Profile

Prof. Dr. Sonja Zillner

  • Visiting Researcher
  • Siemens AG, Data and AI Department, Germany

Prof. Zillner is the Principal for Industrial Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence at Siemens Foundational Technology. Since 2020, she has been the Head of the Core Company Technology Module “Trustworthy AI” at Siemens AG, and since 2023, she has been leading the design, development, and implementation of the Generative AI Risk Management Process for Siemens industrial products. Since 2021, Prof. Zillner has been an honorary professor at the Technical University of Munich (TUM), Germany, and is the author of more than 90 publications and more than 25 patents in the areas of semantics, artificial intelligence, and data-driven innovation. She currently holds the following positions:

  • Head of Trustworthy AI, Siemens AG, Foundational Technologies
  • Head of Generative AI Risk Management for Siemens Products, Siemens AG, Foundational Technologies
  • Principal Industrial Trustworthy AI, Siemens AG, Foundational Technologies
  • Member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Technical TIB Leibniz Information Center for Science & Technology
  • Co-Lead of AI Taskforce in the Charter of Trust Alliance

Prof Zillner visited the CIRES Centre in March 2026 and during her visit presented a training course to introduce the Data-driven Innovation (DDI) Framework and show along concrete examples how it can be used to identify and explore data-driven innovation opportunities. Being based on a conceptual model in form of an ontology with a set of categories and concepts describing all relevant aspects of data-driven business opportunities, the DDI Framework provides a tool to reflect the dynamics of supply and demand and the co-evolution and interactions between the scope of the offering (supply) and the context of the market (demand) in systematic manner. Course participants gained practical experience of how to apply the DDI Framework and Canvas for an in-depth check of all relevant factors of data-driven business opportunities. Link: https://ddi-canvas.com/


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