Marcus Foth is Professor of Urban Informatics in the QUT Design Lab, Creative Industries Faculty at Queensland University of Technology. He is also an Honorary Professor in the School of Communication and Culture at Aarhus University, Denmark.
Professor Foth’s research brings together people, place, and technology. His transdisciplinary work is at the international forefront of human-computer interaction research and development with a focus on smart cities, community engagement, media architecture, internet studies, ubiquitous computing, and sustainability. He founded the Urban Informatics Research Lab at QUT in 2006 and the QUT Design Lab in 2016. Professor Foth has received over $5 million in national competitive grants and industry funding. He received a Queensland Young Tall Poppy Science Award 2013, and was inducted, by the planning, design and development site Planetizen, into the world’s top 25 leading thinkers and innovators in the field of urban planning and technology.
In 2015, in collaboration with the Open Data Institute Queensland, Professor Foth brought the international Open and Agile Smart Cities (OASC) network to Australia, with the goal of implementing open standards and creating an open smart city market based on the needs of cities and communities. In 2017, the Australian Computer Society (ACS) made Professor Foth a fellow for “a sustained and distinguished contribution to the field of computer science. Foth is the international thought leader who coined the term urban informatics – now adopted by universities and industry worldwide. Foth’s work makes clear how academic research can successfully respond to societal challenges.”
In 2017, Professor Foth was also appointed to the Built Environment Task Force of the Smart Cities Council Australia, New Zealand and the Infrastructure Innovation Task Force of the Queensland Government’s Department of Infrastructure, Local Government and Planning.
