Research and Development Management

Vexcel Corporation, Boulder ; Vexcel Imaging GmbH, Graz; Microsoft Corporation

1985-1992 Numerous R&D projects commercially acquired and results successfully delivered in the course of usual business at Vexcel Corporation
1992-2006 Member of, or Advisor to, the Board of Directors at Vexcel Corporation
1998-1999 Building modeling: Development of a business unit at Vexcel Corp. for telecom-applications of 3D urban models
1993-1999 UltraScan5000 Film scanning, from idea to the globally sold and supported commercial product
2001-2007 UltraCam large format digital aerial camera, from product idea to the globally sold and supported commercial product
2006-2008  Microsoft management participation in developing a photogrammetric activity as part of the Virtual Earth initiative [now Bing-Maps]

Markhurd Corporation, Minneapolis

1984-1985
Turn-around from a loss-producing company to a profitable aerial mapping company operating 3 Lear jets and 6 propeller planes;
Development of an operational system for automated map generalization during a period of intense digitization of existing maps and map separates to fill novel digital map data bases as precursors of the Geographic Information Systems GIS.

Austrian Institute of Technology [formerly Austrian Research Centers Seibersdorf]

1996-1998 Research management and research policy, including national research policy of Austria as part of the duties as CEO of this Austrian national research facility. General management responsibility for a wide range of R&D themes. Moving away from the nuclear-inspiried topics to excellence in information technology.

Joanneum Research, Graz [formerly Graz Research Centre]

1980-1984 Start-up of a new Institute and growing this to a staff of 50 cooperators in 3 years. Preparation, development, organization and execution of research projects addressing digital image processing, digital photogrammetry (analytical stereo plotter), pattern recognition, medical image analysis, Computer-Aided Design. Development of an international client base.

Graz University of Technology, Graz

1976-1984 Start-up of a new sub-department (Abteilung) within an established University Institute for Applied Geodesy and Photogrammetry. Organization of a new teaching and research program to address then-novel topics such as digital image processing and computer graphics within the surveying engineering team.
1992-now Start-up of a new Institute within the School of Computer Science and development of teams for Computer Vision and Computer Graphics. Bridging the gaps between vision and graphics, and also photogrammetry.
2008 Dean of Computer Science

California Institute of Technology/ Jet Propulsion Laboratory/NASA

1974-1976 Managing all aspects of a personal project for the analysis of Apollo 17 Lunar Sounder radar imagery of the equatorial region of the Moon.
1975-1980 Managing a project to develop year-round arctic sea ice mapping from airborne and satellite radar images.
1978-1994 Participation in the Magellan Science project and managing the stereo activity of that project to map the surface of planet Venus.
1976-1984 Managing a continuing activity of cooperation between the Graz University of Technology and the radar imaging team at JPL, with responsibility for radargrammetry work at JPL.

International Institute for Geoinformation and Earth Sciences, Delft and Enschede

1969-1974
Development of a new research track in photogrammetric aspects of remote sensing.
Participation in the development of a structured remote sensing research program for the entire 300-people Institute.
1972-1974
Latin American radar mapping project support for PRORADAM in Colombia.
1976-1989
Consultant for Radargrammetry, with part time teaching and international project support

Learned Societies

 

1976-1984
International Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing [ISPRS] — Active cooperation in international working groups on mapping with remote sensing images, on image processing and on pattern recognition, Chairman of a Working Group. 
2000-2004
President of the ISPRS Technical Commission on „Theory and Algorithms“ [Renamed „Photogrammetric Computer Vision and Image Analysis“]
2011-2012
Association of Computing Machinery ACM, Special Interest Group SIGSPATIAL Sponsorship Co-Chair
2016-
ISPRS Set-up of the ISPRS Industrial Advisory Committee, Kick-off at ISPRS-Congress in Prague