SPEAKER – interACTIVE HAPTICS Conference 2024

Elisa Santella

Elisa Santella is one of the founding members of GREWUS GmbH (2007) and one of the conference’s hosts. Since 2017, she has been Managing Director and responsible for Automotive Haptic Key Accounts. Together with her team, Elisa supports customers in integrating active haptics. She understands the market requirements on both a commercial and technical basis. She has been working in the international automotive industry for over 20 years. Furthermore, she was elected Automotive WG chair and Board Member for the Haptics Industry Forum and Industrial Chair of the EuroHaptics 2022.

Topic 1:
“HAPTIC TRENDS IN AUTOMOTIVE HMIS”

Haptic trends in automotive human-machine interface (HMI) are shaping the future of the driving experience. Used correctly, haptic feedback provides a positive user experience, minimizes user error, and emphasizes the action being performed. Active haptic actuators "simulates" electromechanical switches' feel or enhance artificially generated feedback and interaction with an electronic interface. This feedback is critical to the control, safety, and comfort of the driving experience.

Haptic technologies in pedals, seat belts, steering wheels, and seats can provide driver feedback for various actions and are integrated into lane assist, distance warning, and other features. Designers and engineers increasingly incorporate haptic feedback into the vehicle's HMI. As a result, drivers do not have to take their eyes off the road as often, which improves overall driving safety. In addition to improving safety features, haptic technology enables greater personalization of the driving experience. Haptic feedback can be defined, modified, and controlled by software. As a result, it offers designers endless configuration options and a flexible, individualized driving experience.

Topic 2:
“GAMIFICATION IN AUTOMOTIVE"

This topic has several meanings at once. In this presentation, we will explain them specifically in the context of haptics. Gamification is not only an effective way to engage customers and create loyalty. Using games to strengthen and differentiate their brand, several OEMs have already shown that they know what it takes to keep people interested in their products. Furthermore, the connectivity and digitalization of car interiors accelerate. The trends are multimodal HMI and autonomous driving.

"The cockpit of the future" will become an extended living room, workspace, and virtual social environment. Passengers will expect entertainment and gaming in the car. Looking ahead, it is clear that the quality of XR experiences offered in autonomous vehicle cabins will provide a new dimension of brand experience and differentiation between OEMs.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Thorsten Alexander Kern Technischen Universität Hamburg (TUHH)

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Thorsten Alexander Kern

Thorsten A. Kern received his Dipl.-Ing. (2002) and Dr.-Ing. (2006) degrees from Technische Universität Darmstadt (TUDA), Germany, in the fields of actuator and sensor development for medical human-machine interfaces (HMIs) in applications like minimally invasive surgery and catheterizations. He is currently the director at Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH), Germany, of the Institute for Mechatronics in Mechanics. He previously worked in Automotive Industry at Continental as an R&D manager for interior components, leading a team of 300 engineers worldwide. He joined Continental in 2008 covering various functions with increasing range of responsibility in actuator development, motor development and active haptic device development before shifting toward R&D management and product management on Head-Up Displays. Between 2006 and 2008, he was working in parallel in a startup focusing on medical interventions and was the main editor of the first edition of “Engineering Haptic Devices”. He joined Hamburg University in January 2019. His interests are specifically focused on all types of electromagnetic sensors and actuators and their system integration toward larger motor- or sensor-systems in high-dynamic applications. Since 2022 he is vice-president of the EuroHaptics Society and currently holds the position of the dean of the mechanical engineering at TUHH.

“VIBROTACTILE ACTUATORS – HOW TO REALLY QUANTIFY THEIR PERFORMANCE FOR A MORE GENERAL APPLICABILITY“

Vibrotactile actuators are widely used in haptic applications. It is fair to say that from a component perspective no other type of actuator is used in haptic applications as often and has a corresponding high business volume. Considering their broad application from handheld-devices over wearables to exciters for surface-haptics it should be expected that there are established standards to compare their performances in all ranges of applications. Especially as with excentric-rotating-mass-actuators (ERM) and linear-resonant-actuators (LRA) there are two major design variants which do not only differ in their mechanics but also strongly in their application and the corresponding control electronics and methods. However digging into the industrial day-to-day-business there is extremely little agreed on how to quantify those actuators in a generalistic sense. Usually specifications to test these exciters are derived from the intended application leading to more or less representative demonstrations in a target-like-environment done by the supplier base. This is neither efficient nor does it allow a sufficient comparision of actuators especially under the consideration of statistical production spreads (e.g. resonancies due to masses, springs, …). This presentation will show a more methodological approach in quantifying the performance of vibrotactile actuators as a frequency-dependent-energy-source derived from established actuator theory. It will discuss the theoretical concept, the necessary measurement equipment and setups and will show comparative and generally applicable results of a growing database of vibrotactile actuators as being built at Hamburg University of Technology.

Wolfgang Clemens PolyIC

Wolfgang Clemens

Dr. Wolfgang Clemens is Director of Product Management & Business Development and Member of the Management Board of PolyIC. In line with this, he is responsible for Marketing and Sales of PolyIC products with focus on touch sensor applications in HMI systems in automotive, home appliances and consumer markets.

Dr. Wolfgang Clemens studied physics at the University of Cologne, where he specialized in solid state physics. After finishing his studies, he earned his doctorate at the research center in Juelich researching in thin magnetic films. After earning his doctorate, Dr. Clemens worked with Siemens Corporate Technology as leading project manager. He was in charge of the development and application of magnetic sensors. Subsequently, he became project leader for the development of integrated polymer circuits (IPC). Therewith, he is cofounder of PolyIC, starting in November 2003 as joint venture between Siemens and Leonhard KURZ Stiftung & Co. KG (since 2010 PolyIC is a 100% KURZ company).

"POLYTC TOUCH SENSORS IN HMI APPLICATIONS WITH HAPTIC FEEDBACK"

Touch sensitive Switches are becoming standard in HMI surfaces in all industries such as Consumer, Home Appliances and Automotive.

PolyIC – a Kurz Company – offers capacitive Touch sensors with high flexibility and transparency for all touch interfaces. Typical applications are touch buttons, sliders, rotary wheels or touch screens with single touch or multi touch functionality. All our sensors are customized according to the special demands of the project. Within the KURZ group we are able to offer a variety of integration options, from lamination with adhesive tapes to inmold electronics (IME) and functional foil bonding (FFB). Combined with plastic decoration from KURZ we can offer smart decorated HMI surfaces. In the presentation I will show product examples and innovation use cases. Due to cost reasons, in most touch applications, no haptic feedback of the function is established today. But in many products the touch applications are combined with haptic feedback in order to enable a save activation of the function. Especially in automotive applications like steering wheel switches, door control units or center control units a haptic feedback is relevant. I will present product examples of capacitive touch switches with different kind of haptics, from just touch combined with mechanical switches towards force detection with electrical feedback. The future challenges will be to combine large curved decorated HMI parts with force detection and haptic feedback; I will present our activities in this area, that we do with our partners.

Eric Vezzoli Razer Inc.

Eric Vezzoli

Eric is a scientist-turned-entrepreneur with a proven track record in technology strategy and business execution for deep tech and new technology ventures.
He funded Interhaptics in 2017 and sold it to Razer in 2022. Currently leading the venture of making it the market standard for Haptics coding in gaming. He is now Associate Director of Haptics in Razer.
Eric contributed to the architecture of MPEG Haptics standard with haptics streaming, full-body haptics, and XR compatibility.
He founded and Co-Host the Haptics Club podcast sharing and documenting successes and best practices for haptics implementers.
He is a director, XR haptics, and gaming haptics working group chair at the Haptics Industry Forum.

"UNLOCKING THE POWER OF HAPTIC TECHNOLOGY IN GAMING: INDUSTRY LEADERS EXPLORE BEST PRACTICES AND ROI"

The talk will discuss why developers and publisher should implement designed haptics in gaming. We will discuss ROI, best implementation practices, and how to achieve multi-platform haptics development and deployment thanks to Interhaptics.

Iyad Nasrallah TouchNetix

Iyad Nasrallah

Dr. Iyad Nasrallah is Product Line Manager of TouchNetix’s force sensing technology, and oversees TouchNetix’s strategic haptic collaborations. He holds a PhD in Physics in Organic Semiconductor/Flexible Electronics from the University of Cambridge, and was previously a Research Fellow at Wolfson College, University of Cambridge, researching mechanically-flexible smart sensor technologies for the Internet of Things.

"TOUCH, FORCE, HOVER, PROXIMITY, HAPTICS ... AXIOM!"

Haptic feedback is becoming the expectation in smart surfaces, touch panels and general interfacing. However, in order for haptic feedback to fully replace mechanical feedback, reducing response latency is crucial. This talk highlights how the aXiom product range can bring capacitive touch, air gestures, force-sensing as well as haptics into a unique, highly configurable single-chip-solution.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil. Philipp Beckerle Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg

Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil. Philipp Beckerle

Philipp Beckerle received his Dr.-Ing. in mechatronics from TU Darmstadt, Germany, in 2014 and his habilitation from TU Dortmund, Germany, in 2021. He is full professor and chair of Autonomous Systems and Mechatronics at FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg and was visiting researcher at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Arizona State University, and University of Siena. His research interest is in human-centered mechatronics and robotics and his work was honored with various awards.

"HUMAN PERCEPTION OF HAPTICS"

Haptics is a remarkable modality to push human-system interaction. To align appropriatly with users' demands, technical design should be based on a deep understanding of human haptic perception. In this talk, I will outline different facets of haptic perception, putting emphasis on psychological aspects and how those could be considered in systems engineering. Psychological concepts and experimental designs can help to comprehend the perspective of the users and probe the impact of different haptic interface designs on discriminative and affective touch. Human-in-the-loop experiments extend such experiments to online interaction studies, which empower users to provide early and continuous input to yield human-centric solutions.

Ralf Sandomeer GREWUS GmbH

Ralf Sandomeer

Engineer, a specialist in integrating components and modules into customer solutions.

Ralf Sandomeer has 25 years of global business experience focusing on solutions for the automotive and consumer market. Creativity is the basis of every idea; he constantly has new ideas and puts his inspiration into practice. His strength is in designing and producing single components and systems by keeping an eye on the solutions for the customer's machines and applications. Ralf is one of the founders of GREWUS GmbH; for 17 years, he has successfully driven the company with Elisa Santella and the great Team.

"THE RECIPE OF HAPTIC INTEGRATION"

Based on the experience GREWUS earned during the past five years in Haptics, Ralf will show one way from the idea to functional haptic integration. He will pay attention to the disciplines that must be considered for the next level of haptic solutions.

He will lead together the general aspects of mechanics, sensing, measuring, actuating, and driving for haptic applications. Good preparation and planning at the beginning of a project increase performance. The target is to align the "ingredients" to a perfect composition. After the speaker's presentation, the audience will be perfectly prepared for the following lectures. They will be able to dive deeply into every aspect.

Stefan Breitschaft BMW Group

Stefan Breitschaft

Stefan Breitschaft has been involved in haptics since early in his academic studies. He has held an MSc in Psychology at the Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg since 2017. During his studies, he worked on multiple projects about aesthetic, visual, and haptic perception at the Lehrstuhl für Allgemeine Psychologie und Methodenlehre at the Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg. He is pursuing his PhD on the topic „Search Haptics in Seamless Tangible User Interfaces", which he also worked on as a participant in BMW Group's ProMotion program between 2017 and 2021. Since 2021 he has been a Haptics Specialist in the Control Panel Development at BMW Group. Since 2018, he has also been part of the Research Group EPÆG – a research group focusing on topics in perception, aesthetics, cognitive ergonomics, and UX.

Through his academic and applied work, he gained experience in working with various haptic technologies and how to effectively design haptic experiences around the cognitive and psychological foundations of haptic perception. He advocates an interdisciplinary and experience-focused approach in applied haptic design, research, and development settings.

"FROM SENSATION TO EXPERIENCE: A PSYCHOLOGICAL TURN IN HAPTIC DESIGN"

The increasing implementation of haptic technology in mainstream consumer devices has led to an influx of practitioners with different academic backgrounds (engineering, design, interaction, psychology…) and varying levels of expertise to the field of haptics.

Despite the inherent multidisciplinary character of the haptic community, haptic discussions in applied settings are often driven by parameters and technology rather than experience, user requirements, and context.

This talk advocates a more profound cognitive psychological turn in haptic design. Based on experiences I collected throughout my doctoral journey, I will introduce a cognitive-driven mindset and depict how a psychologically-grounded methodology and philosophy might aid the haptics community and foster haptic design.

Morten Rothmann Hamsø Engineering

Morten Rothmann

Morten has a M.Sc. in Business Engineering and a background in disruptive innovations. He is the managing director of Hamsø Engineering that specializes in haptics for HMI-solutions. Together with his team, he focuses on the full application and how to make the design process faster, cheaper, and easier to allow for unique and highly intuitive solutions and satisfactory user experiences. Morten has a broad network within Danish universities and has a technical interest in how things work and come together. He always has the goal in mind and fights to achieve the best solution for the task at hand.

"SELECTION CRITERIA OF CHIPS FOR DRIVING OF HAPTICS"

Haptic feedback introduces various technologies for haptic integration and with each technology comes different hardware driving circuits. Application requirements have high impact on the hardware selected and plays a large role in achieving the best performance out of your haptic component. This presentation will address some of the options that are available to the hardware designer and why certain methods might be preferred to others. The presentation will cover topics such as footprint, signal driving, technology advantages / disadvantages and component selection.

Daniel Shor Innovobot

Daniel Shor

Daniel "Dan" Shor is a Berlin-based designer, researcher, and mechanical engineer exploring the link between emotionality and touch experiences. As Research Director, Europe at Innovobot, he blends human contact and experiential context to build the future of haptic technology, focusing on developing devices that stimulate human connection and behaviors through vibrotactile feedback. At Innovobot, Dan Shor collaborates with companies from startups to large enterprise, as well as designers, artists, and creatives to create novel tactile experiences. He is responsible for developing relationships with academic institutions active in the areas of human-machine interface and haptics. He holds a MSc from Delft University of Technology (NL) in Product Design Engineering (2018), and a BSc in Mechanical Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (USA) (2013). He lectures at TU Delft in the Faculty of Industrial Design and the HCI department at FH Salzburg.

LECTURE:
"HAPTICS LANGUAGE AND DESIGN RULES"

An incoming email used to be a brash shout – "You've Got Mail". These days, it's a soft chime, or more likely a simple buzz on our phone. Great deals of effort go into the vibrations of notifications. Designers must find ways to communicate content, context, urgency, and much more into a simple set of pulses and vibes. How are intuitive, interpretable messages created that can be understood through the low bandwidth of our skin?

WORKSHOP:
"HAPTICS LANGUAGE AND DESIGN RULES"

In this hands-on workshop, learn how to use design thinking techniques and user research to improve the effectiveness and intake rate of vibrotactile notifications. Explore how designers create empathy with their users through ideation and research. Work with the provided cutting edge actuators, user research tools, and prototyping equipment on unique, industry-relevant challenges ranging from smart surfaces to wearables. Collaboratively develop new best-practices for your next haptic messaging challenge. With technical support from Innovobot and GREWUS.

Anouschka Esselun GREWUS GmbH

Anouschka Esselun

Anouschka Esselun has been a project manager at GREWUS GmbH since 2018. She holds a Master of Science from Technical University Braunschweig and has a background in acoustics and digital signal processing.

As an engineer for acoustics and haptics, Anouschka supports customers in integrating active haptic feedback, especially in the field of electronic driving, measurements of actuators, and entire applications. Also, she develops individual haptic patterns depending on the specification, actuator, and use case.

LECTURE:
"MEASURING OF ACTIVE HAPTIC FEEDBACK"

The measurement of active haptic feedback inside an application differs from the quantification of single actuators. The whole haptic experience must be considered, including sensing, human perception, timing and the haptic effect itself.

But which parameters are essential and how to analyze them? What about acoustics and different frequencies? The presentation will look into the physical parameters, which hardware can be used, and how these can support the development process of an application. The goal is to enable the optimization of haptic systems, ensuring a more immersive and realistic user experience.

At the subsequent workshop, the presented approaches and hardware can be tried out directly by the participants.

WORKSHOP:
"LET’S BECOME ACTIVE NOW - FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE"

Philipp Sachs Haptics Alliance (XeelTech)

Philipp Sachs

Philipp Sachs, the Chief Operating Officer of XeelTech, is at the forefront of integrating MR-Technology-based haptic feedback actuators across global industries. With a dedicated focus on addressing customer needs, Philipp and his team strive to redefine human-machine interfaces by enabling intuitive, simplified, and safer interactions through true force feedback in rotary actuators.

Philipp Sachs, alongside GREWUS Managing Director Elisa Santella, is the co-founder of the Haptics Alliance, a pioneering platform committed to fostering collaboration among technology providers. This influential initiative serves as a catalyst for joint efforts in advancing haptic technology across industries.

"COLLABORATIVE INNOVATIONS FOR IMMERSIVE HMI SOLUTIONS"

At the Interactive Haptics Conference, Philipp Sachs will present an enlightening talk titled "COLLABORATIVE INNOVATIONS FOR IMMERSIVE HMI SOLUTIONS." During this session, he will delve into the core elements that transform an HMI into an immersive experience. Drawing from the experiences of the Haptics Alliance, Philipp will emphasize the pivotal role of collaborative partnerships between technology providers in creating tailored systems that meet the specific demands of customers. Furthermore, he will address the current market challenges faced in realizing truly immersive HMIs, inviting engaging discussions and offering valuable insights into the future of haptic technology.

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