Navid Shariat Zadeh has a doctoral degree in production engineering. He has finalized his Ph.D. at the department of Production Engineering, KTH (Royal Institute of Technology), Stockholm, in the field of computer systems for design and manufacturing. His main research interests are product life cycle management (PLM), information modeling and management, data analysis and IT-tool integration within the digital factory concept with the focus on model based factory layout design and discrete event simulation. In particular, he has worked with ISO 10303 that is a standard for the computer-interpretable representation and exchange of product manufacturing information(STEP), semantic web technologies and open services for life cycle collaboration (OSLC) for IT tool interoperability. His research has been conducted in collaboration with industrial partners such as Scania and Volvo Car. One of his most distinguishing characteristics is the diversity of experiences he possesses. His engineering degrees have given a strong foundation to his analytical skills as well as production engineering knowledge. Then, his previous job as a quality system consultant caused him to learn other industrial processes and requirements such as inventory management, after sale processes, maintenance, statistical data analysis, etc. Moreover, during his PhD he dealt with IT related topics in digital factory domain. His teaching activities, team working on industrial projects and working in a multicultural environment (KTH) increased remarkably his communication skills.