Sense '21: Sensing Solutions – future visions from well-being to space

Erja Turunen is the Executive Vice President of one of VTT’s three business units: Digital technologies. As the leader of the unit, Erja’s work involves strategic planning, engaging stakeholders and representing VTT in different organisations. Erja is also a member of VTT’s executive committee. Erja has a long background at VTT in leading research for systemic solutions in transportation, energy, manufacturing and circular economy. Currently she leads Digital Technologies where research is focused for various deep techs and their applications While researching her main subject, material science, she worked in world-leading research groups in Germany and the United States. Erja has been at VTT for more than 20 years and having various management positions more than 15 years. Erja has been member for multiple European initiatives and networks. Currently she is active in BoD’s for Gaia-X Aisbl,  Finnish climate fund Oy, Association of Finnish Defence and Aerospace Industries - AFDA, and VTT SenseWay Oy.

Erno Muuranto is the Managing Director of GE Healthcare Finland and Engineering Director in GE Healthcare’s global Mobile Digital Health business unit.

A 23-year GE veteran, Erno holds a master’s degree in Engineering Physics from the Helsinki University of Technology.

As Managing Director, Erno’s responsibilities include driving the continuous growth and development of GE Healthcare Finland and its 700 employees, as well GE Healthcare’s collaboration with key clinical, university, government, corporate and start-up partners in Finland. Erno is also involved in developing the Health Innovation Village, GE Healthcare’s startup ecosystem located in the company’s Finland headquarters in Helsinki.

In the global GE Healthcare, Erno leads Wearable Monitoring organization in Mobile Digital Health (MDH) unit, developing wearable patient monitoring technology and products. He has been involved with the Mobile Digital Health from the beginning, first as Chief Engineer creating and incubating the technology vision and then building up the Wearable Monitoring engineering organization and partnership network.

Outside of GE Healthcare roles, Erno is Board Member of VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland Ltd and Technology Industries of Finland.

Albert Manninen has 20 years of experience in laser sensing R&D, both domestic and abroad. Before joining Outsight, he was Senior Scientist and Strategic Growth Area Leader at VTT. Currently he leads the Laser and Hyperspectral Group in Outsight, Espoo.

Dr. Tuomas Hieta (M) received his D.Sc. (Tech) degree in the field of applied laser spectroscopy and electrical engineering at the Helsinki University of Technology (Finland) in 2011. He has worked as a researcher and a senior research scientist at MIKES Metrology and at VTT in the field of industrial and environmental laser sensing applications. During his period at MIKES and VTT his has coordinated a large FP7 project (MetAMC) focusing on sub-ppb generation and measurement of reactive airborne contaminants. In addition, he has co-founded a hightech startup Optoseven Oy. Significant part of his work has included direct collaboration with industry and R&D organizations, which has led to a broad network of contacts in both of the aforementioned fields.

Dr Erkka Saukko studied practical and theoretical aerosol science at the Aerosol Physics Laboratory at Tampere University of Technology, Finland. He has been involved in research and development of aerosol science and technology in engine emissions, atmospheric study, and instrument development since 2005. Dr Saukko has been working as a Senior R&D engineer at Pegasor since 2015.

Jaakko Yli-Ojanperä is working as a Technology manager in Air quality at Vaisala and he is responsible of particulate matter measurement technologies and of their development. He has a PhD degree in physics and an M.Sc. degree in Electrical engineering. He has fifteen years of experience in experimental aerosol science and in measurement instrument development jointly from academia and industry. He has also worked as a university lecturer in physics for four years.  He has 20+ peer-reviewed scientific journal articles and has been awarded with a FAAR- Award (FAAR - Finnish Association for Aerosol Research) on his excellent work in experimental aerosol science. He has instructed one PhD thesis work and around ten M.Sc. thesis works and acted as a leader of the Instrumentation sub-group of the Aerosol physics laboratory of Tampere university.

Dr. Johanna Tamminen is a research professor and head of Earth Observation Research Unit at the Finnish Meteorological Institute’s Space and Earth Observation Centre. She is co-PI of OMI satellite instrument on-board Nasa’s EOS-Aura satellite and former member of ESA Mission Advisory Groups for Sentinel 5P/TROPOMI and CO2M. Presently she is a member of ESA’s Advisory Committee for Earth Observation and vice director of Academy of Finland Center of Excellence in Inverse Modeling and Imaging. After working over 25 years with space-based observations, she is still fascinated by numerous aspects of satellite remote sensing – starting from the mathematical interpretation of observations to important societal applications like climate change and sustainability.

Jani Kaartinen has a background in electrical engineering, computer science and control engineering. He did both his Master’s (2001) and Doctoral thesis (2009) in the Helsinki University of Technology (currently known as Aalto University) in Finland. During this time he studied machine vision systems for mineral enrichment processes, camera systems for pulp and paper industry, and performance monitoring and fault diagnostics systems for Cut To Length (CTL) forest machines. In 2013 Jani joined Outotec, where he was leading a concept development group. In his current position, Jani is a Director of Smart Products and Processes at Metso Outotec as part of larger Digital Technologies group.

Metso Outotec provides sustainable technologies, end-to-end solutions and services for aggregates, mining, metals refining and recycling of raw materials.

Saku Kaukonen has a strong background in software/cloud technologies and applying machine vision technologies in the metallurgical industry. Sapotech is one of the pioneering companies of industrial digitalization and has a global reach via strategic partners like Vesuvius PLC (www.vesuvius.com) and Evertz Group (https://www.evertz-group.com/). 

I am the leader of the R&D group at Senop, in which we design new optoelectronic products and technologies. I have been involved in the whole life cycle of optoelectronic products, from the specification requirements, to the development stage and all the way to the manufacturing phase. I have been responsible in numerous projects, which include thermal cameras, hyperspectral cameras, night vision goggles, different sensor technologies, etc. 

I also have several years of experience of semiconductor lasers and related applications, from the designing of the structures to the characterization of the final device. In addition, I have been involved in project management and publishing activities within several international research projects. 

Mark Allen is leading development and integration projects for Emberion’s imager technology. He has technical expertise in sensor development, graphene technologies, electronics, thin-film processing and optoelectronics. Mark has played a key role in the design, implementation and delivery of Emberion’s sensing and imaging solutions since the company was founded in 2016. He holds a Doctor of Science (Tech.) degree from Aalto University, Finland.

Six years experience at Stresstech working with residual stress and grinding burn detection solutions.

Main technology areas of interest are X-ray diffraction and magnetic Barkhausen noise method.

Ph.D from University of Jyväskylä working with superconducting X-ray detectors.

Juha Hassel received his D.Sc. (Tech) degree in engineering physics from the Helsinki University of Technology in 2004. During his career, he has worked in research and engineering topics mainly related to the physics and applications of superconducting sensors and electronics including applications in medicine, security, and quantum technology. He worked at VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland in 1999 – 2019, of which as Principal Scientist since 2015. Currently, he is the Head of Engineering and Development at IQM Quantum Computers.

Tero Vauraste, Lt Cdr (Ret), MSc (Soc.), PhD student in military sciences, is a Senior Advisor and Regional Director Europe at ICEYE OY, a leading Finnish space technology company. He has worked as an entrepreneur and in numerous senior executive positions in the service and logistics sector in Finnish and international companies. In 2013-2014, the Arctic Economic Council was established under his leadership and he is also one of the founders of the Finnish Arctic Society. He also serves as a Global Fellow on the Polar Program at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, D.C., and as a member of the Northern Sea Route Public Council 

Coming from the corporate world of business development and administration. Today, making Space Data work with the help of AI and automated processes to help companies and organisations to utilise satellite-based data in their own processes. 

Jani Puttonen received his M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees from University of Jyväskylä in 2003 and 2006, respectively. Since 2006, he has been working at Magister Solutions as Senior Research Scientist and Principal Scientist with a focus on network level simulations, performance analysis and development of radio resource management algorithms for both mobile and satellite networks. Currently, he is working as a Director of Simulation Services leading and managing the R&D and simulation projects of Magister as well as being commercially responsible for the Magister SimLab simulation service. He has published over 50 articles in international journals and conferences and has been the inventor of several patents in the area of wireless communications. 

Over 25 years of experience in international high-tech industry working in telecom, mobile, medical device, innovation, R&D, standardisation, product management, business development, sales and various leadership positions in Nokia and four different startups. Co-founded Adamant Health Oy in August 2020.

I graduated MsC from Oulu University, Department of Biology, as an animal and neurophysiologist. After short employments in University and Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, I started as a researcher in Polar Electro physiological research in 2000. I founded my first company, Valkee Oy in 2007 and resigned Polar 2008-9 to run my company as a CEO. Since then, I have been in co-founding CEO or CSO roles in several companies in health- and biotech: Selqee-Repmax, EntoProt, HFC Health, MannaInsect and Summa Labs. I was also co-founding Oura Health, but I did not participate in operative role.

As an enthusiastic physiologist, most of my passion is channeled to model human physiology via different sensor data to create more value for the customer.

Jani-Mikael Kuusisto, MSc. Economics & Business Admin Helsinki Business School (now Aalto Uni.), is a seasoned, internationally experienced business development professional at the cross-sections of the physical and digital worlds: with 20 years in the field of printed and flexible electronics. 

Jani-Mikael has worked with numerous companies helping grow business and address business challenges with emerging ICT and materials technologies. He has held business development and managerial positions in Valmet/Metso, Avantone (a JV between Metso, Nokia, Hansaprint), VTT, The Active Paper Co., and is former CEO and current Director of Ynvisible Interactive Inc. (TSXV: YNV) and co-founder in The Warming Surfaces Company. 

Jaakko is and M.Sc. in accounting and finance. CEO of Growth Fund Nordic Option Oy. Jaakko has over 25 years of experience from leadership positions in both Finnish and international businesses. Additionally, he has served as an advisor in the fields of finance, funding, restructuring and business development in numerous small and medium-sized companies.

Markku Hirvonen is a CEO of Hirvonenventures Oy and has worked as entrepreneur and consultant since 2013. He is Executive Chairman of Dispelix Oy and Executive Advisor of Rockley Photonics LTD. Markku has 35+ years’ experience on international high-tech businesses, where he has held several executive positions at VTI Technologies Oy, Nokia Oy, Fujitsu Siemens Computers Oy and at its predecessor ICL Personal Systems Oy. 
Markku graduated in 1986 as B.Sc. of Telecommunications. He studied International Business in the Ashridge Management College.

Roman Bednarik, PhD (https://www.linkedin.com/in/romanbednarik/), is a researcher in interactive technologies and founder of SeeTrue Technologies, a company creating robust specialized eye-tracking solutions. 

Professor Ilkka Korhonen is an Adjunct Professor at Tampere University and a widely recognized international expert and innovator for wearable health sensors and technologies. From 2017 to 2022 he was a CTO at Firstbeat Technologies Ltd. He has more than 30 years of expertise in HealthTech, wearables, algorithms and sensing technology, research and translating research into products, partner relations and business development. His passion is to make the consumer as a central user of health information and to use health tech to transform our behaviors to promote health and happiness. He has several patents and inventions, contributions to several product launches and business and concept designs of commercialized products even during research years. He has over 200 international scientific publications, and he is a founding member of IEEE EMBS TC on Wearable Biomedical Sensors and Systems, member of IEEE EMBS TC for Biomedical and Health Informatics, and Senior Member in IEEE EMBS.

Tapio Fabritius received the M.S. and D.Sc. (Tech.) degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland, in 2003 and 2007, respectively. He was a Visiting Researcher with the Computational Optics Group, University of Tsukuba, Tsukuba, Japan, from 2006 to 2007. In 2009, he was conducting research with the Flexible Display Center, Tempe, AZ, USA. He is currently a Professor and the Head of the Optoelectronics and Measurement Techniques Research Unit, University of Oulu. He has coauthored over 140 journal articles and conference papers. His current research interests include electronics manufacturing and instrumentation.

Jorma Palmén graduated from University of Helsinki, Department of Geology and Mineralogy in 1997 with major in Geology and Mineralogy. He focused on mineralogy, mineral chemistry and economical geology. Palmén completed his Licentiate of Technology degree from Helsinki University of Technology, Materials Science, Laboratory of Engineering Geology and Geophysics in 1999. Mr. Palmén worked during M.Sc. Degree and Lic.Sc. Degree at University of Helsinki and Helsinki University of Technology as an assistant lecturer and a researcher. 
 
He joined Fintact Oy in 2000 as geological expert on spent nuclear fuel disposal. In this position he was working as geologist and senior geologist onwards, 2000 – 2003 in Fintact Ltd. and 2003 onwards in JP-Fintact Ltd, 2006 Pöyry Environment Oy, and 2010 Pöyry Finland Oyj in the Geoscientific Consulting department. At Pöyry he participated in studies of screening rock material resources, the used nuclear fuel waste management, biosphere studies as well as rock construction and tunnel excavation projects. 
 
In the autumn 2010 he started teaching engineering geology and applied mineralogy in Aalto University as a lecturer and 2014 as a project specialist in Ladimo-project funded by TEKES. 
In January 2015 Mr. Palmén as a CTO and his cofounder and CEO Jouni Halme established a company LaDiMo Oy. The Company is a direct continuation for the Aalto University project for further developing the extremely accurate Real-Time 3D point cloud sensor developed in the project.