Wolfgang Kautek holds academic degrees from the Vienna University of Technology, and from the University of Technology Berlin. He served as a research scientist at the University of Kentucky, USA, at the Fritz-Haber-Institute of the Max-Planck-Society, Berlin, at the IBM San Jose Research Laboratory, California, and the Siemens Research Center, Erlangen. From 1988, he was head of the Laboratory for Thin Film Technology of the Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing, Berlin, and Adjunct Professor at the Free University Berlin (Germany). 2004 he was appointed full-professor at the Department of Physical Chemistry of the University of Vienna, and served as Russell Severance Springer Professor at the Department of Mechanical Engineering of the University of California, Berkeley, in 2017.

Nanotechnology and laser processing of interfaces with special focus on the NLO interaction of ultrashort laser pulses with mater, aperture-free scanning nearfield optical nanolithography, "Green" plating technology, femto- and bioelectrochemistry, and and heritage science such as laser cleaning of artifacts, historical photographyl and galvanotype.