He studies parallel and distributed programming systems in combination with real-world applications. His group produced programming environments such as the Orca language, MagPIe, Ibis, Satin, JavaGAT, and SWAN. His current work focuses on programming environments for GPUs (Graphics Processing Units) and distributed sensor systems based on smartphones and Internet-of-Things.

Henri Bal is the winner of the Euro-Par 2014 Achievement Award, member of the Informatics Section of the Academia Europaea, scientific director of the ASCI research school, and coordinator of the DAS infrastructure. He is past program chair of the HPDC and CCGrid conferences and author of three books, including Modern Compiler Design.