Róbert Lovas, the Deputy Director of the HUN-REN Institute for Computer Science and Control (HUN-REN SZTAKI) and Associate Professor at Óbuda University, was elected as an Executive Board member of EGI for a two-year term starting January 2024, marking the first time a professional from Hungary has been designated to this position. EGI is a prominent alliance in the field of digital research infrastructures, representing over 300 organisations from 22 countries, and is a globally unique, publicly funded scientific e-infrastructure provider. Founded 20 years ago, the organisation's federated cloud and additional services support the work of nearly 80,000 researchers from more than 150 data centers, making it a key player in the emerging European Open Science Cloud with its computational and storage capacities exceeding 1 million processor cores and 700 petabytes.
The work performed in this prestigious international position promotes more efficient access for HUN-REN and the Hungarian academic sphere to state-of-the-art European digital research infrastructures, thereby contributing to increasing the competitiveness of the domestic RDI ecosystem.
Regarding his appointment to the EGI Executive Board, Róbert Lovas stated: "Over the past two decades, there has been continual development in digital research infrastructures, both within Hungary and globally. During my previous work, the primary objective – often within EU-supported joint projects, in collaboration with EGI and its member institutions – has been to bridge the gaps between the opportunities offered by state-of-the-art research infrastructures and the users’ diverse scientific needs, including enhancing the interoperability between various computing and data platforms or establishing so-called scientific gateways. Last year, we successfully integrated HUN-REN’s research cloud, the HUN-REN Cloud, into the EGI infrastructure network. I am pleased to have been elected as a member of EGI’s Executive Board, which provides me with the opportunity to contribute to the even more prominent role of this prestigious organisation in overcoming the challenges of the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC), building upon long-term experience. Additionally, I aim to support EGI in continuously expanding, developing, and sustaining its success in the long term, including projects to be implemented in collaboration with other strategic initiatives – such as the extensive ESFRI (European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures) programmes – in which Hungary also actively participates.