Francesco Longo is a Full Professor at the Department of Mechanical, Energy and Management Engineering of the University of Calabria. He is Director of the Modeling & Simulation Center – Laboratory of Enterprise Solutions (MSC-LES), Director of the Second-Level Master’s Program in Industry of the Future & Smart Manufacturing and President of the Federation of the European Simulation Societies (EUROSIM). He is also shareholder and Scientific Director at CAL-TEK Srl, a spin-off company of the University of Calabria.

His scientific and professional activity focuses on the application of Modeling & Simulation, Digital Twins, Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality and Artificial Intelligence to industrial, logistics and production systems, with specific reference to Industry 4.0/5.0, Smart Factory and Smart Operator paradigms. His main research areas include the design and management of industrial plants, internal logistics, safety and ergonomics of production systems, supply chain management, sustainability and advanced operator training in complex environments.

Over the years, he has gained extensive experience as Scientific Responsible of national and international research and development projects funded under competitive programmes. These include projects dealing with Digital Twins, Smart Manufacturing, robotics, immersive reality, simulation-based training and ICT solutions for industry, such as KNOW4I, IO-TWINS, FELICE, 5G-ERA, SO4SIMS, SMARTRAIN, ARDITE 4.0 ESG and LEONARDO and many others.

He is the author of more than 340 scientific publications in international journals and conferencesand he is the General Chair of the International Conference on Industry of the Future and Smart Manufacturing (ISM) and International Multidisciplinary Modeling & Simulation Multiconference (I3M). His most recent and relevant contributions include works on the KNOW4I platform, Smart Operators, the integration of Extended Reality, Digital Twins and industrial interoperability, and the use of Virtual Reality for real-time monitoring and control of complex manufacturing systems.

Through his role in CAL-TEK and MSC-LES, he contributes to the transfer of research results into applied industrial solutions, with particular focus on interoperable digital platforms, immersive virtual environments, decision-support systems, advanced training and enabling technologies for the digital transformation of companies.