRL has been growing steadily and currently employs over 150 technical staff members. The majority research staffs there hold PhD or master's degrees, and join IBM from leading research universities.

IBM Research's mission is vital to IBM's future success and the IBM China Research Laboratory plays a large role in meeting that goal. CRL continually strives to create world-class information technologies and the underlying science that propels the world's advances. CRL carries out joint research projects with universities and research institutes.

Keynote Speaker:Prof. Dr. Gottfried Vossen, Director of European Research Center for Information Systems

Gottfried Vossen is a Professor of Computer Science in the Department of Information Systems at the University of Muenster in Germany. He received his master’s and Ph.D. degrees as well as the German habilitation in 1981, 1986, and 1990, respectively, all from the Technical University of Aachen in Germany. He has held visiting positions at the University of California in San Diego, at several German universities including the Hasso-Plattner-Institute for Software Systems Engineering in Potsdam near Berlin, at Karlstad University in Sweden and at The University of Waikato in Hamilton, New Zealand. In 2004 he became the European Editor-in-Chief of Elsevier's Information Systems-An International Journal, and a Director of the European Research Center for Information Systems (ERCIS) in Muenster. He currently also serves as the Vice-Dean of the Business School at the University of Muenster. His research interests include conceptual as well as application-oriented problems concerning databases, information systems, electronic learning, and the Web. Dr. Vossen has been member in numerous program committees of international conferences and workshops. He is an author or co-author of more than 120 publications, and an author, co-author, or co-editor of 20 books on databases, business process modeling, the Web, e-commerce, and computer architecture.

Title: Have Service-Oriented Architectures Taken a Wrong Turn Already?

Information Systems: Information systems are the software and hardware systems that support data-intensive applications. Information Systems publishes articles concerning the design and implementation of languages, data models, algorithms, software and hardware for information systems. Subject areas include data management issues as presented in the principal international database conferences as well as data-related issues from the fields of data mining, information retrieval, natural language processing, internet data management, visual and audio information systems, scientific computing, and organizational behavior. The Editors-in-Chief are Dennis Shasha, New York, and Gottfried Vossen, Muenster.

ERCIS: The ERCIS – European Research Center for Information Systems – is a network of scientists that conduct cooperative research in the field of integrated information systems development and organizational design. For the first time, core competencies in the discipline of information systems are interrelated with issues in the field of computer science, business administration and specific legal issues within an institutional framework. Thus, a holistic view of information system development and organizational design issues can be ensured. Due to its outstanding reputation in both research and teaching within the field of information systems and business administration, the University of Muenster has been selected by the federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia to establish the European Research Center for Information Systems. Its objective is to undertake joint research projects that span different disciplines and countries, thus fostering research at a level that cannot be achieved by individual go-it-alone projects. The exchange of researchers, such as PhD students, lecturers or (associate) professors, is encouraged and cooperative masters and doctoral programs are also part of the overall objective. http://www.ercis.org