The Chief Technology Officer of the Year Europe 2017 announced
Eyal Shimoni, CTO of Strauss Group and Sebastien Equis, CTO of Nanolive have been awarded with the title European Chief Technology Officer of the Year 2017 in their respective categories: large corporations and SMEs. The awards ceremony took place during the CTO Forum 2017 at Empa Academy, Zurich, Switzerland on October 26th, 2017. Both awardees serve as prominent role models fuelling growth and strengthening European innovation and technology leadership.
Eyal Shimoni played a leading role in setting the vision and accelerating the cultural change inside the Strauss Group, allowing new forms of partnership and fostering open dialogue with innovators. These activities inspired a vibrant Israeli and European FoodTech ecosystem growth, with accelerators, start-ups, investors and multiple FoodTech events, contributing to the strengthening of the innovation and entrepreneurship scene in Europe.
Strauss Group is an international Food & Beverage corporation that strives to improve people's lives. The company's vision is "Creating Wonders out of Basics", which is both a business concept and a driver for product development. The company realised that to compete successfully in the global and domestic markets, it must stand at the forefront of food technology. This started the Alpha Strauss venture, which aims to promote and create a complete ecosystem of relevant technologies in the food industry. The venture was established with the understanding that a large industrial entity was needed to link the research institutes, researchers, inventors and entrepreneurs to the market; help them understand consumer trends and industry challenges. Strauss leverages its assets in product development, production and route-to-market, with the science and ingenuity of inventors, scientists and entrepreneurs. Together they develop exciting technologies that benefit consumers, entrepreneurs, Israel, Europe and the world.
Sebastien Equis co-founded Nanolive with Dr. Yann Cotte in 2013 to make it possible to explore a living cell in 3D without damaging it. With his passion, drive and vision, Sebastien has enabled Nanolive to bring the disruptive technology to the market, actively engaging both customers as well as suppliers to share their ideas and challenges.
Since the cell is the basis of all life on earth, this is a major milestone in the history of microscopy, which may change all the rules in the fields of education, biology, pharmaceutics, cosmetics, labs and industry. Just like a computer tomography for human bodies, Nanolive makes a complete tomography of the living cell. But unlike a CT for human bodies, it does it instantly, in full colour and at very low cost: as a result, for the very first-time users can instantly look inside the cell, discover its interior such as nucleus and organelles and "travel" through it in 3D on any screen, as well as compare it quantitatively with accumulated data and processing in the cloud.
More information about the CTO of the Year Europe award
European CTO of the Year is the leading European award honouring excellence in technology and innovation leadership, awarded by EIRMA (European Industrial Research Management Association) and Spinverse (Nordic leader in innovation consulting). The concept is Pan-European and, as Robert-Jan Smits, Director-General for Research and Innovation, European Commission says: “Europe needs to celebrate those who advance technology and innovate. Initiatives like the “CTO of the year award” are very welcome as they lead to role models and further strengthen innovation in Europe”.
The European CTO of the Year Award was launched in 2014. Since then it has been given to CTOs who are both inspiring leaders and competent technology developers. The winners are awarded in two categories – SMEs and large corporations - to highlight that both are needed to support technology-based growth in Europe.