The Institute of Cybernetics (IoC), founded in 1960 as a research institute of the Estonian Academy of Sciences, is today a semi-autonomous research institution of the Tallinn University of Technology.
The Software Science Laboratory was formed in 1978 under the leadership of Enn Tyugu. From 1992 to 1997 it was led by Jaan Penjam, from 1997-2014 by Ahto Kalja. The current head is Tarmo Uustalu.
The original direction started by Enn Tyugu was automated software engineering with applications to engineering computations. Today, the research areas pursued here range from topics in computer science (logic and semantics) to software engineering and information systems, all fitting under the name of software science.
Within the tiny country of Estonia, our small laboratory makes IoC one of the leading computer science research institutions, with a wide network of collaborations both domestically and internationally.
We have also initiated and led various nationwide joint efforts towards advancing Estonia's computer science research and education. In particular, we coordinated CDC, the national centre of excellence in research in computer science and engineering 2002-2007, and the EXCS national centre of excellence in research in computer science 2008-2015.
Starting 2016, we are part of the EXCITE (Excellence in IT in Estonia) national centre of excellence in research 2016-2023, which builds (with some changes) on the people of EXCS and CEBE.