Last week marked a major milestone for our EU-funded project “TWON – Twin of Online Social Networks”: consortium members from across Europe gathered in Berlin for three intensive and inspiring days for what was the final consortium meeting before the project concludes. With the project entering its final phase, the meeting provided an important opportunity to take stock, reflect, look ahead, and engage with policymakers. The meeting was organized by our team members Cosima Pfannschmidt and Dr. Jonas Fegert.

We are pleased to announce that as of February 2, 2026, Prof. Dr. Philipp Staudt has started his position as Junior Professor and Head of the Research Group Information Systems II - Digital Energy Markets at the Institute for Information Systems (WIN) at KIT. Prof. Staudt's research focuses on the digitalization of energy systems and sustainable digitalization more broadly, with particular emphasis on digitalized energy systems, agent-based modeling, data management and sustainable information systems.

Dr. Rainer Hoffmann

from EnBW gave an industry talk in our bachelor lecture “BWL | Information Systems” 

on February 2nd, 2026. In his talk, he gave deep insights into the data and AI strategy of EnBW including the building blocks of vision, use cases, data & infrastructure, compliance & governance, upskilling, and strategic partnerships. EnBW (Energie Baden-Württemberg AG) is one of the largest energy supply companies in Europe, headquartered in Karlsruhe.

In this CHI 2026 workshop we bring together researchers from different sub-disciplines of HCI and adjacent fields (ML, CV, NLP, Software Engineering) to discuss how multimodal UI design can support AI as collaborative partners, and how these interfaces must evolve to facilitate human-AI interaction across diverse modalities. The workshop is co-organized by Felix Kretzer and Alexander Maedche from the human-centered systems lab with colleagues from University of Utah, Carnegie Mellon University, Apple, and University of Bath.

KIT hosted the 1st “Human Subject Research for Impact” Symposium, bringing together researchers from across disciplines to discuss how human subject research can be advanced responsibly and with impact.The event marked the launch of the Human Subject Research Hub (HSR Hub), which will serve as the academic backbone at KIT for advancing knowledge and processes in human subject research, as well as the conclusion of the Future Field III project on Decision-Making in Hybrid Adaptive Systems.

The end of the winter semester 2025/26 also marks the successful end of this year’s Business Intelligence Systems (BIS) capstone project, which is an integral element of the BIS master lecture held by Prof. Dr. Alexander Mädche  and Niklas Wagner. 46 students worked in 10 teams on a retail banking business intelligence & analytics case provided by our industry partner Atruvia, the IT service provider for Germany’s cooperative banks. The capstone project empowers students in collecting hands-on experiences in using and applying state-of-the-art Business Intelligence & Analytics (BI&A) technologies such as the Databricks platform and in parallel build up transferable skills (e.g., communication, team collaboration, etc.).

On January 12th 2026, Ekta Narang from SAP SE Supply Chain Management gave an industry talk in our bachelor lecture “BWL | Information Systems”. In her talk, she highlighted the current "value gap" in AI adoption, where significant investment often yields low returns due to disjointed data, siloed solutions, and organizational complexity. As a response, she presented the concept of “SAP Business AI" that integrates context-rich data, provides unified user experiences, and role-aware AI assistants integrated into business processes.

The INFORTE.fi programme is hosting an "Advanced Laddering Interviews and Analysis" course from March 10 to March 12, 2026, at the University of Jyväskylä, Finland. This specialized training introduces participants to the laddering interview technique, an advanced qualitative method used to uncover complex user behaviors and deep-seated values in information systems and service research. The course will be taught by Prof. Tuure Tuunanen and Dr. Juuli Lumivalo from the University of Jyväskylä, along with Prof. Alexander Maedche and Mr. Leon Hanschmann from the human-centered systems lab of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT).

We would like to wish all our students and partners a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Thank you for the inspiring and fruitful cooperation throughout 2025. We look forward to continuing our successful collaboration in the coming year and wish you a joyful holiday season and a great start into 2026. 

We will discontinue on-site operations between Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025 to Tuesday, January 6th, 2026. From Wednesday 7th, 2026 the regular opening hours will apply again. 

Artificial intelligence (AI) is a transformative force, upending teaching and learning, science, and the working environment. In issue 04/2025 of the lookKIT magazine, Dr. Julia Seitz, Thimo Schulz from the Institute for Information Systems (WIN) report on the MenschKI! project focusing on understanding and designing the interaction between humans and AI for productivity and well-being. Furthermore, Dr. Florian Kuhlmeier presents our research in the field of Mental Health Therapy Companions. 

Complex software-based systems consist of a multitude of elements that interact in various ways. This includes cyber-physical systems like cars, which comprise numerous software and hardware components, as well as software products on which multiple development teams work on different software elements. Consistency problems represent a key challenge in the development of complex software-based systems.

Every year, the challenge of finding good Christmas gifts returns. Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly used to suggest ideas, but in an SWR3 interview, Martin Feick from the human-centered systems lab (h-lab) emphasizes that while AI can help overcome “blank page paralysis,” prompts should always include a personal touch. He warns against relying solely on AI — a thoughtful, human-crafted gift still matters most.  In the interview, he also shares tips on how to prompt AI more effectively for meaningful gift ideas.