Rory O'Connor Award for Excellence in Research

Dr. Richard Messnarz, General Chair of the EuroSPI recently announced the Rory O'Connor Award for Excellence in Research, which will be presented annually at the International EuroSPI conference. The first recipient of the award is Dr. Béatrix Barafort of Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (List). This award is supported by the organisers of the EuroSPI conference series, ISCN, who are sponsoring a €500 prize, by the American Society for Quality (ASQ) who will invite the award winner to present at their annual conference, and by Lero, the Irish Software Research Centre.

Rory led the School of Computing DCU for almost 6 years (2014-2019), during which time there was very significant expansion in research activities, growth in academic and research staff, and important programme innovations. He was a mentor to PhD students, early career researchers and academics. His own research focused on processes by which software intensive systems are designed, implemented and managed. His collaborators span the globe and publication metrics include top 10 world ranking positions related to software subject areas. Rory sadly passed away during the summer 2019.