FIT, the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Information Technology, pursues a user-centered approach to information and cooperation systems design. Usability and usefulness of IT are optimized in the interplay of work practice, organization, and process design. FIT‘s vision can be defined as human-centered computing in a process context.
FIT has a staff of about 115 researchers from Computer Science, the Social Sciences, Psychology, Business Administration, Economics and Engineering. They are organized in four departments:
Cooperation Systems (Prof. Wolfgang Prinz, PhD)
Information in Context (Prof. Dr. Reinhard Oppermann)
The institute cooperates closely with Prof. Jarke's Information Systems group at RWTH Aachen University.
FIT‘s key competence in human-centered IT design is also offered through two competence centers addressing usability engineering and barrier-free Internet access, respectively. The Micro Models competence center builds microanalytic simulation models and additional analysis tools for the design and impact assessment of federal tax and welfare legislation. They are used in consulting to several federal ministries.
More mature software solutions resulting from our projects, e.g. for Internet communities, visual data mining and surgical navigation, won prestigious awards and are being commercialized by spin-off companies.