Dr. George Katakalos · IT Director · Athens, Greece
I run IT for a regulated investment firm, and I make AI do real work in it.
For more than 13 years I've owned the full stack at HellasFin: infrastructure, Microsoft 365 and security, ISO 27001 compliance, and the in-house platform the business runs on. Lately, that includes putting AI into everyday operations.
- Leading IT since
- 2013
- Team
- 5 people · 34 users
- Locations
- 3 offices + Switzerland
- Education
- PhD, Sheffield
01
About
I lead IT for HellasFin, an investment advisory and wealth-management group with offices in Thessaloniki, Athens and Heraklion and a Swiss subsidiary. I report to the CEO and COO and lead a team of five: three developers, a management assistant and an IT support specialist who also covers product governance.
My work sits where three things meet: dependable infrastructure, provable security, and software that fits how a financial firm actually operates. For the past two years I have been applying AI to all three, from automating routine tasks to analysing our external perimeter and changing how our team builds software.
Before HellasFin I ran my own consultancy, built systems for university hospitals and research labs, and taught computer security at university level. I hold a PhD from the University of Sheffield and an MSc from Heriot-Watt University.
ISO 27001, identity, evidence
Leading the ISO/IEC 27001:2022 programme. Entra ID with Conditional Access, FIDO2 hardware keys, incident investigation and monitoring that produces a record, not just a dashboard.
Reliable, recoverable, lean
Windows Server, Hyper-V and VMware, site-to-site VPN across offices, Microsoft 365, and immutable offsite backup to Azure, sized for a firm of our scale.
Automation that earns its keep
AI-analysed Cloudflare monitoring, AI-assisted software development, and a private local assistant. Practical, measured, and safe for regulated data.
02
Experience
-
2013 — present
IT Director
HellasFin, investment advisory & wealth management · Thessaloniki / Athens
- Leading the ISO/IEC 27001:2022 implementation; hardened Microsoft Entra ID and rolled out FIDO2/PIV hardware keys.
- Migrated from SBS 2003 to Windows Server and Office 365; run a Hyper-V and VMware estate on Dell PowerEdge.
- Built immutable offsite backup for production VMs to Azure Blob Storage.
- Direct in-house development of ISP, our investment platform (C#/.NET, SQL Server, REST API for the mobile apps).
- Two years of AI-driven automation, including AI-analysed Cloudflare monitoring of all our websites, portals and APIs.
-
2008 — 2015
Founder & Principal Consultant
ISTConsultants · Thessaloniki
- Web-based lab system linking oncology labs in Thessaloniki, Ioannina and Athens with three hospitals.
- IT support, VPN and FTP infrastructure for university clinics and the Hellenic Cooperative Oncology Group.
-
2000 — 2008
Earlier roles
Developer, administrator and lecturer
- Course instructor in Computer Security, New York College (2005–2008).
- Programme manager and conference-platform developer for WONCA Europe 2005, ELEGEIA.
- Website administrator, South-East European Research Centre; lab administrator, CITY College.
03
Selected projects
Work I designed or directed. Company systems are described at a high level only.
ISP, Investment Services Platform
C# · .NET · SQL Server · REST API
The firm's core platform, covering contracts, portfolios, trading, billing, custody and regulatory reporting. Includes a Corporate Actions module for 16 event types and an audit-trail module across every part of the system.
AI-Agents framework
Claude Code skills · PowerShell · Python
A shared library of AI agent skills for planning, implementing, verifying and reviewing code. It enabled a colleague with no programming background to deliver complex features.
Cloudflare Security Monitoring Suite
PowerShell 7 · SQL Server · Cloudflare API · Claude API
Long-term security history, rule-change tracking and a weekly AI briefing for three websites, all on Cloudflare's free plan.
GeorgeAI, a private local assistant
Python · Ollama · Qwen 27B · Qdrant · Mem0
A bilingual assistant that runs fully offline on a laptop, with long-term memory, hybrid search, Microsoft 365 administration and security-audit tooling.
04
Education & research
Degrees
- PhD, eLearning & Multicultural Communication
University of Sheffield, SEERC · 2003–2010 - MSc, Distributed Multimedia & Information Systems
Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh · 2000–2001 - BSc (Hons), Computer Science
CITY College, University of Sheffield · 1997–2000
Selected publications
- Addressing multiculturalism for e-learning in higher education environments: a view of South East Europe. IADIS MCCSIS, 2011.
- Conflicts arising from communication, collaboration and cooperation of students in multicultural groups engaged in e-learning activities. EDEN Annual Conference, Lisbon, 2008.
- Multiculturalism for e-learning in post-Bologna higher education environments. EDEN Annual Conference, Lisbon, 2008.
- Current state of the Greek higher education system: the challenges ahead. International Learning Conference, 2006.