Dr. Rishi Relan Profile Photo

Dr.ir. Rishi Relan

 

Strategic Leadership Digital Twin Expert R&D Leadership AI & ML Driven Engineering
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Leadership Profile

Results-driven and visionary Head of Engineering and R&D with a proven track record of scaling high-growth departments and steering highly specialized, elite engineering teams. I leverage deep technical expertise, strategic leadership, and stakeholder management to pioneer next-generation solutions in complex energy environments.

Currently leading a highly specialized team of Core R&D Specialists as the Head of Grid Flow Platform Engineering and R&D at Siemens Energy India Limited (SEIL), while concurrently steering the Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) department through a strategic transition. In this dual-leadership capacity, my mandate builds upon my success in scaling the BESS engineering team to 40+ members, establishing the Battery Advanced AI Technology Lab (BATL), and fostering a robust culture of cross-functional innovation.

Leadership DNA

Initiative
Curiosity
Team Player
Organize & Manage

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Engineers Led

Platform R&D (GFP) 9 Core R&D Specialists
Dept. Mgmt (BESS) Scaled to 40+

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Publications

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Countries Worked

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Years Experience

Global Footprint

IN DE UK BE DK

Industry Verticals

Applied Expertise Across Sectors

Energy

Mechatronics

Industry 4.0

Aerospace

Automotive

Robotics

Professional Journey

Detailed Roles, Projects & Industrial Collaborations

Technology Leadership Roles

Siemens Energy India Limited (SEIL) (Mar 2025 - Present)

Siemens India Limited (SIL) (Aug 2019 - Mar 2025)

Aug 2019 - Present

Leadership & Roles

  • Head of Eng. & R&D (Grid Flow Platform, Jan 2026 - Present): Leading an elite core of R&D specialists. Responsible for high-performance platform R&D and operational engineering feature development.
  • Head of Eng. & R&D (BESS, April '23 - Present): Managing a strategic dual-portfolio transition. Built and scaled the BESS department to 40+ engineers, overseeing budget, headcount, and technology roadmaps.
  • Global Technical Advisor (CbSI) & Digital Twin Tech Advisor (LGT R&D) (Jul '22 - Sep '23): Advised globally on Condition Based Service Intervention (one of 5 major SE FoAs) and Real-Time Soft-Sensing Solutions for Gas Turbine Thermal Modelling.
  • Product Owner (Global): BESS Digital Solutions, EMS, Digital Twins (Oct '22 - Sep '25).
  • Technical Consultant & Former Tech Lead (Oct '22 - Dec '24): Generator Reliability Twin, Large Generator Engg. R&D. Directed development as Tech Lead (achieving 20X faster surrogate modelling), followed by an advisory role as Tech Consultant.
  • Technical Project Lead: BEPO - BESS Prognose und Optimierungs Regler (March 2025 - September 2025): Siemens Energy (SE) Innofond Project.
    • Developing an in-house solution for automated energy trading ("arbitrage") using battery energy storage systems (BESS).
    • Functions as a tertiary controller above the plant control system (T3000) and generates market-optimized setpoints for charging and discharging cycles.
    • Goal: Integration into the existing SE portfolio to enable direct control of trading strategies—without external providers.
    • Implementation: In cooperation with RWTH Aachen University, an algorithm is being developed for the Energy Management System (EMS) that fully transfers software, hardware, and intellectual property (IP) to SE.

Key Initiatives

  • Founder: Battery Advanced AI Technology Lab (BATL).
  • IGSTC: Single-handedly established a first-ever Indo-German collaboration network (Fraunhofer, IIT Bombay).

Technical Projects

  • Only non-German contributor to this public-funded project.

Scientific Researcher

DTU Compute, Denmark

Sep 2017 - Aug 2019

Led development of cyber-physical models for Industry 4.0, renewable energy, and smart cities. Expertise in System ID, SDEs, Optimization.

Key Projects
  • MADE SPIR WP9
  • Centre for IT-Intelligent Energy Systems (CITIES)
  • FLEX-Coop H2020
Industrial Partners

Scientific Researcher (PhD)

Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), Belgium

Oct 2013 - Oct 2017

Developed theoretical frameworks for black-box modeling and stochastic identification of Li-ion battery dynamics. Nonlinearity detection & characterization.

Projects
  • ERC Grant SNLSID
  • BATTLE (Battery Modelling)
Industrial Partners
Rolls-Royce UTC (UK )
Feb 2012 - Sep 2013

Industrial Researcher

Gas turbine health monitoring using statistical signal processing & ML. Fault diagnosis, prognosis, FMECA, IPR patent analysis.

IIT Delhi (India )
Sep 2008 - Sep 2010

Senior Research Fellow

Active vibration control for rotor shaft systems. Experiment design, simulation, control framework.

dSPACE GmbH (Germany )
Oct 2006 - Sep 2008

Application Engineer / Resident Engineer

Resident Engineer at GM Europe. Integrated ESP, ABS, AWD on HIL simulators. Automated failsafe testing. Delivered simulator for Conti-Teves AG.

Tox-Pressotechnik (Germany )
Feb 2005 - Jun 2006

Industrial Researcher

Control system for industrial clinching process. Nonlinear math modeling, PLC/Microcontroller algo design, HIL sims, Patent review.

AutoKame / a2Z Filtration (India )
2003 - 2004

Product Development Engineer

PLC motion control, pneumatic circuits for CNC textile and filter machines.

New Era Controls / Haryana Sheet Glass (India )
2002 - 2003

Industrial Trainee

Process instrumentation, closed-loop controllers, electrical drives.

Academic Excellence

2013-2017

Doctor of Engineering Sciences

Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium

Summa Cum Laude

Domain: Nonlinear System ID & ML.

Thesis: Data-driven discrete-time modelling of the continuous-time nonlinear systems and nonlinear modelling of Li-ion batteries.

Partners: Siemens Digital Industries, Toyota ME, Volvo AB

2012-2014

M.Phil. in Control Systems

The University of Sheffield, UK

Write-up Year: 2014-2015, Degree awarded (2015)

Research Fields: Health monitoring of complex systems: Fault diagnosis, prognosis of the civil aerospace gas turbine engine and real-time industrial wireless control.

Partners: Rolls-Royce plc, Aero-engine controls.

2010-2011

Adv. MSc. in Artificial Intelligence

KU Leuven, Belgium

Cum Laude

Research Domain: Sequential Monte-Carlo methods and its application to a humanoid (PR2) robot.

Skills: Control Theory, State Estimation, +3 skills

2004-2006

MSc. in Mechatronics

Hochschule Ravensburg-Weingarten, Germany

Sehr Gut (A+)

Research: Mathematical modelling, control and hardware-in-loop simulations of the pneumo-hydraulic servo systems.

Partner: Tox-Pressotechnik GmbH & Co. KG

1998-2002

B.Tech in Instrumentation & Control Engr.

Kurukshetra University, India

First Class with Honours

Scientific Leadership

Key Roles

  • Keynote Speaker: ICAMDM-2025 (India )
  • Founding Member: ASME India's Cyber-Physical System (CPS) & AI/ML Sub-Group (Collaborating with GE, Airbus, Baker Hughes, TCS Research, IITs).
  • APAC Lead: Associated Events Subcommittee, IGTI/ASME (Jul 2024).
  • Expert Industry Reviewer: For two ASME India courses: “Foundation of Robotics & Applications” and “Intermediary Robotic Systems and Industrial Applications.”
  • R&D Workstream Lead: RE-INVEST 2024 (with GIZ/German Embassy) (Sep 2024).
  • Panel Member: "Optimisation at Crossroads of ML & Gen AI", MDAO 2024, IISc Bangalore .
  • Jury Member: Smart India Hackathon 2020 .
  • Remote Reviewer: ERC Starting Grant 2020 .
  • Commissioning Editor: Dove Medical Press, UK (2012-14).
  • Session Co-chair: Indian Control Conference (ICC) 2019 .

Visiting Research Positions

  • ETH Zürich: Visiting Researcher (Aug 2016 - Sep 2016).

    Hosted by Prof. Roy S. Smith at the Automatic Control Laboratory (IfA). Fully sponsored by a research and travel grant from the FWO (Research Foundation - Flanders).

  • Vrije Universiteit Brussel: Visiting Researcher (Apr 2013 - Jun 2013).

University Engagement

Thought Leadership

High-Level Panels & Invited Talks

  • Exclusive Panel Invitee: RE-INVEST (Germany Country Session) Recognized for industry-leading R&D expertise by being selected for the session: "India-Germany Energy Partnership: 'Make in India' Solar, Wind, Storage & Skills for a Global Clean Energy Market". Shared the official roster with the Hon'ble Minister of State for Power (Govt. of India), the German Ambassador to India, and the MD & CEO of Siemens Energy India.
  • Invited Guest Speaker: "Idea to Impact 2026" at Siemens Energy India Limited .
  • ASME E-Fest Careers Seminar: "Accelerating Energy Transition... Digital Twin & AI". 1200+ attendees (Sep 2024).
  • IEEE Technical Seminar: "Modelling of Nonlinear Systems" at IIT Delhi (2018).
  • Invited Lecture: "Digital Twin and AI: Industry 4.0" at SRM University (2024).
  • ASME Seminar: Chandigarh University (300+ participants).
  • Presentations: ETH Zürich , Hausdorff Center , IITs (Delhi, Mandi, Ropar) , Rolls-Royce (UK ), Volvo AB , Toyota ME , Umicore .

Knowledge Dissemination

Active contributor to European Research Network in System Identification (ERNSI ).

Peer Reviewer For:

Automatica, IEEE Trans. on Control Systems Tech, SIAM Journal of Control, IFAC, ICC, ACC, CDC.

Research Impact & Publications

Publication Metrics

Total Citations 0
Total Publications 65+
h-index 10
i10-index 13
Journals (Elsevier, IEEE) High Impact
Conferences (ASME, IFAC) Regular
Patents / Invention Disclosures / Trade Secrets 3

Highly Cited Status

Recognized by Applied Energy

Latest Release

From Concept to Reality: Navigating the Challenges of Algorithm Deployment In Battery Energy Storage Systems

Athak Goyal, Vishnu Nair, Vikas Yadav... Rishi Relan

Proceedings of the ASME (2025)

Latest Release

Closing the Algorithmic-Industrial Gap: Robust IT-OT Interfaces for Battery Energy Storage Systems

ASME IMECE-2026, India

Best Paper Award

BAT-TEC: Battery Anomaly Tracking via Time Delay Embedding Features Clustering

IEEE SEFET 2025
Spotlight Presentation Honourable Mention

Digital twin framework for enhancing BESS performance, safety and reliability

Vishnu Nair, Vikas... Rishi Relan

CASML 2024, IISc Bangalore

Soft Sensor Application

Enhancing Turbine Inlet Temperature Prediction in Single Shaft Combined Cycle Power Plants Using Soft Sensor: A Grey-Box Modelling Approach

ASME GTINDIA (2023)

Healthcare AI Research

Unsupervised sorting of retinal vessels using locally consistent Gaussian mixtures

D Relan, R Relan

Computer methods and programs in biomedicine (2021)

Global Media Feature 35 Citations

Exploring non-linear associations between atmospheric new-particle formation and ambient variables: a mutual information approach

Martha A. Zaidan, Ville Haapasilta, Rishi Relan, Pauli Paasonen, Veli-Matti Kerminen, Heikki Junninen, Markku Kulmala, Adam S. Foster

Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics (2018) DOI: 10.5194/acp-18-12699-2018

Featured In:

Highly Cited Award 535 Citations

Characterizing the energy flexibility of buildings and districts

RG Junker, AG Azar, RA Lopes, KB Lindberg, G Reynders, R Relan, ...

Applied Energy (2018)

65 Citations

Prognostics of gas turbine engine: An integrated approach

MA Zaidan, R Relan, AR Mills, RF Harrison

Expert Systems with Applications (2015)

52 Citations

Data-driven nonlinear identification of Li-ion battery based on a frequency domain nonparametric analysis

R Relan, Y Firouz, JM Timmermans, J Schoukens

IEEE Transactions on control systems technology (2016)

47 Citations

Advanced lithium ion battery modeling and nonlinear analysis based on robust method in frequency domain: Nonlinear characterization and non-parametric modeling

Energy (2016)

View all 65+ Publications on Google Scholar

Honours, Awards & Grants

APAC Lead - Associated Events Subcommittee

IGTI / ASME (Jul 2024)

Ingenuity Award (2020)

Siemens Generator R&D (India )

Highly cited research paper award 2018

Journal of Applied Energy, Elsevier (Jun 2020)

Postdoctoral Fellowship

DTU, MADE, CITIES (Denmark )

Doctoral Fellowship

VUB, VLAIO-SBO Grant (Belgium )

Travel Awards (Multiple)

OMFOND, VUB, FWO, HIM, HCM, EECI, UKIERI

Dorothy Hodgkin Postgraduate Award (DHPA)

Conferrer: EPSRC & Rolls-Royce plc (UK )

Senior Research Fellowship

DST India & IIT Delhi (2008-10)

Strategic Partners & Collaborators

Industry Leaders

Siemens Energy Rolls-Royce plc Toyota Motors Europe Volvo AB Siemens Gamesa dSPACE GmbH Umicore Aero-engine controls Tox-Pressotechnik

Academic & Research

ETH Zürich DTU Denmark VUB Belgium University of Helsinki The University of Sheffield IIT Bombay IIT Delhi KU Leuven Fraunhofer-FOKUS CIMNE Spain

Global Bodies & Funding

ASME (IGTI) IEEE ERC (European Research Council) IGSTC EPSRC (UK) DST India GIZ Germany

What Colleagues Say

"In the last 5 years of working together with Rishi in different capabilities, I was continuously inspired by his unique blend of technical know-how, strategic brilliance and visionary leadership. His excellent multilingual skills, combined with his rich and diverse cultural experiences in India and abroad, make him a great storyteller with the ability to capture anyone's attention within a short span of time. My interaction with him began with accidental meeting over a topic which is one of his expertise, and later, I also had opportunity to work in his team. He consistently pushed me outside of my comfort zone, placing me in challenging, unfamiliar, and often uncomfortable situations, while always supporting me with unwavering guidance. Whenever/wherever I ever stumbled, he was there with constructive advice, helping me turn those uncomfortable moments into great learnings. He has a strong innovation mindset and always emphasizes on taking complete ownership. Any organization, team, or individual would be incredibly fortunate to have him as leader and mentor. Thank you, Rishi, for all your guidance and for shaping me into the professional that I am today."

Aditya Dubey

Mechanical Engineer - Heat Transfer & FE, Siemens Energy Innovation Center

"All my meetings with Rishi always confirm:
• his great knowledge and expertise in latest information technologies,
• his deep understanding of the existing challenges of implementation of digital solutions in GT engines regarding rapid time-to-market, and
• his interest in customized produces based on machine learning, genetic algorithms, artificial neural network techniques, and other digital approaches.

I like very much his pro-active communication involving all stakeholders and learning different opinions before making the final decision. Rishi shares his know-how with others in comprehensive manners that do not exclude various participants. His multi-cultural behavior creates an open domain for effective team collaboration with internal members and third parties, like employees of ANSYS.

His work in Germany is a great attitude for being a local key expert. He will serve as a good mentor of successors. His interest in stepping out of the box will bring much adding values for our business and customers."

Jaroslaw Szwedowicz, D.Sc., Ph.D., Eng.

Senior Principal Key Expert for Gas Turbine Modules at Siemens, ASME Fellow

"Looking at and reading both [Digital Twin] presentations have been a full enjoyment for me and they have excited me, as I have experienced clarity (in regards of the intention), quality and competence (in regards of the content), easiness (in regards of understanding) and professionality (in regards of creation of the slides). Thank you for this! For sure I was also very happy to see the Ansys logo on the different pictures."

Dr.-Ing. Michael Hortmann

Director, Enterprise Account Management (ANSYS)

"From our collaboration, I have come to know you as a highly engaged colleague who is always ready to share his knowledge in the field of machine learning and contribute his experience. I particularly appreciated that you supported Aditya in his Agile project on non-linear ROM. The collaboration with you, Aditya, and ANSYS has brought us a significant step forward. From my perspective, we are now in a position to generate an important future service product around the core of the non-linear ROM. For the next steps—connecting to plant measurement data and lifetime evaluation—I see your experience in control engineering as very helpful."

Uwe Loehse

Master Engineer (Retd.), Siemens

"I had the privilege of working with Rishi Relan as a fellow researcher. Rishi is very pragmatic, creative with well grounded research knowledge. His domain knowledge spans across unique inter disciplinary areas such as Control systems, System identification, Machine learning and Systems health monitoring.

This ability of his helped me very much through my research work and eventually lead to produce a research paper on wireless-real time control. He is also a very good critic who has the ability to look into both analytic and logical aspects of a problem which I believe is something only very few people are gifted with. We have also had many fruitful discussions throughout our research period and I have always admired his in-depth knowledge in multiple areas."

Vigneshwaran Venugopalan

Software Engineering Manager at Boeing

"I have worked with many professionals throughout my journey, but Rishi is a unique one. His expertise in various domains like System identification & predictive modeling and simulation, AI and Machine learning and Control Engineering was unparalleled in our team. In addition to domain expertise, he also brings a clarity to problem solving and project execution that is a reflection of his expansive academic and industrial experience.

He is honest and transparent in his actions but is also open to criticism and always strives to constantly improve and grow. He is blessed with extraordinary interpersonal and leadership skills. It was a pure delight working with him."

Ishita Bansal

General Manager at BSES

"Fortunately for me Rishi and I worked together for two years. During this time Rishi took it upon himself to teach me how research is and should be done. Furthermore, with his enormous experience-to-age-ratio he always participates actively in discussions, be they personal or professional. The way he does so is always friendly and inviting, which describes him as a person as well. Always arriving at work with a smile on his face, you will be hard pressed to remove it, and if you do, it will be back in a matter of moments.

No matter what position he is hired in, I am confident that he will make himself useful by producing high quality solutions and by making everyone at work have a good time."

Rune Grønborg Junker

Assistant Professor, Technical University of Denmark

"It is a pleasure to work alongside Rishi on the 'Gas Turbine Autonomous Control & Optimization' project. This ambitious project aimed to develop a cutting-edge autonomous control system platform to optimize combustion process for emissions reduction and to maximize thermal performance of power plants over time.

Rishi's expertise in modeling complex stochastic combustion processes and signals and utilizing them for optimization to create robust controllers played a pivotal role in the project's success. The models he designed for various operational scenarios of the power plants demonstrated good accuracy and generalization, owing to their self-adaptive nature in near real-time. His profound understanding of process dynamics, optimization, soft-sensing, time series modeling, uncertainty analysis, signal processing and advanced process controls provided invaluable insights and implementable ideas throughout the project."

Gurdev Singh

Lead- Autonomous Control Systems, Siemens Energy

"Rishi Relan has a strong vision for Digital Twins in complex integrated environments. Paired with experiences from different industries, analytical background and social skills, Rishi is enriching any team, he is working with.

Rishi worked with me in a corporate wide program to create data driven analytics and digital twins with customers to induce cutting these technologies into the enterprise. I was the technical program lead and Rishi acted as consultant with his industrial and analytical background. He was the person to fill the programs initially theoretical system-of-system digital twin approach with real life examples for applying on compressors and energy management of energy systems and turning these use cases to requirements for software development."

Stefan Lichtenberger

Technical Program Lead, Siemens Energy AG, Germany

"Rishi worked for me as a resident engineer during his work at the dSPACE headquarters as well as a resident engineer at Opel in Ruesselsheim (hardware-in-the-loop systems for vehicle dynamics controllers).

Rishi is a very experienced applications engineer in the area of automotive electronics and automatic control. He has very good knowledge in control, C-programming, modeling and real-time simulation. Additionally, he is a specialist in Matlab/Simulink and the dSPACE tool chain and has good exprience in the automotive bus systems (CAN-Bus), measurement technology and equipment.

Rishi is very enthusiastic in his work and has a lot of intercultural experience. He was very well accepted internally in the company as well as by his customers. He speaks German fluently. Rishi left dSPACE to bring his research career in automatic control to the next step."

Peter Waeltermann

CEO at dSPACE Inc

"I have had the privilege of reporting to Rishi, and he truly helped me grow so much as a professional.

What I love about working with Rishi is his incredible attention to detail and the high standards he sets for engineering. He’s a fantastic mentor who genuinely cares about helping his team grow. He’s always challenging us to never settle for subpar work and constantly pushes everyone to do their absolute best.

I owe a lot of my engineering mindset to Rishi. He really took me under his wing and taught me what true precision and commitment to quality look like. Those are the lessons I'll carry with me throughout my whole career.

Beyond the engineering side of things, he is just an incredible guy to talk to. You can chat with him about absolutely anything, he's well read and always so engaging.

Honestly, if you want a leader who can build an amazing team, attract quality work, and push for real engineering excellence, Rishi is as good as it gets."

Hari Ashwin S

Protection Engineer, Siemens Energy India

"Working with you has been a truly inspiring experience. You are such a motivating mentor and an amazing manager that I have always admired your way of managing everything so effectively. You set high standards in everything you do and have taught us to maintain the same excellence in whatever we do and wherever we go. Your energy and enthusiasm naturally motivate everyone around you. At times, you were like a friend who made the team feel comfortable, while also being a great mentor who guided us in the right direction. I personally have taken away many valuable learnings from you, and I am truly grateful for your support and guidance. I feel genuinely grateful to have had you as a manager at the beginning of my career journey, as the learnings and values you shared will stay with me for a long time."

Subhiksha M

Solution Engineer, Siemens Energy India

"Rishi is the most energetic person around always. I admire all your hard work and dedication towards even the small piece of work. I am impressed with your way of managing any adverse conditions and handling people. It's my pleasure that I worked with you. I learnt plenty of things in relation with academics and managing people, which always remains with me. All the best for your future endeavours."

Gayathri Ganesan

Executive, Siemens Energy

Language Proficiency

English
German
Hindi
Punjabi

Technical Toolkit

MATLAB/Simulink Expert
Python / R (AI/ML) Expert
C/C++ Advanced
dSPACE Tools / HIL Advanced
LabView / PLC Intermediate
Robotics Intermediate

OS Preference

Native