Machine Learning

Frank Hutter is a Full Professor for Machine Learning at the University of Freiburg (Germany), as well as Chief Expert AutoML at the Bosch Center for Artificial Intelligence. Frank holds a PhD from the University of British Columbia (UBC, 2009) and a Diplom (eq. MSc) from TU Darmstadt (2004). He received the 2010 CAIAC doctoral dissertation award for the best thesis in AI in Canada, and with his coauthors, several best paper awards and prizes in international competitions on machine learning, SAT solving, and AI planning. He is a Fellow of EurAI and ELLIS, the director of the ELLIS unit Freiburg and the recipient of 3 ERC grants. Frank is best known for his research on automated machine learning (AutoML), including neural architecture search and efficient hyperparameter optimization. He co-authored the first book on AutoML and the prominent AutoML tools Auto-WEKA, Auto-sklearn and Auto-PyTorch, won the first two AutoML challenges with his team, co-organized the ICML workshop series on AutoML every year 2014-2021, has been the general chair of the inaugural AutoML conference 2022 and is general chair again in 2023.

Bernd Bischl holds the chair of Statistics and Data Science at the Department of Statistics at the Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich and is a co-director of the Munich Center for Machine Learning (MCML), one of Germany’s national competence centers for Machine Learning (ML). He studied Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence and Data Sciences in Hamburg, Edinburgh and Dortmund and obtained his Ph.D from Dortmund Technical University in 2013 with a thesis on “Model and Algorithm Selection in Statistical Learning and Optimization”. His research interests include AutoML, model selection, interpretable ML, as well as the development of statistical software. He is a member of ELLIS in general, and a faculty member of ELLIS Munich, an active developer of several R-packages, leads the mlr (Machine Learning in R) engineering group and is co-founder of the science platform OpenML for open and reproducible ML. Furthermore, he leads the Munich branch of the ADA Lovelace Center for Analytics, Data & Application, i.e. a new type of research infrastructure to support businesses in Bavaria, especially in the SME sector.

Dr. Alassane Ndiaye has been a senior software engineer (R&D) and project manager at the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) for more than 20 years, working on research as well as industry and transfer projects. Among other things, he uses machine learning in forecasting methods for the energy industry and electromobility.

Dr Matthieu Deru is a senior software engineer (R&D) and UX designer for interactive systems at the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence GmbH (DFKI). His project experience covers topics as diverse as the application fields of AI, from intelligent user interfaces to complex prediction models for electromobility.

Ute Schmid is Professor of Applied Computer Science, in particular Cognitive Systems. She has been teaching and researching knowledge-based methods of AI and machine learning for more than 15 years. She is internationally visible in the field of human-like machine learning and is currently researching explanation generation and the use of explanations in interactive learning. Ute Schmid also has experience in the development of intelligent tutoring systems and in the use of analogue examples in the context of knowledge and skill acquisition. In addition to a degree in computer science, she also holds a degree in psychology and has many years of experience in empirical research.