SPEAKERS - 2023
(in alphabetical order by last name)
Kerstin Bach
Professor and Reserch Director NorwAI
Speaking on Day 1, Session 4,
Research-Driven Innovation
Kerstin is professor in Artificial Intelligence and research director of NorwAI. She started her career at the German research center for AI developing decision support systems for various industries. Since then she’s has been responsible for an open-source tool, called myCBR, that has been used in numerous research and industry projects across Europe. After finishing her PhD, Kerstin joined the Trondheim-based AI startup Verdande technology as a research and software engineer before joining NTNU.
In the past years her research focus is the development of AI prototypes in healthcare, intelligent sensing and knowledge management. She was manager of one EU H2020 research grant, selfBACK, whichs results are currently exploited in a number of european healthcare systems. Moreover, she has been involved in developing the European ecosystem for AI (AI4Europe platform) and an active member of the European AI community organising workshop, conference and symposia. Currently, she is the technical lead of a number of interdiscicplinary projects funded by Forskningsrådet and NTNU that work on understanding healthcare data and developing novel healthcare services.
At NTNU she works on promoting AI research among students, especially females who are interested in careers in technology. She teaches AI and Machine Learning courses, supervises master’s and PhD students involving them activeling in writing research papers. Currently, she is the research director of the Norwegian research center for AI-based innovation where develops new projects together with industry and academic partners. As part of this work, she established, FEMAIS, a mentorship program for female AI students bridging between the last year of studies and the beginning of professional careers. At the Norwegian Open AI Lab, she is actively organizing event and seminars to promote AI research among professionals and the public.
Christian Bendiksen
Partner, Bull & Co Advokatfirma AS
Christian Bendiksen is a Norwegian lawyer and British solicitor with a master’s degree in French and specialisation in artificial intelligence and big data streams. Due to his international experience, he is in high demand for international contract negotiations, where he advises Norwegian export companies on export control, understanding contracts and negotiation techniques, and he also helps foreign companies learn how to achieve good results in Norway.
Christian is one of the leading lawyers in the areas of artificial intelligence, big data streams, neural networks and IoT. He regularly gives lectures on these topics for the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH) and the University of Oslo, as well as for foreign clients and chambers of commerce. He has in-depth knowledge of lawtech and has advised foreign legal networks on this topic.
Christian has long experience as an advisor on tender processes for Norwegian and foreign companies in various sectors, from the military to transport and health. He has also assisted Norwegian companies with tender processes abroad.
He is ranked by Finansavisen as one of Norway’s leading lawyers in the area of technology and digitisation and has been on Legal 500’s international list of recommended lawyers for years.
Speaking on Day 2, Session 6
Trustworthy AI
Simone Casolo
Simone Casolo, Oil & Gas Service Lead and Principal Data Scientist, Cognite
Speaking on Day 1, Session 3: Innovation Excellence
Simone Casolo currently serves as the Oil & Gas Service Lead and Principal Data Scientist at Cognite, a position that involves managing and leading teams in machine learning and DataOps projects for the heavy industry, spanning energy, manufacturing, and oil & gas. In his role, Simone is responsible for overseeing project deliveries across the EMEA region, directing teams of data scientists and engineers located in various locations.
Simone holds a Ph.D. in Physical and Theoretical Chemistry from the University of Milan, where his research focused on simulating materials for applications in electronics and batteries. His extensive academic background includes collaborations with research centers in Norway, Italy, the Netherlands, and Japan.
With previous experience in the Norwegian oil & gas sector, Simone has experience in both subsea and materials engineering. His expertise ranges from material selection and corrosion prevention to the development of new material technologies for oil and gas production. This diverse background positions Simone as a unique expert bridging the gap between theoretical research and practical applications in heavy industries.
In his current role at Cognite, Simone applies machine learning techniques to pattern recognition and anomaly detection for industrial equipment. He specializes in leveraging topology and persistent homology approaches to address challenges in flow assurance and equipment condition monitoring. In his position, Simone is instrumental in defining how data and AI can provide concrete solutions to complex problems in the heavy industry, delivering tangible value to companies in the global energy sector.
Keith Downing
Program Manager, AI Sweden
Professor, Department of Computer Science, NTNU
Speaking on Day 2, Session 5
Reflection, creativity and talents in AI
Keith Downing is a professor of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Artificial Life (Alife) at NTNU, with a strong interest in the connections between life and intelligence in both natural and artiificial systems. His 40
years of research in these fields has culminated in two books with MIT Press: Intelligence Emerging (2015), and Gradient Expectations (2023). Most of Keith's work involves
evolutionary computation and artificial neural networks, and he teaches courses in AI Programming and
Deep Learning at NTU. He enjoys lecturing on AI and ALife to diverse audiences throughout Norway.
Remi Eriksen
Group President and CEO of DNV Group
Speaking on Day 1, Opening session
Remi Eriksen is the Group President and CEO of DNV Group, since 2015. DNV Group, headquartered in Oslo-Norway, is an assurance & risk management company with 13,000 employees across 100 countries.
He was previously the Chief Operating Officer of the DNV Group, having served as CEO of DNV Maritime and Oil & Gas and in other senior roles in Asia (from Singapore), Europe and the Americas (from Houston). Remi joined DNV in 1993.
Remi is acknowledged for his leadership skills in capturing growth opportunities in a complex and ever-changing global business environment. His keen interest in building resilient and sustainable business drives him to develop new competencies in leadership, transformative technologies and to the accelerated application of ’data-smart’ and digital solutions. He is a technology optimist and strongly believes business must make a bigger impact on the journey towards a sustainable future. He is dedicated to the company purpose of “Safeguarding Life, Property and the Environment” as a central driver for the company’s culture and all aspects of its business operations.
Amongst many other leadership roles, he is chairperson of the Board of Norway’s biggest university, the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU).
Remi holds a Master’s in Electronics and Computer Science from the Norwegian Institute of Technology and executive education from Rice University, IMD and INSEAD.
Gunn Karin Gjul
Program Manager, AI Sweden
State Secretary, Norwegian Ministry of Local Government and Modernisation
Speaking on Day 2, Session 6: Trustworthy AI
Gunn Karin Gjul is State secretary for the Minister of Local Government and Regional Development, and responsible for digitalisation and electronic communications. . As such, she is heavily involved in the ministry’s work to prepare a new comprehensive strategy on digitalisation that will also include an update of the government’s AI strategy.
Ms. Gjul has previously been a member of the Norwegian Parliament for 20 years representing The Norwegian Labour Party and holding multiple positions in major parliamentary committees. This included heading the Committee for Family and Cultural Affairs, which gave her a chance to further her interest in the maintenance and development of the Norwegian Language.
Gunn Karin Gjul is a lawyer with degree from the University of Oslo.
In the period between 2014-2021 Ms. Gjul was a board member at The Office of the Auditor General of Norway. Before being appointed State Secretary, Ms. Gjul held an executive position in the Norwegian Union of Municipal and General Employees.
Photo: Trond A. Isaksen
Viviana Gropengiesser
Director Entrepreneurship, ETH AI Center, Zürich
Speaking on Day 1, Session 4: Research-driven innovation
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Viviana Gropengiesser has 10 years of operational experience in startup and NGO environment as CEO, Board member or Co-founder, as an investor for a family office and in building educational/ entrepreneurial programs. Graduate in business psychology and currently Director of Entrepreneurial Programs at the ETH AI Center and CEO at Talent Kick. Passionate about technology ventures creating positive impact and enabling top talents to proactively shape the future as entrepreneurs.
Jon Atle Gulla
Professor Dr. Jon Atle Gulla is director of the Norwegian Research Center for AI Innovation (NorwAI) and professor of Information Systems at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) in Trondheim, Norway, since 2002.
Gulla received his MSc in 1988 and his PhD in 1993, both in Information Systems at the Norwegian Institute of Technology. In his PhD thesis he used linguistic theories to generate user-tailored explanations of conceptual models and their executions. Gulla also has a MSc in Linguistics from the University of Trondheim from 1995. In 2003 he completed a MSc of Management (Sloan fellow) at London Business School with a thesis on strategic modeling and simulation of fast growing software companies.
Gulla has a multi-disciplinary research approach and works in close collaboration with industry. His research focuses on Semantics and Language Technology, as well as applications of these technologies in recommendation systems, information retrieval and text analysis. He is active in digitization and AI-based innovation and entrepreneurship, where he advises the industry on the use of artificial intelligence and explores new business opportunities in startup companies.
Gulla is responsible for courses on recommender systems, natural language processing, semantic web, project management, and information systems engineering. He has close to 150 international publications and has supervised around 70 MSc students, 30 PhD students and 10 postdocs. He has served as an opponent / administrator for several PhD defenses and is a frequently invited speaker at both industrial and academic events.
Gulla is a reviewer for many international journals, such as Data & Knowledge Engineering, Information Processing and Management and AI Magazine, and for international conferences such as ACL, EKAW and ECIL. He is also the co-founder and general chair of the annual workshop at the News Recommendation and Analytics (INRA) and the annual Big Data Symposium (NOBIDS).
As part of his business activities professor Gulla has worked closely with a number of start-up companies. He was an early-stage manager of Fast Search & Transfer and a co-founder of computational linguistics company LingIT and data analysis company Mito/Strise. He cooperates with Norwegian and international companies in projects on the introduction of AI-driven Big Data technologies in industry.
Jon Atle Gulla on the web:
CiteSeer, Google, Google Scholar
Director of NorwAI & Professor NTNU
Speaking on Day 1, Opening Session
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Fredrik Heintz
Professor of Computer Science, Linköping University
Speaking on Day 1, Session 2
Recent developments in large language models
Fredrik Heintz is a Professor of Computer Science at Linköping University, where he leads the Division of Artificial Intelligence and Integrated Computer Systems (AIICS) and the Reasoning and Learning lab (ReaL). His research focus is artificial intelligence especially Trustworthy AI, autonomous systems, and the intersection between machine reasoning and machine learning. Director of the Wallenberg AI and Transformative Technologies Education Development Program (WASP-ED), Director of the Graduate School of the Wallenberg AI, Autonomous Systems and Software Program (WASP), Coordinator of the TAILOR ICT-48 network developing the scientific foundations of Trustworthy AI, Vice President for AI research of Adra the AI, Data, and Robotics partnership, and President of the Swedish AI Society. Fellow of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences (IVA).
Jon Espen Ingvaldsen
Adjunct Associate Professor, NTNU and Chief Scientist, Kantega
Speaking on Day 1, Session 2
Recent developments in large language models
Jon Espen Ingvaldsen is a Chief Consultant and Board Member at Kantega and Adjunct Associate Professor at NorwAI, NTNU. His current work at NorwAI is focusing on building generative language models and adopting them for real world use cases.
Jon Espen has extensive experience with innovation and technology management, data-driven insights and machine learning. Throughout his career, he has worked as a researcher in academia, been a consultant in a number of development projects and initiated several start-up companies from Trondheim.
Research work has been aimed at various branches of data science; everything from large language models, analysis of continuous data streams, semantic structures and knowledge graphs, to pattern recognition in large transaction logs. The research has been aimed at practical applications and real life data.
Per Egil Kummervold
Senior Researcher, National Library of Norway
Speaking on Day 1, Session 2: Recent developments in large language models
Per Egil Kummervold is a Senior Researcher at the National Library of Norway's AiLab. He served as project leader for the Norwegian Colossal Corpus and the development of the NB-BERT model. Currently, he is leading the creation of the NB-Whisper text-to-speech model, set for release in late 2023. Outside his work at the National Library, Kummervold led the development of the Norwegian seq2seq models, NorthT5, and partnered with the Digital Epidemiology Lab at EPFL on the COVID-Twitter-BERT model. He holds a TPU Research Cloud Fellowship.
Kristin Y. Pettersen
Kristin Y. Pettersen is a Professor in the Department of Engineering Cybernetics, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), where she has been a faculty member since 1996. She was Head of the Department 2011-2013, Vice-Head of the Department 2009-2011, and Director of the NTNU ICT Program of Robotics 2010-2013. In the period 2013 – 2023, she was Key Scientist at the CoE Centre for Autonomous Marine Operations and Systems (NTNU AMOS). She is Adjunct Professor at the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment (FFI). She co-founded the subsea robotics company Eelume AS, where she was CEO 2015-2016.
She received the MSc and PhD degrees in Engineering Cybernetics at NTNU, Trondheim, Norway, in 1992 and 1996, respectively. She has published four books and over 300 papers in international journals and conference proceedings. Her research interests focus on nonlinear control of mechanical systems with robotics applications and with a particular emphasis on marine robotics and snake robotics. She was awarded the IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology Outstanding Paper Award in 2006 and 2017. She was awarded an ERC-AdG-2020 Advanced Grant from the European Research Council and received the IEEE CSS 2020 Hendrik W. Bode Lecture Prize.
She is an elected member of the Board of Governors of the IEEE Control Systems Society and is currently Vice President of Membership. She is also a member of the IFAC Council and the EUCA Council. She has significant board member experience from holding several board positions in industrial and research companies, in addition to in academia and international organizations. She was Program Chair of the IEEE Conference on Control Technology and Applications in 2018 and has served as Associate Editor for several international conferences. She has served as Associate Editor of IEEE Control Systems Magazine, Associate and Senior Editor of IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, and as Co-Editor-in-Chief of Robotics for IFAC Mechatronics. She was IEEE CSS Distinguished Lecturer 2019-2022. She is a Fellow of the IEEE and AAIA, member of the Norwegian Academy of Technological Sciences, and member of the Academy of the Royal Norwegian Society of Sciences and Letters.
https://www.ntnu.edu/employees/kristin.y.pettersen
Professor, Department of Engineering Cybernetics, NTNU
Speaking on Day 2, Session 7
From Academia to Industry
Daniel Pleus
Data Scientist Lead, Schibsted
Speaking on Day 1, Session 2: Recent developments in large language models
Daniel Pleus works as a Data Scientist Lead within Schibsted's AI Enablement Program. In this capacity, he leads the "use case support" initiative, providing consultancy and practical assistance to more than 60 Schibsted brands in identifying AI use cases and creating prototypes. A significant portion of his recent work has revolved around large language models, encompassing tasks such as fine-tuning, model deployment, but also collaborative development of downstream applications with Schibsted brands.
Before joining Schibsted, Daniel held the position of Data Science Manager at eBay Advertising. During his tenure, he contributed to various machine learning, analytics, and data-driven projects. These initiatives included optimising behavioural and contextual ad targeting, creating data tools, and establishing performance management systems. Daniel also gained experience within the while working with the German media company NOZ Medien and its affiliated entities beforehand. He holds a Master's degree in Big Data & Business Analytics and a Bachelor's degree in Economics and Philosophy.
Alexander Johannes Stasik
Researcher, Analytics and AI, SINTEF
Alexander Johannes Stasik is a AI researcher at SINTEF's Department of Mathematics and Cybernetics. His research interests encompass hybrid/physics-based machine learning, probabilistic modelling, and quantum computing. Alexander's work spans both fundamental research and practical applications in various sectors, including industry, the public domain, and defense.
Alexander holds a PhD in astroparticle physics from Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany. Prior to joining SINTEF, he worked as a researcher in theoretical neuroscience and bio-inspired AI at the University of Oslo, trying to bridge the gap between biological and artificial intelligence.
Speaking on Day 1, Session 3: Innovation Excellence
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Tore Tennøe
Director, Norwegian Board of Technology (Teknologirådet)
Speaking on Day 2, Session 6: Trustworthy AI
Tore Tennøe is the director of the Norwegian Board of Technology (Teknologirådet), which advises the Norwegian Parliament and Government on the opportunities and risks of new technology. Current projects range from generative artificial intelligence, AI in health care, cyber security, and crypto currencies, to green industrial policy, battery production, and lab-cultivated food. Tore has twice been the president for the European Parliamentary Technology Assessment network and holds graduate degrees from the London School of Economics and the University of Oslo.
Notto Johannes Windju Thelle
Head of Section, Oslo Metropolitan University
Notto J. W. Thelle is a Norwegian musician and music researcher. In 2022, he defended his PhD thesis entitled "Mixed-Initiative Music Making", which examined the interface between human musical creativity and AI. As part of his research, he developed an interactive music system based on deep learning, sequence modelling, and heuristic solutions that combined to form a "virtual jam partner for creative music making". Thelle is currently the Manager of Makerspace at Oslo Metropolitan University.
Speaking on Day 2, Session 5:
Reflection, creativity and talents in AI
Yngvar Ugland
Executive Vice President | Head of DNB NewTechLab
Speaking on Day 1, Session 3: Innovation Excellence
Yngvar is known from TV, podcasts, newspaper articles, chronicles, debates and from various scenes both at home and abroad. His professional expertise in technology issues has led to him being a permanent lecturer at Singularity University and a very popular guest lecturer at the Norwegian School of Economics.
Norway's first consumer technologist has first-hand knowledge of new technological solutions and products. Yngvar is DnB's and consumers' man on technology issues. He works with new technological solutions and products, and assesses the opportunities and challenges these solutions offer. The consumer technologist at DNB and the Divisional Director at NewTechLab DNB is the prime mover for the bank's innovation work, and he operates via the offices in Bjørvika, San Francisco and Palo Alto.
Claes Lyth Walsø
Director Knowledge, The Norwegian Police IT Unit
Speaking on Day 1, Session 3: Innovation Excellence
Claes is head of the delivery area responsible for converting data into actionable knowledge for the Norwegian Police and establishing a data driven police. He has set a strategic direction for how the police may better utilize their data in preventing and solving crime, including introducing AI and modern analytic capabilities. Currently he is working on building an efficient, cross-functional, and scalable organization being able to deliver on set ambitions. Before joining the police in 2022 he spent four years as CIO at the Retriever Group, providing insight and analytics within the media industry in the Nordics. He spent the former ten years in his career at Telenor, managing IT and data solutions from both technical and business aspects. His main responsibilities was on delivering value from data with customer insight solutions and personalized communication platforms. Claes has two master's degrees from NTNU, one in Communication Technology in addition to a Master of Technology Management.
Johan Östman
Research Scientist, AI Sweden
Speaking on Day 1, Session 3: Innovation Excellence
Johan Östman received his PhD in Information Theory in 2020 from Chalmers University of Technology.
He has been active within the autonomous driving industry since 2020 and from 2021 he has been focusing on privacy-preserving machine learning with a focus on federated learning. He is currently leading the research initiatives at AI Sweden within privacy-preserving machine learning, closely collaborating with partners such as Chalmers, ESA, and RISE.
He is the project initiator and principal investigator in a project on federated learning to combat anti-money laundering together with two of the largest banks in Sweden.