External memberMarion A. Weissenberger-Eibl
University professor Dr Marion A. Weissenberger-Eibl Dipl.-Kffr. (Univ.) Dipl.-Ing. (FH) directs the Fraunhofer Institute for System and Innovation Research (ISI). In addition, she holds the chair of Innovation and Technology Management (iTM) at the Institute of Entrepreneurship, Technology Management and Innovation (EnTechnon) at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT).
She works on the conditions leading to innovations and their impacts. Her research focuses on the management of innovations and technologies, roadmapping, strategic foresight and planning, corporate networks and knowledge management.
As one of the “top engineers in Germany” Marion A. Weissenberger-Eibl was recently elected to be one of the “Top 100 influential women in German industry”. After first qualifying in garment engineering and business management, she earned her doctorate and habilitation at the Technical University of Munich. In acknowledgement of her scientific achievements, the innovation researcher was appointed to the German Academy of Technical Sciences in 2012 (acatech). Since 2018 she has supported the research committee of the German Council of Sciences and Humanities and has notably contributed her expertise to framing the position paper on “application-led” research.
Politically speaking, too, Univ.-Prof. Dr Marion A. Weissenberger-Eibl’s expertise is appreciated. In 2011/12 she accompanied the Federal Chancellor’s expert dialogue, when she chaired the working group on innovation culture and advised the chancellor on the future shape of the economy and society in Germany. In 2015, in the next International Germany Forum (IDF), a format for interdisciplinary exchange on internationally relevant future-related questions, she moderated the thematic group “The Future needs Holistic Solutions”.
In the context of the German sustainability strategy, Univ.-Prof. Dr Marion A. Weissenberger-Eibl was a member of the steering committee of the Federal Government’s “Science Platform Sustainability 2030”. The platform’s main task is to implement the UN’s Agenda 2030, to accompany its sustainable development goals from a scientific point of view and to develop recommendations for action. She supports the German Federal Environmental Foundation (DBU) and the Karl Heinz Beckurt Foundation as a member of their boards of trustees. In 2014 the Federal Foreign Office appointed her a member of the Sino-German Dialogue Forum for a term of four years. Furthermore, she heads the core working group “research and innovative environment” in the context of the strategic dialogue of the Baden-Württemberg car industry launched in 2017.
In order to implement new ideas in university teaching and research, Univ.-Prof. Dr Marion A. Weissenberger-Eibl sits on the structural commission for refounding a university in Nuremburg and on the Heidelberg University Council. Since 2018 she has served on the advisory board of the annual Deutscher Studienpreis (German Study Prize), which judges the contributions submitted by young researchers, chooses the prize-winners and supports the Körber Foundation in further developing and implementing the award.
Industry’s relations with academia and research are a further interest of Marion A. Weissenberger-Eibl. Since 2012 she has been a member of the supervisory board of HeidelbergCement AG and, with her experience and competence in the areas of innovation research, foresight, strategic development and knowledge management she has been a valuable asset to the company. Further, Univ.-Prof. Dr Weissenberger-Eibl joined the supervisory boards of MTU Aero Engines AG in 2013 and Rheinmetall AG in 2016.
Univ.-Prof. Dr Weissenberger-Eibl is the author of numerous publications and editor of the series “Kooperation von Wissenschaft und Wirtschaft” (cooperation of science and industry). She advises representatives of industry, academia and policy-makers, thereby making a key contribution to the innovation process in Germany.
She has been a member of the Heidelberg University Council since 2016.
