Schlagwort: ‘KI’
Follow-up Report: Lenovo Customer Advisory Forum 2026
This year brings a change regarding customer meetings with framework agreement partners and manufacturers. The new framework agreement for IT client hardware was accompanied by a change in manufacturer. As a result, RWTH and all participating universities in North Rhine-Westphalia were supplied with devices from Lenovo starting September 2025. Our colleague Peter Watzlawik, who is part of the working group for client tenders in collaboration with Department 7.3 – Central Purchasing, was invited by Lenovo to this year’s Customer Advisory Forum (CAF). The event took place from June 9 to 11 in Noordwijk aan Zee, near The Hague.
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A Look Back at the RWTH Talk Lehre 2026: AI in the Higher Education Context
The RWTH Talk Lehre 2026 took place on June 10, 2026. Approximately 350 participants from the fields of teaching, research, and university administration attended the presentations, workshops, and discussions both in person and online. The event focused on how artificial intelligence is changing and has already changed higher education, as well as the opportunities and challenges that arise from this.
In this article, we provide insights into the individual presentations, discussions, and practical examples. You can find an overview of the program and the individual sessions in our introductory article on Talk Lehre 2026.
RWTH Talk Lehre 2026: Shaping AI in Higher Education Together
On June 10, 2026, RWTH Aachen University invites you to the RWTH Talk Lehre 2026. The event will focus on how artificial intelligence is transforming higher education and what opportunities and challenges this presents for faculty and students. The event is aimed at anyone who is actively involved in shaping teaching at RWTH or is interested in doing so.
The Talk Lehre offers an open forum for exchange, new perspectives, and joint discussions on the further development of teaching and learning formats in the context of AI.
The IT Center at the SIGUCCS Annual Conference 2026

Source: SIGUCCS Website
From April 12 to 15, 2026, the annual conference of the ACM Special Interest Group on University and College Computing Services (SIGUCCS) took place in Philadelphia. For many years, the event has brought together IT experts from universities worldwide to exchange ideas on developments in IT services, support structures, and the use of new technologies. In addition to traditional presentations, the program also includes workshops, panels, and interactive formats designed to foster professional exchange. The IT Center was also represented this year with two presentations.
KI:Inferenz.nrw Launches Offering for Universities in North Rhine-Westphalia

Source: Own illustration
The demand for powerful AI models at universities continues to grow rapidly. Applications such as chatbots and AI-supported services in the KI:connect environment are leading to more and more institutions using generative AI in research, teaching, and administration. At the same time, demand for locally operated open-source models is increasing.
RWTH Aachen University is currently testing several open-source models via KI:connect through the WestAI service center. The KI:Inferenz.nrw initiative was launched in January 2026 to provide universities in North Rhine-Westphalia with comprehensive access to open-source AI models in the future. It aims to provide universities in North Rhine-Westphalia with an infrastructure for the use of language models that is independent of the universities themselves.
AI Hallucination – What Is It?

Source: Freepik
The internet seems to have an answer for everything. And even the generative AI models of our time seem to know almost everything. But can that really be true?
Not quite. As powerful and helpful as generative AI is, it is not without its weaknesses. One of these is what are known as AI hallucinations. These are convincing-sounding but factually incorrect or fictitious pieces of content. In this article, we take a closer look at this central problem in the development and application of AI models.
Artificial Intelligence Meets Virtual Reality

Source: Kühlem et al., 2025
Whether in digital learning spaces or virtual museum tours, virtual reality (VR) makes an important contribution to immersive learning. In this context, users can interact with virtual teachers. At RWTH Aachen University, research is being conducted into how these conversations can be made as realistic and natural as possible.
KI:connect.nrw – In Use Throughout the State
A lot has happened since our last post on the KI:connect.nrw project. More and more universities in North Rhine-Westphalia are joining the project, which enables state-wide, data protection-compliant, and legally secure access to generative AI via the central web application KI:connect.
Why Acceptance Research is so Important in IT

Source: Freepik
IT systems have become an integral part of our everyday lives. They simplify work processes, enable communication, and drive digital innovation. And yet, many IT projects fail not because of technical hurdles, but because they are not accepted by users. This is precisely where acceptance research comes in.
KI:connect.nrw: 2025 in Review

Source: Own Illustration
We have reported on KI:connect.nrw several times on this blog, most recently in October when it reached a milestone of over 350,000 potential users at universities in North Rhine-Westphalia. Now we look back on the year 2025, in which KI:connect.nrw has developed from a pilot project into a statewide AI infrastructure that covers almost the entire university landscape in North Rhine-Westphalia.




