Brief Bio

Dr. Kecheng Liu, Fellow of British Computer Society, is a full professor and holds a chair of Informatics and E-Business at University of Reading, UK. He is the Director of Informatics Research Centre, and Head of School of Business Informatics, Systems and Accounting, Henley Business School. He has published over 180 papers in conferences and journals. His research interests span from organisational semiotics, requirements studies, enterprise information systems management and engineering, business processing modelling, alignment of business and IT strategies, co-design of business and IT systems, pervasive informatics and intelligent spaces for working and living. He serves in several journal editorial boards, and guest edited special issues. His research monograph on Semiotics in Information Systems Engineering (2000 Cambridge University Press), is one of the first treating the topic in a systematic manner and has been widely cited.

He was visiting Professor at Southeast University, Fudan University, Beijing Jiaotong University, Dalian University of Technology, Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, Beijing Institute of Technology and the Graduate School of Chinese Academy of Science (all in China), Santiago University of Chile, and officially appointed PhD supervisor in Beijing Institute of Technology. He is member of Senior Board of IBG (British Intelligent Buildings Group) and senior advisor on digital hospitals in a governmental healthcare organisation in China.

Abstract

We now live in the information era. Information is the key resource and information technology is the key enabler in such an era. The keynote examines the features and challenges in this era. The lecture presents an insight of the strategic function of information in relation to our working and living from a semiotic perspective. Examples of the impact of information in typical sectors have been used as evidence to demonstrate how information delivered through IT makes our society intelligent and improves the quality of life in all aspects. Finally it introduces a philosophic approach for understanding the emergent issues and dealing with the challenges in the information era.