The 67th International Conference of Scandinavian Simulation Society (SIMS 2026) was held in Eskilstuna, Sweden, September 16-17, 2026. The conference was organized by Mälardalen University (MDU) in collaboration with Mälardalen Industrial Technology Center (MITC), Linköping University (LiU), and Blekinge Institute of Technology (BTH). SIMS 2026 was co-sponsored by IFAC, with support from IFAC TC 3.2 in addition to TC 5.1, 6.1, TC 6.2, TC 6.3, TC 6.4, TC 7.1, TC 7.2 and TC 9.4.

The Scandinavian Simulation Society (SIMS) consists of members from five Nordic countries: Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. The goal of SIMS is to develop the science and practice of modelling and simulation in all application areas and to be a forum for information interchange between academics, professionals, and non-professionals in the Nordic countries.

SIMS 2026 conference covered recent research and industrial development in modelling, simulation, control and optimization in engineering applications. The International Program Committee (IPC) selected and accepted 65 scientific papers and 1 discussion paper for presentation at the conference and distributed them over 21 sessions with themes covering:
• Modelling and simulation for design, planning, optimization, control, and monitoring
• Tools for modelling and simulation, numerical methods for simulation, artificial intelligence (AI), and other novel techniques
• Visualization of modelling and simulation results
• Practical case studies of industrial automation and control, model- and simulation-based decision making, digitalization
• Use of modelling and simulation in STEM

In total, SIMS 2025 received 93 submissions from Sweden, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Poland, Iran, Italy, Germany, Libya, Russia, and India. Accepted papers were reviewed by at least 2 expert reviewers and evaluated by an IPC member acting as associate editor. The overall acceptance rate was 71%.

The conference program included a keynote lecture on “A Sustainable future for heavy industry” by Anna Ericson Öberg, Research Strategy Manager at Volvo Construction Equipment. The keynote lecture covered broad aspects of modelling, simulation, and optimization as enablers for an electrified and greener heavy industry, one of the dominant industrial sectors for the Nordic countries. An educational panel session was organized on the topic of “Professional upskilling in the digital era”. Panelists included Åsa Kärrman-Bolang from Örebro University, Svante Sundquist from Mälardalen University, Johan Wall from Blekinge Institute of Technology, Esko Juuso from the University of Oulu, Amin Hajizadeh from Aalborg University, and Reno Filla from TRATON/Scania. The panel discussed how academia can offer courses for professionals that meet industry needs. An industrial panel on “Industrial symbiosis for the green transition” was also part of the program, hosting panelists Moksadur Rahman from ABB, Linda Werther from Cloudberry Clean Energy, Ellinor Grape from Scandinavian Data Centers, Pontus Netzell from ESEM, Sarala Naidu from Hitachi Energy, and Anders Levay from Eskilstuna Municipality. The panel discussed how industrial actors can work together to accelerate the green transition. A tradition at SIMS conferences is the SIMS Best Young Author Award. This award is given to recognize young research talents and can be awarded to authors who are PhD or Master students. The award was given to Peshalya Madhawi Kothalawala Kothalawala Wedhage from the University of South-Eastern Norway for an outstanding paper and presentation.

On behalf of the organizers, we wish to thank all participants, authors, keynote and panel speakers, session chairs, and the presenters for their contribution to this conference. We also want to acknowledge the support we have received from the IPC, SIMS, IFAC, MITC, TFEK, MDU, LiU, and BTH.