Structure and networking

The five business units of Fraunhofer IOSB bundle the portfolio of the institute with regard to concrete application areas and markets.

The central competence and organizational units are the 16 scientific departments. Six of them are located in Karlsruhe, five in Ettlingen. Our branches IOSB-AST at Ilmenau and IOSB-INA at Lemgo comprise three and two departments respectively.

At all locations, our institute collaborates closely with the local universities: Employees of Fraunhofer IOSB hold professorships and teaching positions, and local professors are involved as external advisors and advisory board members of the institute.

Within Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, Fraunhofer IOSB belongs to the Fraunhofer ICT Group, the Fraunhofer Business Unit Vision and Fraunhofer Segment for Defense and Security VVS. In addition, the institute and individual departments are members of the following Fraunhofer Alliances: AutoMOBILE Production, AVIATION & SPACE, Big Data and Artificial Intelligence, Energy, Agriculture and Food Industry (aka Food Chain Management), SysWasser, and Transport.

Fraunhofer IOSB is also involved in the Fraunhofer Clusters of Excellence “Cognitive Internet Technologies CCIT” and “Integrated Energy Systems CINES” as well as in the High-Performance Centers “Mobility Systems, Karlsruhe”, “Intelligent Signal Analysis and Assistance Systems – InSignA, Ilmenau” in Ilmenau and “Sustainable Ocean Business” in Rostock/Lübeck. Furthermore, our head of institute Prof. Beyerer is spokesman of the Fraunhofer Strategic Research Field Artificial Intelligence (AI).

In addition, it goes without saying that on a case-by-case basis, we collaborate with sister institutes that complement our expertise with regard to the task at hand.