项目介绍

2024年12月1日

LIRIS, the KU Leuven Research Center on Information Systems Engineering, is part of the Department of Decision Sciences and Information Management of the Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB). The research group has acquired a solid, world-wide recognized reputation in the field of management informatics, as illustrated by the various top publications in high-quality journals, research projects, presentations at well-respected conferences, the frequent organization of scientific events, and the regular editorial activities undertaken. In the area of business informatics, the group has always been a leading research team in Flanders and Belgium. The research team maintains close contacts with other research centers in the faculty, KU Leuven and other universities. LIRIS cooperates with leading international academic research centers in business information systems. The LIRIS group has extensive links with a network of national and international industry partners, serving either as research sponsors or facilitators for data provisioning and research validation. This cross-fertilization between fundamental research and industry practice allows to conduct research according to the domain’s motto: rigor and relevance.

Project

Contemporary information systems have become increasingly complex and heterogeneous in their (inter)dependencies and collaboration roles. At the code and implementation level, they commonly rely on third-party technology such as modules and libraries, whereas on the execution and operational level, they frequently outsource computation and storage to other parties such as cloud providers and service providers. On the business process level, they rely on partner services within a broader ecosystem to accomplish their overall goals, and on the data level, and in their use of artificial intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML), they use consolidated data sets for training and optimization, and deploy pre-trained models obtained from third parties.

While this extensive degree of collaboration and reuse is key to the effectiveness and innovation capability of these systems, they also create substantial risk for misuse, cyber security and privacy issues. Software packages frequently become outdated or suffer from known vulnerabilities. Cloud providers may fail or suffer from significant data breaches, and AI models obtained elsewhere may come with specific backdoors, while data sets may be poisoned or unlawful (e.g., against data protection regulations such as GDPR).
Existing approaches to perform supply chain analysis in software systems (e.g., SCA: Software Composition Analysis tools), or to provide better documentation and management (e.g., SBOM: Software bill of materials) provide support for specific risk perspectives, but lack support for the end-to-end holistic analysis of the complex supply chains in contemporary information systems.

In this research track, you will focus on challenges related to the management of these complex interdependent realities in contemporary software-based systems.
An integrated approach will be designed and implemented to perform extensive software supply chain risk analysis, starting from extensive architecture modeling support for multiple perspectives on inter-organizational collaboration.
You will incept and develop novel model-driven approaches to express complex supply chains and to subject them to risk analysis. You will evaluate the ensuing solutions in realistic application scenarios.

Profile

You are a highly motivated, enthusiastic and independent person with a curious, yet critical, scientific mindset, and a strong affinity and for information systems and software design and architecture. You are creative, maintain strong self-discipline and have a problem-solving attitude.

The ideal candidate will comply with following requirements:

• Master in Business and Information Systems Engineering,  Business Engineering or Business Economics, or a master degree in information technology or science, computer science, informatics, or related fields.
• Strong affinity for the design and architecture of software- and information-intensive systems and supporting technologies.
• Good communication skills, particularly with regard to reporting, presentation and team work
• Able to work independently as well as in teams in an interdisciplinary context.
• Excellent English communication and interpersonal skills, both verbal and written.

Offer

We offer a 4-year PhD research position in a stimulating international work environment at one of the top-ranked universities in Europe. KU Leuven is a research-intensive, internationally-oriented university that conducts both fundamental and applied scientific research with a strong focus on interdisciplinary collaboration, international excellence and innovation. You will be based in Leuven, a historic, dynamic, and vibrant city in the heart of Belgium, in close proximity to major European capitals.
You will complete the doctoral program in Business Economics (domain: Management Informatics).

Interested?

For more information please contact Prof. dr. Dimitri Van Landuyt, tel.: +32 16 32 76 50, mail: dimitri.vanlanduyt@kuleuven.be.You can apply for this job no later than December 31, 2024 via the online application tool

KU Leuven strives for an inclusive, respectful and socially safe environment. We embrace diversity among individuals and groups as an asset. Open dialogue and differences in perspective are essential for an ambitious research and educational environment. In our commitment to equal opportunity, we recognize the consequences of historical inequalities. We do not accept any form of discrimination based on, but not limited to, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, age, ethnic or national background, skin colour, religious and philosophical diversity, neurodivergence, employment disability, health, or socioeconomic status. For questions about accessibility or support offered, we are happy to assist you at this email address.

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