Keynotes Speakers and Tutorial Instructors - ICEDEG 2025

Keynote Speakers

Prof.dr. Marijn Janssen is a Full Professor in ICT & Governance in the Technology, Policy and Management Faculty of Delft University of Technology, head of the Engineering Systems & Servies (ESS) department, and (honorary) visiting professor at Bradford University, KU Leuven and Universiti Teknologi Mara. Marijn Janssen research is in the field of the governance of Smart and Open Digital Government, Open data, and emerging technologies, like AI, Quantum computing and blockchain, which fundamentally change the organizational landscape and influence the governance. He is particularly interested in situations in which multiple public and private organizations want to collaborate, in which ICT plays an enabling role, socio-technical solutions are constrained by organizational realities and political wishes, and there are various ways to proceed. Marijn is on the editorial board of Government Information Quarterly, Decision Support Systems, Information Systems Frontiers, and conference chair of IFIP EGOV-CeDEM–ePart series. He was ranked as one of the leading e-government researchers in various surveys. More information: www.tudelft.nl/staff/m.f.w.h.a.janssen/ Link to Keynote.
Prof. Dame Muffy Calder is a Computer Scientist with research interests in modelling and automated reasoning for complex, interactive, and sensor-driven systems, and responsible AI and national security. She is a Professor of Formal Methods and was Vice-Principal and Head of College of Science and Engineering, University of Glasgow 2015-2025 and is a Senior Visiting Fellow at CETaS (Centre for Emerging Technology and Security). Previously she was the Chief Scientific Adviser for Scotland. She is a member of the executive team of RAi (Responsible AI) UK, and a Co-Investigator of the RAi Keystone project Probable Futures: Probabilistic AI Systems in Law Enforcement Futures. She has been a member of the Prime Minister’s Council for Science and Technology, a Royal Society Leverhulme Research Senior Fellow, and a Suffrage Science award winner in Computing Science and Mathematics Link to Keynote.
Elsa Estevez is the chair holder of the UNESCO Chair on Knowledge Societies and Digital Governance at Universidad Nacional del Sur, an Independent Researcher at the National Council of Scientific and Technical Research (CONICET), and a Full Professor at the National University of La Plata, all in Argentina. She is also a consultant for the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) on matters of digital government, particularly in Latin America. Previously, she was a Senior Academic Program Officer and Academic Program Officer at the United Nations University (UNU) in Macao and Portugal; Visiting Professor at the National University of Rio Negro, Argentina; Gdansk University of Technology, Poland; University of Minho, Portugal; and head of Information Technology (IT) departments in large financial and pharmaceutical organizations in Argentina. She has consulted for governments, taught public managers and policymakers, and organized events about digital government in over thirty, mostly developing countries. Her research interests cover structuring the information technology function in government, the digital transformation of government-citizen relationships, and the impact of such transformation on nations' and cities' capacity to pursue sustainable development. She has a PhD in Computer Science from Universidad Nacional del Sur, Argentina. Link to Keynote.
Prof. Katarzyna Kaczmarek-Majer is an Associate Professor at the Systems Research Institute of the Polish Academy of Sciences and the Principal Investigator for the "Explainable Artificial Intelligence for Monitoring Acoustic Features Extracted from Speech" (ExplainMe) project. Moreover, she contributes to the "Research of Excellence on Digital Technologies and Wellbeing" (DigiWell) at the Institute for Research and Applications of Fuzzy Modeling, University of Ostrava, Czech Republic. She holds dual M.Sc. degrees in Mathematics and Computer Science from the University of Poznań and a Ph.D. with distinction in Computer Science from the Systems Research Institute of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw. Katarzyna's expertise includes fuzzy linguistic summarization, computational intelligence, granular computing, and data stream analysis, with a particular focus on applications in medicine and healthcare. Katarzyna is also the President of the eHealth Section of the Polish Information Processing Society. Link to Keynote.
Prof. Agusti Solanas is the head of the Smart Technologies Research Group and Professor in the Department of Computer Engineering and Mathematics at the Rovira i Virgili University (URV) in Tarragona, Catalonia, Spain. He obtained his M.Sc. degree in Computer Engineering from URV in 2004 with honours (Outstanding Graduation Award). He received a Diploma of Advanced Studies (M.Sc.) in Telematics Engineering from the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC) in 2006. He received a Ph.D. in Telematics Engineering from UPC in 2007 with honours (A cum laude). In 2012, he was a visiting researcher in the Department of Mathematics and Physics of the University of Rome Tre (Italy). In 2013, he was a visiting researcher in the Department of Mathematics of the University of Padua (Italy). His fields of activity are smart and cognitive healthcare, cognitive security, anti-phishing, data privacy, and artificial intelligence, specifically: Neural networks, pattern recognition, and evolutionary computation. He has led and participated in numerous European, Spanish, and Catalan research and industrial projects. He has authored over 160 publications and delivered several invited talks worldwide. He has served as chair, programme committee member, and reviewer in several conferences and journals. He serves as external expert re- viewer for several National Councils for Scientific Research (e.g. The European COST Association, the Romanian National Authority for Scientific Research and Innovation, the National Centre of Science and Technology of the Republic of Kazakhstan, the Italian Ministry of Universities and Research, the Research Council of Norway, the Swiss National Science Foundation, and the Spanish Research Agency). He is a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). He served as Category Editor of Information Systems for the ACM Computing Reviews, and he was vice-president of the Computer Society Spain Chapter. He has been listed among the 2% of most influential scientists by Stanford University for three years in a row since 2022. Link to Keynote.

Tutorial and Workshop Instructors

Prof. José María Alonso Moral holds a M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Telecommunication Engineering, both from the Technical University of Madrid (UPM), Spain, in 2003 and 2007, respectively. He was granted by UPM to proceed with his Ph.D., being finally recognized with maximum qualification (Sobresaliente Cum Laude) and Doctor Europeus mention. From 2003 to 2005 he was involved in the ADVOCATE2 project (IST-2001-34508), funded by the V Framework Program of the European Union. He worked as visiting research fellow in two European research centres: Cemagref, an agricultural and environmental engineering research centre located at Montpellier (Languedoc-Roussillon, France), and European Centre for Soft Computing (ECSC), located at Mieres (Asturias, Spain). Later, he was postdoctoral researcher in the “Fundamentals of Soft Computing” Unit at ECSC from November 2007 to January 2012. In June 2010, he worked as visiting research fellow in the Università degli Studi di Bari (Dipartimento di Informatica). Then, he was “Juan de la Cierva” postdoctoral researcher funded by the Spanish Government under project JCI-2011-09839 in the Department of Electronics at the University of Alcala (UAH) from February 2012 to October 2012. From November 2012 to May 2016, he was Deputy Principal Researcher in the “Computing with Perceptions” Research Unit at ECSC. From June 2016 to January 2018, he was postdoctoral researcher at CiTIUS. From February 2018 to December 2022, he was "Ramón y Cajal" researcher funded by the Spanish Government under project RYC-2016-19802 in the Intelligent Systems Research Group of the University of Santiago de Compostela. From January 2019 to December 2022, he was board member of the ACL Special Interest Group on Natural Language Generation (SIGGEN). From September 2013 to September 2019, he was board member of the European Society for Fuzzy Logic and Technology (EUSFLAT). He was Chair of the Doctoral Consortium at the European Conference on Artificial Intelligence (ECAI2020). He is currently Associate Professor at the Department of Electronics and Computation of the CiTIUS-USC, Vice-Chair of the Task Force on “Explainable Fuzzy Systems” in the Fuzzy Systems Technical Committee of the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society (IEEE-CIS), Associate Editor of the IEEE Computational Intelligence Magazine (ISSN: 1556-603X)(Q1 in ISI-JCR), the IEEE Transactions on Fuzzy Systems(ISSN:1063-6706)(Q1 in ISI-JCR), and the International Journal of Approximate Reasoning (ISSN:0888-613X) (Q2 in ISI-JCR), member of the IEEE-CIS Task Force on Fuzzy Systems Software, member of the IEEE-CIS High School Outreach Subcommittee. He has been Honorary Research Fellow in the University of Aberdeen (Scotland) in 2016 and Research Fellow in the University of Bari "Aldo Moro" (Italy) in 2017. He has published more than 190 papers in international journals, book chapters and conferences. His research interests include explainable and trustworthy artificial intelligence, computational intelligence, interpretable fuzzy systems, natural language generation, development of free software tools, etc. Link to Tutorial.
Prof. Sandra Sanchez-Gordon holds a Ph.D. in Applications of Informatics from the University of Alicante, Spain, and a Master in Software Engineering from Drexel University, USA. Sandra is a researcher and professor at the Department of Informatics and Computer Sciences of the National Polytechnic School of Ecuador since 1994. Sandra´s main research interests include Digital Governance, Human-Computer Interaction, Accessibility for eCitizens and user with disaiblities, MOOCs. Sandra has been Ecuador’s Representative to Hispanic America Software Testing Qualifications Board. Link to Tutorial.
Prof. Patricia Acosta-Vargas holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the University of Alicante. She currently serves as the Director of the Master’s Program in User Experience at the Universidad de las Américas (UDLA) and the Executive Master in UX at the Universidad Latina de Costa Rica. She leads the Intelligent & Interactive Systems (Si2Lab) research group at UDLA. She was a member of Ecuador’s first Artificial Intelligence Committee, selected by the Ministry of Telecommunications and the Information Society. She serves as Vice President of the IEEE Computer Society Ecuador Chapter. In 2024, IEEE-Ecuador recognized her as a "Distinguished Researcher." Link to Tutorial.
Mahmoud Alzoubi is a digital transformation expert specializing in digital government maturity assessment and international digital indicators. Leads key initiatives and projects to evaluate and enhance the adoption of digital government principles and policies, aligning with global benchmarks and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Key Areas of Expertise: Developing and implementing digital government performance assessment frameworks, establishing and optimizing data governance and management offices, enhancing digital experience measurement and customer journey optimization, and designing enterprise architecture solutions and digital service innovations. With a strong focus on policy evaluation, digital experience measurement, and service excellence, he actively contributes to shaping digital government strategies and improving customer-centric digital services. Holds a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering, complemented by professional certifications in digital transformation, customer experience, and emerging technologies. These include Project Management (PMP®️), Quality Management (EFQM®️), Customer Experience (CX), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Blockchain, Internet of Things (IoT), and Business Process Modeling (ARIS) Link to Tutorial.
Ishraq Dalala is a seasoned expert in digital transformation and digital government international standards, she brings deep expertise in benchmarking, performance assessment, and digital transformation. She has led and contributed to strategic initiatives aimed at advancing the adoption of digital government principles and policies in alignment with global best practices and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Her areas of expertise include developing digital government performance frameworks, designing digital transformation roadmaps, and crafting enterprise architecture solutions that support innovation in public service delivery. She also specializes in enhancing digital experience measurement, developing customer journey strategies, and driving the maturity of digital experience across government platforms. Additionally, she is experienced in building e-participation plans that promote inclusive citizen engagement and policy responsiveness. With a strong focus on policy evaluation, service excellence, and user-centric digital design, she actively contributes to shaping national digital government strategies and improving the overall quality of public digital services. She holds a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering, complemented by a portfolio of professional certifications in digital transformation, customer experience, and emerging technologies — including Project Management Professional (PMP®), Customer Experience (CX), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Blockchain, and the Internet of Things (IoT). Link to Tutorial.