ENCONTRASTE

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Dirk Elias is co-owner of Encontraste Lda. He specializes in advising industry and organizations on ICT and software R&D, with a focus on the Cyber-Physical-Metaverse. From August 2024 appointed Chairman of the Eureka research cluster ITEA, he brings extensive experience from Industry and Academia to this role.   

Previously, as Senior Vice President at Robert Bosch GmbH, Elias led the Corporate Research Division 'Advanced Digital' from 2017 to 2023. This division focused on applied research in ICT, software development, systems engineering, and simulation. He also oversaw the Bosch Research and Technology Center in India. Elias successfully transitioned research findings from the Reliable Distributed Systems project to Bosch's mobility sector.   

After earning an EE degree at TU Munich he started his career at Fraunhofer Fokus in 1992. He obtained his PhD in Computer Science from TU Berlin in 1996. In 2000 he left Fraunhofer and founded IVISTAR AG. IVISTAR focused on IoT products for the organization of open offices and provided later also development services for smart home products. In 2008 he left Berlin and started setting up the Fraunhofer Portugal Research Center AICOS. He joined the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto (FEUP) as invited full professor in 2008.