Basically, it is a database in which central data on a university’s research is entered and can be read out as needed: How many publications were published in year x? How many research projects does a university have? How many doctorates are in progress or completed?
These data are needed from time to time, for example in ongoing reporting to ministries or funders. In fact, explicitly released data can also be published directly on the university websites (“research portal” of a university), thus eliminating the need for manual updating.
And not only externally: It also creates more clarity internally for researchers and for research administration by bundling in one place the data that was previously maintained in parallel in many places. The idea is that the data is stored only 1x in a central system in order to use it multiple times. This makes data management and data access much more sustainable.
Hof University of Applied Sciences is in the process of introducing an FIS. This is quite an elaborate process in which the existing system structure and processes are analyzed in order to arrive at an optimized data management. In view of the improved presentation of the considerable and still growing research performance with simplified processes, the effort will be worthwhile.
