ComTec was strongly represented at the 24th IEEE International Conference on Pervasive Computing and Communications (PerCom 2026) in Pisa: Prof. Klaus David, Dr. Judith Heinisch and M.Sc. Lennart Busch presented current work from the field of ubiquitous and intelligent systems there.

A special highlight was the first edition of the EmotionSense workshop, which was led by Prof. Klaus David and Dr. Judith Heinisch. With more than 30 committed participants, the workshop was a very successful start and provided an excellent platform for exchanging views on current research issues relating to emotion recognition, sensor-based analyses and context-aware systems. The keynote speech by Prof. Albrecht Schmidt from LMU Munich, a formative personality in the field of emotion recognition, provided particular impetus. In his presentation "Bio-Adaptive Learning Paradigms - Physiology-Driven Personal Cognitive Systems", he provided exciting insights into his research and opened up inspiring perspectives on human-centered AI and sensing. The numerous high-quality papers and lively discussions also contributed significantly to the success of the workshop.

ComTec was also prominently represented at the main conference: Lennart Busch presented his paper "SignAlign: A Smartphone-Based Visual Positioning System for Enhanced Bicycle Safety" there. The fact that the paper was presented in the main program of PerCom underlines the high relevance of the topic and the visibility of the work within the international research community. The paper presents a novel smartphone-based approach to the visual positioning of cyclists, which should help to improve their safety in road traffic. The work thus addresses a highly topical issue and shows how intelligent mobile systems can make a concrete contribution to greater safety in everyday life.

Professor Klaus David was also involved in an organizational role at the main conference and chaired the first session of the conference programme on the topic of Human Activity Recognition. Alexander Bolz also contributed to the success of PerCom 2026 in a central organizational role. As Finance and Registration Chair, he was closely involved in the preparation and organization of the conference, even though he was not present in Pisa.

With contributions at workshop and conference level as well as active involvement in the main program, PerCom 2026 was an all-round successful event for ComTec and sent a strong signal to the international research community.