Virtual trip group profile

Virtual Trip Group Materializing Innovation

High Technology ICT Products & Services www.vtripgroup.com | [email protected]



THE VIRTUAL TRIP GROUP

Virtual Trip is an EU‐based group of high‐growth start up companies that materialize innovation to offer a range of simple, complete, and cost efficient products and services.

Solo Gateway is a product range that addresses the need of both SMEs and larger firms for simplicity and automation in their IT and telco infrastructure by offering all that functionality (e.g. file server, email server, VoIP, fax, etc) in a single box. It offers a uniquely integrated and cost competitive solution in a strongly growing market.

eFront is a comprehensive interactive eLearning platform that helps organizations address their need to provide global‐scale eLearning capabilities. Offering a solution targeted to SMEs and educational institutes, it is well positioned in a market fragmented between expensive, complex offerings targeted at Fortune 500 firms and incomplete, hard to install and use open‐source offerings.

StudyBox is an online assistive learning service helping pupils with their university admission exams. It offers high quality interactive content as well as a complete feature set including integration with social networking sites such as Facebook. StudyBox offers the only solution in the large, underserved market of online learning for senior high school pupils, with initial focus on the Greek market.

Mobile Social is a mobile social networking platform, integrated with Facebook, where subscribers are able to share content, communicate, and compete with each other in online games. It is currently a successful B2B offering, in use by most mobile operators in Greece. Our roadmap is to make mobile social a leading global platform for user‐generated applications, in a model similar to Facebook’s but targeted towards mobile users.

Insurance Manager is a product addressing the complex needs of insurance agencies including the management of contracts, customer relationships, agency and insurance mediator relationships, and cross‐agency information sharing. Insurance Manager offers a complete solution at a very competitive price point and addresses the needs of both agents and freelancers.

Services and solutions provided by group subsidiaries include the sales order system implemented for OTE (the largest telecom operator in Greece), the secure document issuing system implemented for the Greek police service, GIS systems developed for the Hellenic Army’s Geographical Service as well as for the Navy Hydrographical Service, e‐Government and voice portals, a satellite data archival system for the Met service, and advanced hardware prototypes for the Hellenic Army.

THE GROUP Virtual Trip is a leading entrepreneurial ecosystem consisted by 13 dynamic companies, eleven based in Greece, Heraklion & Athens, one based in Madrid, Spain and one based in Akron, Ohio ‐ US.



The entrepreneurial ecosystem has grown organically, boosted by the strong entrepreneurial drive of the founding team, since the establishment of its first member, Virtual Trip Ltd, in year 2000 at the Science & Technology Park of Crete, Greece.

Virtual Trip is widely recognized as the first successful high‐tech start up effort in Greece as well as one of the fastest‐growing companies in the domestic high‐tech market, having grown by a factor of 75 in terms of revenue and by a factor of 12 in terms of staff in less than nine ears. Its 2008 revenues surpassed €7.5M, with net profits of more than €1M.

The Group companies offer their broad spectrum of high‐tech ICT products and services to the international market.

Virtual Trip recently introduced the concept of the "Entrepreneurial Ecosystem" and became member of EBAN ‐ the European Trade Association for Business Angels, Seed Funds, & Early Stage Market Players, as an early stage / seed capital fund.

The Virtual Trip Entrepreneurial Ecosystem currently includes the following companies: Virtual Trip Ltd, Epignosis Ltd, MVNS SA, NGLS SA, IT Center Ltd, Solo Gateway SA, Insurance Manager SA, S4Trips Ltd, Diagramma Ltd, VERITA Ltd, Actech LLC and Virtual Trip España SL. All of these twelve companies are subsidiaries and receive incubation services by Virtual Trip Holdings SA.

The Virtual Trip vision is to create a sustainable, growing entrepreneurial ecosystem including a large number of non‐competing, high‐technology companies offering products and services for the international ICT marketThe Virtual Trip Group consists of thirteen start‐up companies operating in the Information and Communication Technologies market. Eleven of them are based in Greece, one in Madrid, Spain and one in Akron, Ohio, US.

Virtual Trip introduced the concept of the “Entrepreneurial Ecosystem” in October 2009 as a “group of non‐competing companies, including start‐ups, established companies and one or more coordination entities, which share the same vision, values, culture, strategy and business processes and decide to form an organization in order to explore economies of scale in business functions such as business development, financing, market analysis, marketing communications, IT / MIS infrastructure, human capital management, legal support, financial & accounting managemen.”.

The distribution of the Group’s products is achieved through an extended international network of value‐added reselling partners with strong technical competencies and deep knowledge of their local market.

THE GROUP’S COMPANIES Virtual Trip Holding SA, www.vtrigroup.com, founded in 2009 in Athens, Greece. It provides the administrative and technology infrastructure that support the Group’s operations and manages business development, investments and financing.

Virtual Trip Ltd, www.vtrip.net, founded in 2000 in Heraklion, Greece. Virtual Trip is the leading member of the Virtual Trip Entrepreneurial Ecosystem



along with Epignosis Ltd, MVNS SA, NGLS SA, SOLO Gateway SA, Insurance Manager SA, IT Center Ltd, Diagramma Ltd, S4Trips Ltd, VERITA Ltd, Virtual Trip Espana SL, and Actech LLC.

It is a network‐centric software development company founded in September 2000 by a team of Computer Engineers and "Critical Publics", a consulting firm. The company currently employs 35 engineers, all with university degrees in Computer Science, while most of them also hold Masters and PhD degrees. Currently, Virtual Trip offers development, consulting and integration services in the following fields: 1. Network‐centric information systems, 2. Systems & networks, 3. Geographical information systems, 4. Mobile applications & services, 5. Voice portals and multi‐channel applications.

Epignosis Ltd, www.epignosis.com.gr, founded in 2003 in Aspropyrgos, Greece. EPIGNOSIS Ltd is a fast growing, dynamic, technology oriented eLearning company. Based in Athens – Greece, it’s a member of Virtual Trip, an EU‐based Group of high‐tech companies. EPIGNOSIS Ltd, is the vendor of “eFront” e‐Learning platform, envisages e‐Learning 2.0 as the dominant approach for human capital development, education & training services. Following a thorough market research, it became obvious that users’ frustrations with eLearning software presented a compelling market opportunity. The cost of Enterprise eLearning tools was also too high while current open‐source eLearning tools lacked a professional, expansible and most importantly a beauty touch. There was exactly the chance to “make the world a better place” by developing a "refreshing" learning experience through a tool that would be “fun” to use. “eFront” enables functions such as community learning, supports the principle of collective knowledge and provides functionality towards personalized learning. eFront bridges the gap between Enterprise, Educational, Open‐Source and Proprietary learning.

Solo Gateway S.A., www.sologateway.com, founded in 2009 in Athens, Greece. It offers the SOLO Gateway product line, which is distributed through a global network of partners. The SOLO Gateway product line provides the following: 1. SOLO Small Business Gateway, a s/w Unified Communications and Server solution for Small to Medium Businesses, 2. SOLO Telco Gateway, a platform for Telco Operators and ISPs, to deploy Unified Communications services through the use of a specialized Appliance, 3. SOLO Enterprise Gateway, a high‐availability, high‐performance and high‐capacity Unified Communications and Server solution for Medium and Large Enterprises, 4. SOLO Home Gateway, a complete digital home solution with automation, security and networking features. Our product line reflects our corporate motto: "Simple. Complete. All You Need."

Insurance Manager S.A., www.insurancemanager.gr, is a new Virtual Trip Spin‐out which was founded in 2009. It provides software solutions for the insurance market by people that are specialized in that area. Our vision is to provide high quality and low cost products that solve real problems of our customers. Our flagship software package, Insurance Manager is a product addressing the complex needs of insurance agencies including the management of contracts, customer relationships, agency and insurance mediator relationships, and cross‐agency information sharing. Insurance Manager offers a complete solution at a very competitive price point and addresses the needs of both agents and freelancers.



Next Generation Learning Services S.A., www.ngls.com.gr, founded in 2006 in Athens, Greece. It delivers the online StudyBox service for eLearning.

IT Center Ltd, www.itcenter.gr, founded in 2007 in Athens, Greece. It is a new franchise‐based network of specialized ICT stores focusing on SMEs.

mVision Network Solutions SA, www.mvns.eu, is a Greek start‐up company founded in 2008 as a new Virtual Trip Spin out to address market needs in the field of Mobile Applications & Services. MVNS is a technology and service provider developing mobile services based on content delivery through multiple channels including mobile to fixed internet. The company’s primary focus is directed at selling software platforms to Mobile Network Operators, specifically their Value Added Service divisions.

Actech LLC, www.actechco.com, has been founded by Virtual Trip and a team of experienced Business and IT professionals to serve as the SOLO Gateway distributor for the US market. Based in Akron, Ohio, Actech builds and supports a country‐wide distribution network for SOLO Gateway, which is an all‐in‐one Unified Communications solution for Small Businesses. It provides all communication and computing infrastructure that is needed by modern offices, highly integrated, with minimal setup and configuration overhead.

VERITA Ltd, www.veritadv.com, is the vendor of the homonym platform for Verifiable, Targeted Advertising in the form of Digital Signage. This new company has already a major customer in Greece: The confederation of pharmacies owners cooperatives, in the context of which digital signage systems will be installed in 5,300 pharmacies around Greece.

S4Trips Ltd, www.s4trips.com, is the vendor of the S4Trips on‐line mediation platform which allows travel agents to easily deploy B2C reservation portals.

Diagramma Ltd, www.diagramma.biz, is the vendor of the homonym Student Information System, initially developed by Virtual Trip and later span‐out as a separate company.

Virtual Trip España SL, www.vtripgroup.com, is the first from a dozen of international Antenna Offices which the Virtual Trip Entrepreneurial Ecosystem plans to establish around the Globe. The mission of the Antenna Offices is to gather market intelligence for their Region, to locate, acquire and support a local Distribution and VAR Partners network and to manage local key Accounts. Virtual Trip España SL performs these functions for Iberia and Northern African countries.

THE MANAGEMENT TEAM Executive Board

Dimitris Tsigos, Group Founder & CEO

Dimitris is one of the founders of Virtual Trip Ltd, the first successful student start‐up in Greece. He also co‐founded Epignosis Ltd, the vendor of the eFront e‐learning platform, subsequently he took over InfoMap SA, the leading Greek GIS solutions provider, leading to the creation of Virtual Trip Group. Previously he was a guest researcher at the



Computational Vision and Active Perception Laboratory of the Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, and a member of the Networks and Telecommunications Research Group of the Institute of Computer Science at the Foundation for Research and Technology, Hellas (ICS/FORTH). He holds a Diploma in Computer Science from the University of Crete and an MBA from the Athens University of Economics and Business. In May 2006, Dimitris was nominated for the Special Prize of the University of Crete for Continued Entrepreneurial Development and in May 2007 he was elected president of the Hellenic Association of Computer Scientists & Engineers. In September 2008 he was elected president of the Federation of Hellenic Young Entrepreneurs Association.

Vangelis Zeginoglou, Group Business Development Director

Vangelis is responsible for ensuring the growth and development of the group’s business. During his 35‐year career prior to joining the group he he has held a number of senior technical and management positions including Technical Supervisor in Amber Computer Company and Hewlett Packard, Customer Support Manager in Hewlett Packard and Sun Microsystems, Business Development manager and later Director in Sun Microsystems responsible for the support business of 42 Countries with 5 direct subsidiary offices (Greece, Turkey, Israel, South Africa and Kazakhstan) and dealer channel on the other countries with total budget of about $50 M and direct employee 62 local staff, Business Development Manager in TUV Austria Hellas. Vangelis holds a BSc. in Electrical & Electronic Engineering from Portsmouth University, UK.

Dr. Evangelos Kotsovinos, Group Chief Strategy Officer

Evangelos, Virtual Trip Group CSO since June 2009, is a Vice President at Morgan Stanley, where he leads initiatives in the space of hosting, virtualization, and cloud computing. His focus is on improving the business value of global‐scale enterprise infrastructures by combining novel technologies with entrepreneurial business models and strategies that improve efficiency, manageability, flexibility, and reliability. Before joining Morgan Stanley, Evangelos was a Senior Research Scientist at T‐Labs, where he helped develop an R&D project into a VC‐funded Internet start‐up. Evangelos has pioneered the field of cloud computing, authored several peer‐reviewed publications and served as a program committee member and reviewer in numerous top conferences and journals. He holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of NewCred Ltd, the UK’s fastest growing credit union.

Non‐Executive Board

Prof. Christos N. Nikolaou, Non Executive President

Christos is a Professor of the Department of Computer Science, University of Crete in Heraklion, Crete, Greece. He received a Diploma in Mechanical and Electrical Engineering in 1979 from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece, an MSc degree in Applied



Mathematics in 1979 and a PhD degree in Applied Mathematics in 1982, both from Harvard University, USA. Christos has recently worked as a strategist, an administrator who promotes innovation, and as an educator and researcher. He is developing new opportunities for cooperation and/or employment as a strategist, a business developer (especially in the high technology sector) or a researcher for applied R&D in the Informatics and Communications Technology (ICT) area. His areas of expertise include high‐tech R&D policy and planning, management of large organizations, business and R&D projects development, e‐business, business process transformation.

Andreas Stefanidis, Non Executive Director

Andreas is the President of the Hellenic Association of Young Entrepreneurs in Athens, and the General Secretary of the Federation of Hellenic Associations of Young Entrepreneurs ‐ OESYNE, (www.esyne.gr). OESYNE is the National member of the European Confederation of Young Entrepreneurs, YES for Europe. (www.yesforeurope.eu). He is also the founder and Managing Director of the Hellenic Management Accounting Centre, (www.helmac.eu). In 2007, Mr. Stefanidis founded a not‐for‐ profit organization, the Academy of Entrepreneurship, in order to offer short specialized courses to innovative young entrepreneurs of Greece and the surrounding countries of the Balkans and Turkey. Andreas has been teaching Financial, Managerial and Cost Accounting courses at the New York College Group of Companies since 1995 and also at the State University of New York at New Paltz since 2004 as visiting faculty. He has been offering vocational seminars in Entrepreneurship and Management Accounting to young entrepreneurs in Greece and other European countries. Andreas holds a BSc in Accounting & Economics from the State University of New York, New Paltz and he is partially qualified Chartered Management Accountant from the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants – CIMA.