“I have long been fascinated by design, both in aesthetics and process, and software systems with all their complexities and inherent qualities.”

Mathias Funk is Full Professor, leading the Computational Design Systems (CDS) research cluster in the department of Industrial Design. He leads the Things Ecology lab. In addition, he is the co-founder of UXsuite GmbH, a high-tech spin-off of Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e). He is interested in design theory and processes for systems, designing systems for musical expression, and designing with data. He has a background in computer science and electrical engineering. He is a versatile software engineer and designs tools for designers such as domain-specific languages and distributed systems frameworks.

Mathias Funk’s main research interest is how designers can design with and for data and systems behavior. He works primarily on design tools and the layers between engineering and modern industrial design. In addition, he researches Human-AI interaction, musical expression, feedback and collaboration tools, and human values and sustainability issues in design.

Mathias Funk co-edited a special issue on ‘Designing for Systems of Smart Things’ for the International Journal of Design. Since 2012, he has been heading the development of the systems-communication framework OOCSI, used by hundreds of students internationally to design connected products and systems.

Mathias Funk has a background in Computer Science from RWTH Aachen, Germany, and got his PhD in Electrical Engineering at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) in 2011. His dissertation was on model-driven design of self-observing products. During his PhD, he was visiting researcher at Philips Consumer Electronics. He did a postdoc in the Department of Electrical Engineering at TU/e and another in TU/e’s Department of Industrial Design. He was appointed Assistant Professor in 2013, Associate Professor in 2019 and Full Professor in 2026. He has been Guest Lecturer at Umeå Institute of Design (Sweden), Jiangnan University (China), and TaiwanTech, National Taiwan University, and Shih-Chien University (Taiwan). Funk has published over 130 peer-reviewed papers in journals, conferences and workshops.

Squad: Artifice

Research focus, project topics I like to coach
I like to coach projects designing with data and AI. If students want to work on the Data Foundry or OOCSI, short for “Object-Oriented Communication for Semantic Interactivity”, or other design tools and infrastructure, that is also very welcome.

Vision on education, coaching style
“I expect that master students act like master students, so they are self- directed, academically responsible.  They ask the questions, they drive their projects and development. I like to work with curious, creative people.”

Examples of exemplary graduation projects by students I coached
Lei Nelissen: Aeon - Get a grip on your personal information
Sanne van der Linden: Visualizing Medical Narratives from Electronic Health Records to Improve the Medical Decision Making by Reducing the Overload of Data
Haoyu Dong: Exploratory Design for Haptic Symbols: On-body Vibrotactile Pattern to Convey Specific Information