The Academy was invited to attended the Euro CASE conference 2025 in Vienna and the Board meeting on 30th September 2025.
The theme of the conference was : Complex Systems: Shaping the Future for a Resilient Society
Our gratitude is extended to the Austrian Academy of Sciences for an excellent conference. For more details please visit the Euro CASE website
This was of particular importance to our Academy because next year the 2026 Annual Conference will take place on 19 November 2026 at the International Conference Centre(ICC), Belfast. The event will be co-hosted by the Irish Academy of Engineering (IAE) and the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng).
The meeting in Vienna gave both academies the opportunity to begin detailed preparations for the Belfast conference.
Seamus McKeague IAE, Tom Leahy IAE, Fatima Bokhari RAE, Aisha Salim RAE, Sean Finlay IAE, Shane McHugh RAE.
©OeAW, Daniel Hinterramskogler
Both Academies have a rich partnership history, the former President of RAEng Sir Jim
MacDonald and IAE President Tom Leahy met in Belfast and Dublin in October 2021 and
signed a memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in May 2022 that both Academies would work together on matters of shared interest.
The approved 2026 Euro CASE conference theme is: Engineering Resilience, securing Europe’s critical infrastructure in a changing world.
The event will be designed to lead the conversation on how engineering thinking can shape Europe’s resilience to growing risks facing critical infrastructure, considering key challenges, geopolitical tensions and systems interdependencies. We hope to bring a diverse group of up to 300 leaders from across Europe to Belfast for the event, including stakeholders from government, academia, industry and civil society.
This event is taking place in Northern Ireland where the memberships of RAEng and IAE
overlap. As the first Euro-CASE conference to be held on the island of Ireland, and a high-
profile event showcasing engineering responses to important resilience challenges across
Europe, we believe this could be a unique event :
- Celebrating the IAE / RAEng partnership.
- Showcasing regional engineering excellence.
- Acting as an important staging post for the Irish EU Presidency, with interest in political
- Attracting attendance from Belfast, Dublin, London and Brussels.
- Celebrating the 50th anniversary of the founding of RAEng.
A joint RAE/IAE invitation to Conference 2026 was delivered by Tom Leahy IAE and Shane McHugh RAE at the closing of the Vienna conference. Announcement of Euro CASE 2026 conference in Belfast . Please save the date in your diary!
Sean Finlay IAE President, Shane McHugh Associate Director, Engineering Diplomacy RAE, Tom Leahy IAE Special Advisor, Director & Past President
©OeAW, Daniel Hinterramskogler
The Board meeting on the 30th September 2025 was very well attended and a full programme of activities was jointly agreed.
Euro CASE Board 2025 ©OeAW, Claudia Roithinger
The Irish Academy of Engineering will continue to contribute to provide thought leadership at a time of great change.