Speaker Johanna Pirker

Johanna Pirker has been Professor of N-Dimensional User Experience at the TUM School of Computation, Information and Technology at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and at Graz University of Technology since July 2025. She is Europe's leading expert on gamification. 

She heads the Game Lab Graz research group and conducts research on games with a focus on AI, HCI, data analysis and VR technologies. Her research focuses on the intersection of various disciplines: artificial intelligence, games research, VR and AR, human-computer interaction, data analytics and EduTech. She is also an active and strong voice in the local indie developer community.

Johanna Pirker: ‘How we understand the world through gaming.’

Johanna Pirker has many years of experience in developing games and VR experiences for the entertainment sector, but also specifically for areas outside of entertainment. She is the perfect keynote speaker for Gamification, Digitalisation & Future

Johanna Pirker Lecture topics

- Gamification: Do video games strengthen social awareness?
- Gaming: How we use gaming to make the world understandable
- Social online gaming – the real meeting place for innovation and learning
- Graphics cards, game engines and virtual reality – innovation through new technologies

She specialises in games and environments that motivate users to learn, train and collaborate through motivating tasks. She has many years of experience in game design and development as well as in the design of virtual worlds and has worked in the video game industry at Electronic Arts. 

Her research interests include AI, data analysis, immersive environments (VR), game research, gamification strategies, HCI, e-learning, CSE and IR. She has authored and presented numerous publications in her field and has lectured at universities such as Harvard, Humboldt University in Berlin and the University of Göttingen.  

Johanna Pirker: ‘It's not just a game. It's a game changer.’

Johanna Pirker started her career in the industry as a QA tester at EA and still advises studios in the field of game research. In 2011/12, she began researching VR experiences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Boston. Within the computer games industry, she is best known as the initiator and director of Game Days Graz, Austria's largest conference for game developers, as well as a speaker at international conferences. She is also heavily involved in the indie game development scene and game jams.

Johanna loves to talk about her passion. She is an experienced speaker and has given public appearances, keynotes and panel discussions to a wide audience, including TEDx and GDC. 

Johanna Pirker was included in Forbes' ‘30 Under 30’ list in the field of science and has been awarded the Futurezone Women in Tech Award (2019), the Käthe Leichter Prize (2020) and the Hedy Lamarr Prize (2021).