Day 1: TRENDS AND TECHNOLOGY

Opening speech
Moderator:
- Yugo Neumorni, President CIO Council Romania

Session title: Romania will look completely transformed in 2026, in terms of digitalization

Speaker: Ciprian-Sergiu TELEMAN, Ministrul Cercetării, Inovării și Digitalizării, Guvernul României

Session title: Accelerating Time to Value (TtV) for Digital Transformation initiatives with a Cloud-like networking experience (English session)

Overview: Digitising the enterprise, or as is more commonly known, Digital Transformation, enables enterprises to gain competitive advantage, improve time to market and ensure their offerings are best in class. In effect, it is Digital Transformation that is at the very heart of Business Transformation, and enterprise cloudification is very much the enabler. So, as the evolution from Cloud 1.0 to Cloud 2.0 gathers momentum, with more and more mission critical applications & workloads migrating to the cloud, what role does connectivity play in enabling successful migrations to cloud?

What are the connectivity challenges that IT decision makers need to be aware of and address in order to accelerate the migration to and adoption of Cloud?

Learn how adopting a cloud-like networking experience can accelerate the all-important Time to Value (TtV) metric underpinning Business Transformation initiatives and, can enable businesses to optimise the benefits of cloud.

Speaker: John Armenakas, Director, Cloud Partners Practise – Partner Development & Success, Colt Technology Services

Note: Teo Galea, Country Manager Colt Technology Services – welcome to the participants

Session title: Principles, options and key focus areas on Cloud Innovation (English session)

Overview: Get inspired for you cloud journey. Dell Technologies will share experience to provide Input on design principles, options and key focus areas. Going to the cloud mean for many companies a hybrid / multi cloud setup. Get inspiration on how you design & build hybrid / multi cloud to ensure consistency across all solutions.

 Speaker: Thomas Andersen, Cloud Strategist, EMEA Cloud & Compute, Dell Technologies | Emerging Technologies & Cloud

Session Title: A year in review: AI in the spot light

Overview: Last year acted as a catalyst for digitalization, with many organizations accelerating their efforts to improve workflows and their cloud adoption. From new ways of interactions and teams collaboration, to an update on most of the product roadmaps, and shifts in work culture, all were impacted by the new 'normal'. The applied AI and ML space also experienced a boost in activity. It's time to look back and review some of the innovative solutions of last year. From manufacturing, to retail, to banking and healthcare, all sectors have something to share with the world.

Speaker: Horia Niculescu - Google, Customer Engineer, Smart Analytics

Session title: GAIA-X as the new European data ecosystem – what’s in it for CIOs? (English session)

With GAIA-X, CIOs have a unique opportunity to co-create the next generation of a European data infrastructure: a secure, federated system that meets the highest standards of digital sovereignty while promoting innovation. National GAIA-X Hubs are being set up in European member states to coordinate stakeholder "data space" initiatives. Progress reports and how to participate in the data space initiatives will be on the agenda

Speaker: Francesco Bonfiglio, CEO GAIA-X

One to one talk: Digital Trends

Speakers: 

Valentina Frangu, Public Sector Lead @Dell/Member of TechAngel Romania

Yugo Neumorni, President CIO Council Romania

Session title: Achieving a positive return on AI investment with turnkey purpose-built infrastructure for AI at scale

Overview: An analysis focused on overcoming the challenges for using AI as a key business transformation enabler and major competitive advantage.

Speaker: Vladimir Ester, CTO, Cluster Power

Panel: “Reshaping the future with IT trends and technologies”

Overview:

A digital revolution we are experiencing all over the world. Innovation, agility, and business development are all pushed by technological advancements. Companies accelerated their migration to cloud and multi-cloud while edge computing and hybrid infrastructures continues to drive the critical systems. 5G or even 6G technology is in process to transform the Internet into a big local area network allowing business to easily expand geographically and offering the true mobility for users. Artificial Intelligence is the new joker and it changes completely our life. How company and CIOs benefit from adopting newest technology trends? 

• Digital trends for 2022. Embrace a brilliant technological future.
• Is 5G a game changer?
• Building an Edge Computing Strategy. Distributed and hybrid infrastructure.
• How to build a Cloud and infrastructure strategy.
• Applied Artificial Intelligence and Advanced Analytics
• Future of connectivity. 5G and IoT connectivity
• How to avoid vendor lock-in and unfair practices.

Speakers:

 Dorian Hodorogea, Customer Engineer for Smart Analytics, Google CEE

 Adrian Blidaruș, CEO, Softelligence

 Cristian Turcin, Cloud Services Product Manager, Orange Business Services

 Sorin Nicolaescu, IT Director, Alliance Healthcare Romania

Moderator: Carmen Adamescu, Partner, Technology Leader, EY Romania & Moldova

Conclusions

Moderator: Yugo Neumorni, President CIO Council Romania

Day 2: CYBERSECURITY RESILIENCE

Opening speech: Trends in cyber security and an x-ray of the current state

Speaker: Anton Rog, Head of the National Cyberint Center, SRI

One to one talk: Sports, Olympics and Cybersecurity. What do they have in common?

New digital landscapes, move to cloud, expansion of connected objects, quantum computing and overall speed of digital transformation are changing the way we do business. As a result the surface attack is expanding and the threat landscape is evolving at a fast speed with the arrival of new and more sophisticated attacks.
Analysts predict that over 33 billion records will be stolen by cybercriminals in 2023 alone.

Speakers:

Catalina Dodu, Country Manager, Atos IT Solutions and Services Romania

Yugo Neumorni, President CIO Council Romania

Session title: Adversary simulation and improved defense

Overview: In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, cyberattacks grow in frequency and sophistication and businesses need to outsmart cybercriminals. Mihai Olteanu, Risk Advisory Director, and Adrian Ifrim, Risk Advisory Senior Manager, Deloitte Romania, will present the two sides of the story: the perspective of the attackers, the ethical red teams simulating real world attacks, and of the organizations, through the blue teams, the one responsible to detect, analyze, and contain threats before they disrupt the business.

Speakers:

Mihai Olteanu, Risk Advisory Director, Deloitte Romania

Adrian Ifrim, Risk Advisory Senior Manager, Deloitte Romania

One to one talk - Insights on cybersecurity challenges, trends & developments

From investment in education to mature solutions, Orange focuses on developing and delivering cyber security solutions adapted to every context and business's needs, that can protect companies against today's and tomorrow's threats. Orange has created an ecosystem for cyber security built upon years of experience, knowledge, and data and will share with you insights on challenges, trends & developments that can help you grow and secure your business.

Speakers:

Ioan Constantin, Cyber Security Expert, Orange Romania

Yugo Neumorni, President CIO Council Romania

One to one talk: Data privacy, a major cultural change

Speakers: 

Horia Niculescu - Google, Customer Engineer, Smart Analytics

Daniel Gruia, CIO Council member

Session title: Accelerating Data to Decisions for Investigative Analysis (English Session)

Overview: The most trusted threat intelligence analysis platform for tackling critical missions across national security and defense, law enforcement, fraud, financial crime and cyber threat hunting. Security and intelligence analysts are often at a loss to uncover hidden connections in disparate data from multiple sources and gain actionable intelligence quickly. IBM Security™ i2® arms analysts with the advanced analytics and threat intelligence analysis capabilities they need to detect, disrupt and defeat physical and cyber threats coming at them with increasing speed and sophistication.

Speaker:  Nicolas SAMSON, Consultant investigation & link analysis i2 solution advisor, IBM

Session title: CyberSec Trends - 2021 & Beyond. About data encryption and access to information

Overview: On the IT side, it is very important for the private sector and the Government to understand that cyberattacks exist and must be invested in programs.

For example, Atos invests to open research centers in Romania, precisely because we are aware of this resource, the expertise in cybersecurity and IT.

Speaker: Alexandru Rusandu, Global Cybersecurity Services Head of Portfolio and Service Engineering, Atos IT Solutions and Services

Session title: National–level cybersecurity capacity. A key challenge.

Overview: In the view of recent cybersecurity developments at EU level, it is critical that each country performs an evaluation of their national cybersecurity capabilities, increases the maturity level of awareness, identifies areas for improvement and builds new cybersecurity capabilities. These are current priorities and major action points for Romania as well.

Speaker: Dan Cimpean, General Director CERT-RO

Panel: Is everything broken in security?

Overview: Since Solarwind attack was discovered in December 2020 a strange feeling of insecurity overwhelmed the companies. Mass scale penetration could occur from your friendly asset management software update. In between Colonial Pipeline attack showed us that the ransomware attacks becomes commodities and they could be ordered “as a service”. In addition we understood that the industrial control systems are “unsecured by design” and their compromise could collapse segments of society. These are clear evidences of the cyberwar we are living. We as CIOs are in the front line and we should protect the companies and to assure the business continuity.

• Ransomware the new form of commercial terrorism
• Zero trust architecture.
• Cybersecurity trends into a post pandemic world.
• How to protect national critical infrastructures from cyber-attacks?
• Why social engineering still works? How can we deal with human factors in security?
• How to protect from friendly third-party vulnerabilities?
• Cyber resilience. How can cyber risks be mitigated by business continuity plans?
• Are the CIOs ready for the next cyber attack?
• Security by design. Industrial Control Systems vulnerabilities.
• Data privacy a major cultural change

Speakers:

Cătălina Dodu, Country Manager, Atos IT Solutions and Services Romania

Roxana Ionescu, Partner, Head of Data Protection practice, NNDKP

Ion Ionut Georgian, Head of OMV Petrom Global Solutions IT

Cristian Cucu, CIO Council Member

Moderator: Yugo Neumorni, CIO Council President

Session title: When everything else fails, insurance might help you survive a cyber attack

Overview: To talk about “Resilience” without considering insurance would be a serious mistake in today’s busy cyber environment. Prevention is key, investments in more sophisticated IT systems and educating users is a must but what happens when all else fails? As tangible assets decrease and intangible property becomes essential to all companies, switching your focus from a property & casualty approach to a professional indemnity and cyber insurance cover should be a priority.

Speaker: Vlad STOICHITESCU, Head of Technology Risks Division, OTTO BROKER

Sesssion title: Insurance against cyber risk is more actual than ever

Speaker: Calin Rangu, cofondator CIO Council

Overview: There is a constant risk of cybersecurity attacks and data loss around us. If all the other risks could accidentally appear the attackers are permanently active. You can't fight alone, and cyber risk insurance has become a safe practice to cover residual risk.

Session title: What is Missing in Cyber Securing Critical Infrastructures (English session)

Overview: The presentation will address the vulnerabilities from the industrial control systems (SCADA) from the utilities sector/ national critical infrastructure.

Speaker:  Joe Weiss, PE, CISM, CRISC, Managing Director ISA99

Conclusions

Moderator: Yugo Neumorni, President CIO Council Romania

Day 3: ACCELERATED DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION

Opening speech                        

Moderator: Yugo Neumorni, President CIO Council Romania

Session title: Cropwise Seed Selector. Custom data-generated crop selection in farming

Overview: Make the best seed variety selection backed by data, Maximise your yield using a personalised planting plan, Leverage big agronomic data, Compare product performance in similar field conditions, All supported by data driven insights

Speaker:  Dragos Stanescu, CIO Syngenta, CIO Council Member

Session title: Growing business through open innovation

Overview: Today, innovation is the fuel of business growth and is achieving competitive advantages. For greater creativity, efficiency, and economic impact, Orange works in close collaboration with innovative startups. How can Corporates and startups build a partnership for success and what can they do to make it right?  Find valuable information on how Orange Romania supports startups and creates new services and end-to-end solutions, implemented with one or more Business Clients in a win-win collaboration

Speaker: Monica Obogeanu, Startup Programs Manager, Orange România

Session Title: Digital transformation in a zero trust world (English session)

Overview: Moving fully or partially to the cloud, as part of the digital transformation strategy, involves emerging enterprise challenges that make zero trust security concept more relevant than ever. Thales authentication and access management solutions can boost the digital transformation journey while both reducing associated risks and providing optimal user experience.

Speaker: Kostas Charalampopoulos, Senior Engineer | THALES

Session title: How industrial sectors can be digitally transformed with end-to-end solutions? (English session)

Overview: In this presentation the speaker will introduce real-life scenarios for 3 different sectors:

Digital twins for manufacturing processes on the ML platform

Real time location system for labors, transport and equipment

Remote monitoring of construction objects, quarries, solid waste landfills

Speaker: Oleg Dannenberg, Global Business Development Director of Softline Digital LAB

Session title: Successful digital transformation of organizations - steering IT like a business 

Overview: Considering the importance of digital transformation and the increasing IT costs, the speaker will present some key findings of the Horváth & Partners questionnaire, on relevant topics, in the management of the IT factory such as implementation and penetration of digital initiatives as well as the management of the increasing IT costs. The speaker will answer the question on how can you help your business to harness the full potential of digitalization and intelligent machines to become a data-driven business, making a quantum performance leap.

Speaker: Iulia Malioukis, Senior Manager Digital & Innovation, Horvath & Partners

Panel: The Future Enterprise: Developing Digital Resiliency

Overview: After a massively stressful 2020, the 2021 came with huge challenges to accelerate digital business transformation while increasing agility and resiliency. The pandemic has dramatically increased the speed at which digital is fundamentally changing business. Many organizations are questioning their previous business model in the face of current uncertainties. The future will belong to companies that put technology on top of their agenda. How can companies develop the new digital enterprise agenda and how organizations can develop digital resiliency?

Speakers:

Andreea Ioniță, Chief Digital Technology Officer, E.ON România  

Valentin Stanescu, Country General Manager, Dell Technologies

Constantin Burdun, Director Adjunct certSIGN

Octavian Vitalariu,IT Director CEC, CIO Council Member

Moderator: Bogdan Tudor, Vicepresident CIO Council Romania                                    

Conclusions

Moderator: Yugo Neumorni, President CIO Council Romania