Dr. Walter Hehl

Walter Hehl, Ph.D. holds a Diploma in Physics and a Ph.D. in Natural Sciences, both from the University of Stuttgart in Germany. He is a consultant and speaker on the future of IT and innovation. He retired as content manager of the “Industry Solutions Lab Zürich” in 2007. This Industry Solutions Lab is the European executive briefing center of the Research Division of IBM and a global meeting place of executives and politicians with IBM researchers and consultants.
 
Walter started his career as physicist and development engineer at IBM’s development laboratory in Böblingen (Germany). As a professional, he developed advanced printing technologies (e.g., electro erosion and ink jet printing), and specialized in digital image processing for printing and display of images. As a manager, he was for many years responsible for advanced developments and innovation for systems and software in the Böblingen laboratory.
 
After a sabbatical year as professor for software technology at the Technical University of Dresden, he became the content manager for IBM’s European Industry Solutions Lab, first in Stuttgart (Germany), then directly in IBM Research Lab Zurich. In this function, he was responsible for the technologies and solutions used to represent actual trends in IBM Research and in the industry. This includes the strategic direction of the technology exhibition at the center. His special interests are the trends in technologies — from nanoscience to software technology — and the management of innovation in large enterprises and in the society.
 
He is the author of many scientific papers and also popular articles on Information Technology. He holds IBM’s 3rd plateau for patent disclosures. In his function as event manager at the Zurich Research Lab (Industry Solutions Lab), he hosted and ran workshops on the future of IT and on innovation with several hundred companies and organizations from all over the world.
 
Walter authored Trends in der Informationstechnologie. His patents include Actuator mechanism for a print hammer or the like, Non reactive positioning device, Horn loaded piezoelectric matrix printer drive method and apparatus, and Cost-based method for dynamically pricing and prioritizing an e-mail.
 
Read his blog and his LinkedIn profile. Visit his Facebook page.