Speakers

Don Peppers Don Peppers

Recognized for more than 20 years as one of the world’s leading authorities on customer-focused business strategies, Don Peppers is an acclaimed author and a founding partner of Peppers & Rogers Group, the world’s premier customer-centric management consulting firm. The firm has clients on six continents, and Don has personally counseled or consulted for many of the world’s largest firms including Microsoft, Bank of America, British Airways, T-Mobile, Merck, HP, Syngenta, USAA, Saudi Telecom, Singapore Telecom, Absa Bank, and GM, among others.
As a much sought-after speaker with a popular voice and vast following in the worldwide business media, Don is also highly regarded as a strategic thinker:
·       The Times of London included Don on its list of the "Top 50 Business Brains."
·       Accenture’s Institute for Strategic Change listed Don as one of the 50 "most important living business thinkers" in the world.
·       The U.K.’s Chartered Institute for Marketing called Don one of the "most influential thinkers in marketing and business today."
·       With business partner Martha Rogers, Don was selected to speak at the 2013 SXSW Interactive Festival.
·       With more than 150,000 followers for his regular postings of original content on LinkedIn (and growing everyday), Don is one of the 60 most followed LinkedIn members today, worldwide. He has also been listed numerous times on LinkedIn as one of the Top 10 Marketing Influencers.
Don Peppers’ thought leadership, keynote presentations, and executive workshops routinely focus on the business issues that today’s global enterprises are grappling with, while trying to maintain a competitive edge in their marketplace. These include:
·       Building stronger customer relationships, better customer experiences, and trust;
·       Stimulating innovative thinking and benefiting from new ideas within a firm;
·       Engaging employees in order to create a stronger, more competitive corporate culture;
·       Dealing with social media, customer advocacy, and increasing levels of business transparency;
·       Balancing long- and short-term financial goals by focusing on customer value; and
·       Using scientific reasoning to make better decisions, based on data.
With co-author Martha Rogers, Ph.D., Peppers has produced a legacy of international best-sellers that collectively sold well over a million copies in 18 languages. Peppers’ and Rogers’ latest book, their ninth together, is Extreme Trust: Honesty as a Competitive Advantage (Penguin 2012). Extreme Trust chronicles how the transparency brought on by newly available interactive platforms (particularly including social media) has raised the service standard that businesses are expected to meet.   
Among the other best-sellers authored by Peppers & Rogers, their first – The One to One Future (1993) – was named by Inc. magazine’s editor as "one of the two or three most important business books ever written," while Business Week called it the "bible of the customer strategy revolution." As a testament to this, Don Peppers and Martha Rogers were inducted into the Direct Marketing Association Hall of Fame in 2013.
Prior to founding Peppers & Rogers Group, Don served as the CEO of a top-20 direct marketing agency (Perkins/Butler Direct Marketing, a division of Chiat/Day), and his 1995 book Life’s a Pitch: Then You Buy (1995) chronicles his exploits as a celebrated new-business rainmaker in the advertising industry. Prior to Madison Avenue, he worked as an economist in the oil industry, and as the director of accounting for a regional airline. He holds a B.S. in astronautical engineering from the U.S. Air Force Academy and a Master’s in Public Affairs from Princeton University’s Woodrow Wilson School. He is a competitive runner and very happily married father of five.

Stefan Bumov Stefan Bumov

Stefan Bumov is a Chairman of the Bulgarian Outsourcing Association - a branch organisation which aims to consolidate the interests of companies that offer outsourcing services, boost the competitiveness of the environment and create additional conditions to bolster foreign investments in the sector.
Stefan Bumov is the General Manager of Sofica Group for Bulgaria and Macedonia, Vice President Operations, CEE for TeleTech Holdings Inc. and a member of the Board of Directors. He has led the company and its growth from 30 to over 800 employees since 2007. Prior to joining Sofica Group he held senior positions in HP, including Sales Manager for Bulgaria and Sales Strategy and Development Manager for CEE, the Middle East and Africa.

Ivan Totev Ivan Totev

Dipl. Ing. Ivan Totev is born on 28.10.1975 in Plovdiv. He is Master of Engineering with Diploma from Technical University Sofia, major Computer System and Technologies.
In May 2010 he is awarded Master Degree from the Faculty of Law at Plovdiv University "Paisiy Hilendarski", major Public Administration. He received excellent mark for his Thesis on "Regional policies of the European Union on security and stability. The Black Sea Synergy – the new EU initiative in the Black Sea region". He starts his career in 1997 as a graphic designer in a Publishing House.
From 2001 to 2004 he works as Project Manager in a software company. From 2004 to 2007 he is a Technical Director in a hotel complex.

In November 2007 he wins the majority vote, and is elected for Mayor of District East, Plovdiv. At the Parliament Elections in 2009 he is the leader of the list of Political Party GERB for 16th Election District Plovdiv. He is MP in the 41st National Assembly for the period July – August 2009. From 12.08.2009 to October 2011 he is Governor of Plovdiv District. With Resolution of the Council of Ministers from November 2009 he is elected as a member of the Government Decentralization Council, presided by the Minister of Regional Development and Public Works. The Council was established as consultative body of Government, and its task is to coordinate the implementation of the Decentralization Strategy and its program. In October 2009 he is elected as representative of South Central District in the Monitoring Committee of Operational Program "Regional Development" and the Monitoring Committee of OP "Human Resources". In September 2011 he was nominated as mayoral candidate of PP GERB and on 30.10.2011 he is elected as Mayor of Plovdiv.


















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Dimitar Nikolov Dimitar Nikolov

Mayor of Bourgas
Professional realization:

2006 – Manager of "KBC" Ltd. – Burgas
1998-2006 Executive director of "Pobeda" S.A.
Education:
Higher economic education – Economic University – Moscow
Professional diploma in management and Professional certificate in management – Open University and NBU (New Bulgarian University)
Master’s degree in financial management – SA Svishtov
Public Activities:
Deputy chairman of BTPP (Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry) – Burgas
Chairman of the Consultative business council – Burgas
Chairman of the Commission for economy and investments in the Town council – Burgas
Regional representative of KRIB (Confederation of the employers and industrialists in Bulgaria) for the Burgas district
Awards:
"Burg of the year" for 2005
Winner of "Dimitar Brakalov" prize – 2005 – for charity and contribution in the development of Burgas
Winner of the "Hermes" statuette of the Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry for 2004 and 2005
Member of the University board of BSU (Burgas Free University)

Venislav Iotov Venislav Iotov

Venislav Yotov joined AIG in Bulgaria in 2008 as an Executive Director of the company and from 2012 he is General Manager of the Romanian and Bulgarian branches of AIG Europe Ltd. Prior to that he has worked for the Bulgarian American Enterprise Fund, BNP-Dresdner Bank Bulgaria and the Ministry of Trade.
He holds MSc degrees from the Technical University in Sofia and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, US. He had also passed the specialization from the French Bulgarian Institute for Marketing and Management "Markom " in Sofia. He speaks English, Spanish and French.
Venislav Yotov was elected Member of the Board of Directors of AMCHAM Bulgaria in 2014 while prior to that he was a member of the Board of the Bulgarian International Business Association (BIBA) for four years. He has been Chairman of the Association of the Insurers in Bulgaria (2004-2006) and a Deputy Chairman. He is a Member of the Board of Trustees of the Tulip Foundation since 2008.
At the end of 2013 AIG Europe Ltd decided to open one of the shared services center in Sofia. Currently there are 350 employees servicing policy administration and claims settlement for 17 European countries. It is expected the number of the employees in the center in Sofia to reach 550 people within the next 18 months.



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Plamen Tsekov Plamen Tsekov

Plamen Tsekov has over 15 years’ experience in IT industry in Bulgaria. He is the CEO (Chief Executive Officer) of the software development and outsourcing firm ScaleFocus. Under his leadership the company is now one of the fastest-growing ones’ on Bulgarian software market. ScaleFocus has income of 5,43 MBGN for 2013 and for 2014 it has almost 100% growth (9,55 MBGN). Company’s employees are now over 200 fully-time professionals. For the last 3 years ScaleFocus opened offices in 4 European cities – Sofia, London, Plovdiv and Munich. From December 2014 Plamen Tsekov is member of the board of Bulgarian Outsourcing Association (BOA).

Nikolay Neov Nikolay Neov

Nikolay Neov has a long-standing experience the commercial real estate industry.  He started his career in the USA in 2002 where he was involved in market research and analyses. In the beginning of 2006 he joined the investment and corporate advisory team of Colliers in Bulgaria. Since 2007 Nikolay has been actively involved in the development of MBL|CBRE with a responsibility for the Office Agency, which has established itself in the past 5 years as a market leader in the office space segment, facilitating some of the most significant transactions.
Throughout the years Nikolay and his team have successfully serviced a number of international and local companies including names like Experian, Pfizer, Lenovo, Actavis, Oracle, Lexmark, Nokia, GE, Renault Nissan, NSN, Cargill, C3, and Gameloft in their capacity as tenants as well as many landlords like Soravia, Robul, Erste Group Immorent, Landmark Property Bulgaria and many others. Nikolay holds an MBA in International Business from the American University in Washington DC.

Greg Russell Greg Russell

Greg joined Unify in June 2014 as Senior Vice President Transformation & Services.  He started his career with Procter & Gamble but cut his teeth in designing and delivering transformation programmes at British Airways. He then progressed through a number of executive international roles combining operational and transformational responsibilities at companies including Rolls-Royce, T-Mobile, Cable & Wireless & Tui.  Histime in Telecoms taught him to manage rapid growth and also decline. He has worked with a range of private equity (PE) organisations in a similar capacity, thereby enabling him to combine the best of the corporate and PE cultures.

Markus Kempkes Markus Kempkes

Markus Kempkes joined KPMG IT Germany in March 2015 and is Managing Director of KPMG IT Service OOD. 
He is specialized in enabling IT dependent businesses with his expertise in all strategic aspects including go-to market approach, portfolio optimization, HR and recruitment, alliances, joined ventures and acquisitions and sourcing to near shore/offshore locations.
Markus started his professional career as a software developer and analyst in the real estate industry. After founding and building up his own IT services company in the 1990ies, he decided to join Sapient as a Director Technology to gain international experience in large software outsourcing projects in India, USA and Germany. Markus has been with Microsoft for seven years where he worked as a group manager in the consulting business unit, optimizing sales, sourcing and delivery for complex international software implementation projects. Before he joined KPMG Markus he was founder and CEO of Auxo/cloudpartner.de. Auxo provided a cloud platform for the medium-sized businesses.
Mr. Kempkes studied Mathematics and Computer Science at TU Berlin; he is fluent in German and English.

Marcin Nowak Marcin Nowak

Delivery Centre Director Eastern Europe at Capgemini and Head of ABSL Silesia
Marcin’s role in Capgemini involves supporting  Polish and Romanian Rightshore operations and delivery from fives Delivery Centers based in Eastern Europe. Through over 1500+ employees he is managing support delivered to  Capgemini Customers located across the whole world but mostly in  North America and Europe. On top of that Marcin is heading ABSL (Association of Service Business Leaders) Silesia community. The ABSL is a leading organization representing the business services sector in Poland. ABSL Members include companies which conduct business in the area of Shared Services Center (SSC), Business Process Outsourcing (BPO), Information Technology Outsourcing (ITO), Research and Development (R&D). Marcin was graduated as Master of Science on Technical University in Krakow and Master of Business Administration on Capital Business University in Warsaw. He has over 15 years of experience on management and board positions in organizations from bio-medical diagnostic, IT and outsourcing industry sector, working previously with Hoechst AG, Dade-Behring and Siemens on  Board Member and Leadership positions.
 

David Hand David Hand

David joined ACCA in November 2013 as Head of SSO Market Development. Currently residing in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, he is responsible for ACCA’s strategy for the SSO Sector, working with major companies, governments and other agencies across the globe to drive both growth and standards within the SSO sector.
Originally from the UK, David began his career as an accountant and has performed a wide range of Shared Services and BPO roles over the past 17 years. Working for major multinationals such as GE, AstraZeneca and Genpact he has first-hand experience both as a provider and customer of SSCs and BPOs. He has set-up new Shared Service Centres, led a team of over 200 professionals providing finance BPO services, managed transitions and performed vendor selections.






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Zhulieta Mandazhieva Zhulieta Mandazhieva

Zhulieta Mandazhieva, Attorney-at-law, is a co-founding partner at the Tocheva & Mandazhieva Law Office ("T&M"). She has an expertise in banking and finance, M&A transactions, energy  and environmental law. Listed in Chambers and Partners Europe as a leading lawyer in Banking and Finance and Corporate and Commercial. Zhulieta heads the TMT practice in T&M and possesses extensive experience in the field. She is admitted and registered as Industrial Property Representative with the Bulgarian Patent Office. Zhulieta co-founded T&M after being a Head of the Legal Department of BenchMark Group in the period of 2003 – 2006 as well as an in-house lawyer of Elana Fund Management Company for the period 2002 – 2003. Zhulieta acted as a project leader of Samsung’s acquisition of SPVs in Bulgaria owning renewable energy projects across the country (initially, the Project which started back in 2011, required the conducting of legal due diligence of the targets and the structuring of an acquisition and divestment strategy and respective transactions). She also took an active role in the drafting and negotiations of the O&M agreements for the acquired projects and advised the client on its subsequent operation in a rapidly changing regulatory environment. Since 2002, Zhulieta's extensive experience in the financial services secor included the licensing of investment intermediaries, mutual funds, investment and management companies and the passportization of payment institutions; drafting of legal opinions on the cross border offering of payment services within the EU; the preparation of a full set of MIFID compliant documents for the offering and trading (selling) of OTC derivatives for a foreign owned Bulgarian bank; the representation of the issuer and the drafting of the legal contents of all relevant documents, including the approved prospectus, for both initial and secondary public offering of shares, advising professional and non-professional investors, issuers and financial services companies on the market manipulation, insider trading and disclosure issues.
In the period 2007 – 2009 Zhulieta was also the project leader in advising RWE Power AG jointly with Linklaters on their legal due diligence of the Belene Nuclear Power Plant Project and the negotiations and drafting of the Joint Venture Agreement for the acquisition of a 49% stake in the future Belene project company with the Bulgarian National Electricity Company.
Starting from 2006, Zhulieta advises Tishman International on the corporate aspects of its acquisition of the Sofia Airport Centre project company and the subsequent development of their logistics and business park. Since 2005, Zhulieta has been regularly advising Tishman International on an array of M&A and capital restructuring matters for their investments in Bulgaria.
Zhulieta graduated from the Law Faculty of Sofia University in Sofia in 2001 and became a member of Sofia Bar Association in 2004.
In the beginning of 2013 she was certified as a qualified mediator under the Bulgarian Mediators Act.
In addition to her native Bulgarian, Zhulieta speaks fluent English and German.

George Gueorguiev George Gueorguiev

 George Gueorguiev holds the position of Country Manager at Adecco Bulgaria, part of Adecco Group, based in Zurich, Switzerland. In Bulgaria, Adecco is a leading consulting company in the field of human resources. It provides services in search and selection, temporary staffing, project management and other specialized areas to leading international and IT companies. The two Adecco offices are located in major cities in Bulgaria and works with some of the biggest IT and BPO businesses in the country.

George Gueorguiev has more than 14 years experience in management of local and international companies, among which are Xerox, Sciant (VMWare) & CableTel.  Before Adecco, he occupied the position of Regional Director (South-East Europe) at Motorola Bulgaria, as well as CEO in Bulgaria.  

George Gueorguiev has been a member of the board of directors at The American Chamber of Commerce in Bulgaria for two consecutive terms – from January 2008 to January 2012. As a member of the organization, George Gueorguiev is committed to a number of initiatives for the development of the Bulgarian economy and is focused on making Bulgaria an attractive country to international businesses.

George Gueorguiev graduated from a high school in California, The USA. He acquired his Bachelor Degree in Business Administration and Applied Economics from The American University in Bulgaria, Blagoevgrad.

Iglika Yordanova Iglika Yordanova

Iglika Yordanova joined Colliers team in 2002. She played a key role in the structuring of the Retail department and the company positioning as a market leader. Over the past 8 years, Iglika and her team have worked exclusively on projects such as The Mall, Mall of Sofia, Mall of Plovdiv, Grand Mall, Burgas Plaza, Park Mall. Among their most significant achievements were the consulting services they provided throughout the expansion of retail giants such as Inditex, H&M, Peek & Cloppenburg, New Yorker and Carrefour on the Bulgarian market. Since 2008, Iglika has been actively involved in Colliers Bulgaria operations in her capacity of a member of the management team.
At the beginning of 2013 Iglika was promoted to Deputy Managing Director and soon afterwards in July same year became the Managing Director of the company. Her previous working experience is in the FMCG sector.

Georgi Stoev Georgi Stoev

 Georgi Stoev is founder and managing partner of Industry Watch - research and consulting company focused on macroeconomic development and economic policy. Among the most important analytical products developed by Georgi Stoev and Industry Watch team are IT&BPO Destination Plovdiv, Regular Report on Cost of Labor, Financial Wealth and Housing Market, Investment Destination Plovdiv. Georgi Stoev is one of the economists who in the last 15 years insist hardly on low taxes, market oriented reforms and minimal state intervention in the economy.