BIOGRAPHIES
WORKSHOP
ON MULTIMODAL INTERACTION
ON MOBILE DEVICES
18 -19 November 2008
ETSI Premises
Sophia Antipolis
Multimodal interaction is challenging to develop especially in mobile/ubiquitous settings
with novel interaction devices.
Addressing this challenge, the FP6-35182 OpenInterface project (www.oi-
project.org) focuses on the design and development of an open source platform for
the rapid development of multimodal interactive systems as a central tool for an
iterative user-centered design process.
The OpenInterface Interaction Development Environment (OIDE) includes development tools for assembling,
combining and testing modalities at multiple levels of abstraction (from the raw data to the semantic of users'
events).
The OIDE is built on top of a runtime kernel which enables the communication between heterogeneous components.
The OpenInterface project considers two interaction contexts, namely a mobile and an ubiquitous setting, and two
testbeds, namely multimodal interaction for large information spaces (e.g. maps), and multimodal interaction for
games. The two testbeds are used to explore the functionality of the platform.
The OpenInterface project includes 10 European partners, five academic research institutes and five industrial
partners.
ETSI (www.etsi.org) produces globally-applicable standards for Information and
Communications Technologies (ICT), including fixed, mobile, radio, converged, broadcast
and internet technologies and is officially recognized by the European Commission as a
European Standards Organization. ETSI is a not-for-profit organization whose 700 ETSI member organizations benefit
from direct participation and are drawn from 62 countries across 5 continents worldwide.
It is essential for ETSI to remain at the forefront of the ICT technology for fulfilling the expectation of the ETSI
membership to get the standards that will allow them to develop their business with innovative services and
equipments. The progress of innovation requires a good balance between collaboration and competition and
standardization is serving as the foundation to provide this balance. This is why ETSI seeks contribution from R&D
projects and activities as they carry information on the latest developments in ICT technologies and help to coordinate
the resource allocation to new promising subjects in an effective and timely way.
In many cases research projects do not include standardization early enough, because they are not aware of the
benefits. They quite often believe that standardization requires full manufacturing and distributes forces at the
expense of SMEs or research centres. But, on contrary, early standards work gains big time-to-market advantages,
because:
• Products are commercialized faster
• Products reach global markets
• Standardization contributes to customer confidence
• Standardization exploits research results
• Standardization ensures interoperability
• Standardization lowers the burden of evolution and maintenance, supported by industry
• Standardization improves technologies and products through multiple feed-back
It is however not always straightforward to create the conditions of a good and efficient interface between the R&D
and standardization communities that have different background and mindset. The ISGs structure may usefully help to
speed up the standardization process (quick approval, instant operational pack and quick set-up). ETSI has included
the relationship with Academia and Research as one of the strategic topics for 2007/2008.
Dana Al Kukhun, University of Toulouse, IRIT
Dana is a phd scholar and a teaching assistant at the IRIT (Information Technology
Research Institute of Toulouse), University Paul Sabatier.
She works under the direction of Pr. Florence Sèdes, Professor in Computer Science,
leading the Generalized Information Systems team, who chairs the national GDR-i3
research network.
Dana's domain of interest involves ensuring secure and adaptive access decisions within
pervasive environments. During her phd studies, she published different papers jointly
with Pr. Sèdes concerning access control, security and adaptation within different application fields (Medical
systems, enterprise management, GIS and E-learning). She also joined different conferences in the domain.
Recently, she obtained a scholarship to join a leading research institute in her domain and she was welcomed
by Pr Elisa Bertino for a 3 months exchange visit at CERIAS lab in Purdue University, In, USA.
Philip GRAY, University of Glasgow
Philip Gray is a senior lecturer in the Computing Science Department at the University of
Glasgow. He has been actively engaged since 1984 in research into models, notations,
software architectures and tools for user interface development. Recently, he has
focused on the description and engineering of interaction techniques for mobile and
ubiquitous systems. In this context he is currently PI at Glasgow for the MATCH project
(2005-9), a 4 year project involving 4 Scottish Universities investigating adaptive
multimodal interaction techniques for home care systems. He is also Glasgow PI and
overall Technical Manager for the OpenInterface Project (EU FP6, 2006-2009) that is
developing tool support for the prototyping and evaluation of multimodal user interfaces.
Previously, Phil has been investigator on over ten externally funded research projects. He is a member of IFIP
Technical Committee 13 (Human Computer Interaction) and vice-chair of IFIP Working Group 2.7/13.4 (User
Interface Engineering). He has been conference chair for HCI'94, for the annual UK HCI conference, and for
IHM-HCI 2001 (the first joint Anglo-French conference in HCI). He has about 80 publications. He also a non-
executive director of Kelvin Connect Ltd, a small UK company providing mobile information systems for police
and health-care applications.
Ashley GRIFFITHS, Vlingo
Ashley Griffins joined vlingo in May, 2008 as the Managing Director of EMEA. Ashley spent
over fifteen years in communications as CEO of an advertising and PR business before moving
into the wireless industry as VP WW Sales & Marketing the Geoworks Corporation. Geoworks
had established the first common mobile industry OS (pre Symbian), powering the first Nokia
9000 Communicator phones. There he helped spearhead SMS as new B2B2C communication
channel, launching a number of high value services including Unites Airlines “Easy Update”.
Since then Ashley has played a key role with a number of leading industry players including
Teleca ab and Autodesk Inc in both start-up and public corporation environments. He has
accumulated over eight years experience in the OEM, operator and application space and as vlingo Managing Director
EMEA, is now focused on bringing vlingo voice, the only market deployed unconstrained natural language UI and ‘the
next generation multi modal voice interface to the European mobile device market.
Ingmar KLICHE, Deutsche Telekom Laboratories
Ingmar Kliche is a project manager at Deutsche Telekom Laboratories. He received his Master
of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from the Berlin University of Technology and has
been working in speech technology for ten years in various capacities, including implementation
of voice and multimodal applications, speech technology consulting and project management.
Now he is working on research projects in the area of speech and multimodal technology.
Ingmar Kliche is a member of the W3C Voice Browser Working Group and the W3C Multimodal
Interaction Working Group.
GABY LENHART, ETSI
Gaby Lenhart is currently Senior Research Officer in Strategy & New Initiatives at ETSI
2005 - 2007 Project Leader for Smart Cards and Project Leader for eHealth at ETSI
2002 - 2005 Standardization Expert in the division International Standardization at T-Mobile
International; Head of Delegation, Chairman of OMA POC
Project Leader in the division ‘Network Building & Infrastructure at Max-Mobil Austria (now T-
Mobile Austria)
2001 - 04 study of ICSS (Intelligent Communication Systems and Services) at the Technikum
Vienna.
1983 - 87 study of electrical engineering with emphasis on communications electronics Nachrichtentechnik at the
Technical University Vienna
in parallel study of English and Russian as translator at the University Vienna
Charlotte MAGNUSSON, CERTEC
Charlotte Magnusson, PhD, associate professor (docent), Certec, Division of Rehabilitation
Engineering Research, Department of Design Sciences, Lund University. Charlotte is the
leader of the research at Certec on the design of useworthy haptic and audio interfaces for
people who are blind or have low vision. She has over 10 years of experience in the field.
Charlotte has currently two particular areas of interest. The first is concerned with the use of
haptic devices, and how haptics and audio can be used to make different types of complex
information and virtual environments more accessible.The second is design and design
methodology for persons with and without disabilities. Charlotte is also an experienced
programmer, with particular experience from interactive multimodal applications. Charlotte is the leader of the haptics
group at Certec, and has been responsible for the department participation in the EU projects MICOLE, ENABLED and
ENACTIVE. She is currently the coordinator of the EU project HaptiMap.
Nilo MENEZES, MUTITEL ASBL BELGIUM
Nilo Menezes is a research engineer at Multitel ASBL, Belgium. He got his Master of Science
degree in Computer Networks from the Federal University of Amazonas, Brazil. Before joining
Multitel, he was a program manager of a mobile software development team working for
Siemens Mobile and Nokia in Brazil, USA and Germany. He is responsible for the development
and specification of the Multimodal Middleware Protocol and the Multimodal Hub for J2ME,
Symbian, Android and Python in the OpenInterface project ((EU FP6, 2006-2009).
LAURENCE NIGAY, University Joseph Fourier Grenoble
and Insitut Universitaire de France
Laurence Nigay is a Professor of Computing at the Université Joseph Fourier (UJF, Grenoble
1) and at the Institut Universitaire de France (IUF) and is a co-leader of the HCI research
group of the Grenoble Informatics Laboratory (LIG). Her research interests focus on the
design and development of user interfaces. In particular her research studies centre on new
interaction techniques, Multimodal and Augmented Reality user interfaces.
She has received several scientific awards (including the CNRS Bronze medal in 2002 and
the UJF gold medal in 2003 and in 2005) for excellence in her research. She is currently
coordinator of the European STREP OpenInterface (FP6-35182) on multimodal interfaces. She was vice-chair of the
IFIP working group WG 2.7 “User Interface Engineering” from 1998-2004 and a visiting scientist at the University of
Glasgow (2001-2002). She has published more than 150 articles in conferences, journals and books.
Françoise PETERSEN, APICA
Françoise Petersen is working as an independent consultant at APICA, an ETSI member
company. She has extensive experience in standardization work, and has been leading and
working as expert in several ETSI Human Factors (HF) projects. She has a deep knowledge on
personalization and user profiles due to her participation as leader and expert in an ETSI
Human Factors project which developed EG 202 325 on “Personalization and User Profile
Management” (published in 2005) and she is currently leading two projects on
personalization:
• the ETSI Technical Committee work on “Personalization and User Profile Management
Standardization” which is developing two deliverables, one on “Architectural Framework” and one on “User Profile
Preferences and Information” (http://portal.etsi.org/stfs/STF_HomePages/STF342/STF342.asp )
• the ETSI Human Factors and eHealth Technical Bodies have created a project, STF352 which standardizes the
personalization of eHealth systems (http://portal.etsi.org/stfs/STF_HomePages/STF352/STF352.asp).
She has also worked at the Swedish telecom operator TeliaSonera. Prior to that, she gave courses in Computer
Sciences at Lund University in Sweden.
DR. JOSE ROUILLARD, University of Lille 1
is an Associate Professor in Computer Science at the University of Lille 1. He obtained his PhD
in 2000 from the University of Grenoble (France) in the field of Human-Computer Interfaces.
He is interested in HCI plasticity, multi-modality and multi-channel interfaces. He has written
more than 60 papers and is now engaged in research on mobility and pervasive/ubiquitous
computing.
Thomas SCHEERBART, Deutsche Telekom Laboratories
Thomas received the Engineering graduate for information technology in 1986.
In 1991 he joined the Research and Development Center of Deutsche Telekom AG. He
worked as a project leader in several projects dealing with voice coding and transmission,
voice computer telephony and enhanced voice user interface technology.
2008 he joined Deutsche Telekom Laboratories Thomas is working in the area of intuitive
usability as project leader and consultant. One of his current activities is the development
of mobile, multimodal solutions and services. Furthermore he is focussing on transferring
development results into real operation, targeting the goal to enhance intuitive usability of
various existing services of Deutsche Telekom.
Thomas is also an active member in international standardisation - he supports the
activities of Mobile Client Environment working group within the OMA (Open Mobile Alliance).
Arnold Sheynman, Research in Motion (RIM)
Arnold Sheynman is with Research In Motion (RIM) Advanced Technology organization. He
works on the proof of concepts and prototypes of existing wireless systems evolution as
well as applied statistical analysis and modeling of wireless systems.
Prior to joining RIM, Arnold worked as a Distinguished Member of Technical Staff at
Motorola developing dual mode GPRS/WCDMA stack, EGPRS stack and Personal Area
Network systems. He holds several US and international patents in the areas of mobile
communication.
Arnold received his Ph.D. degree from Saint Petersburg Institute of Precision Mechanics
and Optics (Russia).
ROOPE TAKALA, Nokia
Roope Takala is a Senior Program Manager at the Office of Strategic Research of Nokia
Research Center. His current work is managing research and technology implementation in
the domain of human-machine interaction. His last program named 'Future User Interfaces
and Interaction Solutions' was a four year, multimillion Euro research effort with almost a
hundred researchers at its peack. Some examples of his teams contribution can be seen in
the following Nokia products: N95, 9300, N73, 6108, 7380, 7280 among others.
His prior work includes the management of projects in active haptics, electromechanics
integration, competitor benchmarking, Design for Assembly and developing a system for
product concept demonstration. Mr. Takala has also worked as a Visiting Scholar in
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Center for Innovation in Product Development. His work concentrated on
product concept creation and evaluation related research.
Mr. Takala received his MSc. from Helsinki University of Technology in 1998. He has published several journal and
conference papers on product concepting, environmentally sustainable engineering design and Design for Assembly.
He is also an editor and co-author of two books on product concepting. He is currently a holder of three patents
pending and three granted.
DR. ROBERT VAN KOMMER, Swisscom
Besides a PhD in robust speech recognition, Robert van Kommer has filed more than 25
patents in the field of speech recognition, intelligent services and enhanced multimodal
interaction. Since 2002, he has initiated and contributed to several multimodal interaction
projects. Moreover, he has played a key role in the market launch of Swisscom's 1812
service, the first and fully automated directory assistance service of Switzerland.
James WARDEN, RIM
James Warden is with Research in Motion where he works in Standards and Advanced
Technology developing new technologies through proof of concept trials and working these
new technologies into emerging wireless standards.James was the primary system and
software architect on several
wireless products developed while at Motorola. He contributed extensively to the
development of the CDMA family of standards as well as many Java specifications including
being Spec Lead for MIDP 2.1. He has over 25 years of real-time embedded software
development and hardware design experience.