We are pleased to announce that Prof. Dr. Kari Smolander has joined Software as an Editorial Board Member.

Kari Smolander is a Professor of Software Engineering at the School of Engineering Science, LUT University, Finland, and an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Computer Science, Aalto University, Finland. He is the Head of the Software Engineering Department at LUT University, which is a major research and education unit of Software Engineering in Finland, with 60 researchers in the area. He has a Ph.D. (2003) in Computer Science from LUT University and a Licentiate (1993) from the University of Jyväskylä, Finland. He has also worked in the Finnish software industry and has built software products for the global market.

Kari Smolander has published more than 200 refereed research papers in international journals and conferences, with more than 5200 citations in Google Scholar. He has served as a program chair in various workshops and conferences, such as EuroSPI, ICSOB and IWSIB, and a committee member in tens of different conferences. He has supervised 17 doctors in Software Engineering and related areas. In addition, he has received five best paper awards from conferences and journals.

Kari Smolander’s current research interests include change in software and systems development practices and organizations. He is especially interested in how people work together to understand and build extremely complex artifacts, such as software and information systems. His recent research projects have concentrated on software-based platforms, ecosystems and integrations between systems and platforms. He has specialized in qualitative research in Software Engineering.