Prof. Dr. Ing. Philippe POIGNET received his Engineering and Master degrees in Control and Mechanical Design from Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Mécanique / Ecole Centrale de Nantes in 1992, and his PhD degree in Control theory from Ecole Centrale de Nantes / University of Nantes in 1995. He has been recruited as R&D engineer for SEPRO Robotique company from 1996 until 1998 and Assistant Professor in 1998 at the University of Orléans. He moved to the University of Montpellier in 2000 and he is now Full Professor at the University of Montpellier since 2007. He has been the head of the DEXTER team focused on design and control of robot manipulators from 2004 until 2011 and the head of the robotics department from 2012 until 2015. He is part on the management board of the Labex CAMI (Computer Assisted Medical Interventions) since 2012. He is currently director of the LIRMM since 2015. His research interests mainly focus on the design and control of robot manipulators applied for surgery. He is co-author of more than 200 papers in international journals and conferences. He is associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Medical Robotics and Bionics journal. He is scientific advisor for the STERLAB company and he is scientific advisor and co-founder of the AcuSurgical company.