The GEONARDO Story 

Gábor Kitley is the co-founder and CEO of Geonardo. He has managed and coordinated research and innovation projects under the Framework Programmes since FP5. He has also developed and implemented projects under the Intelligent Energy Europe and LIFE programmes. Gábor’s experience in EU research and innovation projects cover the topics of energy efficiency in buildings, renewable energy, regional development, water management, decision-support systems, sustainable tourism, geothermal heating and training and capacity building. He graduated from Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, as a geologist with a second master degree in Environmental Law.

Ömer is the Managing Director of Geonardo. He has 15 years of direct hands-on experience in developing and implementing EU-funded projects and managing EC contracts in the energy, environment and sustainable development fields. He has a thorough knowledge of the European Union’s funding system and a sound understanding of the programming and implementation of various EU funding schemes and programmes and their interrelations. In particular, his knowledge spans across the EU’s energy, environment, sustainable development, competitiveness, research and innovation, enlargement and external policies and the associated funding schemes and programmes such as FP6/7, Horizon 2020, CIP Eco-innovation, LIFE/LIFE+, Structural Funds and EuropeAid. Ömer is an environmental engineer from Istanbul Technical University (ITU) and holds an MSc in Environmental Management from Aalborg University (AAU).

Gabriella has more than 15 years of international experience in conceiving and implementing EU-funded projects and EC contracts. Gabriella has managed and coordinated EU-funded projects under a broad range of programmes co-financing research, innovation, entrepreneurship, SME support, ICT and educational projects. Over the past few years she has been involved in several projects as a coordinator and as a partner mostly responsible for quality assurance, management, and dissemination/communication. She also has experience in event organisation, developing training and e-learning courses; she has been acting as a trainer since 2004. She has been an expert evaluator to the European Commission in CIP EIP/COSME and FP7/H2020 calls since 2007 and she was also an appraisal and monitoring agent for EEA grant mechanism programmes. Gabriella holds a Master of Science degree in Economics, having specialized in management consulting and European business. Her main areas of focus are on SME development and ICT-supported learning, game-based learning.

Krisztina has 10 years of experience in developing and managing EU-funded projects under Horizon 2020, FP7, CIP-IEE programmes. Previously, she acted as the National Contact Point for Twinning at the National Development Agency of Hungary, where she has gained hands-on experience in international affairs and EU policies. Krisztina has also experience in EC tenders and has been an evaluator to the European Commission. She holds an MSc degree in Agricultural Engineering from the University of Debrecen, Hungary.

Maria has over 13 years of experience in sustainable development and environmental project implementation. She was responsible for activities related to awareness raising, organization of events, contributor of publications, handling website content, communication and dissemination activities (newsletters, co-editor) in the topics such as adaptation and mitigation to climate change at an international environmental organization based in Hungary. Prior to joining Geonardo, she worked in the areas of solid and agriculture waste management and cooperation in rural communities (National Institute of Agricultural Researches in Venezuela) and conducted research on environmental management of protected areas. Maria holds a Licentiate Degree in Environmental Studies and an MSc. Degree in Environmental Science, Policy and Management.

Jelena has over 10 years of experience within organizations dealing with various types of projects. With a degree from the Faculty of Political Sciences of University of Belgrade, she started off in NGOs dealing with security projects and foreign policy. She changed her focus to education while working in the Erasmus+ National Agency of Serbia. Jelena was running a team of 9 employees in charge of trainings for applicants and evaluators, approving and monitoring projects related to VET, adult and school education, as well as managing implementation of two education networks in Serbia (eTwinning and EPALE).

Dóra is a project manager involved in Horizon 2020 projects at Geonardo. She holds a joint B.A in International Relations and Development Studies from the University of Sussex. She obtained her master’s degree at Lund University, MSc in Environmental Studies and Sustainability Science. During her master’s programme she became familiar with most up to date approaches to environmentally friendly solutions to sustainability problems. Her main interests include sustainable agriculture, policies enhancing environmental justice and circular economy solutions.

Dániel is a project manager involved in the implementation of Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe projects at Geonardo. He obtained his BSc from the University of Dundee and his MSc from the University of Gothenburg with a speciality in biology. Due to his education and prior experience, he has laboratory, field, and management experience. During his master's degree, he specialised in plant ecophysiology and has done his thesis work in Rwanda and Sweden investigating the climate sensitivity of tropical trees. Since then, he has worked in agriculture-based projects investigating the role of micronutrients and their effect on nitrogen use efficiency and crop performance and projects aiming to overcome difficulties in plant cultivation caused by a lack of water and nutrients.

Attila works part of our team at Geonardo as project manager, contributing to Horizon Europe projects on a diverse scale. Acquiring his degrees on the field of environmental sciences, he focused on water resource management during his MSc in Sweden and Austria.

During the years since, his scope of interest and gained experiences have branched out covering fields of waste- and wastewater management, nature-based solutions, and urban resilience. He also contributed to working on finding efficient means for reaching the Sustainability Development Goals in the V4 region as part of the V4SDG team.

Pursuing his PhD research at the Central European University, he investigates the resilience and vulnerability of regional water resource systems, accounting for the ecological, socio-economic and institutional aspects. At Geonardo, Attila works on projects connected to e.g. adaptive and resilient natural resource planning, citizen science, and disaster resilient societies.

Catalina is a communication manager at Geonardo, hailing from Romania, with 5 years of experience working in communications. She has worked on projects dealing with sustainability, science education, agriculture, and mineral exploration, on all tasks communication-related, be it social media campaigns, website management, writing blog posts and newsletters, and helping to organise events. Prior to joining the company, she has worked for a social media marketing start-up and completed two internships for the European Network Remembrance and Solidarity (in Warsaw) and British Council (in Cluj-Napoca) respectively. Catalina has an academic background in International Communication and Contemporary History and is passionate about politics, international relations, and culture(s). 

Gloria is a communication manager, responsible for the planning and implementation of communication and dissemination activities of various EU-funded projects, including COLLECTiEF, Train4Sustain and WIN-BIG.

She holds a master’s degree in International Relations and Diplomatic Affairs with a focus on EU governance from the University of Bologna in Italy and completed her university experience between Italy, Belgium and Canada. Her interests range from EU affairs and international politics to social justice, gender equality and environmental policies.

Diego is a creative professional from Spain, with experience in communication and innovation management. Currently serving as our communication manager, Diego is involved in high-impact projects such as MIND STEP, AgEnRes, and EUB SuperHub.

With a backround in Fine Arts, he channeled his creativity and organisation skills in a career on project management, taking on roles in Spanish companies like Inforges and Let's Flow, where he executed innovation initiatives rooted in Design Thinking. Additionally, Diego possesses expertise on community and communication management on an international scale, having collaborated with the Hungarian NGO Artemisszió Alapítvány in Budapest and its community center, Mira Ház.

Eszter is a Communications Manager with over 15 years of experience. She is involved in dissemination and communication activities and is responsible for stakeholder engagement and management in Geonardo's projects.

Rita is responsible for the content management and updating of Geonardo's online portals and tools. She also takes part in the implementation of Geonardo's projects utilising her skills in social media, marketing, dissemination and communication. She holds an MSc degree in Geography with a specialisation on Urban and Rural Development from the University of ELTE in Hungary.

Fruzsi is a Graphic Designer at EMG group, being responsible for the design of EMG group’s visual identity together with the design of different graphic elements and visual identities of Geonardo projects. She is graduated Graphic Designer from the Secondary School of Visual Arts of Budapest and is currently finishing her Master degree at the Hungarian University of Fine Arts also in Graphic Design.

Bese Pál is IT Director at Geonardo. overseeing the design, development and maintenance of the IT tools and platforms delivered by Geonardo. As a full stack developer, he has 15 years of experience in software development in the field of online services, e-learning and e-collaboration platforms, invoicing and time tracking tools, CMS and CRM systems, websites, decision support tools, thermal simulation engines running on different platforms (PHP, .NET, iOS) using the standards and technologies of HTML5, CSS3, MySQL, T-SQL, GIS, javascript, jQuery, Kendo, swift, JSON, MVC5, MapBox. Bese graduated from the Faculty of Sciences at Eötvös Lorand University.

Balázs is a database and business intelligence developer at EMG group. His main role is to maintain and develop the core system's database layer as well as to enhance content management tools. He is responsible for creating applications that provide the best user experience while supporting and fulfilling the requirements of BA. Balázs has a 5+ years experience as a database programmer and 2+ years as a full-stack developer.