Symposium on Electrical and Computer Engineering

Local: Room I105

Date: Tuesday, July 1^st, 2025 | 11h00

“The Hard Path to Excellence or, … why excellence is about details”

In this talk, I will digress about what is behind a research career, with simple examples, constructed around a kind of Research Book of Style, which has inspired the activity of the teams I have led and the people I have mentored. I will hopefully show that being competitive is hard but rewarding and … not that complicated, as the title suggests. The secret of success, which I unveil towards the end, is finding out what or who you compete against…

Paulo Veríssimo

Professor and Director, KAUST

Biography

Paulo Esteves-Veríssimo is research fellow at the Universities of Lisboa (PT) at LASIGE, and Luxembourg (LU) at SnT. He has been professor at KAUST (SA) and founding director of its RC3 Center (https://crisys.kaust.edu.sa/). He is Fellow of IEEE and Fellow of ACM, author of over 220 peer-refereed publications and co-author of 5 books. He is currently interested in resilient computing, in areas like: SDN-based infrastructures; autonomous vehicles; distributed control systems; digital health and genomics; or blockchain and cryptocurrencies.
Check his works on: http://scholar.google.com/citations?user=aMHx8aUAAAAJ

Local: Room I105

Date: Monday, June 30^th, 2025 | 17h15

Round Table – Beyond the Thesis: PhDs as Startup Founders and Leaders

Are you a PhD student or graduate wondering what lies beyond the traditional academic path? This panel dives into the exciting world of startups, showcasing how doctoral-level expertise is not just valuable, but often essential for groundbreaking innovation. Hear from successful PhDs who have transitioned from research labs to leading dynamic companies, sharing their journeys, challenges, and the unique advantages a scientific mindset brings to the entrepreneurial landscape. Discover how your deep knowledge and analytical skills can fuel a new venture and position you as a true leader in the next wave of disruptive technologies.

João Tasso

Associated Professor, FEUP

Head, Underwater Systems and Technologies Laboratory (LSTS)

Biography

João Tasso de Figueiredo Borges de Sousa is a Professor at the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department from Porto University in Portugal. He holds a PhD and an MSc in Electrical Engineering, both awarded by the University of Porto. His research interests include autonomous underwater, surface and air vehicles, planning and execution control for networked vehicle systems, optimization and control, cyber-physical systems, and applications of networked vehicle systems to the ocean sciences, security and defense. In 2002 he was awarded the Luso-American Foundation Fellowship by the Portuguese Studies Program from the University of California at Berkeley. In 2008 he received an outstanding teaching award from Porto University.
He is the head of the Laboratório de Sistemas e Tecnologias Subaquáticas – LSTS (Underwater Systems and Technologies Laboratory). The LSTS has pioneered the design, construction and deployment of networked underwater, surface and air vehicles for applications in ocean sciences, security and defense. Major accomplishments include the design of the award-winning Light Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (LSTS) and of the LSTS open source software tool chain for networked vehicle systems, as well as the organization of large scale experiments at sea, including the annual Rapid Environmental Picture exercise organized in cooperation with the Portuguese Navy since 2010 and with the Centre for Maritime Research and Experimentation since 2014. The LSTS received the Arca second Prize for the best technological realizations Respectful to Environment in 2003 and the national BES Innovation National Award for the design of the Light Autonomous Underwater Vehicle in 2006.

Ricardo Sousa

Associated Professor, FEUP

Chief Artificial Intelligence & Co-Founder, SeeOnMe

Biography

A leader and innovator in designing and developing machine learning and computer vision across various customer-centric products. My passion lies at the intersection of solving customer problems, led by cutting-edge artificial intelligence. Architected a faceted-search/ranking platform leveraged by ML algorithms and computer vision. Beyond search and discovery, my latest work involved building an industry-leading multimodal conversational agent.
More at http://rsousa.co

João Barros

Founder and CEO, Veniam Inc.

Biography

João Barros holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and Information Technology from Technische Universität München, completed his undergraduate studies in Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Universidade do Porto and Universität Karlsruhe, and also holds a performing arts degree in flute from the Music Conservatory of Porto.
After spending 15 years advancing wireless networking technologies at leading institutions—including Technische Universität München, Universidade do Porto, MIT, Carnegie Mellon, and Stanford—João Barros went on to found two venture-backed startups, Streambolico and Veniam, where he currently serves as CEO. His work has resulted in a book, over 180 scientific and technical publications, 22 patents, and media coverage by NPR, BBC, MIT Technology Review, The Atlantic, and TechCrunch.
Prof. Barros has earned numerous accolades, such as the 2010 IEEE Communications Society Young Researcher Award (EMEA), the 2011 IEEE ComSoc & Information Theory Society Joint Paper Award, and honors from CableLabs, the Wireless Broadband Alliance, TU Automotive, and the Bavarian State Ministry of Sciences, Research and the Arts for excellence in teaching.

Local: Room I105

Date: Tuesday, July 1^st, 2025 | 12h00

Round Table – The Convergence of Industry and Academia: Industry Academization and University Industrialization

This panel delves into the dynamic fusion of academia and industry, where PhD programs are increasingly shaped by real-world applications and corporate collaboration. As universities evolve into innovation hubs and companies embrace research partnerships, we explore the impact on academic freedom, research integrity, and career readiness. What does this mean for the future of doctoral education? Join us as we rethink how PhD training can bridge scientific exploration with industry-driven innovation.

Filipa Borrego

Innovation and Research Manager, Vortex CoLab

Biography

Filipa Borrego is the Innovation Manager and a member of the Board of Directors of VORTEX CoLab, an R&D+i Laboratory in Cyber-physical systems & Cybersecurity. She is also an Assistant Invited Professor of the Postgraduate program in Science and Technology Management and Policy at NOVA FCSH.

Alberto Bernardo

Senior Researcher, INESC TEC

Biography

Participation in Conferences and Seminars as keynote speaker. Business Developer for the Efacec solutions and services on Grid Storage. Experience as Marketing Manager (over 10 years). Experience as Smart Grids Designer and Engineer (over 7 ears). Experience in Innovation Management and Deployment (over 10 years). Two years experience as Manager of the Automation School of the Efacec Academy.

João Vieira Silva

Innovation Manager, CNET- Centre New Energy Technologies

Biography

Since July 2023, I am leading one of the technical areas of EDP NEW (the R&D branch of the EDP group). The RES Integration and Flexibility area covers high relevant topics for the energy transition process namely industrial eletrification, decarbonization of major consumption hubs exploiting demand-side flexibility, green hydrogen and storage technologies.

Local: Room I105

Date: Monday, June 30^th, 2025 | 17h00

Carlos Ferreira

Professor, Instituto Politécnico de Leiria

Telmo Fernandes

Professor, Instituto Politécnico de Leiria

Order tracking with smart packaging and Process Mining: the case study of Prozis

With the advent of IoT and Big Data, packaging and delivery business processes have evolved to become “smarter”. With Process Mining to process all the data generated by these smart packages, we have developed a digital platform to track orders and detect bottlenecks in Prozis’ package delivering. The Embalagem do Futuro RRP project – work package 13 – involves two main research areas: customized development of IoT for smart packaging using BLE, and the development of a digital platform which uses Process Mining techniques and innovations for process variant comparisons, to better track and detect order delivery inefficiencies, and to optimize overall customer experience.