Forum Day - 24 November 2026

As Head of Community Management at Switch, Claudia Lienert has been responsible for developing business relationships with the Swiss education, research and innovation community since March 2023. Prior to that, she held various management positions in the IT and transport industry and completed an Executive Master of Business Administration at the University of Strathclyde.

Kaspar Scheller is the Product Owner of the Switch Procure Service for the Swiss Higher Education, Research, and Innovation Community. With his legal background and more than 20 years of experience in the ICT domain, he supports Community members in license management and public procurement matters.

Stefan Arnet is a Procurement Specialist at Switch. As a part of Switch Procure he supports the Swiss Higher Education, Research and Innovation community with his expertise on license agreements and public procurement. He has several years of experience as a buyer in the ICT domain and as a software asset manager within Higher Education. He has more than 15 years of experience as buyer in the ICT domain and as a Software Asset Manager within Higher Education.

Kevin Chavarría is an experienced Senior Product Manager with a background in engineering and business, bringing over 13 years of expertise across the ICT, healthcare, finance, and semiconductor sectors. Having worked in diverse markets including Costa Rica, Spain, the USA, and Switzerland, Kevin has developed a strong, customer-centric approach to innovation. Since 2023, he has applied his extensive experience to Switch, focusing on developing cloud solutions that align with the specialised needs of Swiss institutions.

Since the beginning of the year, Christian Rohrer has officially put on the PO hat for eduroam, for which he has been technically in charge since his return to Switch in 2020. In this position, he recently introduced two new products in the 'ROAM' family: eVA (eduroam Visitor Access) and govroam. With a background in neurobiology and interaction design, Christian enjoys working on interfaces, be it with counterparts made of flesh or silicon.

Daniel is Business Owner of the Research and Education Network at Switch, where he has been leading the Switch LAN network services since 2013. He holds a degree in computer science from the University of Applied Sciences HSR (today OST) and a Diploma of Advanced Studies HSG in IT Business Management. His work focuses on delivering high-performance connectivity solutions to Switzerland’s research and education community

Since 2023, Dominik Valloni has been a member of the Switch Legal Team, bringing with him more than nine years of experience as a lawyer and legal counsel. He advises Switch on all relevant legal matters relating to contract, data protection, trademark, domain name, and intellectual property law, as well as compliance. With his expertise, he helps ensure that Switch can provide its services to universities in a legally sound and efficient manner. Outside the legal field, he is the father of two children, where he finds both the most exciting challenges and the best balance alongside his professional life.

Sebastian joined Switch in 2015 with a background in Internet Economics and IT Project Management. Over the years he guided Innovation Management activities and new business developments. More recently, Sebastian is responsible with Switch's Data Team as Product Manager, Product Owner a.i. and Agile Coach. This team engages strategically in various national and international projects concerning FAIR Research Data activities above the Cloud.

Rolf studied computer science and psychology at the University of Fribourg and then worked for the national Swiss Virtual Campus project. He joined Switch in 2007 and was initially responsible for setting up the e-learning section. Since 2013, he has been working on the then called Swiss edu-ID. He was involved in the design of the service and then with its development and introduction at universities. He has been the product owner for Switch edu-ID since 2018.

Geert joined Switch in 2018 with a background in international product management. Over the years, he has guided several new product developments, introduced and trained several processes, created numerous new Switch tools for product managers, and is now responsible for Switch’ Product Portfolio Board. As the product manager of Switch OER, he drives the business and marketing aspects of this service.

Jean-François Van de Poël is Deputy Director for digital affairs of the Centre de Soutien à l'Enseignement at the University of Lausanne. He has been active in the field of educational technologies in higher education for 20 years. During this period, he has held various positions, including educational designer, virtual campus manager and MOOC project manager in several institutions. He holds masters degrees in educational sciences, educational technologies and higher education pedagogy, and is particularly interested in the fields of teacher professional development, educational multimedia and the hybridization of educational practices.

After graduating in Classical Philology, in 2002 he obtained his Ph.D. in Language sciences at the Catholic University in Milan, with a thesis on the linguistic and semiotic features of virtual communities.

Since 2004 he has been head of USI eLab - eLearning Lab; he is lecturer at USI at the Faculty of Communication, Culture and Society. His research interests include ICT mediated communication and eLearning, virtual communities and online social networks. He has been a certified facilitator for the LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® methodology since 2013. In 2021 he was awarded, on behalf of the entire eLab, USI's Credit Suisse Award for Best Teaching.

Prof. Dr. Thomas Steiner is the head of Cyberlearn, the HES-SO e-learning center. The former CEO of the FRIBOURG REGION and director of the Swiss School of Tourism is specialised in AI, tourism, digitalisation and transition management. As a consultant with immotour ltd, Thomas is leading restructuring, transformation and interim processes for several destinations, official bodies and family businesses. He is the president of Vercorin Tourisme SA and member of several boards among which Switzerland Tourism and Emch+Berger Bern.