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Takis Theodorikakos

Minister of Development of Greece

Panagiotis (Takis) Dimitriou Theodorikakos is Minister of Development and Member of Hellenic Parliament of Athens B3 Constituency (South). He was elected in the 2023 national elections with 47.300 votes and was ranked second. He was Strategy and Communication Advisor to the President of ND since October 2015 and Coordinator of Strategic Planning and Communication of the party, from October 2016 until the victorious election contests of May and July 2019 when he was elected as Member of State of the ND. • In July 2019, he was appointed by the Prime Minister Mr. Kyriakos Mitsotakis as Minister of the Interior. • In August 2021 he was appointed by the Prime Minister Mr. Kyriakos Mitsotakis as Minister of Citizen Protection. • In June 2024 he was appointed by the Prime Minister Mr. Kyriakos Mitsotakis as Minister of Development. • He has a long professional career as Political researcher and analyst and Strategy Advisor. • PhD in Public Policies at the University of Peloponnese where he taught at the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences till June 2019. • He was a scientific partner and president of the company GPO SA, from 2000 to 2016. He has presented important social and political research in Greece and abroad at scientific conferences, workshop and mass media. Graduated from the Pedagogical Department of EKPA. He completed his Master's studies at the Department of Political Science and Public Administration of EKPA in political science and sociology specializing in electoral sociology. He graduated from the High School of the Ionidios Standard School. He was born in 1964 in Piraeus. He is married and has two children.

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Dimitris Papastergiou

Minister of Digital Governance

Dimitris Papastergiou was born in 1973 in Trikala. He graduated from the Polycladic Lyceum of Trikala and the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering of NTUA (National Technical University of Athens). At the same time, he attended journalism courses, while he maintains strong ties with technology and the internet, a relationship that was strengthened at the Multimedia Laboratory of NTUA. In 2001 he built and presented, together with a group of his colleagues, the first integrated website for the Prefecture of Trikala, 3kala.gr. Since 2002 he has been practicing the profession of Electrical and Computer Engineer in the city of Trikala. He was involved in studies and construction of private electromechanical projects and the creation of software programs. In 2007 he entered the field of renewable energy and has constructed more than 300 private renewable energy projects. His involvement in the community began in 2002, with his election to the City Council. He was re-elected in 2006, and in 2014 he was elected Mayor of Trikkaion and member of the Board of Directors of KEDE. He was re-elected Mayor in 2019 and, in the same year, he was elected President of the KEDE. He is married to the engineer Soula Brakis and is the happy father of Faye, Kostas and Nikos. From June 2023, he is Minister of Digital Governance in the government of Kyriakos Mitsotakis.

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General Dimitrios Choupis

Chief of the Hellenic National Defence General Staff

General Dimitrios Choupis was born in 1965 at Nea Kerdyllia, Serres. He was admitted to the Hellenic Military Academy (Evelpidon) in 1983 and graduated in 1987 as Signals Second Lieutenant. As a fourth-class cadet (1986-1987) he was First Captain of the Hellenic Military Academy (Evelpidon). He graduated with honors from all schools and courses of his Branch, from the two-year long Signals Officers Telecommunications and Electronics School course (as an RF Electrical Engineer, A Class), as well as from the Army War College with distinction. He attended Signals and Special Forces Courses in Greece and respective NATO courses in Germany (Long Range Patrol, Communications – Cryptography, Electronic Warfare Operations Planning, Human Resources Management). He is an active freefall parachutist. In 2012, he was selected to attend the ΝΑΤΟ Defence College (SC-121). During his career as a junior and senior Officer, he served in Signals, Electronic Warfare, Electronic Surveillance, and Special Forces Units. He served for three years as Squad Leader in the Special Parachutist Unit. As a Staff Officer, he served in Formation and Major Formation staff and the Hellenic Army General Staff. As a Commander, he served for two years in the EW Company of D Army Corps (Xanthi), as Commander of the Signals Company of the Hellenic Contingent in Cyprus, Signals Commander of the II Mechanised Infantry Division (Edessa), and Unit Commander of the 472nd Surveillance/Intelligence Battalion of the Higher Military Command of Interior and Islands (UAV). He served for three years in the International Staff of the Hellenic Military Delegation in NATO (Brussels, 2006-2009) as Allied Communications Planning Staff Officer in Afghanistan (ISAF) following his successful certification as Project Manager Practitioner by NATO, Chief of Staff of the 80th Higher National Guard Battalions Command (2013-2014)

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Stellina Siarapi

Secretary General for Private Investments

Ms. Stellina Siarapi has served as the Secretary General for Reception of Asylum Seekers at the Ministry of Migration and Asylum since February 2024. From July 2023 until February 2024, she worked at the Secretariat General of the Prime Minister. From September 2021 to June 2023, she held the position of Special Advisor at the office of the Minister of Citizen Protection. From January 2021 to August 2021, she served as Advisor on Demographic Policy and Family Affairs at the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs. In 2020, she was a member of the National Council for Gender Equality. From July 2019 to January 2021, she was Special Advisor at the office of the Minister of the Interior. From February 2017 to September 2018, she worked as a Researcher at the Konstantinos Karamanlis Institute of Democracy, specializing in Research and International Communication. From September 2018 until the July 2019 elections, she worked on Strategic Planning for the New Democracy Party (ND). Between 2014 and 2016, she worked as a Researcher at the Department of Political Science and International Relations at the University of the Peloponnese. In 2017, she graduated with distinction from the Department of Political Science and International Relations at the University of the Peloponnese. She completed her internship at the Center for Security Studies of the Ministry of Citizen Protection (2015-2016). She has completed the following online educational programs: Women Leadership Program (2021) at the Yale School of Management, Strategic Communication (2020) at George Washington University, and the Jean Monnet Module "Moving the EU Forward" (2016) at the University of Athens. She is fluent in English.

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Dimosthenis Anagnostopoulos

Secretary General for Information Systems and Digital Governance

Dimosthenis Anagnostopoulos is a Professor of Information Systems and Simulation in the Department of Informatics and Telematics at Harokopio University of Athens. He served as a Rector of the same University, during 2011-2016 and as a Dean of the School of Digital Technology. He is a visiting Professor at Sussex University, UK, and an Associate Editor of Requirements Engineering (Springer). He served as National Representative of Greece for ICT in EU Horizon 2020 (2014-2015). He held the position of Secretary General for Information Systems of the Greek Ministry of Finance and Economics (2004 - 2009). During his service, he contributed to the development of the following Information systems: Real Estate Data Base and ETAK systems, ELENXIS, new TAXISnet, ICISnet and M-TAXIS (mobile TAXIS). During 2019-2023, he served as Secretary General for Information Systems of Public Administration of the Hellenic Ministry of Digital Governance, responsible - among other projects that contributed to the country’s rapid digital transformation development - for Interoperability across the Public Sector and Government Cloud.

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Dr. Konstantinos Karantzalos

Secretary General of Telecommunications and Post

Konstantinos Karantzalos (http://users.ntua.gr/karank) is a Professor of Remote Sensing at the National Technical University of Athens. His teaching and research interests include geoscience and earth observation, geospatial big data, hyperspectral image analysis, computer vision and machine learning with applications e.g. in environmental monitoring and precision agriculture. He has several publications in top-rank international journals & conferences and a number of awards and honors for his research contributions. He has more than 20 years of research experience, involved with more than 30 EU and national excellence/ competitive research projects. Dr. Karantzalos, IEEE Senior Member, serves as Scientific/ Program Committee and reviewer for top rank international journals/conferences and as an Evaluator/ Panel Member for the evaluation of EU and national research programmes (H2020, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, Israel Science Foundation, Belgian Science Policy Office, Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research, etc). Dr. Karantzalos currently Chairing the ISPRS Working Group WGIII/2 ‘Spectral and Thermal Data Processing and Analytics’.

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Yannis Mastrogeorgiou

Special Secretariat of Foresight - Presidency of the Hellenic Government

From 2019 to 2022, he served as the Secretary General of Communication and Media in the Presidency of the Greek Government. He was previously the Director General of the Konstantinos Karamanlis Institute of Democracy and director of the think tank “DIKTIO for the reformation of Greece and Europe” (2013-2018). Yannis has also served as Director of Communications and Special Adviser to the Greek Minister of Education, as well as Special Advisor to the Minister of Development and to the Greek Parliament. He has worked in the field of communications and advertisement in multinational companies and was also a Marshall Memorial Fellow of the German Marshall Fund (GMF). He studied history in the National Kapodestrian University of Athens, international relations, European Political Economy and law at the University of the Aegean and the Athens University of Economics and Business. He is a PhD candidate of the Science of History and Philosophy of the University of Athens.

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Vassilis Karkatzounis

Special Secretary for Artificial Intelligence and Data Governance

Vassilis Karkatzounis is the Special Secretary for Artificial Intelligence and Data Governance at the Ministry of Digital Governance and Artificial Intelligence of Greece. He is a lawyer specializing in Information Technology Law, holding a Law degree from the University of Athens and an LL.M. in Technology, Media and Telecommunications Law from Queen Mary University of London. He is currently a doctoral candidate at the University of the Aegean, focusing on privacy and data protection in online advertising. Vasilis has advised the Minister of Digital Governance on Cybersecurity, AI, and Internet Governance, and has represented Greece in EU and Council of Europe negotiations on the Artificial Intelligence Act and the Convention on AI. His work centers on data governance and the ethical, legal, and societal dimensions of AI, particularly in public administration and justice, and he has published widely on the intersection of technology, law, and policy.

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Giorgos Pitsilis

Governor, Independent Authority for Public Revenue

George Pitsilis was born in the USA in 1975. He is a Supreme Court lawyer, with scientific specialty and significant professional experience in the entire range of Tax, Greek, International and European Law. He is a graduate of Anavryta Classical High School. He graduated from the Law School of the University of Athens, from which he also received a Master's Degree in Public Law. He also holds a DEA in Tax Law from Pantheon – Sorbonne University (Paris I). He speaks English and French fluently and also speaks German. He is married with 2 children.

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Michalis Bletsas

Governor, National Cybersecurity Authority Greece

Michail Bletsas is a Research Scientist and the Director of Computing at MIT's Media Lab where he has been working since 1996. He is responsible for all the infrastructure that the lab uses to produce, store, transport and consume its bits. He was a member of the core technical and design team for the “One Laptop Per Child” initiative which created OLPC's pioneering, award-winning "XO" laptop. His current research interests include network security, disinformation operations, wireless networks and building efficient high performance machine learning computing infrastructures. Over the years, he has advised governments around technology policy issues and provided expert opinion in technical matters to top-level officials. He has cofounded two companies, has been a director and consulted for many others in a variety of capacities. He has been appointed as the first Governor of the National Cybersecurity Authority of Greece in April 2024. He has implemented broadband access networks using cutting-edge technologies including one of the earliest ADSL testbeds and various wireless technologies. Mr. Bletsas has been a frequent keynote speaker in international conferences and has been engaged in many civic activities. He holds an undergraduate degree in Electrical Engineering from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and an MSc degree in Computer Engineering from Boston University.

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Niki Tsouma

CEO, IDIKA SA

Top Executive of the Public Administration in the Sector of Informatics. A graduate of the Department of Mathematics of the University of Athens, with specialization in Programming and Systems Analysis and a graduate of the National School of Public Administration with highest distinction. She is a lecturer at the National School of Public Administration on ITS Project Management and E-Government issues. She is an external expert in EU committees for the evaluation of innovative proposals in software technologies and cloud computing of the H2020 Program. She has participated in the design, analysis, development, implementation, and installation of large, complex, and critical IT projects of the Public Administration, serving as a member of Project Management Teams and as a Project Manager for 25 years in General Secretariat of Information Systems of the Ministry of Finance and the Information Society S.A. From 2010 to 2014 she was a consultant in reengineering and change management issues and in the project and risk management cases as well as co-financed projects of the General Secretaries of Information Systems of the Ministry of Finance. From 2015 to 2017 she served as a Director and General Manager of Projects in the Information Society SA. From June 2018 to August 2019, she was the Director of Informatics and Technical Operation of EKOME SA. From August 2019 to October 2020, she served as the Managing Director of IDIKA SA. From October 2020 to April 2024, she served as the Chairman of BOD & CEO of IDIKA SA. Since then, she serves as CEO of IDIKA SA. In October 2024, she was awarded with the first prize at the category «Women in Tech Awards» by WITSA (World Innovation, Technology and Services Alliance).