The 5^th Technical Workshop of the APRIORI Network took place on March 4–6, 2026, hosted by the Jožef Stefan Institute (JSI) in Ljubljana, Slovenia. The event brought together all 10 doctoral candidates (DCs), principal investigators (PIs), and cooperative partners from both leading academic institutes and industrial companies to exchange research progress in the past 6 months and participate in technical and industrial training activities.

The workshop opened with keynote presentations by Marko Grobelnik (JSI) on AI Incidents in Manufacturing and Viktor Jovanovski (Qlector). Later on, each APRIORI DC presented updates on their research projects, providing an opportunity for discussion and feedback from supervisors and consortium members. The consortium held the APRIORI General Assembly meeting, chaired by Hendrik Devriendt and Elke Deckers (KU Leuven), where partners reviewed project progress and discussed upcoming milestones.

To further strengthen DCs’ technical expertise and skills to address emerging challenges and opportunities in AI-driven manufacturing, the workshop featured several training activities of great technical and social relevance. These included a hands-on workshop on Machine Learning in Manufacturing delivered by Jože Rožanec (JSI), an industrial visit to Kolektor ETRA providing participants with direct insight into manufacturing practice, and a focused training on Active Learning for Manufacturing presented by Klemen Kenda (JSI).

The event provided valuable opportunities for knowledge exchange, collaboration, and training, further strengthening the APRIORI network and supporting the development of its doctoral candidates.