Since December 2017, Prof. Dr. rer. pol. Sophia Keil has been Professor of Business Administration, in particular Production Management and Logistics at Zittau/Görlitz University of Applied Sciences. From December 2018 until the beginning of May 2020, she was Dean of the Faculty of Business, Economics and Engineering. Since March 2020, she has been Vice Rector for Education and International Affairs at Zittau/Görlitz University of Applied Sciences.
Born on the Baltic island of Rügen, she studied business administration at Stralsund University of Applied Sciences. From 2005 to 2006, she completed a part-time doctorate at the TU Dresden. During her professional development at the semiconductor manufacturer Infineon Technologies Dresden GmbH, at the Chair of Business Administration, in particular Logistics, at the Technical University of Dresden, at Dresden International University (DIU) and at Stralsund University of Applied Sciences, she was able to acquire comprehensive specialist, experience and management knowledge in the fields of corporate process, production, supply chain and logistics optimization. In 2011, she received her doctorate from the Technical University of Dresden with a thesis on "Flow-oriented design of production systems using the example of semiconductor factories". In 2015, she was offered a professorship at the SUNY Polytechnic Institute Albany (NY, USA), which she did not accept.
Her research focuses on the development of approaches for shaping the digital transformation of the economy and society, the development of innovative teaching/learning methods and educational formats for people of all generations and the development of methods for the effective and efficient design of production systems and supply chains.
She is currently active in the two European high-tech research projects "Power to Power" and "Integrated Development 4.0". Here she is particularly concerned with the design of the workplaces of the future in the context of Industry 4.0. In addition, she heads the BMBF research project "Europe Open Academy" ("EurOpA"), which is part of the major structural change project and alliance "Lusatia - Life and Technology". The aim of this project is to design and establish a further education academy in Upper Lusatia. She is a member of the program committees of the Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Conference (ASMC) and the European Advanced Process Control and Manufacturing Conference (apcm) and author of over 30 publications.
Prof. Raj Kollmorgen was born in Leipzig. Between 1985 and 1990, he studied philosophy, social sciences and economics in Berlin and then worked as an employee, lecturer and professor at various academic institutions, including the universities of Jena, Magdeburg and Toronto (Canada).
In spring 2013, he was appointed Professor of Management of Social Change at Zittau/Görlitz University of Applied Sciences. From 2014 to 2020, he was course representative for the Master's degree program "Management of Social Change" at the Faculty of Social Sciences and from 2016 to 2020 he was Director of the Institute for Transformation, Housing and Social Spatial Development (TRAWOS); since then he has been its Deputy Director.
Prof. Kollmorgen focuses on comparative transformation research, East Germany and German unification, and conducts research on socio-ecological change, innovative regional development, elites, political populism and radicalism. He has published widely on these topics, most recently, for example, the "Handbook of Political, Social, and Economic Transformation" (co-edited with Wolfgang Merkel and Hans-Jürgen Wagener at Oxford University Press 2019); "Die neue Mitte? Ideology and Practice of the Populist and Extreme Right (Schriften des Deutschen Hygiene-Museums 14)" (co-edited with Johannes Schütz and Steven Schäller at Böhlau 2021) or "Deutschland ist eins: vieles. Bilanz und Perspektiven von Vereinigung und Transformation" (co-edited with Judith Enders and Ilko-Sascha Kowalczuk at Campus Verlag 2021).
Ongoing third-party funded projects that Prof. Kollmorgen is responsible for include the joint project "Engagement constellations in rural areas - an East-West comparison (ENKOR)" (2021-2024, together with the University of Göttingen and the Thünen Institute Bollewick, funded by the BMEL) or the research project "Perspectives for sustainable development of lignite regions in structural change" (2019-2022, together with the Wuppertal Institute and ifo Dresden, funded by the Federal Environment Agency). He also heads the strategy development project in the alliance/joint project "Lusatia - Life and Technology" (at the ZIT of the HSZG; funded by the BMBF as part of the WIR! program line) and the transfer (sub)project in the "Saxony5" network (at the ZIT; funded by the BMBF as part of the "Innovative University", in which all four state universities of applied sciences in Saxony are involved).
Prof. Kollmorgen is also present in the regional and national mass media and has been advising state, political and civil society actors for years. Among other things, he was a member of the federal government's commission "30 Years of Peaceful Revolution and German Reunification" (2019-2020).
Further information on teaching, research, third mission and functions can be found on the website of the Faculty of Social Sciences: https://f-s.hszg.de/studienangebot/master-management-sozialen-wandels/mitarbeiter-innen-und-fachstudienberatung/prof-raj-kollmorgen.
