CORE Innovation Days #2: From Industry Challenges to Deployed Solutions — and the people who made it real
Markela Kerkezou | January 27th 2025
CORE Innovation Days #2: From Industry Challenges to Deployed Solutions — and the people who made it real
A two-day event driving industrial innovation.
Some events you attend for the agenda. Others stay with you because of the atmosphere: the quiet sense that everyone in the room is here for something bigger than their own organisation, and that the conversations are not only interesting, but necessary. CORE Innovation Days #2 was very much the second kind.
With the slogan “From industry challenges to deployed solutions,” the conference genuinely delivered what it promised. It didn’t begin with shiny tech slides. It began with the real friction points: the gaps, the readiness issues, the “we tried this before” scepticism that so many industrial environments carry. Then, step by step, it moved toward solutions that are already being deployed, measured, and improved. And throughout it all, it felt deeply human. A room full of people who care about Europe’s industrial future, and who are willing to do the careful work required to make innovation actually stick.
Opening: setting the tone with purpose
Day 1 started with warm greetings and opening remarks from:
Stefanos Kokkorikos & Dr. Nikos Kyriakoulis, Co-Founders & Managing Partners, CORE Innovation Group, and
Stavros Kalafatis, Deputy Minister of Development & Investments, Hellenic Ministry of Development and Investments.
Their message was clear from the first moments: collaboration, innovation, and digital transformation are not buzzwords. They are the drivers of Europe’s industrial competitiveness.
Shortly after, Stefanos Kokkorikos returned to the stage with a keynote that anchored the whole day in tangible results:
“Twin4Twin – Turning Purpose into Impact,” presenting the Twin4Twin EU Project’s achievements, vision, and impact. It was a reminder that when European projects are done well, they don’t stay inside presentations. They show up in real workflows, real decisions, and real production environments.
Session A: Technology & Innovation for Industry
The first session set the baseline and did it candidly. Where are we now? What holds adoption back? What needs to change for the transition to accelerate?
Key takeaway: transformation is already underway, but faster adoption requires collaboration, digital maturity, and targeted support to close the readiness gap.
Speakers:
Maggie Athanassiadi (SEV Hellenic Federation of Enterprises), “Bridging the Gap: Unresolved Industrial Challenges and Tech Adoption in Greece”
Raimund Klein (INCIT), “The 90% Problem: Why Industrial AI Readiness is Leaving Manufacturers Behind”
Dr. Denia Kanellopoulou (NCSR “DEMOKRITOS”), “PHAROS: Greece’s Initiative to Accelerate AI Adoption in Southeastern Europe”
Moderator: Dr. Nikos Kyriakoulis (CORE Innovation Group)
Session B: Industrial Challenges
Session B stayed close to industrial reality across manufacturing, process, and mining. It didn’t flatten differences between sectors, but it did underline what they share.
Key takeaway: challenges vary, but the need for interoperability, collaboration, and targeted digital adoption is universal.
Speakers:
Yannis Mamekas (COSMOS ALUMINIUM S.A.), “Cosmos Aluminium: New Era, New Challenges”
Mark Rachovides (Euromines), “Mining the Future in Europe”
Milan Kumar (Automotive Industry),
Moderator: Nikos Frangakis (CORE Innovation Group)
Panel Discussion: The Industrial Challenges from the Tech Providers' Perspective
The session then naturally led into a panel discussion where tech providers responded directly to what had been raised. That pivot mattered. It made the conversation feel less like “diagnosis” and more like a shared effort to move forward.
Moderator: Nikos Frangakis (CORE Innovation Group)
Panelists: Xanthi Sousoni, Christos Athanasiadis, Foivos Psarommatis, Fernando Ubis, Tomasz Barszcz
Session C: Technology Solutions
This is where Industry 4.0 stopped being an abstract idea and became something concrete you could picture being implemented, tested, and scaled.
The session kicked off with a standing panel on Agentic AI, exploring what it really means for industry, what it requires to work, and how we move from automation toward more autonomous workflows.
Standing panel speakers:
Dr. Nikos Kyriakoulis, Dr. Apostolos Chondronasios, Christina Nektaria Vlasi (CORE Innovation Group), and Meriem Jerbi (BORG Automotive Group)
Then came the main talks:
Santiago Grandal Montero (AIMEN Centro Tecnológico), “Shaping a Sustainable Future with Generative AI”
Dr. Giannis Karaseitanidis (ICCS – NTUA), “Operator 5.0: Collaborative Sorting Lines”
Dr. Sébastien Lani (Switzerland Innovation Park Biel/Bienne), “Digital Twins for AM Quality: The Twin4Twin Use Case”
Prof. Paolo Pedrazzoli (TTS – Technology Transfer System), “Virtual Commissioning & Edge Computing”
Moderator: Stefanos Kokkorikos (CORE Innovation Group)
Panel discussion: Back to the Future — Towards Augmented Manufacturing Workflows & Workforces
The closing panel of Session C was future-facing without being vague. It centred on augmentation rather than replacement, and on the idea that the next era will be defined by the relationship between human expertise and intelligent technologies.
Moderator: Dr. John Soldatos (Netcompany)
Panelists: Prof. Pedro Maló, Prof. Sergio Gusmeroli, Dr. Nikos Kyriakoulis, Prof. Dimitris Kiritsis
Session D: Success Stories
Session D brought the promise of the event to its clearest point: these aren’t pilot projects living in isolation. These are deployments, lessons learned, and measurable value.
Key takeaway: Industry 4.0 is already delivering impact across Europe through data, AI, connectivity, and interoperability.
Speakers:
Dominik Rohrmus (LNI 4.0 / Siemens AG), on manufacturing data ecosystems and AI adoption
Argyris Patousias (Hellas Gold S.A.), on private LTE networks in mining environments
Dr. Jacopo Cassina (Syxis), on data spaces and Machinery X moving from projects to industrial application
Moderator: Dr. Nikos Makris (CORE Innovation Group)
Panel discussion: Industry 4.0 Success Stories in the Process & Mining Sectors
The final panel was a strong close, focusing on what actually makes success possible at scale: interoperability, trust, data sharing, and workforce transformation.
Moderator: Dr. Nikos Makris
Panelists: Dr. Panagiota Tsarouchi (HALCOR), Marta Rabal Abad (CIRCE), Irene García Martínez (CELSA GROUP), Dr. Alexander Wrana (GIG – National Research Institute), Vassilis Papaloukas (Metlen Energy & Metals)
The demos: where “impact” becomes something you can touch
Between sessions, the Demo Area stayed alive and open for exploration. During coffee and lunch breaks, teams delivered live demonstrations that made the day feel practical and collaborative, not performative. There was also a rich collection of communication materials from European-funded projects, offering a snapshot of what is being built right now across the ecosystem.
Day 2: invitation-only proposal writing workshops
Day 2 shifted from listening to co-creating. Participants gathered at CORE Innovation Group’s offices for invitation-only proposal writing workshops designed to spark collaboration and future Research & Innovation initiatives.
8 groups of 5–8 participants, 16 topics explored, and 32 total sessions. The energy in the rooms felt focused, generous, and ambitious. People exchanged ideas, explored funding opportunities, built complementary consortia, and shaped the foundations of proposals that may well become tomorrow’s deployed solutions.
